1. Introduction

When we began thinking about this project, both of us instinctively were drawn to James J. Gibson. Not because his name was on all things, but because his ideas immediately spoke to what we are most interested in. At first glance, he seems to be just another psychologist with theories about how people perceive and make sense of the world. But then we read Tim Ingold’s Making, and we realized that Gibson’s ideas are more exciting because they are about how we move through the world, how we perceive it with our bodies, and how we make beings there. His texts go beyond the idea of vision as passive and show us that perception is an active process that takes place when we are most engaged with the world.

Design is the object of our research and design interests, and Gibson’s work deals with exactly that. As media studies students we are constantly interested in how people interact with objects, spaces, and media not just visually but also through bodily and affective interactions. The idea of “affordances” points out that the world is not a static background but an active participant, inviting people to move and act. This is the way in which one may view design as not being fixed but as a dialogue between humans and material reality.

By exploring how Ingold takes Gibson’s ideas further, we will learn how theories of perception are embodied in tools for making and how these inform our knowledge of creativity and design. It is also a project about finding inspiration for our own creative work and how design can be a way of knowing and exploring the world.

2. Background: Who is James J. Gibson?

Let’s begin by learning more about his background. Gibson (his full name: James Jerome Gibson) was born in McConnelsville, Ohio, in 1904. He developed an interest in philosophy from a young age and began his undergraduate studies in philosophy at Northwestern University. He then transferred to Princeton University, where he studied experimental psychology under Herbert S. Langfeld. After his PhD, Gibson began his academic career as a faculty member at Smith College. 

Gibson’s research focused primarily on visual perception. He explored how organisms perceive their visual environment and his understanding of perception as a direct process. During his career, he challenged traditional psychology’s emphasis on mental reconstruction and inferential processing, proposing what he called the ecological approach to perception. However, the world entered World War II, and Gibson was no exception. He was forced to serve in the U.S. Army Air Forces. During his time there, he worked on applied vision tasks, such as visual identification of aircraft and the production of training films. 

After the war, Gibson returned to Smith College, and then in 1949 moved to Cornell University, where he spent the rest of his life devoted to research and teaching, passing away in 1979. His work will undoubtedly remain indelibly etched in the minds of psychologists, designers, architects, and others around the world.

3. Gibson’s Key Works and Concepts

The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception(1979) is one of Gibson’s most influential and most important works, and is also the main piece Ingold cited from in Making. In the book, he introduced the connection between perception and action and one of the central concepts of the book, affordance. 

Affordance is the action possibilities the environment offers to an organism, and is “measured relative to the animal”, which means that they are unique for each organism. Gibson explained how organisms perceive their environment in terms of the possibilities of what they can do with it. He emphasizes that perception is an interaction with the environment, not mental representation, which corresponded with Ingold’s insight on the relations between people learning and materials. Thus, pictures and films are limited in terms of reflecting the natural environment since they only respond to visual perception. 

Gibson’s other works include The Perception of the Visual World(1950), which challenged the traditional idea that perception is an interpretive process where the mind constructs an internal picture of the external world based on sensory inputs. Gibson instead states that people perceive the external world itself, not the imagery we construct in our own minds. He also introduces the “ground theory”, in which the ground provides a framework for the distance, scale, and direction of perception, and the senses that build on top of it – making it three-dimensional in a figurative way – is based on the physical interaction to the objects. 

Another key concept raised by Gibson is Gradient in perception. Texture gradients and motion gradients come together, providing still and dynamic information to allow people to perceive the object as it is in reality, without mental interference. Gibson believes that what we “perceive” is the result combining what we visualize and what we feel. This theory also laid the foundation for his work later on, which is mentioned above.

4. How Ingold Uses Gibson in Making

Ingold is heavily dependent on Gibson’s concepts in presenting his case about how people engage with the world through making. Gibson’s theoretical notion that perception is not a reception of information but more an active engagement of the individual with the environment lies at the heart of Ingold’s own theory. People, for Gibson, do not just look at the world and interpret from a distance. Instead, they only move across it, respond to it, and understand it by performing within it. Ingold finds this perspective crucial to his thinking, as he argues that knowledge emerges not from abstracted thinking but from the bodily act of doing and making.

The most influential concept Ingold draws upon is “affordance,” Gibson’s term for the possibility of action offered by the world to an organism. Ingold uses this concept to illustrate that materials, tools, and landscapes are not passive things waiting to be used. They actually influence the way we think, act, and make. For example, when a carpenter is working with wood, he is not simply insisting on his intention onto a clump of stuff. He is being challenged by the resistance, strength, and feel of the wood, its affordances, and he is adjusting his behavior in response. This dialogical exchange of human intentionality with material properties is, for Ingold, the essence of making.

Ingold also pushes Gibson’s theory beyond perception to suggest that making is a way of knowing. Since perception arises from movement and engagement, so does understanding. Through constant contact with worlds and materials, people acquire skills, techniques, and knowledge unavailable through theory. Gibson’s inheritance enables Ingold to show that making is not object-production but being actively involved in a relationship with the world.

By integrating Gibson’s theories into his argument, Ingold demonstrates that creativity and knowledge are derived from interaction rather than isolation. Perception and making are inextricably linked processes, and Gibson’s theory enables Ingold to position making as a form of thought, one that is based in the body, the senses, and the dialogue of humans with the environment.

5. Critical Reflection

Rereading “Making” and incorporating the ideas of James J. Gibson, we gradually realized that “making” isn’t simply the act of completing a “specific work,” but rather a process of ongoing understanding and interaction. Gibson’s theory teaches us that perception isn’t a static “seeing,” but rather “feeling” and “responding” through the body’s interaction with the environment. This line of thought resonates with Ingold’s view: true knowledge doesn’t come solely from external observation, but is discovered through action, experimentation, and the response of materials.

When we consider “making” from this perspective, it becomes more than a unilateral plan by the designer, but rather an ongoing exchange between people, materials, and the environment. Every adjustment, failure, and re-attempt is part of the creative process. This process merges “knowing” and “doing,” transforming creation into a way of thinking and learning.

For those of us studying media, this understanding is particularly meaningful. Whether shooting images, editing videos, engaging in interactive design, or working with digital tools like digital sculpting and rendering, we are all experiencing “responsive creation.” Media isn’t just a tool for conveying information; it constantly communicates with us, influencing our choices, feelings, and expressions. Through the ideas of Gibson and Ingold, we recognize that media practice is a way of “understanding through doing”—it allows us to relearn how to perceive the world, understand materials, and generate new meanings through interaction in the process of creation.

Image Credits

Header image designed by Mio on Canva

“James Gibson” image courtesy of Cornell University

Mio Hashimoto, Rai Yanagisawa, Saber Wang, Siming Liao