StoryLabs Multi Platform StoryTelling

Ep08: The Business of Games as Transmedia Brands: Tony Reed: StoryLabs & Screen Australia Clinic

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 19:01:30 +1100

The Business of Games as Transmedia Brands - A 101 introduction to the games business and how to approach attaching multi million dollar games through to cheap and cheerful casual games to your multi platform story world. The importance of growing your brand and how upfront community and transmedia brand building is the most important factor in making any kind of success. Also some very surprising statistics surrounding entertainments biggest playground. A presentation from Anthony Reed, CEO of the GDAA, given at the inaugural Screen Australia & StoryLabs digital ignition lab held in Robertson in late November 2011. StoryLab's Podcasts: Recorded and Produced by Gary P Hayes ABOUT Antony Reed (Australia) - a 20-year veteran of the interactive entertainment industry. With global experience in game development and publishing, Antony has been a marketing brain behind some of the world’s biggest games franchises, including Command & Conquer,Baldur’s Gate, Fallout and too many Star Trek titles, and has won numerous awards for his campaigns. In his publishing days Antony worked for industry heavyweights, Virgin Interactive and Interplay Productions, before turning his attention to game development in 2003. Today, Antony is the CEO of the Game Developers’ Association of Australia and is tasked with advocating the interests of the sector to government, educational, financial and commercial institutions as well as heavily promoting Australian game development creativity and talent internationally.

Ep07: When Participation Becomes Promotion: AntheaFoyer: StoryLabs & Screen Australia Clinic

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 20:06:54 +1100

When Participation Becomes Promotion. How to use online participatory and social story to draw users into your IP. Using a film in production this explores the nature of social media as a way to create major interest in your project by getting users involved in the creative process. A presentation from Anthea Foyer (post throat infection!) given at the inaugural Screen Australia, StoryLabs digital ignition lab held in Robertson in late November 2011. Podcast Recorded and Produced by Gary P Hayes. http://antheafoyer.com/sidebar-menu-parent/about ABOUT ANTHEA Anthea Foyer is a creative director, producer, visual and new media artist and curator. She has created, advised and mentored on a wide range of critically acclaimed projects including graphic novels, online narratives, wearables, interactive installations, participatory theatre, live events, multi-platform experiences and television and film convergence projects. Anthea is currently co-founder, with Alex Mayhew, and Creative Strategist at The Labs, a creative and strategic consultancy that helps to deliver truly convergent properties that transform multi-platform challenges into opportunities for creative and commercial success.

Ep06: Making Stories Gameful: Matt Costello: StoryLabs & Screen Australia Clinic

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 19:53:27 +1100

Making Stories Gameful - Creative IP and Desiging Play – Looking at Rage as a study of how to take IP from game, to book, to film. How to approach original branded IP and creatively develop from story world to game. A presentation from Matt Costello given at the inaugural Screen Australia, StoryLabs digital ignition lab held in Robertson in late November 2011. Podcast Recorded and Produced by Gary P Hayes. http://storylabs.us/mentors/#MATT-COSTELLO ABOUT MATT - Matt Costello is based in New York, London and LA and has written ground-breaking and award-winning novels, games, and television. Time Magazine said of Doom 3, which he scripted, “The story is delivered with unusual art.” He wrote the groundbreaking Pirates of the Caribbean 3 game across all platforms. Rage, a 2011 release from id Software which Matt worked on, won the most Game Critics Awards at this year’s E3, including “˜Best Console Game’.Just Cause, co-written with Storylab founder Neil Richards for Eidos, debuted as the #1 game for Xbox 360 in the UK and was named “Best Adventure Game” at the 2006 E3. His current projects include a major game for the revolutionary Nintendo 3DS. Other notable games include: Hercules, for Disney, The Dark Half, for MGM, Derelict, for The Syfy Channel, The Clue Chronicles for Hasbro, Barbie’s Riding Adventure for Mattel, Clifford’s Reading” for Scholastic, Starsky & Hutch for Empire, and The Italian Job for Eidos. Matt also specialises in the kid’s genre and has created many award-winning games for children. He co-created one of the first major experiments in “˜two-way TV’, called ZoogDisney, branded as “˜TV you do’. For two years the ZoogDisney weekend bloc re-shaped the Disney channel, bringing it squarely into the interactive and “˜tweens world. He has written a kids book series for Scholastic , The Kids of Einstein Elementary which blends adventure and math and he also scripted episodes of the award-winning PBS animated series, Cyberchase. Other games include the landmark Aladdin’s Mathquest with math expert Marilyn Burns for Disney, as well as the multi-award winning A Cartoon History of the Universe (Putnam). His novel Beneath Still Waters was filmed and released by LionsGate and Penguin/Putnam published his latest suspense novel, Nowhere. His new novel,Vacation, will be published by St. Martin’s Press in 2011.

