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Digital Alberta once again help out with the annual Christmas @ Cannes event organized by the CMA. Showing the NABS reel of the latest award winning commercials from around the globe, the night took place at Flames Central on the 1st of Dec and was a lot of fun. I think one of the favourite commercials of the evening had to be ‘if cats had opposable thumbs’ along with a super unique Japanese mobile phone ad. As the drinks and food flowed, Digital Alberta members mingled in the DA reserved section and enjoyed the evening. All in all another great event this year.

Category: Industry News

On Monday December 12th, Digital Alberta sponsored one of the more unique seasonal mixers held in the province this month. Nat Jones and Travis Shewchuk have been showcasing their work (Nat’s comic art and Travis’s sculptures) at Shades of Grey tattoo studio that features some of the most rare collectible toys in city. This only makes sense since Shane Turgeon is the organizer of the Edmonton Collectible Toy and Comic Show and owner of Shades of Grey.

The show featured original work from Nat's incredibly successful '68 series including some works that were not included in the published comic. As well, several Travis Shewchuk creations, including two full sized zombies based on the '68 series. Amongst the most memorable pieces were Nat's zombie-based pop culture pieces that served as very clever and nuanced socio-political commentary on the times. These pieces are must-sees for any comic zombie fan.

The evening was a wonderful mash-up of digital media folks, film & TV folks, comic fans, and at one point I could have sworn I saw a zombie shuffle past the bathroom door. Jay Bardayla of Happy Harbor comics was ranting about growing the indie comic scene in Edmonton. Suzette Chan was on hand to promote a new curated show of the late Gilbert Bouchard’s comic book collection titled “I’m No Superman.” Andrew Foley (one of the writers of the original graphic novel “Cowboys & Aliens”) was on hand to chat about the joys of being a comic book writer and creator. Multiple members of the Guru Digital Arts College faculty and student body checked out the cool space and amazing work of Nat’s and Travis’s.

The evening was a steady stream of folks chatting and enjoying a little “cheer” courtesy of Digital Alberta. More and more it seems that Digital Alberta is present at the intersections between media forms. From the Alberta Book Publishers speed dating with media producers to the amazing Banff weekend co-produced with AMPIA, Digital Alberta is continually seeking unique opportunities to discover synergies between groups that have yet to discover the power of their collaborative potential. 2012 is shaping up to be an exciting year and Digital Alberta will be in the thick of it mashing all the way.

Category: Industry News

Unit B is a newly repurposed space in the basement of the McKenney building on the corner of 104 St. and 102 Ave., on the edge of the warehouse district in downtown Edmonton. Like many of the early 20th century brick warehouses and lofts in the area, it’s sturdy looking 3 level brick building with layers of stories buried inside. 

Unit B is a shared workspace conceived of and occupied by a group of entrepreneurs in different parts of the creative arts business. We’re home to artists, writers and graphic designers, PR and marketing pros, a political consultant, and several internet wizards specializing in web architecture, web development and organic search engine optimization.

Each member of the B team had a hand in renovating and fixing up the place, and now we’re proud to say that it looks like the beautiful creative studio that we envisioned. We all the rent our individual offices, and each pitch in on the upkeep of the shared common areas.

The space had been vacant for many years before we took it over several months ago. The whole thing is still very new, a little blurry, and a lot of fun.

Here are some shots from the opening reception we hosted in early December, which we hope is just the first of many. There are potentially some more offices to open up in Unit B, so please be in touch if this sounds like the way you want to work. You’d probably like it, it’s fun.

Tags: yegcreative spaceoffice spacenetworkingCategory: Industry News

Media Release

Edmonton- Two local leaders in the digital arts and technology sector, Rocketfuel Games and GURU Digital Arts College, have reached an agreement to co-produce a new education-based video game. Mind’s Eye is a first-person shooter game that teaches students math skills while they obliterate mutant enemies. The project will integrate Rocketfuel’s game design expertise with the art direction and development skills of GURU staff and students.

Kyle Sams, a student in GURU’s Digital Illustration and Sequential Art program, along with support from program instructors Nat Jones & Lee Neilsen, will provide concept art, and GURU’s Interaction Design & Game Level Development program students will develop the game under the game design direction of GURU’s Executive Director, Owen Brierley.

Rocketfuel has produced multiple award-winning games in the learning sector, and is a leader in understanding game design and the dynamics of game play in a learning environment. “The level of expertise that GURU provides on both the art side and the technical side is phenomenal. We’ve done a lot of great games over the past few years and we’re excited to get started on Mind’s Eye,”  says Rocketfuel Games COO Norman Mendoza.

