Inside the Lab

The Lab is where we build the thing before it has to work. It’s where frameworks take shape, ideas get oxygen, and experiments get just enough form to test what matters.

Some projects here are speculative. Some are confidential. All are real. These are prototypes, working sketches, and immersive systems designed to provoke, prove, or rethink what’s possible—before scale or certainty set in.

The Witness Project

A woman with dark skin and short black hair, dressed in white, looks thoughtfully at a sculpture of ruins displayed in a museum. The sculpture appears to be a miniature model of historic architecture, placed on a stand in front of a dark ornate backdrop. A man with glasses and dark hair, wearing a dark jacket, stands in front of the display, holding a tablet with a map or diagram.
Person taking a photo of a burned-down building with a smartphone.
Blueprint of a museum exhibit called Pepper's Ghost Cabinet, showing front elevation, side elevation, top plan view, and cutaway section with detailed annotations of materials, dimensions, and components like viewing windows, a projected image, optical glass beam splitter, internal lighting control, cooling system, computer hardware, and access panels.

Spatial journalism for public memory.

The Witness Project is a headset-free immersive storytelling platform that presents first-person testimony as dimensional, explorable memory.

Designed for museums, cultural institutions, civic spaces, and community settings, each Witness installation invites visitors to encounter real stories through spatial scans, oral histories, archival material, and tactile interaction. Instead of asking audiences to put on a headset or enter a private VR experience, The Witness Project creates a shared public encounter: a walk-up kiosk where memory, place, and testimony appear in three-dimensional space.

Our first pilot focuses on Altadena, California, where the Eaton Fire destroyed homes, landmarks, and community spaces while leaving residents to preserve the stories of what was lost, what survived, and what comes next.

Using LiDAR, 3D scanning, spatial audio, and carefully edited oral histories, The Witness Project captures places and objects that carry meaning for the people who lived through the fire. These stories are then shaped into modular “Capsules” that can be experienced through a physical kiosk installation and adapted for future public, educational, and digital contexts.

The goal is not spectacle. It is presence.

The Witness Project asks what journalism can become when audiences do not simply read about a place, but stand before it; when testimony is not only heard, but spatially encountered; and when communities are given tools to preserve their own memories in forms that feel alive, accessible, and shared.

Pilot: Altadena Fire Memory Capsule
Format: Headset-free immersive kiosk
Focus: Climate memory, community testimony, recovery, and public history
Created by: Zev Berman, Creator, Creative Director, with Wesley Jones, Founding Creative Partner & Editorial Lead

A futuristic medical or scientific workstation with a sleek computer monitor displaying data, a keyboard, and a high-tech chair in a sterile, modern white room.
Two girls using a digital kiosk in a library to browse or search for books, with shelves of books and large windows in the background.
A digitally enhanced image of a woman's side profile with city lights and digital data streams surrounding her face, creating a futuristic, technological atmosphere.

Rchive.AI – Archival Intelligence in Prototype

Short Description:

Rchive.AI is a knowledge interface for institutions that think in decades, not quarters. It blends private archival material with structured AI—allowing users to query, explore, and converse with complex memory systems in natural language.

The prototype is built for cultural institutions, oral history collections, and knowledge stewards who want their archives to teach, not just store. We’re exploring how narrative framing, AI transparency, and expert-tuned personas can make historical knowledge accessible—and trustworthy—at scale.

Status / Context:

This project is currently in early-stage prototype development, with use cases spanning museums, film archives, and mission-driven research collections.

zev4006_An_old-school_archive_room_filled_with_towering_shelves_16f31cc1-9731-418b-bcdd-43be18edce5c.png
A group of four people gathered around a large interactive display table with maps and data, in a modern, well-lit room with large windows and greenery.
A side profile of an elderly woman with glasses, overlaid with a digital glowing network pattern.
A corridor inside a data center with server racks on both sides and glowing orange lights, creating a futuristic look.
Digital illustration of a woman with curly hair looking at a screen, interacting with a touch interface in a futuristic setting.
A computer monitor displaying a digital document with text, headings, and graphics related to film analysis and cultural topics.