Cambridge VERY short

Author: Alina Loth – Berlin School of Public Engagement and Open Science, Germany

Co-authors:

• Diogo Gomes – University of Cambridge, United Kingdom

In our digital world, communication becomes increasingly more fast-paced. Visuals are often key in drawing attention and conveying information to new and wider audiences. Animated gifs are a relatively new technology that links the gap between stationary images and video formats. Gifs are used through a variety of digital channels (e.g. social media, blog posts, websites, news stories) as well as integrated in more traditional engagement methods (e.g. talks, poster presentations, exhibitions, festivals). This gives them great potential as a tool for research communication and engagement. The short format forces storytelling to the extreme of often one repeated movement while allowing for endless creative styles and interpretations. This makes animated gifs a very flexible visual tool suitable for almost any audience. During the visual presentation format of the conference, we would like to present the animated research gifs co-created between University of Cambridge researchers and visual artists. While each gif has its very own story and style, they all play with the limitation of time and complex content. The gifs are the result of a facilitated creative exchange where researchers and creative professionals develop visual ideas and build up partnerships. Established teams continued working together over the course of several weeks. The finished animations are presented as part of the Cambridge Science festival, in social media campaigns, talks, as well as in print through flipbooks and picture galleries.

The author has not yet submitted a copy of the full paper.

Presentation type: Visual presentation
Theme: Time