# Timo Arnall

> Timo Arnall is a designer at Apple, previously co-founder of Playdeo and creative director at BERG; the site collects 25 years of films, projects, photography and notes.

- Page: https://www.elasticspace.com/
- Updated: 2026-10-03
- Site map for agents: https://www.elasticspace.com/llms.txt

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![Timo Arnall on a hillside at dusk, with a camera around his neck](https://www.elasticspace.com/images/_pages/about/DSC2897.jpg)

*Exploring the California coast. Photo: Ethan Daniels*

## Selected work

- [Internet Machine](https://www.elasticspace.com/2014/05/internet-machine/) (2014): A multi-screen film inside one of the world's largest data centres, run by Telefónica in Alcalá, Spain. The infrastructure of 'the cloud'.
- [Satellite Lamps](https://www.elasticspace.com/2014/08/satellite-lamps/) (2014): Lamps with Einar Sneve Martinussen and Jørn Knutsen that reveal the uncertainty and materiality of GPS by sampling signal accuracy.
- [The Immaterials project](https://www.elasticspace.com/2013/09/the-immaterials-project/) (2013): An overview of the Immaterials project, five years of work on visualising the invisible infrastructures of interaction: RFID, WiFi, GPS and machine vision.
- [Making Visible](https://www.elasticspace.com/2014/06/making-visible/) (2014): My PhD thesis 'Making Visible', four peer-reviewed articles on interaction design as a cultural, material and mediational practice. Download as PDF or ePub.

[All projects](https://www.elasticspace.com/project/)

## Selected notes

- [No to NoUI](https://www.elasticspace.com/2013/03/no-to-no-ui/) (2013): A critique of 'invisible design' and the NoUI movement: invisibility propagates the myth of immateriality, ignores interface culture and takes agency away from users and designers.
- [Robot Readable World](https://www.elasticspace.com/2012/02/robot-readable-world/) (2012): A short film pulled together from computer vision research footage: a glimpse of the world as cameras and algorithms register it.
- [A phone to save us from our screens?](https://www.elasticspace.com/2010/10/a-phone-to-save-us-from-our-screens/) (2010): Microsoft's 2010 Windows Phone 7 launch ads take an anti-screen position. Without tangible interaction, can tiles pull attention out of glass?
- [Mother. Father. Always you wrestle inside me.](https://www.elasticspace.com/2011/07/mother-father-always-you-wrestle-inside-me/) (2011): Kartina Richardson on Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life, the voluptuous bulging energy of the film and how to approach its CGI dinosaurs with tenderness.
- [Talk to Me](https://www.elasticspace.com/2011/09/talk-to-me/) (2011): Five of my projects are in MoMA's Talk to Me exhibition (2011): Nearness, Immaterials, Media Surfaces, The Journey and Suwappu. Reviews at CNN, NYT, WSJ.

[All notes](https://www.elasticspace.com/notes/)

Timo is a designer at Apple.

Previously he was the co-founder of [Playdeo](http://playdeo.co.uk) and [Ottica](https://otticattica.tumblr.com/), working with design, games, product invention, filmmaking, photography and strategy, in particular working with [Google ATAP](https://otticattica.tumblr.com/post/120195177281/project-soli), Google AR & VR and other special projects.

Timo’s design, photography and filmmaking work is about developing and explaining emerging technologies through [visual invention](http://vimeo.com/14958082), [films](http://elasticspace.com/films/), [visualisations](https://nearfield.elasticspace.com/2011/02/wifi-light-painting), [products](http://berglondon.com/blog/2012/12/19/lamps/) and [new interactions](http://berglondon.com/projects/magplus/).

He led the [research project ‘Touch’](https://nearfield.elasticspace.com/) investigating RFID, NFC and physical interaction with everyday objects. As creative director at BERG, he worked alongside an [extraordinary team](http://berglondon.com/studio/) to design, visualise and communicate a [wide range](http://berglondon.com/projects/) [of work](http://berglondon.com/films/) for clients such as Google, Intel and Dentsu. In particular our work on Mag+ was [called out as *‘really, really breakthrough’* by Steve Jobs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLgBMgf7vP8).

