The DCRC is based in the Pervasive Media Studio, Bristol

There are two part time posts currently advertised at the DCRC – both Research Fellow roles focusing on different research strands within the centre.

Please share any of these roles with people who you think may be interested. Both RF roles require a PhD and unfortunately we can only accept candidates from within the EU.

Research Fellow – Interactive Documentary - 0.5 
From webdocs to Virtual Reality, docugames to data storytelling and personalisation; digital culture has seen a proliferation of interactive and participatory documentary forms. These have emerged within a context of transformation within twentieth century modes of documentary production, exhibition and reception, and a blurring of boundaries between documentary and other genres – most notably journalism. The i-Docs group within the Digital Cultures Research Centre explores these developments and their potential for documentary’s role within the public sphere. We now seek a Research Fellow to play a key part in developing the DCRC’s research and knowledge exchange programme in the area of interactive documentary.

Application deadline: Aug 3 2015
More information: http://bit.ly/1KzRFKR

Research Fellow – “The Automation of Everyday Life” - 0.5 

From software agents, predictive systems and recommendation services, to robotics, drones, and artificial companions, automated text and design experiments, and on to the internet of things, the automation of choices, actions and production is already a crucial theme in the emergence of 21st century digital culture.

In this role you will play a key part in developing the DCRC’s research and knowledge exchange programme in the area of the automation of cultural production and practices which is driven by Dr Patrick Crogan.

Application deadline: Aug 3 2015
More information: http://bit.ly/1JG827k

The DCRC’s Creative Territories project has published its major outcome, The Good Hubbing Guide. It is available on the project site here.

The GHG represents the Creative Territories network’s major findings and recommendations about independent game maker colocation. 3 games hubs participated in the network along with researchers and members of the wider community: the Bristol Games Hub, the Arch Creatives in Leamington Spa, and the Dutch Game Garden .

In what network member and Indiecade co-founder Celia Pearce calls a “watershed moment” for the industry worldwide, small and independent game producers have become increasingly significant and viable in recent years. The Good Hubbing Guide offers the collective wisdom of the network about how to support this promising expansion of the pool of creative work nourishing experimentation and innovation in the industry as a whole.

Author of the Guide Patrick Crogan said “The Good Hubbing Guide maps the many relationships indie game makers have not only with peer communities, industry and creative economy bodies, but with locals – local shops, groups, schools, local government. Our findings concern how game maker collectives can work to strengthen the relationships between game makers inside and outside the hub, and between game making and the wider social and cultural life of their particular context.”

“Games are part of an increasingly global media business and culture, but we found that it was important to keep an eye on these more immediate and face to face relationships to help startup and smaller game enterprises survive the boom and bust cycles. It also helps embed game-making as part of everyday cultural and social life. This enriches the potential of games to become a more diverse and culturally valued and significant expressive medium.”

Thanks to the AHRC Video Games Research Networking Scheme for funding this project, to the DCRC’s Nick Triggs of the Digital Cultures Research Centre for helping to ‘bring it home’, to co-Investigator Helen Kennedy (Brighton University) and project partners Utrecht University and the Bristol Games Hub.

6th May 2015

Next week we are holding a free talk in the Pervasive Media Studio with Hannah Brasier.

Hannah is a PhD candidate in the School of Media and Communication, at RMIT University, in Melbourne, Australia. She is also a member of the nonfiction Lab. Her project-based research is developing potential models of online interactive video practice unique to the affordances of the network.

Hannah makes her interactive documentaries using Korsakow - software for interactive video that is often used for interactive documentaries. Her work is largely observational; a collection of short video clips gathered from everyday life.

She is also interested in the process of making interactive documentaries, with specific interest in Korsakow as a tool for thinking about documentary content and multilinear narratives. Hannah’s PhD will consist of four Korsakow interactive documentaries, which in varying forms, explore the viability of the essayistic form, list-making, and noticing, as potential methods of making interactive documentaries attuned to the qualities of the network as a specific site for practice.

She has previously presented at the Australian Screen Production and Education Research Association annual conference and is currently working on a chapter for a forthcoming anthology on interactive documentary. Hannah regularly teaches within the Media program at RMIT University, and is a visiting PhD scholar at the University of Leeds during 2015.

