From October 2007 to October 2008, I will be taking courses at ENSCI / Les Atéliers (École nationale supérieur de création industrielle). I will be pursuing a masters in Nouveau média. Throughout the year, I will post up the different projects that I have worked on in the different workshops.

Cartographie des stars américains is a web-based application created with flash that visually explores the relationships and trends of the movie industry. Accessing casting information from imdb, this application visually demonstrates the relationships of actors and actresses according to the roles they play. For example, Johnny Depp co-starred with Keira Knightley and Orlando Bloom in the Pirates of the Carribean trilogy. Each time every episode is released, they approach one another. Of course, there are roles in other movies that draw them apart. Another aspect of the movie industry represented by the application is the star power determined by the salary and recent films. The bigger and brighter the name, the more popular and powerful is the actor.

Lives Aquatic is the result of a study on the role of web technology in non-profit organizations. Most organizations use these technologies as a means to sensitize the public to certain issues. However, in tackling the problem of the lack of potable water in non-developed countries, it was necessary to go beyond the sensitizing and find a way to have the public act in a concrete manner. Lives Aquatic is a virtual fish tank on the web that uses ad-technology to donate to this cause. A fish tank serves as a metaphor for the problem of potable water, that is caused mostly to sanitation problems; a fish literally lives in its own wastes. In order to care for the fish, the user must press certain buttons, such as to clean tank or to feed fish, and as each button is pressed, a new ad comes up which will eventually pay for sanitation equipment. A subscription model creates a steadier stream of donations and it allows the user more options to their fish tanks and greater access to the site.

Safari Artigue is a project in response to a contest proposed by the Mairie of Artigue-près-de-Bordeaux. Each year, architecture schools in the area are called to design an installation for the local park according to the annual theme. This year the theme is "jeux" (games). With the help of fellow student Guo Yan as the artist, we created a location-based game using a Wi-fi positioning system to determine each of the participants location. The object of the game is to find virtual animals hiding in the park. Similar to real animals, each animal has a particular trait that the participants can use to find them. With a Wi-fi enabled device, the participants search the park to find the animals.