2023 BMC speaker series: Gladys Tong, Founder of G Creative Productions Inc.

Gladys Tong, MScBMC ‘94

Stepping forward into virtual production: Embracing Emerging Technology in Film Production

In the field of entertainment, my role has been running a company producing interactive graphics and visual storytelling for the film and television industry for more than 25 years. Since the work we do has been tied to technology, it has always been a challenge to keep up with the latest hardware and software tools. For the past year, I have been engaged with the latest technology in film production called Virtual Production. My talk will focus on the key aspects of Virtual Production as well as the challenges of embracing discomfort when jumping from a relatively comfortable position to suddenly being immersed in a new environment with an unfamiliar risky emerging technology.

Date and Time:
Friday, February 3, 2023
2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. ET
One-hour presentation including Q&A.

Register here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/2023-bmc-speaker-series-stepping-forward-into-virtual-production-tickets-523290665467

2023 BMC Speaker Series 2023 full program: https://bmc.med.utoronto.ca/news-events/2023/01/30/bmc-speakers-2023

---

Gladys Tong, MScBMC ‘94, is the Founder and President of G Creative Productions Inc., a Vancouver-based company specializing in interactive motion graphics and visual effects for the film and television industry. For over 25 years, she has worked on Hollywood’s top feature films such as Deadpool II, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, and more. Gladys is a Class of ‘94 graduate of the Master of Science in Biomedical Communications at the University of Toronto.

Web site http://g-creative.com

BMC alumna profile in Temerty Medicine Magazine's art issue

Sonya Amin, MScBMC ‘03 - Director, Client Services and Co-Founder of AXS Studio Inc.

Sonya Amin (MScBMC '03), one of the co-founders of AXS Studio in Toronto, tells how Temerty Medicine’s MScBMC program helped her and her partners to launch AXS, the company’s growth from a three-person operation to a fully-realized venture, and the impact of their work on health care.

Get the whole story in the Temerty Faculty of Medicine Magazine’s Winter 2023 Art Issue AXS Studio: Making moves in biomedical communications https://temertymedicine.utoronto.ca/news/axs-studio-making-moves-biomedical-communications

BMC grad creates first visual work to depict procedure that delivers drugs through the blood-brain barrier

This scientifically accurate, compelling and visually striking still is one from thousands of frames in Hang Yu Lin’s animation Focused ultrasound and microbubbles to overcome the blood-brain barrier for drug delivery.

Hang Yu Lin, MScBMC Class of 2020, created the 3D-animation Focused ultrasound and microbubbles to overcome the blood-brain barrier for drug delivery.

Lin's animation depicts a procedure developed at the Sunnybrook Research Institute in Toronto. This innovative procedure uses a combination of focused ultrasound and microbubbles to deliver drugs to the brain through the blood-brain barrier.

The blood-brain barrier is important for keeping pathogens and foreign substances from entering the brain. But it also impedes the entry of drugs that can treat brain tumours, and diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.

Before Lin's animation, there were no visuals that told the whole story of this procedure, the complex way that it works, and the resolution after treatment.

Learn more about Hang Yu Lin's 3D-animation and Sunnybrook's innovative research through the University of Toronto's Research Revealed exhibition.

~

Websites referenced

H. Lin Visuals https://www.hlin-visuals.com/

UofT’s Research Revealed Exhibition https://uoft.me/microbubbles

UofT's Research Revealed exhibition adds BMC grad's 3D-simulator to its gallery

Still image from Alexander Young's 3D simulation of the procedure used to treat a rare complication that can occur during twin pregnancies.

The Twin-Twin Training Simulator created by Alexander Young, MScBMC Class of 2019, is one of the latest additions to the University of Toronto’s Research Revealed gallery.

Research Revealed is an online exhibition that celebrates the research of students at the University of Toronto. The exhibition is intended to engage the public with trainees’ research through images.

Gaming in medical education

Video gaming simulators are proven educational tools.

But Alex Young wanted to know how best to leverage these digital tools for medical education. He wondered if simplified 3D visuals in a simulated environment might help surgical trainees to learn more effectively.

