The A.R.T Mobile Lab is a research initiative of the Banff New Media Institute at The Banff Centre. The lab was created in 2005 to enable design-driven research into mobile and location-based media, art, technology and cultures of use. We are located at the Banff New Media Institute at The Banff Centre, with our offices nestled above the beautiful Bow River Valley, overlooking the town of Banff, Alberta, Canada.

The Mobile Lab team is comprised of a small group of dynamic thinkers and doers. Led by senior researchers with interdisciplinary backgrounds in new media, art and design, environmental studies, philosophy, communication, community-based projects, public education, natural sciences, computer science, human computer interaction, social science, media ethnography, and plain old imagination and elbow grease, the Mobile Lab is a small place for cultivating big ideas. The Lab is also a locus for learning and professional development, with many key contributions coming from visiting artist-researchers, students and participants in The Banff Centre's work study program.

Our primary activities at the Mobile Lab include technical R&D (mainly software development and rapid prototyping for mobile devices), content creation, experience design, user testing and participant ethnography, developing media theory, writing and dissemination, mobile media outreach and training, artist workshops and residencies, conference presentations, community outreach, building new partnerships, and so on. In particular, we often focus on media created for outdoor spaces and communities - innovative technologies, interactions, and experiences designed for remote locations from cultural heritage sites and wilderness areas to urban parks. We conduct major research projects, design new interactive technologies and prototypes, and develop technology-based learning projects. We design community-minded and sustainability-focussed initiatives, and collaborate with artists and other partners working on projects of shared interest. In short, we contribute to the advancement of both practical and theoretical knowledge related to mobile media evolution. And we have a good time doing it!

The Mobile Lab's recent research initiatives include Tracklines, a mediascape project or "walkumentary" which explores the potential of GPS locative media for enriching the experience of trail environments in Banff National Park for local audiences and park visitors, and the Locative Learning project, a community-based initiative in which Grade 7 social studies students author their own locative multimedia walking tour of Banff's human history

Even more recently, we've been investigating issues around sustainable design and mobile technology, and are excited about the possibilities presented by recent innovations in the field. In particular, we are developing new research programs in the areas of "slow design" and "open design" related to the field of mobility. We are developing notions of "slow mobility", and excited about organizing future residencies and open design challenges focussed on mobile sustainability.

The Mobile Lab also conducts participant ethnography and user integration research to study patterns of mobile media use - in particular, to evaluate the usability and applicability of GPS-based locative media with respect to outdoor environments and audiences. In March 2008 we completed a major research report evaluating the audience potential for Parks-based mobile media in partnership with Parks Canada. And we continue to explore the field of mobile learning through the Locative Learning project in partnership with Learning Through the Arts and Banff Community High School.

As the aforementioned projects demonstrate, the Banff New Media Institute is committed to working not just with international new media artists and businesses, but also the diverse communities of practice steadily adopting digital expression - both globally and locally. In keeping with this philosophy, our work at the ART Mobile Lab acknowledges its global context while remaining deeply rooted in the local. Through community outreach we aspire to build working partnerships not only with Banff National Park and Banff Community High School, but with the people who visit or live permanently in the Southern Alberta Rockies bioregion. We are striving to create mobile media content tailored not only for mountain places, but mountain-going people, by incorporating an inclusive attitude into our design process, backed up by human-centred research methods ranging from focus groups to participatory design practice and usability field testing. In this activity, we join the hundreds of mobile media projects currently engaging community-based design practices around the planet, from the tropics to the far North and South.

Our unique location at the Banff New Media Institute not only situates us smack dab in the middle of a physical geography and cultural context that's ideal for exploring mobile media aimed at outdoor spaces - it also allows us to interact with all of the artists, programs, activities, resources, and networks that flow through The Banff Centre, and therefore places us in the middle of a thriving international community of artists and cultural producers where the flow and exchange of knowledge and inspiration are paramount and constant. Being in Banff also opens the door to working with special partners like Banff National Park and other local community institutions and groups, as well as members of the wider new media community in western Canada.

Mobile Lab Team Bios