CUSTOMER CHALLENGE

How do you invite a generation of cyber punk fans to experiment with a new kind of pop culture, storytelling, that doesn't end when the credits role at the end of a movie?

In 2003, working with Joel Silver Pictures,The Wachowski Brothers and Warner Bros we designed the first of it's kind Transmedia storytelling experience that acted as an open-ended, provocative multilayered experience which delivered a more deep audience exploration and engagement. That experience was anchored with the release of first Samsung Matrix phone and Voice driven game that asked fans to Answer The Call.

MATH & MAGIC

To begin building a first of a kind voice (voice recognition, Voice XML and sound design) and mobile experience we first worked to build out the world of The Matrix in an ambitious Voice driven game that contained hours of original audio content featuring the cast of the movie.

Our collaborative design approach began with a deep dive in to the Cyberpunk sub-genre of science fiction to create a futuristic audio setting that focused on combinations of lowlife and high tech story arcs. Each featuring advanced technological and scientific achievements, such as artificial intelligence and cybernetics, juxtaposed with a degree of societal breakdowns and radical change in the social order.

Each of the voice plots center on the conflict among artificial intelligences, hackers, and mega-corporations set in a near-future Earth, rather than in the far-future settings or galactic vistas found in other genres.

Inspired by Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan I began studying the architecture like the DoCoMo Yoyogi Building, machines of our current era and night lighting and sounds of its immersive environment. Working with script writers and sound designers we began working to design highly-efficient VUI, with a focus on reducing cognitive load — an amount of mental effort required to use a system - with a guided experience that has simple choices. e.g. Red or Blue Pill?

The Enter The Matrix Voice Game ultimately consisted of branching narratives and glitches in the code that encouraged additive comprehension across the three films, video games and anime.

Leveraging the power of hacker and cyberpunk internet communities we introduced many different perspectives and empowered audiences to pool their knowledge, and compile the information with us.

The Matrix mobile phone and voice game wasn't designed to be the end the story but a entry point that allowed fans to float between 2 dimensions, theirs and ours, in order to unleash humanity from machines with Neo.

DELIVERING RESULTS

The worldwide box office earnings of the trilogy stand at about $1.6 billion.

10,000 SPH-N270, Matrix phones were designed and released with the second film, Matrix Reloaded. Today the device is a rare collectors item that can be found on eBay

The Voice Game was enjoined by millions of users.

Our approach to Transmedia storytelling became the the industry standard and became a new business model for franchises in an era of media conglomeration, fan fiction and social media. 

WISDOM

In 2003, linguistic clarity was highly dependent on the sound design with Laurence Fishburne & Keanu Reeves. Branching narratives, “glitches" in the code coupled with training models that helped first time users. Today, conversation modeling would create a superior experience as fall back phrases would allow players to enjoy against the machine in a more responsive method.

Error prevention was paramount to the experience. We did this by helping users recover from and prevent errors from occurring in the first place with fall back phrases and recovery design. As speech recognition has improved in recent years, errors in natural-language understanding have dropped significantly.

Inspiring Orator

Joanna is regarded as a thought leader and headline speaker at the conferences. Her subject matter expertise in AI, Ethics & Workforce Development is customized to inspire and influence global audiences. 

+ View Talks | + Book Joanna To Speak
 
+ Ready-To-Wear The Future Blog
+ CognitiveExperience.design
+ AiDesignCorps.org

Featured Talks

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the tool of the modern inventors. Amidst the great global transition, AI aided product design accelerates what is invariable complex seem indistinguishable from magic.

+ Presentations | + Videos  | + Articles

Host of Designed By

DesignedBy.show invites you to join the audacious trailblazers transforming our world for the next 100 years.

CONNECT WITH JOANNA AND COMPANY AS SHE EXPLORES SPACESHIP EARTH