Five questions I am left with after #TtW15

The purpose of the New York based conference Theorizing the Web, now in its fifth year, is “to ask conceptual questions about the interrelationships between the web and society”. So after an intense two days, here are the five questions that I left NYC with:

1. When finding new languages to theorize the monstrous, mysterious and unfathomable, how do we make them preferentially accessible to people rather than capital?

One strong theme throughout the two days was the increasingly unfathomable and sometimes monstrous nature of the vast technological systems we are now immersed in in our daily lives. From the mysterious black box that is your car or your iPhone, to the arcane algorithms that shape your Facebook feed for maximum happiness (thereby unintentionally suppressing, for instance, news of the Ferguson protests), to the monstrous apparatus of mass surveillance (state, corporate, and even consumer-based), the language of magic may be an increasingly useful way of conceptualising the technologies around us. Of course, magic means different things to different people. This is partly what makes it such a useful and multi-faceted metaphor, but also one of its limitations. It is all too easy to declare complex technologies as magical and surrender the understanding and control of them to a specially trained an increasingly powerful technological priesthood. And so the key questions here are, how do we make that which appears to be magical transparent? How do we instil the values of transparency and democratisation of technology in those who aspire to priesthood? And, when theorizing magic and technology, how do we make these languages and concepts accessible to people rather than opening the doors to capital?

Sessions to check out:

• Magic, Machine and Metaphors, #TtW15 #a4
• Algorithms as Social Control, #TtW15 #k2
• Living with Algorithms, #TtW15 #a7
• (in)visibility Is A Trap, #TtW15 #a1

Panelists to follow:
@debcha
@lifewinning
@claudiakincaid
@wolven
@karen_es_levy
@luke_stark
@zeynep
@katecrawford
@nd_kane

2. How do we decolonise the web?

There is something deeply colonialist about early conceptualisations of the internet as a “new frontier”, and even more recent neologisms such as “digital native”. While, unlike the frontier of old, the web is not built on land already belonging to a people, it is nonetheless a deeply racialised and colonial space. It’s a space where black girls as young as eight and young black women who post twerking videos on YouTube are harassed, propositioned for sex, and called ugly, but white women’s twerking videos get millions of hits and are described as sexy and cute. It’s a space where white American tourists can review their tours of Jamaican plantations on TripAdvisor to complain about the food, thereby reconstructing what is and is not important about the sites of the history of slavery. In the physical layer, the internet is a space where Caribbean islands have ICT infrastructure which vastly outstrips local consumer demand – reflecting their history as a trading hub between Europe, Africa and the Americas, but also the fact that this infrastructure is there for the benefit of white capital, not the local population. Conversely, Native American reservations are some of the most poorly connected places in North America. So how do we decolonise the web? How do we shed racist and colonial structures, in our language, in the physical layer, and in online interactions? And how do indigenous and racialised people and people of colour use the web to dismantle structures power?

Sessions to check out:

• Racial Standpoints,

Panelists to follow:
@kyraOcity
@lpromeranthro

3. What is the cultural intervention necessary to undermine our collective belief in images (and data) as “proof”?

Pics or it didn’t happen! (And increasingly, metadata or it didn’t happen!) Of course the ubiquitous presence of smartphones with built-in cameras has helped, for instance, expose and document anti-black police brutality in the US and provide testimony of human rights abuses around the world. But our belief in and reliance on images and data as evidence is a two-edged sword. Even without the use of Photoshop, the photographer has power to frame an image to present conflicting narratives of the same scene. This is also the case even with what looks like a complete set of surveillance or metadata. An image in the hands of protesters may be a symbol of community, but in the hands of the police it’s evidence that you were there. In a humanitarian context, asking for images as proof is asking for images of another human body’s suffering. Documenting and archiving injustice becomes a form of humanitarian work, and gives the archivist power to adjudicate different suffering. At the same time, focusing on what is visible draws our attention away from that which is concealed. We see police point guns at young black men with their hands raised (which in itself encourages a kind of respectability politics), but we don’t see – and therefore don’t question – the 1.8 million black bodies incarcerated and brutalised by the US criminal justice system. So how do we neutralise or redistribute the power of data and images? How do we refocus attention? And how do we undermine our collective belief in the absolute truthfulness of images and data?