“I don’t always gravitate to what’s thought of as edutainment,” explains GURU Executive Director Owen Brierley. “It just conjures up an image of someone singing to me while I’m trying to do math, ugh. But this game is going to truly be entertaining and enjoyable to play, that’s our focus. I mean, its a hardcore mutant shooter, how fun is that? The game play will be so engaging that the students won’t even realize that they’re learning at the same time. That’s the key to this.”

Rocketfuel Games President Jason Suriano explains how the concept was born: “I was sitting at a conference and someone came up to me and said, ‘my kid will only play an educational game for about fifteen minutes before he starts playing Angry Birds. Can you guys fix that?’ The truth is, educational games haven’t been able to compete with entertainment-first games, but we think it’s time to try to do something disruptive in this space and what better way than to create a math-based first person mutant shooter game.”

About Rocketfuel Games

Rocketfuel Games produces games that you play online and in the real world. Launched in 2006, Rocketfuel has been recognized with various awards including Most Promising New Company at the Canadian New Media Awards and a 2010 Children’s Technology Review Award for their work with Discovery Communications. For more information visit www.rocketfuelgames.ca. 

About GURU

GURU Digital Arts College is an Edmonton-based private post secondary institute that trains students to work at the intersection of art and technology. Our graduates leave ready work for video game companies, advertising agencies, and graphic design studios and other interesting corners of the digital media industry. We make the learning fit the student rather than the student fit the learning. 

For more information or an interview, contact: 

Rocketfuel Games
Name: Jason Suriano
Number: 780-994-4237
Email: jason@rocketfuelgames.ca 

GURU Digital Arts College
Name: Erin Hazen
Number: 780-429-4878
Email: erin.hazen@gurudigitalarts.com

Tags: media releasegururocketfuel gamespartnershipCategory: Industry News

by Owen Brierley

This past weekend 50 producers of various stripes gathered at the Banff Centre for a unique event that offered the first co-production between Digital Alberta and AMPIA. What ensued was several good sessions featuring a range of perspectives from both the digital media and film and television industries.  

Why was this important? The general trend of government funding (which supports up to 70% of Canadian film or television production) has been to merge digital media production funding and film & TV funding into one “media fund.”As a result, film and television producers are asked to also include digital media in their content development strategy. As well, digital media producers are now competing with seasoned film & tv producers for funds. The vision for this, long term, is a good one. The notion that content is moving from broadcast to “bitcast”(a term coined by Nicholas Negroponte in “Being Digital”an old futurist book from 1997 that still has relevance today) is prevalent in conversations about the future of media production. AMPIA used to be the Albera Motion Pictures Industry Association and recently changed its name to Alberta Media Producers Industries Association. The Banff World Television Festival is now called the Banff World Media Festival. You can see a trend. 

On Saturday, the group gathered to hear the various perspectives of several representatives from the industries. The broadcast landscape was championed by Tessa Sproule from CBC interactive, the TV producer perspective was shared by Jordy Randall of Seven24 Films (creators of “Heartland”, the digital media production story was told by Michael Sikorsky of 1400 Months, the on-line distribution perspective was covered by Trevor Doerkson from MoboVivo, and the overall digital landscape was presented by Michelle Sklar from Digital Alberta. 

This was followed a lunch hosted by McLeod Dixon, and featured a presentation from Peter Menzies, CRTC Commissioner. Mr. Menzies shared the CRTC’s mandate to ensure there was a healthy interpretation of the two acts (Telecommunications & Broadcast) handed down from parliament. The questions from the group were indicative of the ramifications of convergence. Tessa Sproule asked if the CRTC saw the fact that the broadcasters also happened to be the telecommunications companies as a conflict. Menzies could only shrug and agree that the situation is not optimal, but change is happening. Joe Novak wanted to know why online distributors like Netflix are not under the same Canadian content regulations as broadcasters. Michelle Sklar wanted to know more about the UBB issues and the upcoming ramifications for those who watch their tv shows online. 

After lunch, Claire Stillwell & Meredith Macdonald from the law firm McLeod Dixon gave an overview of brand, trademark and copyright in relation to the world of social media. The general message was the old saying, “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”If you are proactive with your brand and message, you can avoid others stealing or impersonating your online presence.

Next up, a case study, we were presented with a collaboration between "1400 Months" and the producers of "Heartland" to develop a game related to the television series “Heartland". The game is based on the popular casual game “Sally’s Spa”developed by Games Cafe (also from Calgary). The game mechanics would remain the same, but the characters would be from the Heartland series. The result is a “horse spa”where the various activities that the player manages are activities that relate to caring for a horse. This was a great example of Digital Media adapting to fit an environment where the creative property has already matured. There are positive and negative aspects of this approach and the resulting conversations during the coffee break sponsored by Prime Capital Leasing. 

