_Seven Grams

Have you ever wanted to see how your phone works? Have you ever opened it and marveled at this treasure trove of technology that fits in the palm of your hand, sleeps under your pillow, and that you touch more than 2,600 times a day? Have you ever wondered how it is made and what resources are needed to make it work?

Seven Grams is an augmented reality (AR) experience that proposes, in a radically innovative way, to discover the link between your smartphone and the often dramatic conditions in which the rare minerals needed to make it are extracted, particularly in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). For the Congolese people, the country’s wealth seems to be a curse rather than a blessing. Seven Grams invites you to go back up the production chain of our smartphones and apprehend their human cost.

Mixing augmented reality and charcoal 2D stop motion animation sequences, Seven Grams tells you this hidden story of your smartphone on your smartphone. And it does so by weaving the make of your phone into the narrative, saying aloud the name of the manufacturing company, creating a bespoke experience. It then proceeds to augment your manufacturer’s latest model in your own space. While inviting you to take a step closer to this smartphone and look inside, an interactive element pulls apart the phone’s components fragmenting them across your field of vision. You discover the minerals used in your smartphone and their unique characteristics. Using AR isometric cartography, the experience traces these minerals back to their source: the mines of the DRC, where laborers, including children, work in dangerous and life-threatening conditions. Using augmented reality enables materializing the supply chain in front of users and bringing the DRC right to their homes and hands through this roughly seven grams of precious minerals on their smartphones.