Sessions to check out:

• (in)visibility Is A Trap, #TtW15 #a1
• The Truth Is Out There, #TtW15 #a5
• Lockscreen: Control and Resistance, #TtW15 #c7

Panelists to follow:

@aintacrow
@lifewinning
@drcab1e
@joshscann
@karen_es_levy
@luke_stark

4. How does shifting medium shift the balance of power?

The internet is decreasing our attention span! It’s making us stupid! Yet more often than not, shifting medium – whether from offline to on or vice versa – can open new possibilities and give us new perspectives. If you assume text on the internet behaves like text in a book and compare comprehension rates then you may find the web performs badly. But if you look at text on the web as interactive, as something much closer to an oral, dialogic culture, then you can quickly see how it can improve learning outcomes and allow for new forms of creativity like the almost oral-like and folkloric storytelling you find in some communities on Tumblr. If you try to tell stories of hackers in a comic format, like Alyssa Milano’s “Hacktivist”, you may find that, for better or for worse, they quickly become superheroes. Printing content designed for the web, and searching Twitter for phrases you find on pen test pads in stationery shops can make visible the unique features of each medium, the disjunctures between them, and the inequalities in access and power. And taking Star Trek characters and writing stories about them having sex in a medium with different norms to mainstream culture may give you new infrastructures and languages with which to explore concepts like sexual consent. So how does shifting medium shift the balance of power? And how can we use such shifts to make visible, explore and challenge said power?

Sessions to check out:

• Writers’ Block (a video recording of this session is not currently available), #Ttw15 #b2
• The Truth Is Out There, #TtW15 #a5

Panelists to follow:
@zara_dinnen
@soulellis
@meganbigelow
@kamalasankaram
@elmyra (yours truly)

5. How do we create more spaces for healing and shut down spaces of harassment?

GamerGate is by far not the first organised hate campaign online, as anyone who’s ever been a member of a marginalised group in a public online space can tell you, but it has raised the visibility of online harassment to the general public. Platforms from Twitter to Wikipedia to popular online game League of Legends have come under fire for allowing or even enabling harassment. They have also, with varying degrees of success, tried to find ways to protect their users and shut down harassment, whether through architectural choices, human intervention or automated solutions based on machine learnings. Different online spaces, on the other hand, have enabled healing and community formation. Indie video games have allowed for the exploration of issues such as depression and the expression and sharing of personal narratives of trans people in a way not reliant on and aimed at the cis gaze. Online spaces like Tumblr and Twitter have allowed marginalised people to come together and develop communities which in turn enable forms of life-hacking, story-sharing and community-based self-care not otherwise available. We can learn a lot from the experiences of the Black Panther Party with genetic screening and healthcare, and from attempts by those classified as insane to gain a credible voice in society. How do we leverage the potential of technology while being vigilant of its excesses? How do we amplify marginalised voices? How do we build and nourish our online communities and ways that help with healing and shut out harassers?

Sessions to check out:

• H8, #Ttw15 #b6
• In Sickness and In Health: Technologies and Pathologies, #Ttw15 #k3

Panelists to follow:
@alondra
@m_kopas
@pushinghoops
@BriellaColeman
@carolinesinders
@ludist
@scroeser

All this is barely a glimpse into the huge variety and excellent quality of talks at #TtW15. Luckily, recordings of most of the sessions are already available online, with the rest hopefully coming soon. You can also check out the #TtW15 hashtag on Twitter, and follow most of the participants.

The app allows you to shoot video from multiple devices, in sync and play them back simultaneously through the Nth Screen platform.

Within the platform, you can also multiply and move the video to create a mosaic style playback like the one below.

Nth Screen collaborates with another studio project, Alphasphere.

DCRC director Mandy Rose, researcher Charlotte Crofts and research associate Jess Linington have all contributed to the development of the app, working with Tim through funding from the REACT Prototype award.

You can also enter a competition Nth Screens first film competition:

Nth Screen is holding its first ever film competition: the Nthscars. We are seeking delightful / moving / beautiful / funny / dramatic 10-second video mosaics made by you using the Nth Screen app and uploaded to nthscreen.tv. They could be documentaries, fiction, concept pieces, abstract visual montages, or … whatever you think will excite or move our judges.

