RLUK Digital Shift Forum Digital creativity and the future of storytelling - Damian Murphy York

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my name is damian murphy professor of sound  and music computing at the university of york   and i'm also director of a project called exile  stories creative industries r d partnership and   my talk is about digital creativity  and the future of storytelling   and it's an opportunity to reflect on some  of the work that i've done at the university   in collaboration with many colleagues around  creativity digital creativity and that's led to   the the xr stories project and how this is uh  changing or shifting and some of the research   that we do and the culture of research at our  institution and with for our colleagues we hope   so um just over six years ago maybe five six  years ago and the university of york launched   a new strategy and that's for research and that  strategy was focused on seven themes of activity   multi-disciplinary activity under which our  work could become focused and one of those   um themes was creativity and i was looking and  privileged enough to be the research team champion   for creativity and it was a huge opportunity to  work with many brilliant colleagues over the last   five years and i've just stepped down from  that role and there's a new cohort of research   champions who are taking over from now and so  it is an excellent opportunity to reflect back   on what this theme has meant and what maybe has  changed as a consequence of our work and endeavors   over the last five years and so when we set out  to sort of explore the themes creativity at york   emerged from 50 years we're still quite a new  university of interdisciplinary collaboration   and we recognize that creativity is a key driver  of modern dynamic societies and it's at the center   of all aspects of our research excellence at the  university certainly it was a theme that i felt   all colleagues could could be part of because  fundamentally research teaching learning is   a creative endeavor in particular our research  work consists considered the nature of creativity   the creative process um across linguistic and  cultural aesthetic and cognitive dimensions but in   particular we were starting to realize back then  there was a particular emphasis or interest in   research at the convergence of technology digital  games interactive media and how we could work   with leading partners in individuals creatives  organizations in the creative economy to try and   deliver new experiences that would provoke inform  and entertain for the wider benefit of our society   and again this work was based on perhaps 30  years of activity in my own discipline which   is sound of music computing and music technology  and this was based on a collaboration between our   music department and our engineering department  based on a common language and a common interest   in research practice collaboration between the  two disciplines and how computers ultimately   and engineering methods could be used to meet  the needs of composers over many aspects of   that 30-year period and so that project music  technology is one of the key areas that has   sort of emerged from from york over that  particular period of time and indeed it's   helped it's given me um my position at the  university over that period of time as well   and perhaps more recently that's been made  manifest in a fairly new department although   it's 10 years old now department of theater film  television and interactive media which you can see   on the right hand side there and indeed that's a  fundamentally multi-disciplinary department that's   founded on creatives scholars researchers  working across theatre film and television   production and post-production and interactive  media effectively computer science and so it's   a fundamentally multi-disciplinary department  that brings together arts and humanities research   practice collaborating with computer science and  engineering to understand and inform new forms of   creative research and so i just want to talk about  some of the particular interesting projects that   um i've emerged over the last few years as part of  the creativity theme to give a wider sense of how   colleagues and projects have identified  with that particular subject area   one of which was um an example of  archaeological creativity this is a   an 11 000 year old pendant the earliest known  example of mesolithic art in britain that was   found at a site not too far from the  university of york on the yorkshire   coastal near the yorkshire coast called star  car and colleagues in archaeology worked to   interpret and explore and examine this beautiful  piece of work which you can see here on the screen   and it has these very very fine indentations  and engravings and they use 360 degree lighting   techniques and computer visualizations in order  to explore visualize render and make you know   realistic what this piece of of art looks like  and and particularly from the point of view of   being able to talk about it and write about it um  in their publications and so um there's a really   interesting publication there in the journal of  international internet archaeology um where that   piece of work is particularly explored and you can  see some of the methods that they use to render   the the the pendant beyond just traditional 2d  imaging and 2d representation to explore and give   us the reader a sense of of what it looks like and  what it means and the importance of this artifact   for our archaeological  understanding of our country   and if we move from the department  of archaeology to the department   of history um and the center for the study of  christianity and culture um this small research   center uses computer visualizations  animation film to reveal the architecture   culture and history of the cathedrals churches and  the heritage sites around the uk and that's about   interpretation and it's about communication and  understanding but it's also about what the methods   and techniques used in deploying those  visualizations ultimately reveal for the   the core researchers working in the history and  the architecture the archaeology of these sites   what they reveal about those sites which is  new and couldn't have been explored through   without using these methods  as part of their practice and colleagues in **Psychology** are also  using computer visualizations and this is a   a project called the four mountains test and this  is a means of simple and non-invasive detection of   early onset alzheimer's and it's based on sets  of landscape visualizations that focuses on as   you