About the lecture

Creating a post-brexit dystopia in Not Tonight
In the game Not Tonight we created a post-brexit 2D dystopian vision of Britain. With post-launch hindsight, what resonated emotionally with the players?

About the speaker

First name / last name: Tim Constant
Title: Founder & Creative Director
Name of the company: PanicBarn
Website of the company: panicbarn.com

Speaker biography:
Born and raised in Somerset, England. After over twelve years in the tech industry Tim Constant gave into his creative desires and founded the micro-games studio PanicBarn. As creative director the initial focus was on mobile gaming; Tiki Taka Soccer and Tiki Taka World Soccer were released. A move into his beloved PC gaming space was next with Not Tonight. A post-Brexit dystopian adventure out now on PC and arriving on consoles in February 2019.

Company presentation:
PanicBarn was founded in 2014 by Tim Constant. The desire was to create games with a focus on progression and enjoyable core mechanics regardless of platform. Tiki Taka Soccer, Tiki Taka World Soccer, Not Tonight and Peck it Up are the current portfolio. An unannounced soccer game is next.

About the lecture

Virtually unreal – e-motional journey through the web hole
Igor Coric has been working in the field of web animation for the last 15 years. He will tell a story of how he created his own way of digital storytelling, how this took him on a journey to the end of the world and back to create an animation studio with a heart and soul.

About the speaker

First name / last name: Igor Coric
Title: Animation Director
Name of the company: Artrake
Website of the company: www.artrake.com

Speaker biography: Igor Coric is an animation director with 15 years of experience in the field of web animation. His films competed and won numerous awards at animation and short film festivals around the world.

Company presentation: Artrake is animation studio servicing clients like TedEd, The School of Life and PBS Kids.

About the lecture

Emotional storytelling in BBC Earth: Life in VR
BBC Earth: Life in VR – a new way to experience stories from the natural world. From coastal kelp forests to deep sea trenches, users can witness first-hand the creature behaviours and relationships which sustains this ocean’s rich and diverse ecosystems, and discover the secrets that underpin it.
The lecture will explore the grammar and language of this landmark format and the storytelling techniques adopted to connect emotionally with the audience.

About the speaker

First name / last name: Bradley Crooks
Title: Head of Digital Entertainment & Games
Name of the company: BBC
Website of the company:

Speaker biography:

Company presentation:

About the keynote

Emotional Storytelling Through Games: 11-11: Revive our heritage
Video Games are one of the most fascinating medium for emotional storytelling at the moment. They can evoke strong feelings – and not just excitement and fear but humour and passion and sadness. 11–11 is a painterly game on World War One made by DigixArt and Aardman Animations. Discover how the game was designed in order to explore our History throughout different perspectives and how emotions drive the story forward.

About the workshop

Participate in the creation of an interactive narrative scene
During this workshop, you will work on a scene of the game « 11-11: Memories Retold” in order to experiment how narrative can be delivered in an interactive environment. You will learn about the issues attached to non linearity storytelling and how to create emotions without mastering the exact pacing of the sequence.

About the speaker

First name / last name: Yoan Fanise
Title: Creative Director
Name of the company: DigixArt
Website of the company: www.digixart.com

Speaker biography: Yoan Fanise is a game creator and sound designer (Beyond Good and Evil, and Rayman Raving Rabbids). He’s the content director and writer for Valiant Hearts: The Great War. That game, which tells a story about the First World War, won a BAFTA for best original property (2015). Fanise has also founded his own company, DigixArt Studio. Its first production, Lost in Harmony, gained huge success by combining rhythm game mechanics with a story about overcoming fear and illness. DigixArt is now producing, in collaboration with the legendary Aardman Animation studios, a game called 11-11: Memories Retold.

Company presentation: DigixArt is a development studio focusing on narrative and artistic experiences born in 2015 and based in South of France.

About the speaker

First name / last name: Verity McIntosh
Title: Senior Lecturer in Virtual and Extended Reality
Name of the company: UWE Bristol
Website of the company: https://go.uwe.ac.uk/MAVR1

Speaker biography:
Verity is Senior Lecturer in Virtual and Extended Reality at UWE Bristol. She is leading a brand new, practice-based, industry led masters course in Virtual Reality, starting in January 2019.
As former Managing Producer of the Pervasive Media Studio, VR lead for Watershed, and as a founding member of Bristol VR Lab, Verity has developed a distinctive voice within the VR/XR community. She is an advocate for interdisciplinary storytelling that bridges physical and virtual worlds and argues for a more considered and inclusive approach to audience care in VR experiences.