Find out more and enter!

You can read more about the development of the app here or try it out yourself on nthscreen.tv. 

Kicked off by Sundance New Frontiers and with the looming release of consumer kits (if they stick with the 2015 release date), I think it’s safe to say we are in the year of VR.

This has not gone unnoticed in Bristol, where indie games studio Opposable Games organised South West VR; a conference dedicated to the exploding platform.

Whilst the focus was games, the majority of the speakers discussed the change in narrative structure, the new affordances that were on offer and the challenges of directing user behaviour.

Something that really stuck with me from the day was the realisation that this early open access to new technology hasn’t happened in a lot of people’s life times. Now creators of games, non-fiction, films and more have access to a platform that is experiential, immersive and empathy-inducing.

The lessons

Encourage exploration

Games designer’s Ana Ribera and Katie Goode both spoke of the challenges of getting your audience to really interact with VR when we’re so used to just sitting and consuming media.

- People don’t always know to turn their heads once in a VR world – create a bland, relaxing setting to slowly introduce people to the environment and its affordances.

- Add elements to an experience that encourage exploration.

- Reward the exploration when it happens.

A new set of rules

For every piece of tech that comes along, we try and use old language to create work. Nick Pittom (Fire Panda) highlighted that whilst we can take lessons from film, theatre and games – we must recognise VR is a new medium and we need new ideas.

Whilst you can point your audience through a narrative, the direction is driven by the viewer – they may not look where you want and they may not behave in the way you expect. Design the whole experience.

You can watch Nicks talk in its entirety here:

Enticing an audience

Ana spoke of the difficulties of sharing VR work when the platform exists within conference and demos – not in the hands of the general public.

One option is to release experiences through Google Cardboard, which is currently far more accessible – but doesn’t really provide a fully immersive experience.

You also need to expand to people who are outside the demo circuit – those who haven’t tried VR and don’t know what to expect. You need to cross people’s boundaries and make them want to try.

Be brave

Mark Washbrook and Paul Colls (Fierce Kaiju) recognised the the potential of VR to reach audiences that games haven’t been able too.

The opportunities within gaming to touch a wider variety of topics extends to non-fiction work as well – we are just at the beginning of exploring the possibilities.

Think about experiences in VR – passive things still work. Not everything has to be complex in its design.

The tech

Alongside the games and experiences and experiences being showcased, there was also some new tech being demonstrated.

Ultra Haptics

Ultrahaptics has developed a unique technology that enables users to receive tactile feedback without needing to wear or touch anything. The technology uses ultrasound to project sensations through the air and directly onto the user. Users can ‘feel’ touch-less buttons get feedback for mid-air gestures or interact with virtual objects.

Ultrahaptics was founded in 2013 based on technology originally developed at the University of Bristol, UK. The company secured Seed Funding in 2014 to allow for the further development of the technology and the expansion of the engineering team. Ultrahaptics is currently engaged with tier 1 customers, from multiple markets, with their recently launched Evaluation Program.

Wiz dish

The WizDish is looking to solve the problem of movement in virtual reality by providing a platform that allows you to “walk” around the environment without walking into a wall.

Although I was initially unconvinced after watching other people have a go – they looked unnatural and awkward – once I was in the dish and playing a virtual game of Pacman, it added to the experience hugely and to my surprise, felt almost immediately natural.

You can see my experience here – worth watching until the last second where I am caught by a Pacman ghost:

Immersiv.ly

immersiv.ly is a multi-platform app to showcase news reports and features produced in virtual reality and 360-degree video.

Check out Edward Miller from immersiv.ly’s talk: Will VR be the future of broadcast television?

You can see more of the talks, plus interviews with the speakers here.

Jillian York and Alan Rusbridger presenting the keynote, chaired by Prof. Ian Hargreaves

To celebrate the launch of two new Masters programmes, Cardiff University hosted Coding for Social Change; an event to discuss the ways in which digital technologies are transforming society and the role of journalism within this.