Timo started his career as a digital and visual effects supervisor on animated films and commercials, introducing award winning animators, filmmakers, artists and choreographers to emerging tools such as Brilliance, [Deluxe Paint](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLvTG5hwa1A), [Softimage Eddie](https://news.microsoft.com/1996/04/15/softimage-previews-new-version-of-award-winning-video-compositing-software/), [3D Studio Max](https://beforesandafters.com/2020/06/04/a-visual-history-of-3ds-max/), [SGI workstations](https://www.techspot.com/article/2142-silicon-graphics/) and [Amiga digital video I/O](https://web.archive.org/web/20141228175435/http://amigareport.com/ar124/p1-17.html). Inspired by the likes of [Jef Raskin’s Humane Interface](https://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=4790), [Andy Cameron’s Dissimulations](http://mfj-online.org/journalPages/MFJ28/Dissimulations.html) and the early signs of a more ‘designed’ web experience Timo began designing and developing web and mobile interfaces in 2000.

He has a bachelors degree in filmmaking and a [PhD in interaction design](http://www.elasticspace.com/2014/06/making-visible/).

## Photography

I have been making images since I was 8, but my working photographic method began with digital photography in 1999 and settled around 2002, in a short statement I wrote for an exhibition:

> As a filmmaker, used to working with images changing 25 frames every second, I have been using digital photography as a narrative medium, taking sequences of photographs to suggest movement, place, stories, journeys and discovery. I never use the viewfinder. The screen allows for photographic framing and composition so that the camera rarely gets in the way of the experience.

What has accumulated since is a daily diary, the photographs titled with nothing but the timestamp they were taken at. The [Photography](https://www.elasticspace.com/photography/) section reads it as bodies of work.

## Exhibitions

- **2019** Design Museum, London. *Beazley Designs of the Year 2019*, Digital category. [*Avo*](https://designmuseum.org/exhibitions/beazley-designs-of-the-year/digital-2019/avo).
- **2015–2016** [Somerset House](https://web.archive.org/web/20250917060813/https://bigbangdata.somersethouse.org.uk/artist/timo-arnall/), London. *Big Bang Data*, with *Internet Machine* opening the show.
- **2015** [Transmediale](https://web.archive.org/web/20240408020255/https://archive.transmediale.de/content/internet-machine), Berlin. *Internet Machine* as a three-screen installation.
- **2015** Fundación Telefónica, Madrid (Feb–May). *Big Bang Data*, with *Internet Machine*.
- **2014** [CCCB](http://bigbangdata.cccb.org/en/internet-machine-timo-arnall-2/), Barcelona (9 May – 26 Oct). *Big Bang Data*, premiering *Internet Machine*. Co-curated by José Luis de Vicente and Olga Subiros.
- **2013** [De Hallen Haarlem](https://thedreadexhibition.tumblr.com/) (7 Sep – 24 Nov). *Dread*, with *Satellite Lamps* and *Robot Readable World*. Endorsed by Bruce Sterling: ‘Hey, I’d go.’
- **2013** [Lighthouse](https://lighthouse.org.uk/events/immaterials-2013-brighton-digital-festival), Brighton (5 Sep – 13 Oct). *Immaterials* survey show, Brighton Digital Festival, with Jack Schulze, Matt Jones, Einar Sneve Martinussen and Jørn Knutsen.
- **2012** LABoral Centro de Arte, Gijón. *[Invisible Fields](https://www.domusweb.it/en/interviews/2012/01/24/invisible-fields.html)*.
- **2011** [MoMA](https://www.moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/1071), New York (24 Jul – 7 Nov). *Talk to Me*, curated by Paola Antonelli. Five works on display: *Immaterials: Ghost in the Field*, *Nearness*, *Media Surfaces*, *The Journey*, *Suwappu*.
- **2011** [V&A](http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/p/powerofmaking/), London (6 Sep – 2 Jan). *Power of Making*, V&A / Crafts Council partnership, curated by Daniel Charny.
- **2011** [London Transport Museum](https://londonist.com/2011/06/preview-sense-and-the-city-london-transport-museum), London. *Sense and the City*.
- **2010** [LABoral](http://blog.fabric.ch/index.php?/archives/1600-Laboral-The-HABITAR-Exhibition.html), Gijón. *HABITAR — Bending the Urban Frame*, with *Wireless in the World* as a multi-screen installation.
- **2009** Nordes 3, Oslo. *Engaging Artifacts*, with the *Touch* interactive exhibition.
- **2008** DogA, Oslo. *Unge Talenter*, with *Sniff* and *Bowl*.

