Immersive Arts Lab 5 by Future Artists (Rapid Prototype / VR,AR,MR / Projection Mapping and Performance

Immersive Arts Lab 5

Friday 15th , Saturday 16th, Sunday 17th February 2019 (25 spaces)

Immersive Arts Laboratory 5th Edition – takes place across three days at Manchester Metropolitan University at the Chester Street site, in Manchester – in the Innovation Shed. The project is being produced by Mark Ashmore FRSA at Future Artists with the support of the School of Digital Arts at MMU (SODA).

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Now in its 5th edition, 4 previous labs have been ran over the past 18 months, and would usually take the format of a 3 day 'hack' style challenge in Virtual Reality, working in small groups to solve a problem – for the 5th Edition, and after our 8 month break, we have decided to change the format to suit both beginners and intermediate's learning about the immersive arts of Virtual Reality, Mixed Reality and Augmented Reality.

To this end, the lab can be explored and enjoyed over 3 days, or if you
can only make one or two days, there is an option to join us on single days – as the format of this lab is broken up, as to allow development over a series of days.

The lab is aimed at professional and student creatives looking to
develop in the arts and creative fields, this could be in any of the
visual arts, creative design and the fashion industries,
entertainment, product design and film, theatre and CGI – and
beyond.

Have a read about the format of the labs below, and if you have any questions about the
suitability, then please e-mail info@futureartists.co.uk with any questions.

We will also supply VR equipment, but we do ask, if you do own a headset
and a VR ready computer laptop or workstation, or any creative
software, tools or gadgets which will help you and maybe inform
others, then please bring them in – kit can also be left overnight
at our space, safe and secure.

Please also join our 100+ facebook group of Lab alumni, pop in for a chat and see what we are sharing

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1537457282955910/

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Who are we?

The Immersive Arts Laboratory was founded in 2017 by Mark Ashmore at
Future Artists,(http://www.futureartists.co.uk ) as a shared creative space for people wanting to
learn more about Virtual Reality and the arts... and for the past two
years the lab has been at the forefront of understanding what the immersive
arts are, can be, and how we can push the boundaries of creativity in
this new field – the mission statement of the Future Artists art
collective best sums up their involvement with this emerging art form
and practice, in the words of Frank Zappa ' Without deviation from
the norm, progress is not possible'....

The labs are aimed at professionals and students looking to apply their
current creative tool set, to a new exciting and emerging art form
and become artists and creative leaders in this new industry.

A common mis-conception surrounding VR and AR is that you need to be
some kind of coding genius to get involved in it – this could not
be further from the truth, the lab aims to dispel this myth and many
more and unleash your creativity within an immersive world.

So what are we doing over 3 days.

Participants have the option to join us for the full 3 days (highly recommended)
or to pick a day and join us then – please note that places are limited to 25 people.

The laboratory summary looks like this..

Day one is an Introduction to the immersive arts, and future immersive industry's and learning how
to rapid prototype for this world in a group, which will have a huge variety of
skill-sets... and then moving on to day 2, a selection of bespoke small group hands on workshops on how to create in VR and working with the new VR workflow – and then on day 3 we have an introduction to digital projection mapping and interactive digital design outside of the headset, inspired by teamlab of japan!,... – Finishing off with network drinks and time to play on more VR.

Immersive digital projections on an epic scale!

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Day to day breakdown.

Day 1 Friday – Presented By Mark Ashmore (Future Artists) and Rob Scott (VR Manchester)

Session starts at 10am : doors open from 9.30am session ends around 5.30pm

Mark Ashmore will introduce the 5th Edition of the Immersive
Arts Laboratory and outline the current industry – including his
work with Oculus as part of their Oculus Boot camp and Warner
Brothers with Ready Player One.

And then.. Our prototyping lab...

Rob Scott is a User Experience Architect, with experience across the web,
mobile apps and smart TVs. Through his involvement organising the VR
Manchester Community Meetup, he is taking design thinking into
Three-dimensional digital spaces  At his day job (At a well
known broadcaster), he facilitates workshops to uncover creative
solutions to complex problems, also leading sessions at conferences
such as EuroIA and Thinking Digital Manchester. 

