Process Studio is the design practice of partners Martin Grödl and Moritz Resl. They’ve led projects with clients Adobe, MIT, and Vienna Design Week, and have collaborated with some major studios like &Walsh.
What tools do you usually work with? i.e. Three JS, Processing, etc.
We have a core set of tools built on three.js. For quick prototypes we keep using Processing and p5.js. Lately we were working a lot with Python, mainly for machine learning projects with Tensorflow and pygame.
What was the most technically demanding project you have worked on so far?
An experimental video annotation software called Research Video (still in progress): Uses Angular, rx.js, NgRx
And: Running into Processing’s limitations some years ago and having to write a real-time particle simulation in pure OpenGL.
Credit: Process Studio
Do a majority of your projects revolve around technology or do you take on traditional print and branding projects as well?
Actually our work quite often ends up in “traditional” print media like books, catalogues, posters. Mostly our projects revolve around “graphical systems” we specifically build for each project. These naturally lend themselves to being driven by data or interactivity, so there’s an undeniable technology touch. Nevertheless most of our projects are fundamentally about communicating through images and type, so pretty traditional goals at least.
“There’s an undeniable technology touch. Nevertheless most of our projects are fundamentally about communicating through images and type, so pretty traditional goals at least.”
Are your clients mostly Europe-based or do you branch out internationally?
Mostly Europe right now, but we love to collaborate with anybody with an interesting project (and realistic budget).
Credit: Process Studio
What was one major take away while working on the MIT School of Science project?
Probably how important good project management is. Kudos to you guys for clear briefings, materials and feedback, all on time.
Was there a way we could have provided better support?
Not really. The whole project was quite short notice, so a bit more time would have been nice.
Credit: Process Studio
What does your process look like (that sounds so meta given the name of your studio)? Is it dependent on the type of project?
As outlined before, we often develop custom graphical tools for projects. These are basically interactive web apps. We sometimes call them instruments, because the metaphor is quite fitting. We have to “play” them in real time, and record videos or save images, which the client uses. Sometimes they are intended for in-house use by the client or as public-facing web component. Recently we are involving the client much more by inviting them to these “performance” sessions. This way they not only understand the potential of their custom tool much better, they can also give immediate feedback. Often we produce some of the final imagery (or ideas) for a project in these sessions together with the client.
Do you implement an agile workflow into your projects?
Pretty much. We do show many in-between steps, and iterate and refine any given tool accordingly. Software-wise, we do use source control, so we can simultaneously work on code.
Credit: Process Studio
You recently worked on an emoji machine learning project? How did that come to be?
The AImoji idea came as part of a communication design project for the exhibition “UNCANNY VALUES: Artificial Intelligence & You” at the Museum of Applied Arts in Vienna as part of Vienna Biennale. We were hired to do all the marketing materials as well as extensive displays within the exhibition. The AImoji were liked by everyone involved, so they became the key visual. In the exhibition they are generated dynamically as part of a few “AI-Pods”, live machine learning models running on Raspberry Pi’s strapped to projectors.
Have you ever considered writing about your code process and giving some insight into a project? Similar to this.
Certainly. We are also planning to consolidate and open-source our toolset. Being a super small studio, the issue is time and workload. On a more traditional side, we do speak at design conferences presenting projects from start to finish.
