Shape of Story

A one-night only event as part of 2013’s Design Week Portland, Shape of Story transformed the historic Hollywood Theatre into a dynamic space for dialogue and debate. With their mobile phones in-hand, movie-goers gathered to watch short media pieces from the University of Oregon’s Multimedia Journalism master’s program, Spin Film, Periscopic, Oregon Public Broadcasting, and The Oregonian, all focused on issues related to gun ownership. As the films played, a smartphone-enabled web app allowed viewers to “tag” moments of emotional impact using a simple gesture: a tap. After each piece, the crowd’s marks were aggregated and visualized on the big screen to illustrate the ebb and flow of their engagement. They were given a window of several minutes in which to contextualize their reactions and provide feedback on what they’d seen.

After all seven pieces had been shown, the shape of each story and a curated selection of the submitted comments were displayed while a moderator, Dave Miller from OPB’s “Think Out Loud,” facilitated an engaging discussion structured around the audience’s contributions. The evening offered attendees a unique collective theater-going experience that integrated technology in a considered, unobtrusive way.

We look forward to further exploring this experimental technology to see what it can do. Valuable for filmmakers to gather input to enhance their work and as a tool to collect feedback to initiate thoughtful discourse, the possibilities for Shape of Story are endless.

All images provided by Wes Pope. Footage provided by Kate Szrom, Summer Hatfield, Katelyn Black, and Wes Pope.