can see in this slide here an arrangement of  four mountains and the test consists of giving the   the subject a set of four images in series where  three of those images are the same mountain range   but rendered using different lighting conditions  to reflect different time of day different seasons   of the year different viewer perspectives on that  particular scene and one on the fourth picture   then is a slightly different change version of  it but ultimately it's not the same landscape   and this helps to give an early potential  detection of alzheimer's because the the   way that alzheimer's affects hippocampus  affects our spatial perception of the world   around us and makes that task of identifying four  similar but three the same one different images   all the more challenging and and so it's a it's  a really interesting project and that is relates   to you know how imaging can be used for diagnostic  testing in disease and could potentially transform   early diagnosis options for what is a terrible  disease and you can find out more about the   project at the link there on the full mountain's  test but we also work with our city and we work   with cultural organizations and we work with  artists and the york curiosity project was a   collaboration between history of art and many of  the cultural centers in york to explore the city   through contemporary art installations and the  idea here was to move away from the traditional   iconic aspects of heritage that exist in our city  to think about its past and the environment in   different ways through colour texture and wood  and we work with again colleagues in history   archaeology history of art to explore aspects of  the city in different ways and to and to build   hidden aspects of contemporary art in the city for  for the um visitors to explore in a different way and one of the other big projects at  the university something called digital   creativity labs which in itself is a team  of multi-disciplinary researchers working   in many different aspects of digital media and  storytelling and this particular project which   we call viking vr they worked with yorkshire  museums trust as part of a big exhibition that   itself was a partnership with the british museum  that explored and displayed contents from um   a number of viking hordes um as part of a major  touring exhibition and there was a particular   challenge set to the colleagues in dc labs digital  creativity labs as to how these artifacts these   aspects in the collection could be translated into  experiences and to be and to use virtual reality   to render those experiences for visitors as part  of the expert as part of the ex the exhibition   and so the project brought together again  archaeologists animators sound designers   user experience researchers scholars of literature  to help bring to life the scenes related to   these collections and the great viking army  when they were camped at torksey and lancashire   lincolnshire around 872 a.d and so it was a huge  and significant and difficult project to try and   manage um and tell the story of these pieces in  a way that was going to be meaningful and deliver   effective and learning you know experiences  that could work for you know hundreds of people   through the exhibition a day and and some of  the challenges around that is how you deliver   a virtual reality experience that's going to  work in the museum context and so that enables   us to build these beautiful masks that you see  on the right hand side of the screen which have a   vr headset embedded with them within them and how  they could be it could be used day in and day out   and how they could then translate into new  novel experiences that could be shared by   all the visitors to the museum and and give them  shared experiences as part of that so part of the   research was also in the user experience for  this project because virtual reality if you   strap yourself in a vr headset can be quite an  isolating experience we wanted to make it a more   shared experience so that families could explore  it together so that was a very interesting and   rewarding project to work on and so perhaps what's  emerged out of some of these you know wonderful   projects that um i've had experience of working  with colleagues on over the last five years is   they do all feature digital aspects as part of  the core work and so that led then more recently   to work on what would digital creativity look like  at york and what might it look like in our future   so we've worked on consulting widely across our  whole sort of community of researchers scholars   professionals at the university to understand what  part it plays in their work and with the view to   looking to our future and our aim there now is to  build a community of interdisciplinary researchers   actively researching creativity in all its forms  that's embracing and supported by core technology   digital tech tools and methods that both inform  and influence new research as well as enhance   existing research output so it's about core  research but also supporting existing research   and to enable collaborative research both with and  for the creative industries the cultural sector   and other relevant external partners where there  are shared economic culture and societal goals   for the widest benefit and publicly good because  many of the projects that i've cited so far are   all about collaboration and working with  external partners and so the basis of this   strategy then was to was four principles  that we would like to work on in the future   the key importance of interdisciplinarity in our  work which was one of the original sort of aims of   of the original research themes we want to invest  in skills training and support services to enable   that change for a wider part of the community as  possible we feel it's important to have a place   within the community a place where colleagues can  come together and share their experiences and work   on things together and articulate new questions  of research around these experiences but of course   there's also challenges around what we mean by  a place within the university now and we've all   been learning to work in different ways over the  last 12 months because of covid and the particular   relevance to that as well is partnership as part  of that partnership outside of our university and   other universities and how the work that we do  can be part of the community renewal we would   like to see post covid so that gives a sense of of  where we've come from and some of the work that's   ongoing at our institution around creativity  and how that's informed then our strategy