Ep05: Making Transmedia Make Money: Jennifer Wilson: StoryLabs & Screen Australia Clinic

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 18:36:51 +1100

Making Transmedia Make Money - Why you are unlikely to make any money unless you are willing to deal with the small stuff, lots of it. Jennifer explores many digital business models and shows how they can be applied to almost any Multi Platform and Transmedia project. Case studies will feature non-commercial projects such as China Heart & Making Australia Happy and how they could have been commercialised. A presentation by Jennifer Wilson given at the inaugural Screen Australia & StoryLabs digital ignition lab held in Robertson in late November 2011. Podcast Recorded and Produced by Gary P Hayes. http://storylabs.us/mentors/#JENNIFER-WILSON Jennifer Wilson is a Director of The Project Factory – a multiplatform media company. She is fascinated by the intersection of creative concepts, their technical implementation and the commercial realities that underpins these. Beyond cross-platform – the intelligent exploration of how to generate engagement on the third and fourth screens through social, play, story, sharing and interactivity. She is passionate about mobile (ubiquity); semantic web (understanding), social media (connection) and the need to find engagement at the heart of every interaction. Jennifer teaches courses in multiplatform, trans- and convergent media. She works with emerging leaders across all forms of media to help them understand the connected, networked world. She has authored books and papers aimed at writers and film makers covering key concepts, business models, rights issues and new ways of thinking about copyright. Jennifer is a member of SPAA, on the board of AIMIA and chairs the Mobile Industry Group.

Ep04: Creatively Failing Forward: David Varela: StoryLabs & Screen Australia Clinic

Sat, 04 Feb 2012 15:17:35 +1100

Creatively Failing Forward – Using two key properties, Sony XI ARG and Lewis Hamilton Secret Life ARG, this talk looks at the nature of interactive, finding need and developing community thinking. David also refers to his earlier ARG Perplex City and how to choose appropriate platforms for users. A presentation by David Varela given at the inaugural Screen Australia & StoryLabs digital ignition lab held in Robertson in late November 2011. Podcast Recorded and Produced by Gary P Hayes. David Varela (UK) - http://storylabs.us/mentors/#DAVID-VARELA - David is a writer and producer who works across a huge range of media – sometimes all at once. He is currently producing and writing a global ARG sponsored by Reebok and starring Formula 1 driver Lewis Hamilton. Lewis Hamilton: Secret Life is running in nine languages for eight months, with live events staged in Africa, Europe, the Middle East and Asia. Prior to that, David wrote and produced the world’s first console-based ARG, Xi. Based in Sony’s virtual world PlayStation Home, the adventure spilled out across the web and into the real world too, attracting over 600,000 players. David’s background is as an award-winning writer for theatre, radio and advertising. It was as a writer that he first got into transmedia back in 2005, working as in-house writer on the influential ARG Perplex City for 18 months. He was heavily involved in the adventurous crossover between Perplex City and BBC Radio 1 known asFrozen Indigo Angel. His stageplays have been performed at the ICA, the Royal Court, Hampstead Theatre and RADA, and his short films have premiered in Leicester Square and been broadcast on ITV. He has also written several one-off dramas for BBC Radio 4 and BBC7.