Beyond the named institutional shows, the Touch and Immaterials work has appeared in smaller settings in Norway, Spain, the Netherlands and the UK. MoMA holds an artist record at [moma.org/artists/39373](https://www.moma.org/artists/39373).

## Press

The work has been written about most substantially by:

- [**Adam Greenfield**, *On Immaterials*](https://speedbird.wordpress.com/2009/10/15/on-immaterials/) (Speedbird, October 2009). A long commissioned essay on *Ghost in the Field*, framing the Hong Kong Octopus and Tokyo Suica systems and arguing for design as a translation discipline for invisible infrastructures.
- [**Fast Company / Co.Design**](https://www.fastcompany.com/1663329/immaterials-uses-a-wand-of-lights-to-reveal-hidden-wi-fi-networks) on *Light Painting WiFi* (‘a delightful fusion of low and high-tech’) and [on *Robot Readable World*](https://www.fastcompany.com/1669539/what-the-world-looks-like-to-the-robots-around-us-video) (‘a haunting piece of design fiction’).
- [**Slate / The Eye**](https://www.slate.com/blogs/the_eye/2014/06/11/internet_machine_by_designer_timo_arnall_takes_us_inside_the_cloud_video.html) on *Internet Machine* (‘a short film that pulls back the curtain on the cloud’).
- [**TIME**](https://time.com/inside-the-internet-machine/) photo essay, *Inside the Internet Machine*.
- [**Designboom**](https://www.designboom.com/technology/internet-machine-timo-arnall-05-20-2014/) on *Internet Machine*.
- [**Vice**](https://www.vice.com/en/article/53wbqd/the-cloud-is-actually-a-tangible-thingand-this-is-what-it-looks-like) on *Internet Machine* and on [*Robot Readable World*](https://www.vice.com/en/article/in-response-to-bruce-sterlings-essay-on-the-new-aesthetic/).
- [**Wired**](https://www.wired.com/?p=1574611) on *Internet Machine*.
- [**The Economist**](https://www.economist.com/1843/2015/12/10/big-data-theres-no-escape) on *Big Bang Data*.
- [**Cory Doctorow** on *No to NoUI*](https://boingboing.net/2013/03/21/why-user-interfaces-should-be.html), Boing Boing (‘well-argued … great and provocative points’). [**Frank Chimero**](https://www.frankchimero.com/blog/2013/the-cloud-is-heavy/) wrote a long companion piece, *The Cloud is Heavy*.
- [**Bruce Sterling**, *An Essay on the New Aesthetic*](https://bruces.medium.com/an-essay-on-the-new-aesthetic-by-bruce-sterling-2012-b0933b48ae2e) (Medium, 2012), with *Robot Readable World* as a central touchstone. Sterling covered *Light Painting WiFi*, *Dread* and other work multiple times in *Wired Beyond the Beyond*; the Wired blog has been offline since 2020 but the Wayback Machine has the posts.
- [**Eye Magazine** #80](https://eyemagazine.com/feature/article/change-through-making). *Change Through Making*, a manifesto with Jack Schulze.
- [**Royal Statistical Society *Significance***](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1740-9713.2013.00683.x). Peer-reviewed article on *Light Painting WiFi*.
- [**Game Developer**](https://www.gamedeveloper.com/design/the-new-grammar-of-television-and-games-lessons-from-an-avocado) and [**Dan Hill**‘s four-part essay](https://cityofsound.com/2019/04/02/avo-stadia-arcade-bandersnatch-and-the-new-grammar-of-television-and-games-part-1-form-is/) on *Avo* and the new grammar of television and games.
- **Discovery Channel** programming featured the *Light Painting WiFi* visual technique. **BBC Newsnight** featured *Making Future Magic*.