for   digital creativity and maybe we'll come back to  some of these points for the future as part of   the q a but i want to talk a little bit now in the  last five minutes or so the presentation about a   particular project that's emerged at this time  which is the xr stories project and this is one   particular project that has a significant focus on  digital creativity and the future of storytelling   it's one of nine significant large investments or  projects around the uk from ahrc to support and   develop work for the creative industries working  with universities it has a focus on what's called   clusters of activity that's a cluster in terms of  the creative sector within which you're working   and the region in which that creative sector is  particularly active and the map on the right hand   side of the screen shows um the the one two three  four five six eight projects and then there's   what's also called the policy and evidence  center which sits underneath all of the   the regional projects to try and draw  together some of the evidence that we're   gathering about how r d in universities  helps and supports the creative industries   and xr stories is focused on yorkshire humber  and their screen industries cluster which is a   significant area and region of activity supporting  the film television and games industries across   a diverse region of the country that we  identify as yorkshire but actually consists   of many different counties and regions and at  the heart of this activity of at the heart of   the screen industries cluster in yorkshire  and humber here are two organizations screen   yorkshire that supports investment and production  in film and tv in the region and supported in turn   by the british film institute and indeed the  exile stories project is a partnership between   the university of york screen yorkshire and the  bfi and you see there some of the the brilliant   content that has emerged recently from yorkshire  number production companies and locations in both   film and television and then also associated with  the activities of screen yorkshire the bridge film   institute is one of the largest games networks  outside of london in the southeast called game   republic and again there's a huge community of  small to medium to large companies working in the   games industry around various sort of cities and  regions of uh yorkshire and humber and xr stories   focuses all this activity to try and establish the  yorkshire and humber screen industries cluster as   the uk center of excellence in immersive and  interactive digital storytelling no less than   the future of storytelling and storytelling is at  the heart of everything that we try and do as part   of the xr stories project so what does the future  of storytelling look like well from my perspective   i can go back to sort of you know my sort of idea  of what the future of storytelling was like when i   was growing up and for me it was books like um  the choose your own adventure series and which   then led on to the fighting phantom fantasy series  of books and ultimately these are you know books   where you're able to to some degree choose your  path through uh some form of branching narrative   uh giving you the reader some kind of agency in  the story to hopefully succeed in solving a series   of problems and get the best outcome of course i  was never quite satisfied with that and i would   always be reading those books with a finger in  each page i think that was trying to look at the   best possible option to get me through to the end  of the story and of course nowadays that's that   kind of branching narrative based storytelling has  been you know supported and replaced by technology   so for exile stories the project of and the future  storytelling is about research in that particular   area and colleagues working industry in that  particular area focused on two core areas which   is virtual reality and related technologies  and then interactive storytelling so i've   already mentioned some of the work we've done  for instance with viking vr in terms of what   vr technology might be or what it might offer in  terms of interactive media that's still quite new   outside of the games industry but probably the  most famous example of this in television in   recent years was banda snatch as part of the black  mirror series where you could again choose your   own adventure or choose your own path through the  story by making decisions at particular points and   we're the excel stories project is fundamentally  for our companies in the region to support them   in their work and endeavors in the future  of storytelling through the research and   development work that we're doing in yorkshire  and humber universities so as an example of   some projects that we've supported over the  last two years so exile stories is its midway   point we've been two and a half years in and  we've got another two and a half years to go   one project is led by opera north working with  the university of york and they had the production   just a year ago actually of benjamin britton's  turn of the screw and they were interested and   are fundamentally interested in expanding their  audiences to bring in new and younger audiences   into this old and traditional form of storytelling  and so rather than doing the usual approach for   a trailer for their production which would be a  filmed version of production on stage they work   with a number of companies and our researchers  at the university of york to build this beautiful   interactive immersive 360 degree trailer that  allowed you to explore particular scenes from   the opera and listen to the performers render  that out in lots of different ways as of january   last year when it went live it had nearly a  hundred thousand views and most interestingly   from those views two thousand people or more  than two thousand people have booked tickets   so this trailer itself is about advertising but  it's also a way of tracking data through to see   who watches the trailer and then goes on to buy  a ticket and can we understand the demographic   of that audience to understand what the impact  of such a shift in how we market ourselves is to   the audiences that we get and so we did some work  focus grouping this and of a group of young people   60 agreed strongly and that the trailer made them  more interested in seeing live opera and um and   only four percent said that the trailer had not  changed their idea of what that art form was about   and for opera north it's been hugely important  as well they've seen it as a completely new   way to think about reaching new audiences it's  led to a shift in