The company I’m interning at this semester is called Membit. Membit is a privately owned augmented reality company owned by Jay Van Buren. I’ve been with Membit for about two years or so. The company is a relatively small company with a design in different parts of the world.

I’m currently aware of the East Coast, where the CEO Jay Van Buren is operating, and the West Coast, in NYC, where I was recruited. On the website “Membit solves the problem of needing developers to create location-based augmented reality experiences and provides a no-code platform for creators on mobile devices. Membit uses the patented Human Positioning System ™ to create markerless and persistent AR anywhere in ways other platforms can’t.” Membits customers could range from college students like myself who didn’t know about AR and want to try something that is interesting and allows you to express yourself in a different way of storytelling, to huge company owners who’ve heard of AR and wants to know how can AR add to their company but want to try something different from the regular norm. Under regular internship standards, I would be considered a regular intern, but at Membit with the amount of time I’ve had with the company, an inside joke is that I’m the Membit Master. I’m the guy you call when you need someone to navigate the application with ease but also trying give you the best Membit experience that the client has envisioned. During the time I’ve been at the company, I was able to be involved in some of the projects that they were taking on. One of those projects was the “Say Their Name Project” in which the company worked alongside The San Diego African American Museum of Fine Art to bring a memorial that they have to honor the people who have suffered from police brutality.

So my duty in Membit is sort of straightforward. The goal is to get investors or potential customers to use the product to buy a channel so they can tap into the fun creative world of AR. So basically I go to the place that Jay would have probably already informed me about. I go to this place and I’m given full access to the channel, then I create an AR experience that was discussed in the meeting or through email.

AR content could be done with photos, 3d models, videos, and audio. This brings back Sanctuary Spaces who is partnered with Membit to tell the story of Brooklyn and the civil rights movements of the 1920s to the 1960s. I generally work close to the head of projects or organizers to ensure Membit is able to capture the visual story they are trying to tell. Working with Debra, I didn’t have to go through any interviews. Our first-day meeting was our first meeting and we took about four hours going over the material we would have covered and the Membit channels we would be using. I looked over the documents and gave myself access to the channels I would be working in. I have general access to the backend, so I get to see all the chaos of what going on in the channel and familiarize myself even more than what me and Debra discussed.

Let me reference first that Membit is a fun place to work or intern at, you rarely ever work on solo projects because a lot of the work done is with the client to ensure the Augmented Reality work they are trying to show is in its proper place. I would get a random text from Jay about someone needing help with membit, then boom I’m in a room with Jazz Lincoln Center demoing membit to get AR involved in some project. We meet on Google Meetings and discuss the progress of how the work or project that is going on in New York if we took up any work.

All that being said, my first week of Sanctuary Spaces wasn’t as insane as I thought it would be, Given that AR is a very new thing people explore and show to people it sometimes is daunting. It was calmer than most projects I’ve been on i guess that’s because I joined almost at the end so things are much more on edge.  We talked about about sanctuary spaces and got her direction she is trying to take her exhibition with AR but talk about the story she wants to tell to the public. We talked for a long time going over social media and extra design and content to populate the membits. Side note I’m not a social media head even though my appearance says otherwise, just getting that thought out. So, the social media conversation tangents off into streaming on social media and I was not expecting that. We discussed it figuring out how to link social media accounts together, and then tangent into creating a video. The tangents were fun though because this was my first time talking to someone and them asking me about my thoughts on how something should be communicated to the audience we are trying to reach.

You know, honestly, I learned some interesting things about working on this project with sanctuary spaces. I guess the first thing that stood out to me was that most people don’t understand social media UI and I as a designer should have some knowledge on how to navigate a social media platform to promote myself. After today’s session talking in Shack Shake about this film showing that is going to happen sometime in March we are using the gallery of the space to show off the membits and somehow tangents into discussing social media while I was editing a video on premiere rush. I realize I should brush up on my UI and UX knowledge because not everyone can keep up with the pace of tech sometimes changes. When I got home I spent some extra time on my phone looking around the social media apps I have and checking out the limitations of the apps but also noticing some features that would be helping for the social media streaming we were discussing. The hugest thing I found out is that because Instagram and Facebook are owned by the same company streaming on either platform won’t be a hassle once both accounts are linked. I learned something and then I didn’t get to use the knowledge because the event day was about 3 weeks away and haven’t gone out into the field to make membit.  We did go to see the gallery today, even though I tampered with my account and also went live on my socials. That social media knowledge is staying in with me, you’ll never know when you are working with someone who is social media inept.