Other coverage in [The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2000/oct/15/features.review57), [HOLO](https://web.archive.org/web/20150628171852/http://holo-magazine.com:80/2), [Icon](https://www.iconeye.com), [RIBA Journal](https://www.ribaj.com/culture/big-bang-data), [Electric Sheep](http://www.electricsheepmagazine.co.uk/reviews/2011/07/17/immaterial/), Gizmodo, Designboom, and a long list of design and tech blogs.

## Talks

From the [nearfield.org publications archive](https://nearfield.elasticspace.com/publications) and BERG / Ottica / Playdeo years:

- **2014** AHO / HiOA, Oslo (12 Jun). PhD doctoral defence, *Making Visible*. Trial lecture: *Remaking the cultural construction of immateriality through discursive design*.
- **2012** Frontiers of Interaction, Rome (7–8 Jun). Keynote on the ‘Talking objects’ session.
- **2012** Vimeo Festival + Awards, New York City (7 Jun). *Light Painting WiFi* finalist.
- **2011** CIID Open Lecture, Copenhagen, with Jack Schulze.
- **2009** LIFT, Marseille (19 Jun). *Making Things Visible*. Archived at videos.liftconference.com.
- **2009** PICNIC, Amsterdam (24 Sep). Web of Things special event.
- **2009** Barcelona Design Week (29 Oct). *Designing from the web to the world*.
- **2009** VERDIKT programme, Oslo (4 Nov). *A model of user experience in networked products*.
- **2009** Sensing and Sensuality, Umeå (27 Mar). *Making Visible*.
- **2008** Web 2.0 Expo Europe (23 Oct). *The web in the world*. [Slides at slideshare.net/tmo](https://www.slideshare.net/tmo).
- **2008** Foo Camp, Sebastopol (14 Jul).
- **2008** Stamen Design + Adaptive Path, San Francisco (16 Jul). *Visible, present, branded*.
- **2008** Design Engaged, Montreal (5 Oct). *Visible, present, branded*.
- **2008** Sarasota Design Summit (29 Oct). *Visualisation, simulation and evidence*.
- **2007** Recalling RFID, Amsterdam (19 Oct). *RFID as material in design*.
- **2007** Mobile Camp NYC (19 May), Xtech 2007 (17 May). *Physical hyperlinks*.
- **2006** Reboot 8, Copenhagen (1–2 Jun). *Digital services and physical things*.
- **2005** Design Engaged, Berlin (13 Nov). *A graphic language for Touch-based interactions*.

And at IXDA, Design of Understanding, Oslo LUX, the Microsoft Social Computing Symposium, MoMo Amsterdam, the Museum of London, and other venues during the BERG / Ottica years where the public record is patchier.

## Teaching

- **Oslo School of Architecture and Design (AHO)**, 2004–2014. Taught interaction and industrial design. Instrumental in founding the Interaction Design programme.
- **Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design (CIID)**, 2010 onwards. Taught the GUI class on the Interaction Design programme; ongoing visiting faculty.
- **Umeå Institute of Design**, Umeå.
- **Royal College of Art**, London.
- **Institute for Advanced Architecture (IAAC)**, Barcelona.
- **Interaction Design Institute Ivrea (IDII)**, student advisor.
- **Bartlett UCL**, London. Guest lecture, 2006.

## Awards and recognition

- **2019** Design Museum, London. Beazley Designs of the Year, Digital category. *Avo*.
- **2019** Apple App Store Game of the Day. *Avo*.
- **2012** Vimeo Awards, finalist. *Light Painting WiFi*.
- **2011** MoMA permanent collection. Five works (*Talk to Me*, 2011): *Immaterials: Ghost in the Field*, *Nearness*, *Media Surfaces*, *The Journey*, *Suwappu*.
- **2010** Steve Jobs called the work on *Mag+* ‘*really, really breakthrough*’ (referenced in [Apple commentary](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLgBMgf7vP8)).
- Apple App Store featured *Avo* as ‘a magical adventure with the production values of a kids’ TV show’.

## Publications

Roughly 13 academic papers and one PhD thesis, with about 716 citations on [Google Scholar](https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=IocfxqsAAAAJ).

