School of Arts and Creative Technologies
Dr Ben Kirman
Senior Lecturer in Interactive Media
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Profile
Biography
I’m a creative technologist and designer with over 20 years of experience in academic and commercial interactive media design and development. My PhD was in social aspects of game play and identified links between patterns of social interaction and game mechanics. I also have a BSc (Hons) in Software Engineering, MSc in Computer Games Technology, and a PGCE in Higher Education Teaching & Learning. My work tends to be playful and experimental, working with unusual technologies and settings to explore novel interactions and experiences in unexpected places. This has taken many different forms including videogames, board/card games, interactive TV, rich web projects, mobile apps, interactive theatre, and much more, dealing with topics like the gig economy, esports, education, futurism, non-league football, airport security, time travelling robots, and the dog internet.
Collaboration is central to my practice, and I have worked with organisations including the BBC, Telecom Italia, Philips, the NHS, Honda, and many more companies, groups, museums, theatres, galleries, and cooperatives around the world. These collaborations have contributed to scores of academic publications, and thousands of citations. My work has been covered widely in the press, including the BBC, New Scientist, the Guardian, the New York Times, Metro, Wired, TIME, and Your Cat magazine.