After coffee and a chance to stretch our legs, we returned for a session on funding called “Follow the Money”featuring, Luke Azevedo the CED Commissioner, Film & Television Creative Industries, Canada Media Fund - Paul McDougall, Brian Prokop –Roxy Enterprises, and Jeff Davison –Poor Dog Entertainment. This session looked at the various ways to fund projects and the conditions that content creators must meet in order to acquire either public or private investment. One of the big ideas shared by Brian Prokop was the necessity for a content creator to be able to demonstrate how the investment will be paid back, what is the result of the risk? Amazingly, there is over $30 million dollars in funding available for various CMF projects.  

After all that, it was time to network. Everyone at the event was eager to meet other producers and many were proactive about blazing new trails to connect with folks outside their discipline. The pre-dinner mixer was sponsored by Calgary Economic Development in the MacLab Bistro in the excellent new Kinnear Centre for Creativity and Innovation. Dinner was in the lovely Vistas Dining Room. 

The evening saw several groups continue the networking sessions in smaller groups. Self-selected groups who discovered all sorts of common ground.  

In the morning, Adobe sponsored the Sunday breakfast at 7:30, followed by an early morning session devoted to Digital Narrative Strateigies. I had the privilege of leading this session with 3 of my esteemed colleagues from a fairly broad spectrum of the digital media realm. Michael Magee is a Ph.D. in Educational Technologies and developing an online comic book publishing environment called the Fabler. Nat Jones is a legend in the comic industry. Kevin Franco is a transmedia storyteller. Each of these guys have developed intellectual property that was formatted for multiple media formats. From games to graphic novels to films the core of this session was to ensure that every creative concept begins with thinking about multiple media strategies.  

After the morning session, the group got intimate and interactive with a digital dating session that cycled all the attendees around a set of tables of about 6 people per table. During this time, everyone was able to share their story and connect with others they might not have had a chance to connect with yet.  

The overall theme of the weekend seemed to be connecting, sharing and comparing. Not everyone agreed with the perspectives shared, but instead of dismissive attitudes, the group in general seemed to want to hear and be heard. There seemed to be a genuine interest in continuing the conversations and find opportunities to have follow up events. It was a privilege to be a part of an event that initiated positive change in our industries. I am optimistic that as we continue these conversations, we will help develop new governmental policy, best practices in production, and sensible business models that address the growing changing face of the digital world. 

UPDATE: The "Heartland" game was a collaboration between 1400 Months and the producers of Heartland.  The article has been edited to reflect this. - OB

Can you give us a brief overview of 3DI is and what your company does?
We deliver physically accurate simulations in a repeatable and safe digital environment that blend art and science, capture attention and produce measureable results. 

What projects are you currently working on at the moment?
We are currently working on three simulators: one for snubbing, one for an automated drill rig and the last for a blast hole drill. We have also just started a major e-learning project for the oil and gas industry. 

What is the biggest impact that 3DI hopes to make on the industry and your field that you develop products for?
We hope to reduce accidents, save lives and improve core competency through cost-effective interactive training. We recognize that hands-on learning is a very effective training tool, especially in today's world of video games and phone apps. People learn more effectively if they are engaged and interested in what they are doing and we use a video game engine to give them an environment that both looks and behaves realistically. We are looking to take the entertainment value that video games provide and apply it to training applications so that the user can learn in a new way and enjoy themselves while they are doing so.

3DI does its development in Edmonton, what strengths do you feel that operating in this city provides that are conductive towards the growth of your company?
Having access to the University of Alberta has been a big help in growing our company. We've hired many people who have gone through their undergraduate or graduate programs in Computing Science, Engineering and Industrial Design. We're also lucky to be close to so many of the companies in the oil and energy industries. Having existing and potential clients so nearby is a huge bonus and it makes us more appealing because we are local and that makes communication that much easier.

Do you see any industry trends occurring with regards to your line of work?
Training is starting to become more important across many industries. Accidents are costly and so we've seen that companies are putting a higher priority on properly training their employees and they are looking for effective ways to do it. Digital media is becoming an increasingly large part our everyday lives and this results in people looking to be taught in more interactive ways than traditional classroom training. Companies are realizing this and looking to incorporate digital media into the way they train their employees, which leads them to look into simulators and e-learning.