their marketing outlook and   and to involve participatory techniques again  to reach out to audiences and that's also   resulted in the doubling of their investment in  digital engagement particularly post covid when   of course it's so hard for the live performance  industry to again make sure they're relevant and   reaching audiences and continuing to do their  work at a time when audiences are not possible   uh traditional audiences that is the rising tide  of the humber is a project between the university   of hull and a small company called beta jester and  they've worked together to develop an immersive   vr story world to visualize how a historic  flood affected the city in the 17th century   it's based around the poet andrew marvel  who wrote about the event 400 years ago   and they've developed a 360 degree vr video  as an immersive experience and transports the   user back to the time of the flood beta gesture  developed the model in collaboration with maps   archival evidence archaeological evidence and  work with the university's energy and environment   institute to understand what the flooding effect  would have been at that particular time in history   and the idea again is to allow users to experience  hull as it would have been in the 17th century   and discover what caused the flood in the eyes  and the words of the poet andrew marvel and   finally from the exile stories project uh as a  brief sort of introduction to what we're doing   this is a project between again our colleagues at  dc labs at the university of europe bright white   which were a york-based interactive media company  and the science and media museum in bradford   and it's about it's called responsive interpretive  storytelling and it's using a combination of   vision sound ai holographic display to deliver  the right story about particular artifacts to   the right audiences at the right time and in  particular here the object is the bbc mark   marconi axbt microphone which probably has a  limited audience of interest in its own right   but of course when one learns about the role  that that artifact has played over the life   and development of the bbc's broadcaster  to the to the country into the world   the stories it has literally heard suddenly  it becomes a very very interesting artifact   aside from its in terms of its abilities as a  microphone and from that then a whole possible   world of stories and interpretation become  possible and the audience is for those stories   and the final thing that i want to mention is  um a project that emerged a little bit out of   the creativity theme from colleagues at our  library and i.t services at the university of   york which is called digital creativity week and  this was about engaging with students across our   organization to engage with the potential for  what digital creative tools mean for them and   also engaging with the collections in our library  and archives and also with the city and so over   the course of a week a whole cross-section cohort  of students come together learn about coding learn   about digital editing image editing sound editing  and the tools to author digital media content and   by the end of the week they need to have found  something that engages them that relates to the   city and relates to our collections and they  have to put on a series of art installations   by the end of the week which is then open to  the wider members of the university community   it's a wonderful wonderful project um it's  it's been a very satisfying thing for me   to be personally involved with and to see  some of the work that's emerged from that   and everybody's had a lot of fun along the way so  uh thank you very much for listening that gives a   sense and a flavor of some of the work that we're  doing at the university of york and have done   and what ex-our stories might mean in  terms of the future of storytelling   and very happy now to have to um listen to  questions and have a bit of a discussion thank you thank you damian that was that  was really fascinating and just   some really lovely examples of projects  bringing digital creativity into practice   and there's some questions starting to come  through now if anybody has any questions if   you could um note them in the in the q a  function and i'll kick off with a question   if i might and so how might we grow um a wider  pool of of digital creatives who who are able to   embrace some of these opportunities yeah it's  a that's a really good interesting question   it's something that we've reflected on a lot  certainly because what we felt as part of doing   the digital creativity strategy work there was a  sense of if you're inside the the wall as it were   and you understand that the tools the technology  and the language around um sort of this idea of   media convergence then then that can be quite  alienating to those who don't necessarily sort   of understand it as their the core work and so i  think um collaboration and that interdisciplinary   disciplinarity part that i mentioned a number  of times is core to that particularly around   research and developing a common language  and a common understanding of of what might   be possible and then the other part of that i  think which has particularly come out through   the um aspects of the uh the digital creativity  week and also from our strategy work is developing   skills around that particularly you know coding  skills as well and and how um understanding the   digital language of code can ultimately transform  what you're able to do and the questions that you   might ask because there's an additional depth and  layer to the understanding behind the questions   that open up new worlds and new questions  new avenues avenues of research ultimately there's a question come through about digital  poverty and are there any issues around that here   and can we ensure that we're not disenfranchising  some audiences yeah yeah clearly that's a huge   issue and i think it's a huge issue um that we've  had to deal with in many aspects of our lives over   the last you know 12 months in particular it's  an issue that we've had to think about in terms   of all aspects of our teaching and learning at  the university and universities across across   the country and wider and it's not something that  we should shy away from but i guess at the other   side of that in terms of it's looking at how we  can support particularly our institutions those   individuals who don't have access to such um you  know tools technologies a place to do this and   again that came through i guess in some of our  our work and and what we didn't want to do is to   create another sort of silo