Geoff Hinchcliffe (b.1969) is a designer, developer and researcher with an interest in design, data, computation and interface aesthetics. Mitchell Whitelaw (b.1972) is a writer and maker with interests in digital design and culture, data practices, more-than-human worlds and digital collections. Both are academics at the Australian National University and often work together, undertaking computational experiences within the network context.

Hinchliffe and Whitelaw have an extensive history collaborating on data visualisation projects, with a particular emphasis on providing tangible representations of data. Together they created Climate Coasters (2018) for the ANU Climate Change Institute, and the Corley Explorer (2018) – a unique record of Queensland suburbs of the 1960s and 1970s, comprising over 61,000 photographs. Commissioned by the State Library of Queensland, Hinchcliffe & Whitelaw worked with digital design studio Icelab to craft Corley Explorer. Together they developed a rich, explorable interface and invites the community to describe and enrich the collection.

Commissioned by the Australian Conservation Foundation, Hinchcliffe & Whitelaw developed MyClimate2050 an illustrative future location-specific climate projection tool. MyClimate2050 is based on a ‘business as usual’ emissions scenario, illustrating potential data futures and provides projections for over four thousand Australian locations. As a speculative tool for considering of what might be MyClimate 2050 works by enabling the public to pinpoint their city, home town or suburb to understand how current inaction on climate impacts their town. Through this tool data becomes personal and the future, tangible.

Website: MyClimate2050

Watch Geoff & Mitchell’s presentation as part of the Climate Data panel during the FUMA Data Imaginary Symposium 2022.

This work features in: GUAM (2021) | FUMA (2022)