Do you have a particular wish list of things that you would like to see changed here in Alberta to see the industry as a whole grow?
- Better government understanding and acknowledgement of interactive digital media. The more the government understands our industry, the easier it is for them to properly allocate funding and promote the industry, which in turn helps our industry to grow.
- Better facilitation and communication between post-secondary and industry. It would be great if we could work together more to ensure that students are learning things that are applicable both to their academic education and to their chosen industry when they graduate. Our industry moves so fast - we want to make sure that students aren't behind the curve before they even start their careers.
- Easier access to funding for R&D.

Read more about 3DI >

Tags: member profilegamingCategory: Member Profile

The future of digital industries in Alberta got a shot in the arm on Wednesday when Digital Alberta and CE3C brought Laurie Gloge from Global Game Jam and Luis Berumen from StartUp Weekend to speak to a packed room at the Alberta College of Art + Design. More than 40 students heard about two events coming up in the new year: Global Game Jam (January 27-29), and StartUp Weekend (February 3-5).

Students were excited about the opportunity to interact with real industry professionals and exercise their ACAD skills in a real, applied context. Global Game Jam pairs artists, designers and technologists to create computer games in a 48 hour marathon. StartUp Weekend matches creatives with business mentors to create project pitches for a real life Dragon's Den and the opportunity for investment to create a new start up venture. Registration for Global Game Jam starts today (Thursday, November 17th).

Watch the DA website for details about how you can participate these great events, and check back for the results of the events in the new year.

  Tags: Startup weekendGlobal Game JamACADCE3CCategory: Industry News

Great voices met around the table at the Auburn Saloon on Tuesday for an intimate, creative, and super constructive evening. Representatives from the Vulcan Business Development Society (VBDS), the Alberta Rural Development Network, and Cybera met with some very talented thinkers from the Digital Alberta  membership to carve out a new wave of opportunities for Digital Producers and a vibrant rural constituency. Vulcan presented a number of challenges for our membership to brainstorm and consider. On offer here was the opportunity to bid $100,000 worth of contracts, and partner with Vulcan on future funding applications and initiatives. Our members were quick to see the potential of developing a cutting edge solution for this surprisingly large niche market that extends not only around the province, but across the country and the world: rural communities are increasingly competing against urban environments both for quality of living and business opportunities.

The participants of the Vulcan Digital Possibilities Symposium will have two weeks to develop their concepts before the competition will be opened up publicly. Watch the Digital Alberta website at the beginning of December for information and videos about what Vulcan, and other rural communities, are looking for. Then submit your pitch for up to $100,000 worth of contracts that may lay the foundation for your next big product line.

This opportunity is exclusively for Digital Alberta members; a current membership in good standing is require to hold a contract with VBDS. This is yet another way DA supports its members and drives innovation across our industry and the province.

Category: Industry News

Our PR Lunch and Learn took place yesterday at Accelerator YYC, Calgary’s new Day 1 startup launchpad. We had a packed room and great crowd – a mix of technical minds and marketing practitioners looking to re-fresh their PR skills. The session provided participants with an introduction and practical tips on creating a thought-out PR strategy and campaign. Lead by Digital Alberta board member Arleigh Vasconcellos the session included a presentation from guest speaker John Robertson from Marketwire. Marketwire offers a number of great tools and resources to help run a successful PR program. Yesterday’s workshop is a part of a series focused on PR and its skills. The next Lunch and Learn will delve into how to engage with the media. Stay tuned for dates and sign-up details.

Category: Industry News

About Arleigh Galant Vasconcellos – principal of The Agency

Arleigh is a bundle of energy and brings a wealth of experience and passion to all of her communications projects and clients. Working in the field for over 13 years, she founded The Agency in March 2009 upon her return to Canada.

Prior to coming home to her native Calgary, Arleigh lived in London, UK where she had the opportunity to hone her PR skills working with a diverse contact network including international government bodies such as the UNWTO and global business leaders in the banking, technology, and travel and tourism sectors. Some career highlights include leading the Communications and PR team for WTM at Reed Exhibitions, and managing the PR, Sponsorship and Promotions team at Virgin Holidays. In both roles she focused on strategic planning, change management, project messaging, and managing globals communications campaigns.

Since her return to Canada, Arleigh has jumped head first into growing her business and connecting with the interesting people who live and work in the Canadian tech space. She currently works with a handful of excellent organizations including Digital Alberta and Wmode Inc., sits on the TechRev PR Roundtable and this past spring ran two Lunch and Learn sessions on the basics of PR for tech start-ups at Innovate. 

About The Agency

Favouring technology, especially the mobile start-up and software spaces, The Agency is an enthusiastic member of the local technology community.

We specialize in delivering integrated strategic communications campaigns and building long term communications plans for our clients. What does building a communications strategy mean? It’s everything from setting-up your communications goals, to planning how you’ll execute on them, to doing the work to get-it-done.