Press freedom and digital futures

Rusbridger framed this discussion within the keynote panel; explaining that there are a broad set of issues – which are intrinsic to our current use of the internet – that are going to face the public more and more in the future:

The role of journalists

During The Guardian’s coverage of the Snowden/NSA leaks, they received criticism from other news outlets, as well as the government who stated they had endangered national security. Should this reaction stop journalists from publishing leaks like this in the future or were they in the public interest?  Rusbridger continued by raising the blurring of lines between the powerful corporations involved in the leaks and government, stating he has a hard time trusting the claims from corporations that they are fighting surveillance and non-compliance.

US vs UK freedom

Jillian York, Director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, brought in the US perspective by calling upon the 1973 New York Times v. United States case, in which a high court ruling set a precedent for the publication of leaked materials in the US. She also highlighted the cultural differences around free speech/free press in our society; Americans have the importance of the First Amendment drummed into them throughout their childhood, whereas UK citizen’s right to freedom of expression is enshrined within Article 10 of the Human Rights Act – legislation that is not widely understood and is potentially under threat from our current government.

The complexities of  covering these digital issues, such as surveillance and privacy, was also raised - with Rusbridger pointing out the problems with the over-simplification of mainstream coverage, seeking sensationalist headlines over balanced, informed reporting.  York pointed out the positives of digital media as a whole, which has been a counter balance to the traditional press in the coverage of these issues.

Education

Following these stark warnings, a clear message from both York and Rusbridger was the role of universities within this changing landscape. The new generation of graduating journalists must be aware of these issues and know how to deal with creeping surveillance and reduced privacy.

For example, both discussed the necessity for end to end encryption to protect sources, as well as drawing attention to recent cases involving the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (Ripa), where journalists’ phone records were obtained by the met police.

Skill gaps

The role of universities extended into the second panel discussion as well, with Digital News Development Editor at The Times, Joseph Stashko, Matt McAlister , Director of Digital Strategy at the Guardian and Joanna Geary representing Twitter UK, all calling upon institutions to recognise the changing demands of the industry. 

‘Diving into data’

From working with news organisations, Joanna Geary didn’t believe Twitter is currently being used for its full potential. For example, the data mining opportunities for storytelling alone are huge – companies like Storyful have created a business model based entirely on a skills gap in this area.

McAlister seconded this, saying news organisations are missing a trick by not diving into data. He drew attention to the Guardians datablog, as well as their tool Swarmize, which was used to analyse tweets during the Scottish referendum. Stories come off platforms like Twitter everyday, they just need journalists who are adequately trained to pick them up and know how to get meaning from the data.

Coding: a shared language

There wasn’t an expectation from any of the panelists that journalists should all be able to code. Instead, they placed importance on a level of technical proficiency that allows journalists to successfully collaborate with programmers. They also encouraged a shared language and understanding that allows journalists to know what to ask for and be ambitious with their requests.

Experimenting with interactive

Obviously Snowfall was raised, as still possibly the most ambitious (and costly) piece of interactive journalism to date. However, all Geary was keen to highlight the need to manage expectations from journalists who want something visually spectacular.

New tools

 The feeling was that just because these new tools exist, there still needs to be careful consideration about how they are used, for example Stashko commented that ‘making a map doesn’t always serve stories’.

However in saying this, Matt McAlister was cautious not to stifle creativity; if we want diversity of storytelling, we must celebrate these thing and this is a great time to be experimenting.

The future of journalism is uncertain and will probably not take one single path, as the panelists recognised the difference in current and future business models. However, the pace in which change is now happening, with VR , interactive and open data, a clear message was that digital breaks down what journalism is and challenges its traditional, conservative nature.

Papers/presentations and workshops are invited in relation to the on-going themes of creative writing and digital technology, the future of the book, new forms of publishing, and new forms of digital curation, and in any of the following areas:

•    Digital fiction and digital poetry
•    Digital art and text
•    Non-fiction and multi-platform publication (digital and print)
•    Digital and interactive scriptwriting (including theatre-making and film -making)
•    Transmedia practice
•    Collaborations between writers and technologists
•    Participatory media
•    Transnational creativity

In partnership with the Digital Cultures Research Centre at UWE there will be a co-curated strand for which presentations are sought around either the practice of interactive documentary and or the emergent field of ‘ambient literature’, including mobile, locative, and other site-specific storytelling forms.

