Episode Notes

Co-creator of "Processing" and founder of Fathom Information Design — Ben Fry (@ben_fry) — on the beginnings of the Processing programming environment, the use of information design and visualization to understand complicated data problems, and his approach to design, life, & work.

Ben Fry is founder and principal of Fathom Information Design, a studio in Boston focused on understanding complicated data problems. He holds a Ph.D. from the MIT Media Laboratory and is a Lecturer at MIT. Fry has authored and co-authored multiple books and develops "Processing" — the programming environment he co-created with Casey Reas used by artists, engineers, scientists, and students all over the world since 2001. His work can be found in museums, feature films, research labs, and the portfolios of Fathom's clients such as Nike, JP Morgan, DARPA, and National Geographic. In 2011, Fry was honored to visit the White House to receive the National Design Award for Interaction Design.

Connect with Ben at Fathom.info, benfry.com, and Processing.org.

Links

• Processing
• Netscape
• Fathom Information Design
• Arduino
• OpenFrameworks
• Open Render
• acu by Ben Fry, Jared Schiffman, and Tom White (1999)
• acWorld by Tom White, Jared Schiffman, and Ben Fry (1998)
• acWindows by David Small (1996)
• OpenGL
• C++
• Bad Windows by Bob Sabiston (1988)
• Visible Language Workshop
• Aesthetics + Computation Group (ACG)
• Design by Numbers
• Human genome project
• NYU ITP
• Valence by Ben Fry (1999)
• Valence in Minority Report
• National Air and Space Museum
• Star Wars
• Star Trek
• NASA
• MIT Media Lab
• Valence in the Hulk
• On needing approval for what we create, and losing control over how it's distributed by Ben Fry (2010)
• SGI Octane
• Photoshop
• Sentinel typeface by Hoefler & Co.
• National typeface by Klim
• Fabriga typeface by Lux Typo
• Ringside typeface by Hoefler & Co.
• ProPublica
• MacRecipes by Fathom
• Rocky Morphology by Fathom

Books

• The Information by James Gleick
• The Innovators by Walter Isaacson

Movies

• Big Hero 6
• 2001: A Space Odyssey by Stanley Kubrick
• Alien by Ridley Scott
• Powers of Ten by Charles and Ray Eames

People mentioned

• John Maeda
• Casey Reas
• Daniel Shiffman
• Andres Colubri
• Tom White
• David Small
• Bob Sabiston
• John Underkoffler
• Tom Cruise
• Jose Luis García del Castillo y López
• Jack Dorsey
• Charles Kingsley
• James Gleick
• Walter Isaacson

Chapters

• 00:05 · Intro
• 02:05 · Ben Fry
• 06:00 · The beginnings of Processing
• 15:42 · Information design and visualization
• 16:33 · The human genome project
• 18:27 · Casey Reas
• 19:03 · Daniel Shiffman
• 22:02 · Valence
• 27:00 · John Underkoffler
• 27:44 · Valence in the Hulk
• 30:20 · On needing approval for what we create
• 40:17 · Building your own tools
• 45:57 · Your favorite user interface
• 47:36 · Typefaces
• 49:22 · What you look for in a design
• 52:21 · Fathom
• 59:07 · Projects that spread
• 01:01:32 · Is your life simple?
• 01:03:34 · Daily habits
• 01:04:26 · Non-work activities
• 01:05:06 · Boredom
• 01:05:51 · Social media
• 01:07:53 · Disconnection
• 01:10:44 · Technology
• 01:12:33 · Ads
• 01:16:31 · Success
• 01:18:28 · A message to the world
• 01:20:30 · Book recommendations
• 01:23:39 · Side projects
• 01:24:06 · Simplicity

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Theme song Sleep by Steve Combs under CC BY 4.0.