Company presentation:
UWE Bristol (University of the West of England) is a pioneering institution with a mission to make a difference to our cities and regions. UWE Bristol is delighted to launch one of the world’s first dedicated Master programmes in Virtual Reality. Starting in January 2019, this industry-led MA will help you become a creative content developer for new forms of immersive experiences, including VR/AR/MR and 360° filmmaking, with a critical awareness of culture, technology and business.

About the lecture

Immersive Journalism using VR and AR
A range of emerging technologies, from virtual and augmented reality to data capture techniques like photogrammetry and videogrammetry, are offering journalists powerful new ways to tell urgent stories. This talk will look at VR’s ability to generate intense emotional, empathetic responses on the part of viewers; give an overview of the latest data capture techniques; and touch on some of the ethical issues involved in recreating real-life events in VR and AR.

About the Panel

I Second that Emotion: How different levels of visual verisimilitude affect our empathetic responses to socially conscious narratives
Emerging media like VR and AR have enabled socially conscious storytellers to immerse their audiences like never before as they address topics ranging from the immigration crisis, to global warming, to domestic violence. Yet these new formats present challenges both technical and ethical. Is it appropriate to use a video game environment to address issues like homelessness and poverty? Does the heightened level of emotional engagement created by VR make viewers more susceptible to manipulation? Do ultra-realistic environments and characters give VR journalism more substance, or do they distract from the content? This panel will address all these questions, as well as others being debated in the vanguard of immersive media.

First name / last name: Jamie Pallot
Title: Co-Founder
Name of the company: Emblematic Group
Website of the company: www.emblematicgroup.com

Speaker biography:
Jamie Pallot is co-founder, with Nonny de la Peña, of Emblematic Group, a pioneering VR/AR/XR company that has produced award-winning tools and content for partners including PBS Frontline, The New York Times, Google, The Wall Street Journal, Mozilla, the Sundance and Tribeca film festivals, and the World Economic Forum. He is a former Contributing Editor at Vanity Fair and Editorial Director of Condé Nast Digital, where he won a National Magazine Award for General Excellence. Pallot has been a keynote speaker, presenter, and moderator at international events including Games For Change Europe, Fashion Tech Forum in New York, Re:Publica in Berlin, and the Nyon Film Festival in Geneva.

Company presentation:
Emblematic Group has a legacy of award-winning work in collaboration with renowned media and commercial partners including Google, Warner Brothers, PBS Frontline, The Wall Street Journal, The Guggenheim Museum, The New York Times, the World Economic Forum, and the Sundance Film Festival. Emblematic’s technologists and storytellers have spent over five years on XR projects ranging from: a series of immersive documentaries featuring hologram characters in photo-real “walk around” locations; a 3D visualization of live stock market data; and an AI-powered police training simulation.

About the lecture

The rise of creative machines
Let’s explore why and how technologies developped by some of the most innovative startups from the field are about to change how 3D worlds are created and exeprienced through a combination of AI-based methods, real-time and collaborative technologies. What impact will this have on either content creators but also consumers? Where can or will this be used? Let’s walk the talk with a live demo of PocketStudio.

About the workshop

Create a short movie with others in real-time and watch it live on your phone!
Abstract of the lecture: PocketStudio is the first digital content creation tool allowing several users to work together on the same 3D animation project and see each other’s changes with real-time feedback. A sort of Google Docs applied to the creation of movies. In this workshop you will have a chance to explore how it feels to create movies with others in real-time using PocketStudio authoring app and augmented reality.

About the speaker

First name / last name: Jean-Colas Prunier
Title: Founder, Product Architect and CEO
Name of the company: PocketStudio
Website of the company: www.pocketstudio.io

Speaker biography:
Jean-Colas worked at ILM and Weta Digital on more than twenty films in total, five of which received an Academy Award in the special effects category (Avatar, the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Life of Pi, King-Kong). Over the past three years Jean-Colas has been working on the development of real-time software for the production of movie content. He is recognized as one of the world’s experts in this emergent field.

