2022
Toronto Urban Legends
A transmedia experience based on Toronto folklore
{transmedia storytelling, illustration, 3D modeling, AR experience design, print design, web design}
Overview
Worldbuilding for local urban legends
Toronto Urban Legends is a transmedia storytelling project that imagines a Toronto inhabited by creatures drawn from urban legends. I developed the project across illustration, 3D modeling, AR, print, and web media, using each format to build a different part of the same fictional world. The project uses urban legends as a way to invite people to look at familiar places from a different perspective.
Character Design
Mapping Toronto’s urban legends into character profiles
I researched Toronto’s urban legends and selected three creatures from distinct local stories, each associated with its own type of legend, history, and reported location. The creatures were developed as species within the same fictional Toronto, with individual traits, facts, personalities, and sighting locations. This research became the foundation for the character cards, location-based AR experiences, and the wider transmedia narrative.
AR & Transmedia
Extending the experience across the city
The creatures were developed as 3D models for location-based AR experiences, appearing at the Toronto locations connected to their respective legends. Image anchors trigger each experience, with animation and audio bringing the creatures into the physical environment. The project also extends into a fictional blog and YouTube channel, where Alex, a Toronto resident, documents his sightings and builds an archive of the creatures. Together, these media connect the researched legends, physical locations, and fictional world into one narrative.