In addition, Bath Spa’s Media Futures Research Centre will co-curate a strand on ‘Analogue Futures’ for which invitations on the following are sought: the digitalisation of writing practices and techniques; remediation associated with emerging digital technologies; slow media; concepts and cultures of vintage, heritage and authenticity; sustainability and materiality within the realm of digital media.

Workshops on creative practice and pedagogical papers in relation to any aspect of the above are welcome.

There will also be a separate competitive international call to create a new artwork for our eight-metre high digital gallery space, MediaWall; this work will be launched during Writing Digital.

Abstracts of up to 300 words for a 20-minute paper/presentation or a 90-minute workshop should be sent to mixdigital2015@gmail.com by 31 January 2015.

Conference Website: mix-bathspa.org

Much has changed since Tomb Raider was first released in 1996, across both videogames and Game Studies.

Helen Kennedy’s paper addressed some of the concerns surrounding Lara Croft as a feminist icon for games. Critics have consistently argued that Lara, despite being a forerunner for female avatars in games, is also problematic because of her sexuality, her increasingly bionic appearance, and her target audience; male players. Created primarily for the male gaze, Lara occupies a problematic space in gaming culture and the representation of women within it.

Esther MacCallum-Stewart argues that Lara Croft is, despite her faults, held in high regard by female players. Lara has been a constant in their gaming lives, and an icon for female representation. Many women in the games industry credit Lara as an influential part of their lives and one of the reasons that they have remained fans of games and gaming culture. Examining earlier writing about Lara shows that despite this opinion being prevalent amongst gamers prior to this, it was often ignored by critics wishing to pillory Lara as an unfavourable role model. Her paper calls for a recognition of fan voices as a valid part of gaming culture. Fans are well aware of the conplexities of Lara Croft, but choose to repurpose or play with them in order to enjoy the games.

The recent reboot of the Tomb Raider has demonstrated that a more general trend exists in gaming whereby the female gaming body is changing. The 2013 version of Tomb Raider rethinks Lara Croft as a young woman discovering her own potential, with functional weapons that help her hunt, climb and move around the various types of terrain. Lara is repositioned as a heroine on a voyage of discovery, not a ‘cyberbimbo’ pandering to the male gaze. Scripted by Rhianna Pratchett, the new game reinvents Lara, but also reclaims her as an important heroine within gaming culture.

Finally, the paper argues that it is reductive to see Tomb Raider merely in terms of Lara Croft’s body. Too much criticism has focused on how Lara looks, and not on what she means to fans and players. Many of these players look ‘beyond’ Lara, celebrating her physicality and prowess, aware of her problematic appearance, yet still able to celebrate her as a strong female archetype. Moving beyond Lara’s body and towards her importance within gaming is therefore a necessary step of developing feminist debate within Game Studies and Transformative Fandom.

She is one of the women making games who have joined the Queen of Code initiative, which has been set up by Creative England and Crowdfunder to find and fund female developers in the UK.

Constance has sought to address the issue of gender and representation in her game; the player does not choose to play as girl or boy, but as a child. The gender of the main character is deliberately not important. The one character whose gender is clear is Granny, who is keeping a watchful eye as Lux creeps out to explore a midnight landscape under a full moon. Granny will not be a ‘little old lady’ as Constance is sick of older women being characterised as frail and lacking in power. 

Artwork from Lux and the Shadowmaker

In an interview with Creative England, she talks about her motives for making the game, what she’ll do with the funding and the support she has received from Bristol Games Hub:

Tell us a bit about your game studio and how it formed?

At the moment my game studio is me, working slowly, but as soon as I get some funding I’ll be able to work with a 3D artist and a Unity coder – it seems a bit much to ask other people to work on my idea for free… I know a lot of local indie developers through Bristol Games Hub, and the people there are really welcoming and supportive, so there won’t be a shortage of people to work with. I’ve had a brilliant piece of free artwork done to get the game idea across, but asking for more of that from busy people would be a bit too cheeky, even for me!

I’ve always liked the idea of making games, and have developed playful apps over the years with young and old people, and now I want to make things based on my own ideas. I really got into the idea of making games myself after attending XX Games Jam in London, and since then have been involved in organising and attending a few other jams at the Bristol Games Hub. I’ve developed a couple of ideas and collaborative experimentations but nothing live and public yet.

