Interactivity and Transmedia: new presentations

At i-Docs we love a couple of things: sharing and our community and this post is a perfect combination of the two! A couple of brand new slideshows from Siobhan O’Flynn which she presented at  the CWC Strategic Digital Leadership Accelerator in Toronto last week, particularly useful for people interested in interactivity and transmedia: CWC Social Story Business & You …

Hackathons, podcasts & choose your own adventure: an update from i-Docs

Over the past few weeks, we’ve had some good emails to the i-Docs inbox about some interesting things happening in the world of interactive documentary, so thought we’d share them with you! First up, you can download a great podcast about documentary in the digital world from the folks at ABC (Australia) Radio National: “Most of us have a stuffy …

Upian strikes back: Alma is out

After 2 years of hard work, Upian (Gaza/Sderot, Prison Valley) has just released Alma. This is not a story like others, nor an i-docs like others. Although it is a cross-media production (it is an iPad application, a website, a documentary, a book and an exhibition) it is one unique story made available on different platforms. No game, no story-world, no transmedia …

TED gets remixed

Ryan Merkley, COO of the Mozilla Foundation, demonstrates Popcorn software in this short, but informative TED talk which has recently been put online. Incase you weren’t already aware, Popcorn.js is an HTML5 media framework written in JavaScript for filmmakers, web developers, and anyone who wants to create time-based interactive media – you can find out more in this short film by …

OFFSHORE: a creative space between serious games and i-docs

OFFSHORE has just launched their online preview!  Try it for yourself… it is worth it… OFFSHORE is a web documentary created by Brenda Longfellow, Glenn Richards and Helios Design Labs that explores the dark waters of the global offshore oil industry in the wake of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion. The storytelling  takes place within the virtual world of a 3D, imagined oil rig that …

‘Newsgames’: playing with the news

Using a game as a narrative resource in journalism is nothing new, although it is a minority pursuit. Nevertheless, the influence of gaming strategies is growing in digital works and even two Pulitzer journalists are working in a documentary and a game. Their goal is to make the world aware of the conditions of inequality in which women and children …

Tommy Pallotta on technology and documentary

The following is an interesting interview with Tommy Pallotta (Collapsus) – who is apparently currently working on a documentary were animation is  widely used (not clear if there is any interaction too). Pallotta has an interesting view on technology – a view that I entirely share and that I always try to remember:  “For me” he says ” technology is …

¡Documentary Now!

A guest post from Adina Bradeanu, originally published on DocWest. Set up to explore the ‘contexts and possibilities’ of past and recent docu-output, and organized by documentary scholars Alisa Lebow and Michael Chanan, the ¡Documentary Now! conference has joined forces this year with Open City London Documentary Festival, and moved to a new location within the UCL. I only attended a few presentations during each of the …

Henry Jenkins on the The Transmedia Generation: Web chat TODAY

The Transmedia Generation: Spreadable Media, Fan Activism, and Participatory Culture At 1.00pm (GMT) Henry Jenkins will be opening his virtual doors and conducting a web chat and you could be a part of it. Commonly referred to as the Digital Generation, or Digital Natives, young people of today’s new media world think, learn, create, and mobilize politically much differently than …

The Block: Stories From a Meeting Place

The Block, a residential area in Redfern, Sydney, was established in 1973. Located on land traditionally inhabited by the Gadigal people, it quickly became known as a place for the Indigenous community: “a place where people converge to share their stories and to release their pain. For the Stolen Generations in particular, it is a place to reconnect with long lost …

i-Docs and the BBC

I wrote this post for the Open Democracy website. It is one of a number of open letters to the incoming BBC Director General, that have been published within the OurBeeb section of the site. MR You’re a journalist; investigating the working conditions of the miners who are fuelling China’s industrial growth. You follow leads, conduct interviews in the polluted, devastated landscape of Shanxi, …

TFI New Media Fund: a look into the projects now

Last year saw the first ever recipients of the Tribeca Film Institute new media fund. Four to eight non-fiction projects are funded between $50,000 and $100,000 as well as mentoring and peer support for producers. The projects funded were a diverse collection of nonfiction transmedia works, including i-Docs keynote Jigar Mehta and his project 18 Days in Egypt. Eight months later …