Opportunity to train in rare surgical procedure

Young’s research resulted in the Twin-Twin Training Simulator. This 3D-simulator replicates the surgical environment. Surgical trainees can learn the complex procedure that is used to treat a rare complication, which can occur during twin pregnancies. The simulator provides opportunities for trainees' to practice, which increases patient access to the procedure.

Learn more about trainee research at the University of Toronto through the online Research Revealed exhibition.

---

Web sites referenced:

Twin-Twin Training Simulator: Using a 3D Game Engine to Train Surgeons: https://uoft.me/twin-twin

AY Design: https://www.alexyoungdesign.com/

BMC Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/552473875/08897751ab

Research Revealed: https://researchrevealed.utoronto.ca/home/

MScBMC (In-person) Open House

Date & Location

Saturday, September 17, 2022 from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Master of Science in Biomedical Communications
Third floor, Terrence Donnelly Health Sciences Complex
University of Toronto Mississauga
3359 Mississauga Road
Mississauga, ON L5L 1C6

For directions and campus maps, see https://bmc.med.utoronto.ca/visit-us.

Drop-in

The BMC Open House is an informal, casual opportunity for potential applicants to meet with students who are currently enrolled in the program, with faculty, and to tour BMC's facilities at UTM. This is not an interview.

Formal interviews for Fall 2023 admission will take place in late February/early March 2023 and are by invitation only. Ideally, interviews will be in person. However, if interviews must take place on-line, the BMC Open House will have provided an opportunity for potential applicants to meet BMC faculty in person and to seek feedback on transcripts and art.

Pre-application review

For potential applicants who would like a pre-application review, there are available a limited number of 10-minute scheduled appointments with various faculty members.

Review the BMC faculty profiles and request an appointment with someone whose areas of specialization are of interest to you. https://bmc.med.utoronto.ca/faculty-staff

Required

Attendees must register to attend and must bring unofficial transcripts and art samples with them. Register here: https://forms.office.com/r/eVDYu3rSN8

Humanizing the experience of HIV-stigma through animation

9:26 a.m.
by Maeve Doyle

Jenn Lee, 2021 graduate of the Master of Science in Biomedical Communications at the University of Toronto. Photo courtesy of Jenn Lee

In her second year of the Master of Science in Biomedical Communications program, Jenn Lee sat in a coffee shop where she sketched ideas for her master's research project. She needed to create a visual representation for stigma.

Stigma occurs when people simultaneously experience some or all of discrimination, loss of status, being labelled, stereotyped, and separated. Stigma does not have a physical shape or form.

"I thought of it as something that always follows you around but also changes. I thought, stigma is kind of like a beast, like the monster hiding in your closet." That's when the blob monsters, as she calls them, materialized. "And it just felt right."

Jenn Lee created monsters to depict three different aspects of stigma–enacted, anticipated, and internalized. Image credit: Jenn Lee

Lee, who graduated from the University of Toronto with her MScBMC in 2021, created a 2D-animation for her capstone project.

End HIV Stigma is an emotionally affecting video designed to help the public understand what HIV stigma is, and its debilitating effects. Using monsters endowed with human characteristics, she makes stigma real and visible for audiences.

The Positive Effect

In 2019, REACH Nexus, a national centre working to address HIV, Hepatitis C and other sexually transmitted and blood-borne infections in Canada, launched PostiveEffect.org, as a place to engage people through stories.

"The Positive Effect is really a movement. It's emotive. It's resilience based. It's about how you can think about stigma, learn how other people have navigated through the challenges, and about helping people to get on the right path," says Sean Rourke, director of REACH Nexus.

Continually on the search for novel and innovative ways to educate the public about HIV Stigma, he settled on animation and posted a master’s research project with the Biomedical Communications program.

Lee, who had earned a master's degree in public health before joining the Biomedical Communications program, and who had some experience in HIV research, knew right away that she wanted to work on this project.