of of activity that  again is separating out um those who are not   able to access for whatever reason um what might  be again a a really open door for their future   potential and so for us again it was really core  to work and engage with particularly our libraries   and archives and i.t services as being the central  place that people can access to enable them to   again find what's right for them and to you know  to get the support they need to be able to um do   this kind of work and that might be as simple  as booking a laptop out of the date it might be   learning how to code it might be um you know  accessing our network as best they can to enable   them to do the basic work they need to do so it's  not going to go away but at the same time i think   clearly um it's it's a huge issue that  we need to get better at because we are   changed by the last 12 months in terms of how  we engage and work digitally with one another   thank you and thinking about some of the tools  that you've mentioned are there any issues with   long-term preservation yeah yeah absolutely you  know that that's one of the particular challenge   really is um uh you know as as so much of this  is embedded in you know the tech sector and and   the provision of tools and technologies  and software to enable this work to happen   and that then is subject to the the whim of the  market and whether a company is successful or   not long-term so there's huge issues about um  how one preserves and archives both the content   and then develops skills and tools and  technologies that are translatable across   different media different platforms different  software and so again i guess that's part of what   we're trying to encourage in terms of digital  skills is that we're not teaching people to   use particular things we want them to have a  common language understanding and ability such   that those skills become translatable and future  proof them slightly and so yeah and there's also   big questions in terms of how we then preserve  an archive particularly all these new experiences   that are being developed for very bespoke and not  very common sort of virtual reality and similar   platforms and and how then we you know think about  keeping them for future generations and translate   them into the the next to the media platforms that  come along lots of issues around that certainly   yeah thank you and there's a question  from kevin grist that's sparked echo   of immersive storytelling where community  groups and non-technical experts have had   a major input and the question really is how  accessible might this become in the future   um yeah let's see if i can  think of a particular example um i suppose at the moment in the projects that we're  working on in relation to dealing with community   you know we're sort of working with community  groups to understand their stories and using   you know those who are expert in the media  to translate those stories into experiences   again there are issues about how that  technology that then translates into   those communities and so we get  back to sort of you know an issue   an access issue and how we enable  others to explore that but i think   it's also about translating the skills down to the  individuals in the community so that they can um   don't need gatekeepers to the the platforms  and the technologies to tell their own stories   i think that's that's really really important and  um that will only um you know develop as as as the   technology and the me you know it's still a very  new medium it's interesting that um for instance   there aren't many examples of interactive film  and television the bandist one was a great big   sort of high platform high profile experiment but  it hasn't necessarily spawned lots of copycats   and so there's still lots of risk associated  with these new media platforms and these new   storytelling experiences and what they might be  so there's a long way to go yet i think before   they become commonplace and so there's roles for  us in the privileged positions in our you know   institutions to bring as many people along with  that story and to tell their stories as we can and there's a question about covid and how do you  think the the cultural sector could benefit from   some of these um initiatives and and tools you'd  describe to help with their recovery and perhaps   find new audiences yeah yeah that's that's a  a huge question um and a really important one   i think you know i guess from two of the extra  stories projects i can i can cite examples of the   turn of the screw opera north project happened  just before uh lockdown last year but clearly   what they learned from developing a new form of  interactive trailer in terms of engaging your   audiences has informed them how they approach  their digital strategy as an organization   post covid the example from the science and media  museum has asked to shift considerably because   that was designed to be a live exhibition that  was going to go up last year and of course that   hasn't happened so there's it's still unclear as  to how that project will actually roll out and   become something and meaningful whether it will  change to be a digital and online experience only   another really interesting and quite high profile  example of this that was in the news recently is   the work of the royal shakespeare company and  there's another big parallel set of projects to   the ahrc creative clusters um projects called  the audience of the futures project which are   industry-led projects that are exploring again  immersive and interactive storytelling and um the   royal shakespeare company were have been leading  on digital engagement with shakespeare content   and using digital platforms and clearly and  they had a plan to deliver something around i   think it was a midsummer night's dream last  year but of course that all had to change   um and so but they've taken the learning  that they were doing in the development   of the digital aspects of that work and that  performance to be an online only experience   which is going live in in march and there  was a lot of press done about it last week   and it's very high profile very important event  to go and get your tickets and go and explore   what a midsummer night's dream might be  digitally and online so yeah i think it's   hugely important and of course again we still  want to go back to live shared experiences   but new experiences are coming out of this  and it will change how these organizations   work and hopefully protect them somewhat  against similar challenges um in the future   thank you there's quite a few questions that  are coming in about in