Skills: Videography, Final Cut Pro, Flash 8

I shot, edited and co-wrote the “Acting On What You Know” video for the Think Tank exhibit at the National Zoo. I did the simple animations in Flash with illustrations done by a National Zoo designer.

Think Tank is an exhibit about cognition in primates. A major feature of the exhibit is a demonstration area. “Acting On What You Know” is a small part of an on-going overhaul of that area, in which I play a major role.

On the Web: Capital City Market
Skills: Flash 8, ActionScript 2, XML, Final Cut Pro, Videography

Also known as the Florida Avenue Market, Capital City Market has been the wholesale center of the city for over 75 years. Between grimy warehouses, retail stores hide and thrive.

I made this Flash/XML-based interactive for a graduate journalism class. The project includes a short video, two narrated slideshows and several photographs.

The Science Stations are two 32” touch screen kiosks adjacent to the indoor Giant Panda viewing at the National Zoo.

The huge, vertically mounted screens invite visitors behind the scenes with three Giant Panda-based stories of Zoo science: veterinary medicine, reproductive science and animal management.

Designed for families, the Science Station kiosks have layers of information and interactivity. The three interactives are chocked full of video, photographs and a very interactive mating game, in addition to the basic science stories.

“A Day At The Doctor” has a video of the head veterinarian at the National Zoo explaining the importance of preventive veterinary medicine and lets visitors “perform” four procedures. Selecting a procedure shows video of the procedure being performed on Mei Xian, the adult female Giant Panda at the Zoo.

“Pandadate.com,” has a video of a Zoo scientist explaining the importance of selectively choosing captive panda breeding pairs. Visitors take the advice of the scientist and try their hand at choosing female partners for a series of fictional captive male pandas. The key is to remember the “three A’s:” age, access and ancestors.

“Keeper Stories” has video of the Giant Panda curator and three panda keepers talking about their favorite moments with the pandas. The fun interviews incorporate B-roll of the moments.

My role in the exhibit included project management, information architecture design, Flash and ActionScript development, videography for some video and producer for the other shoots, all video editing and co-wrote/developed the exhibit.

I also specified the touch screen, LCD and computer for the indoor kiosks.

On the Web: The End Is Mir
Skills: Flash 5, PHP, MySQL

In 2001, I had to build a game to demonstrate proficiency in Flash for Advanced Multimedia Journalism, one the required courses in my undergraduate journalism track at UNC. The game was part of a multimedia news package on the recently decommissioned Mir Space Station.

I used the basic requirements as a guide to build a much more complex Asteroids-like game, complete with two types of weaponry and a finite number of lives. I built the three-teir application with PHP, XML, MySQL and Flash 5.