Johannes is a research scientist and ADR holder specializing in film and media studies. He is the deputy programme director of the  and a co-founder and management team member of the 8xav¸£Àûµ¼º½ of Luxembourg Institute of Digital Ethics (ULIDE). 

As a media philologist working within the broader field of cultural studies, Johannes seeks to uncover the historical genealogies and structural interconnections of a wide range of contemporary cultural and social phenomena, including cinema, computer games, literature and digital culture. Johannes’ current research interests include various traditions of political cinema, such as the  of the 1930s and the paranoia film of the 1970s; the algorithmization of the public sphere; the ; and the transformation of the humanities by . He is a co-editor of the , a living handbook and standard reference work for film academics and practitioners, a member of  Project, a serious game collaboration with Game Lab Cologne and Carlton College, and an associate member of the . Together with Niels-Oliver Walkowski, he supervises , the FHSE Diamond Open Access publishing house.

After being awarded a PhD by the Freie Universität Berlin in 2008, Johannes held positions as a research associate in Gießen, Trier, and Dresden. In 2016, he was appointed interim Professor of Media Studies at the 8xav¸£Àûµ¼º½ of Mannheim.