relating to the pandemic   so how have you considered how to support digital  creatives in the wake of the of the pandemic what   additional support they might need yeah that's  an interesting one um and a big question um   i don't you know i think the work that  we've done in exile stories has been   okay so an example here is is the work that we're  doing in exile stories and most of the companies   that we've been working with um so far are  technology focused um probably from more of the   games industry than film and tv and and that's  because they've been able to adapt quite well   to the the restrictions of lockdown and home  working in in a way the film and tv production   and again has been written about quite a lot  in the press in terms of film and tv production   has found more challenging um and also the nature  of the the content that they produce means that   there's you know there's a digitally online  audience that they can market to and sell to   that's already there um but we're concerned that  again it comes back to questions of sort of you   know um digital poverty and the common language  and understanding of what the potential is for   this medium i suppose um there is uh you know  it's been harder to engage more traditional film   and tv production companies in the opportunity  that such digital media and virtual reality and   interactive storytelling means for them and part  of that is just the traditional production process   that comes from a commission for a particular  program or series of programs and the very tight   schedule that then is used to deliver that and  to produce it for a particular platform or medium   and um so we in the next coming year  we're specifically addressing that by   setting up a challenge that's going to be led by  a particularly sort of you know forward-thinking   media production company to directly challenge  the film and tv production companies to think   about something different um here's some funding  here's an opportunity to work with us and to work   with our ideas you've got great storytelling  um chops as it were great storytelling ideas   great writers great production teams how would you  respond to this challenge which could potentially   become a much bigger commission and so that's  so that's sort of an example of again trying to   encourage creatives to think new  ways about what the medium means   that then potentially leads them to  new audiences and new ways of working   and i guess that might not address the issue  which might where the question might have   emerged about individual creatives rather than  large companies and i think there you know   i i guess i think from my own experience  it's about building you know building online   communities of engagement and and you know this is  an amazing opportunity this platform here there's   a hundred participants i can see and if we've done  this in real life in a room somewhere in in the uk   it would maybe be 10 20 30 40 participants who  travel to be able to go to it so there's you know   things like zoom although far from satisfactory  enable us to reach out to communities in a way   that we haven't really had to think about before  and i think again that will that will encourage   and enable those communities to grow and to  support one another and we're not just going to   go back to the old ways we'll have to use some  hybrid blended model in the future that brings   the best of both i would hope thank you  and this question about impact and have   you done any work to capture the impact  of these digital storytelling approaches   yeah we we have done some and so a couple of  examples there at the viking vr project so part   of that was we did a big audience engagement  piece to explore people's perceptions of   the experiences to explore whether people had  engaged with virtual reality technology at all   whether this is the because it was  you know primarily aimed at families   and and so this was from i think we saw about 60  000 people go through the exhibition and i can't   quite remember the numbers but for the majority of  people who had the experience it was their first   time of doing anything in vr and therefore  we could get some really valuable feedback   on what that experience was like for them or  whether they'd return to something like this   and also it um although i didn't mention it then  it then did inform the next exhibition that was   going into the museum yorkshire museum and that  had a vr aspect as well because clearly it worked   really well engaging families and particular  audiences and then the other thing of course   is the um is the turn of the screw trailer  which we did do some data gathering around   and and particularly you know their work they were  quite still clever about it and said it's not just   a novel means of engagement let's see how many  people buy tickets on the back of watching this   trailer and will that inform what we do in the  future and that's a really good example of that   and on the xr stories projects it's probably  a little bit too early to tell now most of the   first set of projects are just finishing so  we're doing the work now to go back to them   and do the evaluation and monitoring work that we  need to do to understand what the impact has been   from those projects both for the communities  they've worked with for the organizations   for the businesses and for the academics  that have been involved with them as well okay um lots of questions coming in now um so  there's one from an artist who's creating a   a geo-located audio installation with interactive  sculptures and what would be your tips in terms   of where to go for inspiration for products  and ideas uh go and look at echo's xyz i   think it's called which is a company that does  geo-located audio tours they're brilliant and   they're you know they can help you turn um audio  content into something that will be interactive   geo-located that anybody can use on their  phone great great idea great project top tip um there's a question about addressing the  balance um where there's a feeling or perhaps   a misconception that digital creativity isn't  very academic um how won't we address that   perception yeah that's a really good one  um uh i would you know i i think the the it is very i think there's a there's a  barrier of perception there in terms of   what it means and possibly a barrier of you know   not feeling comfortable in the domain you're  not familiar with and i'm being a bit fearful   of what you might learn about yourself and and  the outcomes of working in that new area um you   know i i can give an example from my own practice  which i haven't sort of