Thought Cafe · FutureTalk · Live & Installation, 2012–2025 · BEKIN Health · Alchymine
Overview
From 2012 to 2025 I built production systems, led technical pipelines, and co-founded a studio that made interactive and immersive media at a scale I didn't think was possible when I started. This is a selection of that work.
At Thought Cafe I was Executive Technical Director across animation, VFX, VR, and mixed reality production. At FutureTalk I co-founded and ran the studio as CTO, building our own AI-powered content platform (Trek) alongside client work in enterprise product launches, projection mapping, and interactive installations. The two studios collaborated often. Many of the projects below were made by both teams together.
This archive is in progress. I'm constantly making new work and I'm still in the process of collecting and cataloguing previous projects — expect new entries and refinements to land here as I dig through the back catalogue.
Current
What Tyler is building now.
Community-based longevity and sports-performance platform co-founded with Julian Ho — Honours Kinesiology, six-time ultramarathon champion. Q2 2026 launch cohorts include PRIME 3.0 (high-performance running with central gait analysis) and FORTIS (six-week strength training). Pairs Eastern Medicine with Western Science. Privacy-first AI-augmented coaching using on-device Gemma 4 models with statistical-validation pipelines (HRV, gait, readiness) and a practitioner observability dashboard.
Interactive digital field guide to holistic human development across 47 chapters. Built on the Somatic Triad framework — movement, stillness, breath — with a transparent citation system distinguishing established science, emerging research, traditional wisdom, and theoretical frameworks. v0.9 prepublication, April 2026.
A workspace for human assessment, intelligence, and creation. Where analysis, synthesis, and making converge.
Open-source AI-assisted ecosystem developed with Carl Hayden Smith (University of East London / Ravensbourne). Operationalizes Hyperhumanism — endo-technologies, Contextology, consciousness literacy, archaeoacoustics — as deployable skills and agents. Licensed CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 with enforced pharmacological exclusion for clinical safety.
Original products and apparel storefront. Tyler is product designer, artist, and model on the line.
Thought Cafe
Executive Technical Director, 2012–2024
Thought Cafe is a Toronto studio known for turning complex ideas into branded visual media. As ETD I owned the technical production pipeline across 2D and 3D animation, VFX, stereoscopic VR, mixed reality, and interactive web experiences. The studio's work runs from flagship educational series to award-winning immersive documentary and broadcast TV.
Branding, visual identity, motion systems, and asset infrastructure for 60+ subjects across the flagship educational YouTube series. Thought Cafe built and maintained the brand across 50+ series iterations over fifteen years, including custom intros, graphic packages, a mobile flashcard app, curriculum workbooks, and an internal library of 50,000+ vector assets. Channel reports 16M+ subscribers and 2B+ lifetime views.
YouTube Diamond Play Button · Webby Award (People's Voice) 2021 · Webby Honoree 2015
Immersive multimedia experience accompanying the Polar Extremes documentary. Players travel the Arctic and Antarctic through clickable 360 landscapes built from real footage, mini-games, and animated sequences to study climate history methods. Nova Labs has served 6M+ students since 2012.
W3 Awards Best in Show 2020
3D immersive web game where players become NOVAnauts responding to alien distress calls by locating exoplanets as potential new homes. Character design, the Star-Dex interface, and full game development and deployment for PBS NOVA Labs.
150+ minutes of science communication content on AI and quantum computing, produced over two years. Work included live-action video shot in our Toronto studio, visual effects backgrounds, animation, virtual production content using real-time green screen compositing and camera tracking, and keynote presentations including CogX.
Stereoscopic 360 VR documentary with actor Dominic Monaghan exploring interconnected micro and macro worlds. Psychedelic collage illustration throughout. Released on Hulu and YouTube. Co-produced with FutureTalk.
Canadian Screen Award winner 2019 (Best Immersive Experience) · W3 Gold 2018
Animation and interactive web companion spanning seasons 3, 4, and 5 of the award-winning eco-adventure documentary. Macro/Meso/Micro analysis layers, 3D interactive visuals, and scrollable animated stories covering the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, whale conservation, ocean acidification, and more. Co-produced with FutureTalk.
Canadian Screen Award 2018, 2019 · W3 Silver 2017 · Davey Silver 2017
Animated lesson on how packing and cracking district manipulation works and why it matters. Part of an ongoing TED-Ed collaboration across civic and political topics.