 How would you describe your game Lux and the Shadowmaker?

Lux and the Shadowmaker is a game that you play as Lux, a child who is woken up one midsummer night by a finger of moonlight coming through the bedroom curtains. There are strange lights flitting around in the shadows of the midnight garden, so Lux climbs out he window and goes out to explore. I wanted to make a game that didn’t involve having to thump, kick or shoot anything, that rewards exploration and moments of stillness.

Lux and the Shadowmaker grew out of a Writing for Games residential course I went on earlier this year in Yorkshire. Having a week away from home meant I was able to develop the storyline and design ideas and get useful feedback from the other games writers and developers there. The house, Lumb Bank, and its surroundings were pretty magical (and Sylvia Plath lived there once) and I used the layout of the gardens and fields and forests around the house as a basis for the different levels the player will pass through in the game. I’ve got lots of photographs to use as the basis to work on with the 3D artist.

What is it that you think makes your game unique to everything else that is currently out there?

I have absolutely no idea. Any piece of creative work will have echoes of other pieces of creative work. I know I want it to have a very English rural feel, set in a time that seems to suggest just postWW1, and then subvert that.  When I was at Lumb Bank I kept thinking of the fairy tales and stories that I read a lot as a child, and what I loved about them was there was often a resourceful and daring main character  who is a child – and I say child rather than boy or girl because I want to make Lux as genderless as possible. This means Lux will be a short character, so the viewpoint of the player may be lower than they are used to in Real Life. That will be interesting.

When did you fascination with shadows begin and what do you think they add to your game?

Shadows – well, there’s always something rustling in them. How often did you wake up and wonder what that monster was in the corner of the bedroom, until you screamed for your mum and dad to switch the light on?

The shadows in Lux and The Shadowmaker will be a bit unusual, in that they won’t always ‘fit’ with the objects they are attached to, and may move independently. And you won’t be able to reattach them with soap…

How important is the music going to be in your game?

I love the music I want to use – the Three Cane Whale tracks – for me they echo all the children’s animations I grew up with – like Noggin the Nog, or Pippin and Tog, ok, so mostly the music from anything  by Smallfilms  – I loved their work as they never spoke down to children and incorporated all sorts of strange tall tales, like wild haggises in Bagpuss.

What made you decide on Unity as the software for your development?

It seemed to make sense when I was writing, as I kept visualising moving through the games as a very 3D sort of experience. I’ve ‘done’ some very basic Unity and knew that you can make light sources and set angles so you get shadows, and as the shadows are a big element of the game  it seemed obvious to use it. I also want to develop my own Unity skills so it will be great to work with an experienced game coder and see how it’s done.

How did you hear about the Queen of Code programme and what was it that made you want to apply?

I think it was someone at Games Hub who mentioned it. I saw the info just after the Writing for Games course and thought, ok, it’s a chance to take that idea and make it happen.

What will the funding allow you to achieve?

I’ll be able to pay some more experienced people to work with me, a 3D artist and a Unity Coder. I’ll also be able to pay myself for my time to work on it so I can ignore other paid work for at least a month and get a good demo of the game to share with supporters to get feedback.

Have you used Crowdfunder before and what are your thoughts on crowd funding?

I’ve watched other people run crowd funding campaigns and I know it can be time-consuming and addictive watching the amount creep up. I’ve supported a few in my time as well, and seen some people manage to get a project completed that they’ve wanted to do for ages. It’s a brilliant way of getting a project going, if you get enough support. I imagine it’ll feel a bit like being the unsuccessful kid at school on sponsored walk day if you only get a fiver altogether.

What are you hoping to get out of the Queen of Code programme and where do you see your project in 12 months time?

Ideally the Queen of Code programme will get me to a point where I have a good small team of people and we create the first working version of the basic game. In an ideal world we get so much money on crowdfunder that we can pay ourselves for several months to get a really cracking version with all the envisaged levels and a huge fan base.

Constance is more than happy to talk non-stop to anyone who is interested in the story of the game and how it will look. You can see more on her games site PrettyDigital.co.uk or follow @prettydigi.