 "HIV stigma is alive and well in Canada, and we really need to correct all the misinformation and the myths that people have about HIV, and help people get access to care," says Rourke, also a scientist with MAP Centre for Urban Health Solutions at St. Michael's Hospital. "HIV stigma is a barrier to testing, treatment and support, which increases the potential for HIV transmission."

Community-informed ideation and creation

"Initially, we thought that the project would be more about data visualization and showing findings from the HIV Stigma Index. But after speaking with people who live with HIV, we found that there were things that the public didn't understand and that it would be more important to take a story-based approach and evoke a more emotional response," says Lee.

Rourke connected Lee with one of the investigators on the HIV Stigma Index. The investigator helped Lee to create a community advisory committee of seven people, six of whom disclosed that they lived with HIV. Lee consulted with them on the animation's content, message, and script.

Representation was also important to Lee. "HIV affects such a wide range of populations, and many of them are marginalized. I thought it was really important to have a broad cast of characters so that most people could find at least one character they could relate to."

Casting call. Jenn Lee created a broad cast of characters so that most people could find at least one character they could relate to. Image credit: Jenn Lee

Lee says that diverse representation of people in all media, and especially in medical illustration, is vital. "From the healthcare providers depicted, to the friends and family–I thought it was really important to make sure people felt represented."

To focus on movement and making emotions natural, Lee chose 2D-animation for the story’s medium. "Because I could hand-draw some of it, it really helped to make it feel more organic,” she says.

The blob monsters made stigma more tangible. "Having them visible was important to show how different stigma is for everyone."

Lee used size to convey how stigma can, at times, be overwhelming or more manageable but never completely go away. She used colour to convey shifts in mood.

Rourke says Lee creatively communicated “those things which are internal, and which everyone has their own way of describing, into something that transcends the individual experience. I think the animation is very effective in humanizing the experience of stigma and letting people know that there are things you can do about it. Small steps can be huge advances."

Lee attributes the success of her End HIV Stigma animation to the support she received from the community advisory committee, her Biomedical Communications research supervisors Shelley Wall and Derek Ng, and to Rourke. "I was really lucky to have a clinical advisor who was so engaged and committed."

Now a biomedical communications designer at Bridgeable, Lee translates complex pharma-related medical information to make it more accessible for patients. "I look forward every day to being able to continue to apply the skills I learned at BMC to everything that comes next."

~

Web sites referenced in story

Jenn Lee Visuals https://jennleevisuals.ca/

The Positive Effect https://www.positiveeffect.org/

Limited Term Appointment (50%): 3D-Visualization Design Instructor, Fall 2022 to Summer 2024

The Master of Science in Biomedical Communications, within the Department of Biology, University of Toronto Mississauga (UTM) invites applications for a 50% two-year Limited Term Lecturer position in the area of 3D Visualization Design. The appointment is expected to begin September 1, 2022, and end August 31, 2024…

For the full description, please see https://bmc.med.utoronto.ca/employment.

Apply by August 8, 2022!

Dr. Derek Ng promoted to associate professor with tenure

Associate Professor Derek Ng. Photo credit: N. Woolridge

We are proud to announce the promotion of Dr. Derek Ng to associate professor with tenure, effective July 1, 2022.

Ng, who holds a PhD in biochemistry, joined the MScBMC faculty in 2015. His research focuses on the design, application, and evaluation of visualizations in augmenting and supporting knowledge discovery and communication in molecular biology. His work has been funded by the Connaught Fund, e-Campus Ontario, Mitacs, and the University of Toronto. Since 2015, he has supervised 20 graduate students.

Congratulations to our colleague Associate Professor Derek Ng!

Sessional lecturers wanted for Fall 2022/Winter 2023 writing courses

Sessional Lecturer HSC300H Written Communication for Health Care (Fall 2022), and
Sessional Lecturer HSC406H Advanced Written Communication for Health Care (Winter 2023)

For the full job descriptions, please see:

https://uoft.me/HSC300H5F, and
https://uoft.me/HSC406H5S.

Apply before July 21!