mentioned previously which   is a project with a colleague in the department of  history and he and the work that we did um around saint stephen's chapel which is part of the palace  of westminster which was the original seat of the   house of commons which burned down around 1840 and  we worked on a pro he worked on a project that was   looking at the history and the archaeology  and the architecture of that space over a   considerable number of periods of years and as  part of that process some beautiful 3d models   were generated by our colleagues at the center for  study of christianity and culture but from that we   were able to ask questions about the nature of how  parliamentarians sat and engaged in that historic   house of commons chamber and from that then we  started to realize there were questions about   um how women engaged with political debate at  that time when they were otherwise excluded from   particularly the public gallery in the  house of commons and there was a study   or project that emerged from that about called  listening to the commons which was all about   and particularly how women used to gather in the  ventilator space around um uh again and listened   in to debate and what their experience of  listening to those debates were and so my   colleague john is a historian tuna historian and  suddenly he's working in areas of visualization   oralization sound acoustics that he never would  have thought of before and suddenly i'm also as   someone who's working you know an expert in sound  i'm working in the politics of women engaging   with you know um the the political debate at that  time and aspects of and women's suffrage and the   last hundred years of you know of of women in  politics in the uk and all of this went into   the voice and vote exhibition in parliament  a couple of years ago which was a tremendous   privilege again to work as part of so but there  was you know that that relationship that research   relationship between myself and my colleague john  and the colleagues who worked on that project was   all about communication understanding shifting  perspectives and a lot of talking before we could   understand what we could each bring  to something new so fundamentally   it comes back to the idea of collaboration  interdisciplinarity and communication and to   establishing a common ground and from that then  new and really exciting opportunities can grow   thank you a question about libraries and what  libraries might do to transform their offer   um in support of digital creativity you talked  a little bit there about about the uh the york   example and and the great digital um creativity  yeah is there anything else you think we can do   well i think one of the one of the one of the  interesting things that came out of our digital   creative strategy work was where would we want  this work to sort of who would you want to own   it and and um if we want to really you know  again i might hate to use the term develop some   kind of leveling up agenda for our institution to  bring as many colleagues along as possible with   the opportunity that we see a sort of a certain  number of colleagues have benefited from so far   and so we felt that the library was actually  key to that and and key to the strategy was to   to put in place a project manager and a project  manager who would be responsible for building the   links between these different communities  both within and out with the university   and also a research technician or a research  engineer who had expertise and a background in   the social sciences and the arts and humanities  but had the technology and digital skills to be   able to translate the ideas that colleagues might  come from those disciplines into something where   they could again interface with aspects of the  collections or the archives or the technology   to help those ideas along and to encourage  those colleagues to sort of benefit from   those findings as well and so for us it was you  know it was central that um well the library is   essential part of our university a core pillar  of what we offer and to put those individuals   in the library means they become for the whole  community so it was fundamental it is fundamental   to our thinking around um how we you know have  a shift at our own in our own home as it were thank you how can we ensure that storytelling  stays at the heart of the work of this work   that engenders engagement rather than a focus  on on doing cool things with tech yeah that's a   really good question and you know storytelling is  is at the heart of everything really and you know   um i've told a story about the work we're  doing about storytelling ultimately there   are many more different stories to be told  about that work and and as human beings   telling stories is is fundamental to what we do  and to how we communicate make sense of the world   explore the world and communicate the world  to you know um the people around us so i   don't think that that's ever going to go  away and again maybe it relates back to   one of the other examples i gave of how we engage  with film and tv production companies to take on   sort of or explore what this technology means for  them and fundamentally it's not even the film and   tv production companies we need to engage with  it's the writers the writers are at the heart   of the whole process and the writers who are you  know come up with the story ideas and articulate   those stories and see them through to whatever  final platform they're delivered on be that a   book or be that a film or a vr experience  they're key to the whole process and so   by again informing i guess we're thinking the  production companies they can then inform the   writers and the writers can see the opportunities  of this medium but without the writers it's just   a bunch of technology um the stories are at  the heart of it and and that will never change have you done any work looking at sustainability  of some of these projects or any any successful   strategies to to ensure that projects  become more embedded and sustainable   so rick that's a really good question um and  in particular um you know for for me and for   colleagues who've been working on this at the  university of york there's quite a sort of um   a blurry line between our take on digital  creativity and research in that area and   digital humanities and in that it's all part of  the same piece and i know that there's certainly   a lot of work being done in aspects of digital  humanities to think about what the impact is of   increasing levels of digital technology and  our digital footprint and ai engines and data   storage and all that