Company presentation:
The startup behind the development of PocketStudio was founded by VFX and animation veteran Jean-Colas Prunier in August 2017. PocketStudio is under development and will be released as a commercial solution in 2019.

About the keynote

Emotional Storytelling Through Games: 11-11: Revive our heritage
Video Games are one of the most fascinating medium for emotional storytelling at the moment. They can evoke strong feelings – and not just excitement and fear but humour and passion and sadness. 11–11 is a painterly game on World War One made by DigixArt and Aardman Animations. Discover how the game was designed in order to explore our History throughout different perspectives and how emotions drive the story forward.

About the workshop

Participate in the creation of an interactive narrative scene
During this workshop, you will work on a scene of the game « 11-11: Memories Retold” in order to experiment how narrative can be delivered in an interactive environment. You will learn about the issues attached to non linearity storytelling and how to create emotions without mastering the exact pacing of the sequence.

About the speaker

First name / last name: François Rizzo
Title: Game Designer
Name of the company: DigixArt
Website of the company: www.digixart.com

Speaker biography: François Rizzo studied cinema and many other things in Paris before deciding to work on videogames.  He graduated from Cnam in 2016 and joined DigixArt at the start of pre-production of 11-11 : Memories Retold as a game and level designer, which happens to be his first commercialized game.

Company presentation:

About the lecture

Playtime; Creating positive and emotionally engaging interactive experiences for all ages.
Joyful, intrepid, excited, calm.  Starting with how we want our audience to feel, this talk explores how Nexus blends linear and interactive storytelling techniques to create work that moves people.  Who is our audience and why will they care?

About the speaker

First name / last name: Claire Spencer-Cook
Title: Executive Producer
Name of the company: Nexus Studios
Website of the company: nexusstudios.com

Speaker biography:
Executive Producer for interactive film and animation projects, including AR, VR, installations and short form content for web and apps.
At Nexus, Claire leads on the development and production of original interactive projects across commercial, public service and arts commissions. Recent projects include BBC Civilisations AR for BBC R&D, the Bafta-nominated Gruffalo Spotter AR for Magic Light Pictures, Rain or Shine for Google Spotlight Stories and Wednesday With Goddard, which won Best Animated Short at SXSW 2017. Previous work includes productions for BBC Bitesize, Channel 4, Samsung, Tate Modern, the Royal London Hospital and The V&A Museum.
Prior to Nexus, Claire was Editorial Advisor and Guest Curator for leading digital arts venue, La Gaite Lyrique in Paris. For 5 years at the BBC, Claire was Senior Producer for BBC Film Network and the BBC Kermode Uncut video. She commissioned and produced the annual BBC short film production schemes with BBC Films, including Oscar nominated animation ‘This Way Up’ and the Bafta nominated ‘short ‘Turning’.
For 5 years at onedotzero, she produced and programmed the content for its digital moving image festival and international tour, the DVD label and short film distribution. She started out in film by studying French and German with European Cinema at Cambridge University.

Company presentation:
Nexus is home to a world-class roster of talent supported by experienced production staff, creative thinkers, animators, technical directors, engineers, coders, illustrators, designers and makers. Together they work in a collaborative atmosphere to make talked-about work.
Our prolific output includes Academy Award nominated animation, Grammy nominated music videos, D&AD Black Pencil and triple Cannes Grand Prix winning commercials and D&AD White Pencil winning digital and immersive experiences.
Be it hand-crafted or high-tech our goal remains to make engaging, heartfelt stories people want to share and to transform brands and organisations through the power of entertainment and culture.

About the lecture

Emotional storytelling in BBC Earth: Life in VR
BBC Earth: Life in VR – a new way to experience stories from the natural world. From coastal kelp forests to deep sea trenches, users can witness first-hand the creature behaviours and relationships which sustains this ocean’s rich and diverse ecosystems, and discover the secrets that underpin it.
The lecture will explore the grammar and language of this landmark format and the storytelling techniques adopted to connect emotionally with the audience.