Ep03: The Writers Dream inside the Nightmare: Neil Richards: StoryLabs & Screen Australia Clinic

Sat, 28 Jan 2012 16:57:31 +1100

A step-by-step study of the writing process to a very tight interactive brief. How limited story world and entrenced stake-holders creates a freedom of its own and how trans-channel entertainment can still have have embedded educational value. A presentation by Neil Richards given at the inaugural Screen Australia, StoryLabs digital ignition lab held in Robertson in late November 2011. Podcast Recorded and Produced by Gary P Hayes. Neil Richards (UK) http://storylabs.us/mentors/#NEIL-RICHARDS has story executive, writer and producer credits for BBC, ITV and Channel 4 in drama, children’s and entertainment. Since co-writing Starship Titanic with Douglas Adams in the mid-90s he has worked increasingly in interactive media, scripting children’s iTV, education, broadband and platform games, earning three recent BAFTA nominations, an IGDA Writing Excellence nomination and a Writers’ Guild nomination. He has written more than 20 game scripts including the popular titles Driver, Just Cause (1 & 2), Broken Sword and The Da Vinci Code. He has mentored in workshops for BBC, PAL (Media Programme), PILOTS (Media Programme), PYGMALION (Media Programme/Paris/Berlin Film Schools), the Akademie für Kindermedien in Erfurt and Crossover Labs. He was one-time senior lecturer in screenwriting at Bournemouth University. He has also consulted for the BBC as a producer in creative development, devising and running Creative/Interactive Labs across the BBC.

Ep02: Story Community: Laurel Papworth: StoryLabs & Screen Australia Clinic

Sun, 22 Jan 2012 16:36:53 +1100

The Story Community. Building community around your story and game world and then growing and managing that community. Using examples of Big Brother, Master Chef and various online games, a step-by-step guide on how to build loyal users. A presentation from Laurel given at the inaugural Screen Australia, StoryLabs digital ignition lab held in Robertson in late November 2011. Podcast Recorded and Produced by Gary P Hayes. Laurel Papworth (Australia) http://laurelpapworth.com/about has been creating and managing online communities for over 20 years. Marketingmagazine named Laurel ‘Head of Industry, Social Media’ for Australia and AdAge named Laurel in the Power150 bloggers globally. She is CEO of The Community Crew setting up online communities on forums and managing them including Everquest, Ultima Online, Westpac Bank, Junior Masterchef TV show, Middle East Broadcasting (women’s online community), Singapore Military, journalists with The Australian newspaper. She has been runningvirtual online communities since the late 1980s including virtual worlds and forums. Laurel teaches workshops on online community management, social media press releases, Facebook marketing, increasing your Twitter reach, and social media monitoring and measurement to governments, corporations, small business and not for profits in Australia, New Zealand, Asia and the Middle East.

Ep01: Story R&D: Lance Weiler: StoryLabs & Screen Australia Clinic

Sun, 22 Jan 2012 16:07:14 +1100

The Creative Story World Process – How transmedia is both commercial and real, the studio and broadcast system and how to create stories that engage and extend across platforms. Exploring services evolving from one to another using key case study of how Head Trauma moved into Pandemic and other projects. A presentation from Lance given at the inaugural Screen Australia, StoryLabs digital ignition lab held in Robertson in late November 2011. Podcast Recorded and Produced by Gary P Hayes. Lance Weiler (US) http://lanceweiler.com/press is recognised as a pioneer in mixing storytelling and technology. Businessweek named him “one of the 18 who changed Hollywood” alongside the likes of George Lucas and Steve Jobs. His films include The Last Broadcast and Head Trauma, around which he also made an acclaimed ARG (alternate reality game), and an online documentary series, Radar, which was nominated for a Streamy Award. In 2011, Lance’s Pandemic, an immersive storytelling project, was official selection of the New Frontier section of the Sundance Film Festival. He sits on a World Economic Forum steering committee for the future of content creation, and teaches at Columbia University on the art, craft and business of storytelling in the 21st century. Lance is founder of the Workbook Project, an open creative network, and writes a regular column for Filmmaker magazine on the impact of tech on entertainment.