Austin Heller

Hey! I’m Austin (they/them). I’m a Chicago designer and artist who makes websites, music, new media, and lots of stuff in between. A creative developer for over two decades, I’ve worked on all kinds of interesting, delightful projects for the web and beyond:

Screenshot of Choicelab, an app for making branching narratives. A flowchart is visible with several nodes, and a right-side panel that shows editable properties for the selected node.

Screenshot of Choicelab's preview functionality. A video is playing showing a typical American highway landscape, with text overlaid that reads: "when the road is long/enough to change the weather/you can believe it will change you too/your claws will turn to open palms/you will go running/play chess/drink tea or even water/your eyes will stay towards forward/you will no longer be in love"

Choicelab is an app I’m building for making your own branching narratives. A Choicelab project lives on the web, and can use media, text, and input to create an immersive experience that’s sort of like interactive fiction, but more conversational and visually rich.

Currently in development, Choicelab will be available later this year.

Every winter, The Advent Project brings hundreds of people brand-new, bite-sized art on the web—made by a variety of artists working in a variety of media, having raised over $16,000 for various worthy causes.

My goal is to make the site feel like a keepsake, and also an effective fundraising tool for our nonprofits. Each year's site features a unique design with its own visual theme:

Screenshot of The Advent Project's 2021 calendar. Tiles representing December 1–24 are on a parchment-colored background. Each tile is represented by an ink-toned icon that obliquely hints at the day's contents.

Screenshot of The Advent Project's 2022 calendar. Tiles representing December 1–24 are on an ombré background that goes from a dusky purple to a faint blush pink. Each tile is represented by a light-toned icon that obliquely hints at the day's contents.

For 2024, I made two custom zines using a handrolled app that allows for rich media, custom page designs, and more:

For our contributors who record songs, I compiled them together into a mixtape that plays as one immersive experience, or lets you jump song-to-song:

I love interactive media and bite-sized games—there’s no better place for them than the web—and have made my fair share, including these recent ones:

Screenshot of "The Light", a branching audio narrative game. A question reads: "Check out the mysterious fire? Or the strange music?", with two choice buttons: "The fire", or "The music". — *The Light* is a branching audio narrative about a scientist and her partner, looking for light on the shortest day of the year, in one of the most remote places on Earth. I produced visuals for *The Light*, and contributed to its production as the developer of Choicelab.

Written by Chad Eschman and Jessy Lauren Smith. Performed by Chad Eschman and Jennifer Rumberger. Sound design and music by Purple Urchins.

Screenshot of "A Frosty Crostic", a puzzle game. A grid of characters, separated by spaces, is partially filled in with the words "There must b". An onscreen hint reads "Tommy Tutone's Jenny had a famous one (2 wds.)". — *A Frosty Crostic* is but one example of the many puzzle games I’ve developed over the years. Created for The Advent Project, it’s tailor-made for the project’s visual design, and—crucial for serious puzzle-solvers—is completely keyboard-navigable.

Puzzle designed by Jonathan Baude.

Screenshot of "It's December", a branching audio narrative. A colorful vector illustration of a ghost hovers forlornly onscreen; two choice buttons are overlaid on the visual, offering the choice of "See how high I can fly" or "Go home". — *It’s December*, a multi-choice adventure filled with dragons, sea witches, dark jokes, and a longing for home. I developed *It’s December*, produced its audio, and composed the score.

Written by Jessy Lauren Smith. Animated by Mason Sklar. Performed by Adrienne Matzen, Nathaniel Andrew, Erin Austin, and Katie Markovich.

Screenshot of "Ho Ho Hiatus", a puzzle game. An illustrated Santa is standing in the cold, with only beach shorts on. He is freezing, indicatively hoping to find the rest of his outfit soon. — *Ho-Ho Hiatus* finds Santa, after another triumphant Christmas, ready for a vacation. But a new jetpack has other plans for Saint Nick. I developed a miniature JavaScript game engine for Ho-Ho Hiatus and implemented the game design.

Written by George Hufnagl. Art by Brad Oexeman. Santa voiced by Brandon Paul Eells.

When I’m not designing, I write and play music as a producer, and through my group Smallhounds:

The album artwork for Triangles, by Smallhounds. It illustrates a lakefront, with a small amount of beach visible—as if you were standing and looking out from this angle. As the lake hits the horizon, it reveals a number of abstract shapes that rise upward, fading into a night sky. — *Triangles* is Smallhounds’ debut album, released in 2023. Stream it on Bandcamp.

A monochromatic illustration of a mixtape against a light blue background. — For this year’s Advent Project, I compiled a mixtape of all the original songs contributed by our pool of artists. Within the compilation, I wrote one song and produced two of them.

Songs by Rose Lewis and Coale Henderson, Chad Eschman and Alaina MacManus, Nathaniel Andrew, David Death, and Austin Heller (that’s me).

The artwork for the Pod Has Been Cast TTRPG podcast. Pixelated text that says 'The Pod Has Been Cast' sits on a pixelated dark purple gradient. Near the top of the gradient, stars can be seen in the distance. — Last year, I composed music for *The Pod Has Been Cast*, a queer- and community-focused actual play TTRPG podcast. Game master joolz was looking for a solarpunk vibe, and I came back with over an hour of riffs that are sometimes cosmic, a little emo, and a little...Dick Dale?

The album artwork for $5 Whiskey Sours, by Smallhounds. A duotoned photograph of the back of a local bar, with the bar colored in a bright gold against a white background. — **“$5 whiskey sours”** *If you want, if you want / I know a happy hour*

The album artwork for Roll On, by Smallhounds. A vector drawing (from an isomorphic perspective) illustrates a window of a bright yellow house—into which looks a red floor, a blue rug, and a green table with some household items on it. Also, there's a small rocket inside the house. Meanwhile, A blue tube interweaves, vine-like, through the window panes. Outside the window is a mint-green bush with white berries. Blue, white, and red cones break up the leaves. — **“Roll On”**, the first Smallhounds single. Gosh, was that really six years ago?

The album artwork for Novelty Songs, by Rose and Her Bros. A black and white drawing illustrates three people sitting on the floor, looking inside a guitar case with a few dollar bills. Above the drawing, lettering reads "Rose and Her Bros Novelty Songs EP." — The incredibly rare* twelve-year-old ***Novelty Songs*** EP is Rose & Her Bros’ only release. I produced it, sang backing vocals, and played drums.

* Okay, no, it’s freely available on Bandcamp. But don’t tell anyone else, OK?