what all that means in terms  of the wider sustainability and impact of our work   in the world so um it's not something that's  a core focus of for instance xr stories at   the moment or the work we're doing as part of  our strategy work at the university it might   come through as particular sub projects as part of  that but i know it's certainly a significant issue   in in the field more generally and more widely  and it's one that we certainly need to address okay and this question about promotion of  these projects and what channels have you   used is it primarily social media or what other  solutions have you tried yeah that's that's   another really interesting question um i think  yes social media of course is really important   most of the examples that we've cited so far  were ultimately designed to go to a live audience   be that at a festival or be that in an exhibition  in a gallery somewhere or be that on a screen for   a shared experience um and so again that's that's  been a huge had a huge impact on how the projects   and the organizations and the companies we work  with have respond to that challenge you know a big   um platform for the creative clusters projects on  behalf of the uk and ahrc and so on was the south   by southwest festival in austin in texas because  that's one of those big festivals where you know   there is a big convergence between technology and  storytelling and new experiences and and that was   a really important shop window effectively for  some of the projects that we were developing and   the companies who developed them and again that  that was it was this time last year when it was   one of the first big sort of cultural flags that  basically said this is going to be a serious   situation that we're dealing with when south by  southwest cancelled around this time last year   and so that's again had to mean that had a huge  impact on the companies from the uk and from exile   stories were going to go there and so they've had  to all shift and pivot onto sort of online means   um so again i think there's there's issues around  how we promote this how we make it accessible how   we engage with those audiences how we preserve  those experiences more generally for future people   to explore them and experience them and i think a  lot of the projects and the companies that we work   with at the moment are thinking about that thank  you um question from an archivist um uh commenting   that's fascinating possible for exhibitions but  then there can be reluctance amongst some archive   towards non-traditional speculations um from the  archaeology case study or any others is there   any guidance on making the case to explore this  yeah that was again a really good and relevant   question the viking vr project was a really good  case in point there and that was a huge risk for   the yorkshire museum to take on on what was going  to be a really high profile exhibition for them um   and to give a part of that exhibition floor space  away to a digital medium that had never been tried   in the context of either that kind of exhibition  or um the yorkshire museum before so it was a   huge risk and uh but it was it was a risk worth  taking and again it was down to a long period   of collaboration and communication between the  digital creativity labs team at the university and   the team at the yorkshire museum particularly  their digital officer who again they that those   two individuals understood what the potential  was here and it was a case then of really sort of   taking a long-term planning view on it and  really sort of you know risk checking it at   every stage of the process and making sure it  was going to work and it was going to deliver   and it was going to work day in and day out and it  wouldn't stop people going through the exhibition   because it was a huge bottleneck for instance  and the project almost fell down at the very   very last minute because the paint on the  masks that we created was not antibacterial   and we had to try and source antibacterial pain  that was going to be health and safety compliant   and put up with 60 000 people over three  months going through and handling them   so even the smallest things it almost  all came down to the last minute   thank you from a writer i love the spread of  questions here so a question from a writer are   they at a major disadvantage because not many of  them have coding skills that's a really oh god   that's a really good question i don't think they  are because um i i would you know anyone who you   can i i wouldn't at no point would we want to um  you know disenfranchise or or those who who can't   code or can't or aren't sort of digital natives  or o fade with this technology because there's   still so much that can be brought to the table  in any kind of collaboration or research project   but i think there's there's other advantages  that can be brought if you're able to at least   appreciate and communicate in that kind of side  of the language and the technology and what   then it offers that's new to your own practice  and and so you know i think that's probably um   the best sort of way of thinking about it  really it's not to replace and it's not to   demean any anything that an individual brings  to again a particular collaboration or a project   but it's what can be added to your skill set  already and your practice and your experience   that you would not be able to have done before  that opens up new individuals avenues for you   as an individual so i would yeah i don't think  you're a dis a writer is at a disadvantage but to   learn and understand for instance what non-linear  narrative might be in the co and how that might   be realized for different digital platforms would  potentially be a really exciting thing to explore thank you one final question and what was  opera north's conversion rate with their   traditional style trailers well that's all  that's a data question i don't have to be fair   um but i don't think they tried it before i  don't i really i think the nature of this type   of trailer was um to explore that opportunity  whereas previously it was a pretty sort of   traditional example of let's shoot the production  on film on stage make a short film of it cut it   up for about a minute and make it available  so people got a sense of the excitement it's   going to be like i don't think they tried it  as a specific digital marketing tool before   i could be wrong and i'm happy for my colleagues  on that project to tell me that i am wrong   and but i think it was quite a new thing  for them first chance to try this out okay

2021-02-26

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