- **2014** Arnall, T. *Making Visible: Mediating the material of emerging technology*. PhD thesis, Oslo School of Architecture and Design (AHO). 178 pages, 53 illustrations. Defended 12 June 2014. Available via AHO’s open-access archive ADORA, and from the [post on this site](http://www.elasticspace.com/2014/06/making-visible/).
- **2014** Arnall, T. ‘Exploring “Immaterials”: Mediating Design’s Invisible Materials.’ *International Journal of Design*, 8(2). [ijdesign.org](http://www.ijdesign.org/index.php/IJDesign/article/view/1408).
- **2014** Martinussen, E. S., Knutsen, J., & Arnall, T. ‘Satellite Lamps.’ *Kairos: A Journal of Rhetoric, Technology, and Pedagogy*, 19(1). [kairos.technorhetoric.net](http://kairos.technorhetoric.net/19.1/inventio/martinussen-et-al/).
- **2013** Arnall, T., Knutsen, J., & Martinussen, E. S. ‘Immaterials: Light painting WiFi.’ *Significance*, 10. Royal Statistical Society / Wiley. [doi:10.1111/j.1740-9713.2013.00683.x](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1740-9713.2013.00683.x).
- **2013** Arnall, T. ‘Fear of the Invisible.’ Book chapter.
- **2013** Arnall, T. [‘No to NoUI.’](http://www.elasticspace.com/2013/03/no-to-no-ui/) Essay, elasticspace.com.
- **2011** Morrison, A., Arnall, T., Knutsen, J., Martinussen, E. S., & Nordby, K. ‘Towards Discursive Design.’ Proceedings of IASDR2011, Delft.
- **2011** Morrison, A. & Arnall, T. ‘Visualizations of Digital Interaction in Daily Life.’ *Computers and Composition*, 28(3), 224–234.
- **2010** Arnall, T. & Martinussen, E. S. ‘Depth of Field: Discursive Design Research Through Film.’ *FORMakademisk*, 3(1), 100–122.
- **2009** Martinussen, E. S. & Arnall, T. ‘Designing with RFID.’ Proceedings of TEI ’09 (Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction).
- **2007** Martinussen, E. S., Knutsen, J., & Arnall, T. ‘Bowl: Token-based media for children.’ Proceedings of DUX ’07, Chicago. ACM, New York, 3–16.
- **2006** Arnall, T. ‘A graphic language for touch-based interactions.’ Proceedings of Mobile HCI 2006, Espoo.
- **2005** Arnall, T. ‘Marking in Public Space.’ Proceedings of Engaging the City workshop, CHI 2005, Portland, OR.
- **2016** Work featured in *Photoviz* (Gestalten), the photography-as-visualisation survey volume.

## Patents

Co-inventor on four granted US patents.

- **[US10789781B2](https://patents.google.com/patent/US10789781B2/en)**. *Interactive frame-synchronized augmented video*. Filed August 2019, granted September 2020. Inventors: Jack Schulze, Timo Arnall, Nicholas Ludlam. Originally assigned to Playdeo Limited; reassigned to Apple Inc. in February 2024. Underlies the runtime in *Avo*.
- **[US10936085B2](https://patents.google.com/patent/US10936085B2/en)**. *Gesture detection and interactions*. Filed January 2020, granted March 2021. Inventors: Ivan Poupyrev, Carsten Schwesig, Jack Schulze, Timo Arnall, Durrell Grant Bevington Bishop. Assigned to Google LLC. The widest-claim continuation in the *[Project Soli](https://www.elasticspace.com/2017/05/project-soli/)* family.
- **[US10203763B1](https://patents.google.com/patent/US10203763B1/en)**. *Gesture detection and interactions*. Filed October 2015, granted February 2019. Same inventor team. Earlier continuation in the same family.
- **[US10088908B1](https://patents.google.com/patent/US10088908B1/en)**. *Gesture detection and interactions*. Filed September 2015, granted October 2018. Same inventor team. The first granted patent in the family.
**[US20160349845A1](https://patents.google.com/patent/US20160349845A1/en)**, *Gesture Detection Haptics and Virtual Tools* (filed May 2016, with Ivan Poupyrev, Carsten Schwesig and Jack Schulze)

[@timoarnall](https://instagram.com/timoarnall) / [Flickr](http://flickr.com/timo) / [Tumblr](http://timoarnall.tumblr.com) / [LinkedIn](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/timoarnall/)

timo at elasticspace dot com