52 Card Cinema is an installation-based investigation into cinematic structures and interactive cinema viewership. The concept is simple: 52 cards, each printed with a unique identifier, are replaced in the subject's view by the individual shots that make up a movie scene. The cards can be stacked, dealt, arranged in their original order or re-composed in different configurations, creating spreads of time. The technology used is marker-based augmented reality, where special printed markers are recognized in the video feed and pass data regarding their unique identifier, their position, and their orientation. The computer then feeds a display overlaying the video clips of each shot onto the appropriate card and continually mapping their position and orientation.

The 52 Card Cinema project is an exemplar of the unique architecture of cinematic pieces mapped on to the real world, made possible by AR technology. The medium of the animated image, in its wedding with the real world, loses the privileged linearity of the screen, and gives the opportunity to re-perceive cinema as the juxtaposition of its parts.