About the speaker

First name / last name: Phil Stuart
Title: Founder & Creative Director
Name of the company: PRELOADED
Website of the company: www.preloaded.com/

Speaker biography:
Phil is founder and Creative Director of Preloaded, a BAFTA winning games studio using the power of play of solve real world problems and change people’s lives. Working across a range of technologies, Phil is passionate about creating purposeful experiences for the widest possible audiences. In XR his focus is on user-experience, ergonomics and telling new types of stories with agency and impact.
Phil also sits on the BAFTA Games Committee and BIMA’s Immersive Council.

Company presentation:
PRELOADED is a BAFTA-winning game studio using the power of play to reinvent the way organisations connect with their audiences. Collaborating with ambitious partners, such as LEGO, Tate, Google, HTC VIVE, BBC and the Science Museum, they make games and immersive experiences that have purpose, and that place the user at the center of the design process.

About the keynote

Emotional Storytelling Through Games: 11-11: Revive our heritage
Video Games are one of the most fascinating medium for emotional storytelling at the moment. They can evoke strong feelings – and not just excitement and fear but humour and passion and sadness. 11–11 is a painterly game on World War One made by DigixArt and Aardman Animations. Discover how the game was designed in order to explore our History throughout different perspectives and how emotions drive the story forward.

About the speaker

First name / last name: Bram Ttwheam
Title: Head of Post Production and Director
Name of the company: Aardman Animations
Website of the company: www.aardman.com/

Speaker biography:
With over 20 years’ experience Bram has worked for a number respected UK animation companies. He has contributed to many features and shorts including four BAFTA winners. From VFX supervision to animation he has turned his hand to a variety of roles. With commercials, promos and a BAFTA nomination under his belt he’s now represented as a director for Aardman where he also looks after the Post Production Department. Bram is passionate about the craft and revels in the joy of stylistic fusion and blending of different techniques.

Company presentation:
Aardman, based in Bristol (UK) co-founded and run by Peter Lord and David Sproxton, is a world leader in animation. It produces feature films, series, advertising and digital entertainment for both the domestic and international market. Their multi-award winning productions are novel, entertaining, brilliantly characterised and full of charm that reflects the unique talent, energy and personal commitment of the very special people who make up the Aardman team. Aardman’s work is often imitated and yet the company continues to lead the field producing a rare brand of visually stunning and amusing independent and commercial productions.

About the speaker

First name / last name: Rich Warren
Title: Director
Name of the company: Encounters Festival
Website of the company: encounters-festival.org.uk

Speaker biography:

Company presentation:

About the speaker

First name / last name: Jean-Michel Blottière
Title: President
Name of the company: Games for Change Europe
Website of the company: www.g4ceurope.eu

Speaker biography: Jean-Michel Blottière is a pioneer in the field of new technologies. After preparing ENS Ulm – a French grande école (higher education establishment outside the framework of the public university system), he created TILT, the very first magazine dedicated to Videogames in Europe (1982), and PixiFoly, the first TV Show to plunge audiences into virtual worlds (1983). Since then, he has been Editor in chief of magazines such as Consoles + or PC Review. He has produced and hosted TV Shows (Pixifoly, Microkids, the Night of Videogames…). As Editorial Consultant for all of Canal+’s « new programs”, he was involved in the creation of such groundbreaking programs as Cyberflash, Cyberculture and Le Deuxième Monde (8 years before Second Life!). He has been leading prestigious Festivals and Conferences in Europe (Imagina, FMX, Videogame Economics Forum…). He is the President of Games for Change Europe, and CEO of NX Publishing – The NeXt Media Specialists – a communication company specialized in the field of VFX, Animation, Videogames, VR-MR-AR, and Transmedia.

Company presentation: Founded in 2004, Games for Change empowers game creators and social innovators to drive real-world change using games that help people to learn, improve their communities, and contribute to make the world a better place. Founded in 2013, Games for Change Europe helps support and increase the growing interest in social impact games throughout Europe. Therefore we frequently showcase best practices to the European public and discuss the potential of the medium with companies, organisations and governments. With our partners from games academia and industry, we have access to leading expertise and technology to help leverage entertaining games with non-entertainment goals and transform them into a compelling and convincing communication tool. Furthermore, we help find business opportunities for direct investment into new projects and incubate games to strengthen the role of European Game Developers in the emerging international markets.