Three CreativeXR cohort companies selected for Tribeca Film Festival 2019

Digital Catapult and Arts Council England are proud to celebrate the success of three CreativeXR cohort companies whose immersive experiences have been invited to participate in the prestigious Tribeca Film Festival in New York, from 24 April to 5 May.

Featuring cutting edge virtual and augmented reality projects from around the world, the Tribeca Immersive programme is a core part of the Tribeca Film Festival, celebrating content and storytelling in all its forms. The companies were part of the first cohort of CreativeXR, a joint programme between Digital Catapult and Arts Council England to stimulate the strength of British storytelling and commissioning talent, helping startups in the creative industries use immersive technologies like VR and AR to reach new audiences and create compelling and unique content.

The three companies selected for Tribeca Immersive are:

Common Ground by VR City: a groundbreaking 360 degree interactive immersive exploration of the history of the notorious Aylesbury Estate in South London.

Traitor by Pilot Theatre: a high-stakes thriller, two-player escape game challenge requiring audiences to complete puzzles to reveal the story.

The Collider by Anagram: an immersive experience that explores your the audience’s personal relationship with power.

Rebecca Gregory-Clarke, Head of Technology, Immersive, Digital Catapult, said: “The opportunity to showcase these hugely creative and varied immersive experiences, which are each so groundbreaking in their own ways, to an international audience opens up all sorts of possibilities for the four companies moving forward. It’s so exciting for those of us who have been involved during the process of development and experimentation over the last 18 months to see these experiences recognised in this way.”

Ben Lane, Senior Manager, Enterprise and Innovation, Arts Council England, said: “These three pieces show that when artistic talent and vision are brought together with the immersive power of virtual and augmented reality technology, extraordinary things can happen. It’s been a privilege to follow the development of these prototypes from idea to fully fledged experiences and it’s fantastic to see them selected for the Festival.”

CreativeXR was developed by Digital Catapult and Arts Council England to give creative talent the opportunity to experiment with immersive technologies to create new experiences that inspire audiences. It focuses on the creative industries, particularly the arts and culture sector, providing the best UK creative teams the opportunity to develop concepts and prototypes of immersive content using virtual, augmented and mixed reality. A second year of CreativeXR was announced in early 2019; find out more at creativexr.co.uk

About Digital Catapult

Digital Catapult is the UK’s leading advanced digital technology innovation Centre, driving early adoption of technologies to make UK businesses more competitive and productive to grow the country’s economy.

We connect large established companies, startup and scaleup businesses and researchers working with artificial intelligence, immersive technologies, and future networks (5G & LPWAN) to discover new ways to solve big challenges in the manufacturing and creative industries. Through this collaboration businesses are supported to develop the right technologies to solve problems, increase productivity and open up new markets faster.

Digital Catapult provides physical and digital facilities for experimentation and testing that would otherwise not be accessible for smaller companies.

As well as breaking down barriers to technology adoption for startups and scaleups, our work de-risks innovation for large enterprises and uncovers new commercial applications in the advanced digital technologies that underpin a modern industrial economy.

For more info please visit www.digicatapult.org.uk / @digicatapult

About Arts Council England

Arts Council England is the national development body for arts and culture across England, working to enrich people’s lives. We support a range of activities across the arts, museums and libraries – from theatre to visual art, reading to dance, music to literature, and crafts to collections. Great art and culture inspires us, brings us together and teaches us about ourselves and the world around us. In short, it makes life better. Between 2018 and 2022, we will invest £1.45 billion of public money from government and an estimated £860 million from the National Lottery to help create these experiences for as many people as possible across the country. www.artscouncil.org.uk