Ideate Manchester - Creative England Creative England

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Ideate Manchester

Interested in learning to develop immersive content? Ideate is a programme for Greater Manchester-based creative and cultural businesses looking to expand into immersive storytelling. Bringing together leaders from across the ever-growing world of XR, we provide workshops, events and mentoring opportunities.

This is the ideal programme for creative/cultural businesses working in film, TV, games, theatre, live events, visual arts and heritage who are looking to take their first step into immersive content creation.

Participation in the programme is fully funded through the European Regional Development Fund and the programme is delivered in partnership with Manchester Growth Hub and Northern Powerhouse.

Bootcamps

We’re delivering a series of interactive bootcamps aimed at giving you the theoretical understanding and practical skills to develop your own immersive experiences.

Upcoming:

1st & 2nd September

Next Steps in VR: Advanced Prototyping Skills 2 Day Course

This fully funded course, delivered by NobleProg is for companies and freelancers who know that they want to invest in VR and have some basic experience or understanding of building a VR app from scratch.

Over two full days, we will take a small cohort of designers and/or programmers to the next level by exploring advanced concepts and techniques in order to initiate a competitive advantage, identify the skills they need to improve and raise the level of the internal conversation about VR strategy.

Find out more and register to attend here

Previous Bootcamps:

Ideate Launch Bootcamp November 2019

How to Become an Immersive Creator with Storyfutures Academy September 2020

Developing Augmented Reality Trails for Creative and Cultural Experiences May 2021

Intro to Immersive – How to Plan and Pitch a Creative XR Project June 2021

Mentoring

Creative England’s Ideate mentoring programme is currently working with 15 Greater Manchester-based creative businesses to develop a suite of new immersive experiences and products. All 15 companies have been matched with industry leading mentors who are guiding them through this exciting new world.

If you’d like to register your interest in joining the Ideate programme, email stephanie.clark@creativeengland.co.uk

Ian Forrester – Senior Producer, BBC R&D

Ian Forrester is well-known on the digital scene in the UK and Europe. Based in Manchester, he works for the BBC’s R&D Future Experiences team and specialises in open innovation and new disruptive opportunities.

David Johnston – Senior Product Manager AR/VR, BBC R&D

As the Senior Product Manager for Future Experiencesfor Virtual & Augmented Reality, David looks at how immersive technologies can be applied to areas of the BBC and the wider digital economy.

Rose Kay – CEO, Immersive Storylab

Rose is the CEO of Immersive Storylab, a company making storyworld XR experiences. Immersive Storylab deliver projects exploring the potential of mixed reality to create innovative, imaginative cinematic-theatrical events which enchant unexplored spaces with story.

As the Senior Product Manager for Future Experiencesfor Virtual & Augmented Reality, David looks at how immersive technologies can be applied to areas of the BBC and the wider digital economy.

Paul Bason – Director of Digital Innovation, Manchester Metropolitan University

As the Director of Digital Innovation at MMU, Paul is responsibile for building relationships with broadcasters, agencies and other companies in the North West’s digital media sector. He also leads aspects of MMU’s new School of Digital Arts.

Sharon Clark – Creative Director, Raucous

Sharon is the Creative Director of Raucous, a theatre company that fuses performance, music, film and creative technology.She is a resident at the Pervasive Media Studio, Associate Artist at the egg, Bath and lecturer at Bath Spa University.

Alison Norrington – Founder, storycentral

Alison Norrington is a writer/producer, CEO, Founder & Chief Creative Director of storycentral, a London-based entertainment studio that incubates and develops ground-breaking transmedia properties with global partners in film, television, publishing and gaming.

Dan Tucker - Freelance Executive Producer & Consultant

Dan is an award-winning executive producer and curator in immersive and interactive media with over 20 years of experience working with broadcasters, digital agencies, startups and international artists. He’s worked on TV projects like Charlie Brooker’s How Videogames changed the World to digital projects like the VR documentary Easter Rising: Voice of a Rebel.

Jamie Finlay – CEO, We Make Audio

Jamie Finlay established We Make Audio in 2019 after ten years of working in music and sound design. His work has spanned multiple disciplines; from games and VR, to experiential design, film and installations.

Irini Papadimitriou – Creative Director, FutureEverything

Currently Creative Director at FutureEverything, Irini Papadimitriou is a curator and digital culture manager. Irina co-curated for the Arts & Culture experience at Mozilla Festival, co-founded Maker Assembly, and has been a recipient of curatorial research programmes.

Claire Tymon – Executive Director, FutureEverything

Claire is a creative entrepreneur who delivers creative urban projects and embeds co-design and participation at the heart of her practice. Since joining FutureEverything, Claire has taken a lead role in business development, fundraising and evaluation methodologies.

Avril Furness - Director, Furness Films

Avril is a fearless, critically acclaimed, award winning Virtual Reality, 360 and film producer, director and creative director. Having worked within the advertising industry for just under 10 years, first as EA to Lord Maurice Saatchi at M&C Saatchi then moving into Account Management before becoming a Creative, working at Ad agencies Fallon and Wieden+Kennedy.