CSA-nominated broadcast TV series that decodes historical narratives through numbers, combining fast-paced infographics, 2D and 3D animation, and expert interviews across topics from King Tut to air travel.
Canadian Screen Awards nomination 2023 (Best Visual Effects)
Immersive product launch for Siemens' Biograph Trinion PET/CT scanner at the Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging annual meeting in Toronto. Integrated 3D elements from technical CAD drawings, animation, and mixed reality with hyper-realistic simulations. See FutureTalk section for full case study.
FutureTalk
Co-Founder / CTO, 2012–2025
FutureTalk is a design and innovation studio specializing in immersive production pipelines, interactive XR, and AI-enabled content systems. Work has ranged from enterprise product launches to large-scale public projection installations. The studio developed Trek, an AI-powered instructional design platform that delivers immersive 360 lessons to web, mobile, and XR devices — subject of WIPO PCT Publication WO/2026/060516 (Systems and Methods for Generating Immersive E-Learning Content, published March 2026).
Live & Installation
FutureTalk, 2013–2025
Live AV performance and installation work across galleries, festivals, and stages. Projection mapping, audio-reactive visuals, interactive environments, and real-time generative systems with artists and institutions.
Largest projection mapping installation at Nuit Blanche 2025. A 350×200 ft canvas on the Canada Malting Silos created by OOOPStudio (Alessandro Grisendi and Marco Noviello). FutureTalk served as technical support partner. See FutureTalk section for full case study.
Large-scale projection mapping and audio installation transforming the Canada Malting Silos overnight for Nuit Blanche Toronto. Artist Emilija Škarnulytė's work on mythology, future archeology, and climate science. FutureTalk served as technical realization partner. See FutureTalk section for full case study.
"Unveiling the Cosmic Tapestry" — large-scale audio-reactive animations envelop the audience in cosmic, ego-dissolving visual journeys, transporting them into otherworldly realms that mirror psychedelic perception. Live immersive performance using 3× Microsoft Azure Kinects and iPhone LiDAR for real-time performer capture; visual pipeline across Unity, Unreal, Houdini, After Effects, Premiere, Brekel Point Cloud, and Polycam.
Live video projection mapping and interactive point cloud installation at RBC House during TIFF.
Live video projection mapping and interactive visual intermissions for the OVO Summit.
Projection mapping and live video production across the full Canadian tour run.
Two-night concert and livestream at a Toronto-area drive-in, replacing a cancelled Budweiser Stage show (16,000 capacity). Tyler as technical director and live projection performer. Three Panasonic laser projectors mapped stage, amplifiers, and rear-stage surface; rear unit used a short-throw periscope configuration to solve weather and sight-line constraints. Eight cameras for live stream and record. See FutureTalk section for full case study.
Live projection mapping and custom augmented-reality filter designed for July Talk's "I Am Water."
Feature-length documentary on July Talk's pandemic Live At A Drive In Concert and Live Stream Performances, featured and credited for Technical Direction and live projection performances and creative technology work with the band. Apple TV · goodjobhifive.com.
Two nights of live projection video performances at Massey Hall, Toronto.
Live video production and audio-reactive visuals for Metric's Osheaga performance.
Live projection-mapped interactive painting installation at the Gardiner Museum, Toronto.
Interactive projection installation for the Design Exchange, Toronto.
Interactive pagoda projection mapping installation, featured in director Randall Okita's exhibition Things I Can't Tell You at Robert Kananaj Gallery, Toronto.
Interactive immersive dining experience for 28 guests per seating, multiple seatings per day. FutureTalk assembled creative technicians alongside Future Food Studio's chefs to build a sensory-rich program where informative menus and visuals evolved with each course's story. Media, network, and mapping servers with remote monitoring; pressure-sensitive drink coasters and OSC trigger integrations drove live performance interactions based on guest movement; multi-projector mapping and audio playback — installed and struck without access to existing tables or projection infrastructure.
Immersive and interactive art/dance installation. Iterated through multiple versions including a 3D printing variant shown at The Design Agency Block Party (Aug 2014) and a collaborative version at NXNE Art Lounge (2014).
Content creation, technical direction, and live hyperhuman integration and performance.
Selected Clients
Speaking
Panelist on AI for Digital Creators.
Thought Cafe & FutureTalk.
International video conference presenter.
Thought Cafe.
Thought Cafe.