What & Why:

A fast-paced session of rapid ideation and development, designed to
bring your ideas out of the safe space inside your mind and into the
real world where they can be appraised, pulled apart, and stuck back
together again. We’ll use techniques employed by Google as part of
their Design Sprint methodology, as well as others
picked up from his professional practice. Everything we do will be
through lo-fi sketches, which will ensure we iron out the biggest
flaws in our ideas before we even look at a screen. 

After the workshop you’ll have a better understanding of how to develop
and critique ideas as a group and ensure the idea that goes forward
isn’t always the first idea presented and be prepared for the next 2 days!

At then end of this day and during the day, we will have a wide
selection of VR, AR and MR kit to play with.

Day 2 (Saturday) 10am until 5.30pm

Day 2 will comprise of a series of workshops each lasting between 1 – 3 hrs, which will allow small groups of 4-5 people direct hands on experience and short rapid prototype challenges (based on what was
learnt in day 1)

With a large variety of Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality and 360 Video
hardware, software and kit – the idea of the day is to allow people
the time and space to make, create and play all day!

Sessions will include workshops on

360 video production – learn to shoot, edit and experience 360 video –
find out what works, what doesn't and what the industry is up to

Designing immersive reality experiences for audiences – what are the best
practices for designing an immersive experience, what kind of things are audiences looking for, and how are these being created – the how to guide.

The future of graphic design and illustration in VR – In this hands on
workshop, our VR artists take you on a journey of creativity. This session is Ideal for graphic designers, illustrators and 2d/traditional artists, showing how to transfer your talent into a virtual world, and what can you create and output – from video to immersive logo's to set designs and beyond –  bringing a 2D design to life in the real world.

Unity and VRTK – How do you play in a virtual world, and how do you
interact –  a session on how Unity and 3rd party developers like VRTK
(Virtual Reality Tool Kit) have made coding for VR a whole lot easier
for non developers, in this workshop, newbies will be introduced to
the basics of building VR in Unity (which is free to use) and more
intermediate creatives will be taken into the world of VRTK.

Further sessions to be announced....

We will also have a range of VR hardware kit and games to play
throughout the day.

The idea behind the day is to give you rapid tasters of the software and
tools you need to make VR, and then all you have to do is spend the
time making it!

You can see a range of video's from our previous labs here...

Day 3 (Sunday) 10am until 6pm

Beyond the headset.... Immersive art forms in the real world created by digital projections (like the teamlab video above), projections which are interactive, and could be created in VR and infused with AR– is this artform  the future of cinema, theatre and gallery space – what is it and what
can it be...... in this experimental workshop, we are very excited to
bring in Artist Rebecca Smith to work with the immersive laboratory
to look at what is possible.

Please see a full brief of Rebecca's artists career here
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1OJjAAlCYPtLzWumESDMaUoo1s5NdMnct/view

and check out Urban projections here https://www.urbanprojections.com/

Rebecca’s work seeks to discover new, and original, ways of presenting digital
media for audience interaction, pushing the boundaries of creative
possibility and pioneering new approaches to mixed media
application.  Above all, her work always remains accessible to
its audience, regardless of the intricacy of its design.

Rebecca’s work has been viewed in prestigious venues throughout the UK and
Europe, such as The Saatchi Gallery, Royal Festival Hall, Nottingham
Contemporary and The Roundhouse. 

However, her work is equally at home on the streets and in unusual outdoor
locations.  With a heavy influence of street art culture, and
love of abandoned sites and objects, she uses forgotten spaces
as a canvas for much her work.  From 8-storey tower block, to
pedestrian underpass or forest location, Rebecca has realised an
array of mobile projection systems which further her performance
possibilities and allow for truly site specific application.

With over fifteen years experience as a professional audio-visual
performer, Rebecca has lead high quality, cross-boundary projects,
workshops, and seminars at both educational institutions and
within the community.  Sharing her enthusiasm and passion
for arts and technology she actively encourages new and creative
ways of exchanging new media practice.

Future Artists are pleased to announce our unique lab collaboration for an
entire day of VR and Digital projection design and fun... as we take
immersive beyond the headset - a true lab experiment.

At the end of Day 3, there will be our wind down networking drinks
until 7.30pm (optional)