research :: us++ :: 2004 Us++ is a research initiative that explores methodologies and tools for seamlessly and fluidly documenting our experiences and sharing them with others in a reflective, thoughtful and engaging manner. Using media-rich weblogs and custom-designed software, this process adopts an integrated, conversational and co-constructed approach. Multiple participant inputs and perspectives expand and surprise our story-selves as the roles of creator, interpreter and audience are continuously exchanged. One current experiment capitalizes on the spontaneous and instant nature of mobile messaging combined with the organizational framework of weblogs to create a near real-time support environment in which a group of friends capture, expand and share rich media messages; this playful engagement allows this group to stay connected even as, one of them is in hospital. This project will be facilitated further by the introduction of Mov-its, a custom-designed application for cell-phones for gathering, constructing and sharing multimedia messages. check out the weblog :: media fabrics experiment 01   movits :: 2003 - 2004 movits aims to make the exchanging, sharing and publishing of phone captured media more integrated, evolving and fun. modifiable presentation templates allow the user to put together multi-media messages containing images, movies, audio and text. i imagine these as a form of movie post-it which can be quickly created, exchanged, modified or indeed destroyed. this mov-it can also become part of an evolving chain of movits as media is shared between phones and also published and downloaded from the web. this project is being developed in conjunction with nokia and you can read about our progress on our development weblog - http://weblogs.media.mit.edu/mupes/ sample movits :: all content was recorded using the nokia 3650 videophone. click on the images to open the movies! four movies playing simultaneously. this layout shows four composite closeup shots of a large object - good for capturing 'the sense' of something one movie plays over a background of still images captured during the same mountain hike. with this waterfall trail you ascend from warm sunshine to cold snow conditions in a matter of hours. the various images show the changes while the video demonstrates the focal part of the whole hike blending and merging different size images of a fun evening in the snow, with a quickly recorded introduction audio track   video blogs :: audiovisceral + digital dialogues + roballet + ic :: 2002 - 2004 "leafed through the diary a little. got a kind of inkling of the way a life like this is constructed." entry from kafka's diary, kept while writing "the trial" for centuries, people have used diaries, journals and commonbooks to record the events of the day, interesting anecdotes, their thoughts and their hopes for the future. writing in diaries helps people reflect and make sense of their lives, by allowing them to document initial observations and feelings about an event that they can subsequently revisit and review at a later date. in my current research i am looking to explore this process of chronological documentation and reflection, within the context of an online, multimedia domain. specifically, i am interested in developing a software tool that will provide users with a functional and uncomplicated method for publishing their video content online, using a diary format as the display and distribution framework. the goal of the application is to provide for a casual and natural approach to moviemaking, where the process of producing video content becomes embedded in the activities of daily life, and as straightforward and manageable to do as making a written entry in a traditional diary. one popular format for producing online journals are weblogs. as part of my exploration into web-based video diaries, i made both my own video weblog and a group weblog for the digital dialogues symposium, held at haystack mountain school of crafts in fall 2002. i also developed a video weblog for documenting 'roballet', a two week dance and technology workshop for children, held at mit's media lab. currently our entire research group is experimenting with capturing and publishing content created using the nokia 3650 and 6600 video phones. check them out! audiovisceral.net weblogs.media.mit.edu/digitaldialogues weblogs.media.mit.edu/ic   cinemaware :: 2002 cinemaware is a custom-built capture, annotation, editing, and compression tool for preparing video content for integration with multiple display and distribution applications. implemented in java, the application provides four modes of operation: live capture, keyword annotation, rudimentary editing, and batch processing. the capture mode provides an interface for capturing video through a USB port, while the annotation mode presents an extensible interface for adding freeform text annotations, time-code associated key-words, and general movie properties such as title, character, location, and time.tThe annotation schema can be modified to incorporate appropriate input fields depending on the needs of external retrieval and display applications. captured video clips can be modified using a simple editing interface that also provides a sequencing functionality for creating larger pieces. the batch-processing mode enables the export of multiple video, image, or audio files according to a specified compression output. software inteface ::     plusshorts :: master's thesis :: 2001 plusshorts is a web application that explores the use of punctuation as an iconic system for describing and augmenting edited video. this system allows for a distributed group of users to contribute to and collaborate upon the creation of shared movie sequences, where punctuation symbols can be utilized to detail the structure of that sequence and inspire dialogue about the essence of that structure. plusshorts is implemented as a java applet that can be launched from the shareable media website. within the applet there are three main activity areas: a newsgroup-type interface for browsing through and selecting sequences to play, a storyboard grid for manipulating sequences and a playback area for previewing and submitting sequences. more...   shareable media :: aisling kelliher, cathy lin, pengkai pan, james jung hoon seo :: 2000 - 2001   Shareable Media is a web-based system that explores how a community of users can tell stories and express ideas through a shared database of digital video clips. Each user can help expand the database by contributing original material, which becomes available to all other users. Viewers become authors as they create new sequences from the shared clips, with the help of novel editing tools that rethink the traditional timeline interface. Visualization tools show how the video content is being used by the community of users, and recommendation systems help ease the browsing of the video database. Communication among users is fostered through the tight integration of message boards, personal webpages, and chat. In order to encourage the development of virtual storysharing communities, we are partnering with several physical storytelling communities from different countries. We are interested in determining the impact of Shareable Media, both at an individual and a group participant level, in terms of artistic expression, emergent storytelling techniques, virtual collaboration, community-oriented self organization and global communication.