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Part 4

Cooper Hewit Museum was fun, I think this was my first time being there but I don’t remember. But anywho i went to the museum with my favorite person and saw the Delvin exhibition. I took a lot of photos and videos but sadly my pixel has some weird encryption with the videos. My journey started with me waking up late and a friend invited with me was there before me so I had to race to get to the museum. The odds were in my favor because the MTA decided it was a lucky day and I got there in 30 mins. Getting the tickets and getting into the museum was bad. The security guard did think that my and friend were with the students, we looked at the crazy high schoolers and shook our heads laughing then walked into the museum. I think that interaction made the security guard day. We continued to the desk to claim or think and the lady told us to start from the top and work our way down the experience is better than the way. So we did exactly that. When we got to the top floor we saw an orange wall with a city being reflected and someone laying or standing in the plain. I’ll be honest I don’t know how to best describe the stuff I was looking at but it was some cool stuff. We had to wait a bit because a film was going on and then it would be our turn to go in and see the film. The film was worth the wait. We got inside and took pictures of the cool work we saw on the wall, but the main event was about to start. The lady told us to take a seat and then start the film. Mindblown was the only word that came to mind when I looked at all the stuff that was happening. The creator was telling her story about using paper to create and connect and showing the almost holographic AR experience with projectors casting on the table and room. We were taken on her adventure following her story until the coolest moment for me was when she took a box cutter and cut out a circle in the wall and this bright light was shining through. Then the new paper comes over the circle and then she cuts down the middle and pulls the paper apart from each other and the doors open. That was a 10/10 experience will see it again, me and my friend were like wow that sooo cool. I wanted to see it again but we continued to through the exhibition of art pieces they created. We some of the Coachella pieces she did like Miley Cyrus when she changed the way she wanted to do music and also the Weekend. I think another piece that caught my eye was the circle with the name of the artist and songwriter with the year and was creating this swirly effect it was almost drawing me in. When I swirly effect it was like a circle with another circle with another circle and the names are on the circumference of each circle. It was cool I’ll post a picture. Oh, another that was kind of trippy was the pieces with the rotating box, but it was split in the middle from corner to corner, and on each side was a different object, and when your box would turn you would see two different stories. For instance, one was a bedroom and the bed was in the middle of a split and one side had the woman sitting on the bed and the other side had the guy away from the bed and when you look at it from a different side you would get these cool optical illusions that had me and friend like wow and intense. Most of the pieces on exhibition were white and gray, it felt futuristic. We walked around looking at the other pieces and going to schedule more museums to see some cool exhibitions.

 The portfolio review at Creative Cafe was super cool. This was my first time actually getting my portfolio looked at by some professionals. I was super nervous. I kind of didn’t know how I wanted to show off my portfolio. When I got to the location some students from the campus and then I saw other designer students who probably live in the city. The biggest thing that stood out to me is that everyone has a laptop or iPad that they display there work on. It made me think about investing in an iPad because it would be beneficial to me in the long run. They gave all the attendees some tote bags and then a lady explained how the reviews would work. I looked around the space and scrolled back and forth before sitting down in a line. Luckily enough I sat in line with the illustration person who was giving her feedback on illustration portfolios. I wanted some insight into how to make my portfolio better before I have to do my college portfolio reviews. I waited about 15 mins before getting to the front of the line but then the lady was being swapped out for someone else. My expectation was destroyed but I had to have a different mindset because any feedback from any professional would help me develop my portfolio and maybe fix my bad portfolio website. The new lady swapped in and we chatted and told me some good tips on how develop my portfolio. Some important things that she said that I’m going to put into my portfolio and resume. She mentioned I should find a way to reword my resume instead of saying I worked at a supermarket how can I use design in the rolls I did at the supermarket. Then, another thing she said was include your process somewhere in your portfolio, it helps the director understand my process and it also give us something to talk about for them to further understand my way of designing. We chatted over the 15 mins time we were a lot but the info she gave me kind of got me psyched to edit and improve. I walked around a couple more talking to some more designers and getting tips and design methods. I think one of those tips I would incorporate into my website is using hashtags to categorize my work so when people look at my portfolio website they can see what my work is tagged with. I felt bad because I got hungry but today was fulfilling and I’m psych to edit my portfolio before reviews happen.