As social networking sites and services become more commonplace, the higher education community often struggles with adapting to the digital environment in which student interact. Inigral, creators of Schools on Facebook, seeks to help universities embrace social networking by creating safe, custom environments on the Facebook platform in which students can connect with others in their academic community. This provides universities with an opportunity to enrich their student community through social networking.

The Inigral blog serves to inform a variety of audiences within the higher education community as to the potential of social networking and the various services Inigral can provide. To allow users to easily access articles related to their specific user group, we created a navigation based on the target audiences. Want to see how Schools on Facebook can help increase attendance to sporting events? Check out the Athletics section. It’s a simple, straightforward method of navigation.

For this project I worked closely with the director of communications to decide what content should be displayed and how. I created mock-ups to discuss content and methods of interaction with the team. I created visual assets based on Inigral’s branding style. I built the site using css, html and php around the wordpress content management system. At the end of the project, I created a brief guide explaining to blog contributors how to utilize the variety of features I built in to the custom theme.

TwoCampfires is composed of a small group of friends working together to build free iPhone applications. They approached me to create a simple web site that they would be able to edit and fill with content as content became available.

I created several mock-ups based on rough ideas the team had. After establishing that the site would need roughly two simple page types, I went about mocking up a number of possible type and image treatments they might use to display different content. From there I coded the css and prepared a few generic html/php based pages to test while the team developed their content.

As the content became available, I flowed content into each of the pages, adjusting my css as needed. The team has been able to create additional pages and include additional content on their own based on the templates I provided.

I have always wanted to learn how to surf. I’ve watched surf films, I love being in the ocean, and having lived in California since 2002 I thought I might as well take a class. In April of 2008 I took a few lessons and have been surfing ever since.

I wanted to share my experiences out in the ocean with my friends and family. I also wanted a chance to learn how to code in php and practice my css skills. Creating a surfing site was the natural product.

Using the wordpress blog engine, I build a theme and began posting my photos and surf sessions. From there I began experimenting with rss feeds and embedded web applications to automatically aggregate content. Rss feed information includes updating surf reports for the spots I frequent most, updating twitter feeds to display on the go information about where I’m surfing and what the conditions are like, and updated weather reports. Using google’s embedded calendar, I can post information about when and where I will be surfing next.

To promote Fox’s “Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles”, online and social media advertising company Millions of Us developed a live-action alternate reality game consisting of video, puzzles, and user contributed content.

The game begins with Enitech Research Labs, a modest tech-based start up based on San Francisco. As an open-source technology company, Enitech releases some of its research findings hoping for feedback. Early video blog posts reveal that Enitech has developed a Tachyon camera that can photograph the future. As the weekly videos unfold, the camera begins to reveal grim predictions of what’s to come.

Game participants visited enitechlabs.com to receive video updates, find clues to the next piece of the puzzle, and discuss the progression of the game’s storyline. Over two million people followed the Terminator: Dark Discovery storyline. Wired, Ain’t it Cool News, BoingBoingTV, Gawker Media featured content from the ARG or provided discussion about the project. “The Sarah Connor Chronicles” scored the highest series premiere ratings of any new TV show in three years. Terminator: Dark Discovery was acknowledged as a Webby Honoree.

For this project, I designed and built the Enitech web site. Using css style sheets, html and some php, I created a simple web structure intended to communicate the idea of a small, modestly funded tech start up. A “slick” site may have tipped game players on to the viral marketing component of the game before they were engaged in the story.

Photography Note: I supplied the image of downtown San Francisco that the artists at Industrial Light and Magic converted to the future image of San Francisco in ruin.

My team and I relied on a blend of humor, creativity, and practical problem solving skills to tackle this design challenge.

From our user studies based on a family of action figures (let’s face it, Batman is the ultimate early adopter and would be one hard working dad) to scenarios involving seamless integration into teen life, we were able to address a variety of user needs while creating a product that would be fun and easy for the whole family to use.

Our solution was the Adeo, a portable media and communication device intended to capture and share multimedia content. The Adeo would allow family members to share experiences at home together, or anywhere their individual lives take them. It would also act as a digital scrapbook, storing and organizing content automatically.

Complete project details available at: Carnegie Mellon University – Interaction Design

Fun Fact: Our first act of business as Team KickIt was to create a team identity. Team member Reagan Heller drew each team member anime-style with big boots for kicking around ideas. Our anime-identities helped foster teamwork and served as a reminder to keep a light-hearted perspective on this design challenge.