Develop your project with professional support
This interactive storytelling and multiplatform production training program is now in its sixth year. Under the direction of Diego Briceño (Makila coop) and Michel Lefebvre (TOPO), this bootcamp aims to support the development of creative projects by offering a context for exchange and learning with a variety of specialists in the field of digital project design, realization and production. The bootcamp includes four Saturdays of professional meetings and 3 hours of mentoring with one or other of the guest speakers.
This training is offered with the support of Emploi-Québec.
For this first online edition, a variety of meetings and exercises using collaborative work tools are planned.
Detailed Program
DAY 0 - Wednesday, January 20, 2021, 5 pm to 7 pm
Preparatory meeting
Objectives : To meet and hear about the experience of a bootcamp organized by the NFB and Arte, and prepare to use the bootcamp's interaction platforms.
16 h 50 : Opening of the meeting
17 h 00 : Opening remarks and brief introductions by those present
17 h 15 : Valérie Darveau, in charge of editing for the NFB's Interactive Studio, will share some of the lessons learned from a collaborative virtual exchange program between creative artists supported by the NFB and Arte (France).
- Context of the Workshop
- Implementation (rules, tools, platforms)
- Key take aways (learning)
18 h 00 : Introduction to the platforms used for bootcamp, mainly Mural, which will be used on Saturday January 23. The other platforms are: Zoom, Miro, Figma, Padlet, Slack, Google Drive, EventBrite.
On the subject of Mural, here is a link to a video by Stéphanie Lagueux prepared for the Artenso research center for art and social engagement: https://youtu.be/Du1JrqDES3c
DAY 1 - Saturday, January 23, 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.
9 h 30 – 10 h 45 : Project presentation with Diego Briceño and Stéphanie Lagueux.
11 h 00 – 11 h 25 : Structuring workshop - Tips on the art of the pitch by Diego Briceño and operating instructions with Mural
11 h 25 – 11 h 30 : Dividing the artists into 2 groups
11 h 30 – 12 h 30 : Structuring workshop - Beginning of the workshop with Mural, in two separate groups (20 min per project).
LUNCH BREAK
13 h 15 – 14 h 15 : Structuring workshop (continued)
14 h 30 – 15 h 45 : Structuring workshop (continued)
16 h 00 – 17 h 00 : Artist talk - Introduction by Stéphanie Lagueux and presentation of an online experiment with Olivia Mcgilchrist.
Diego Briceño is a Colombian-born media producer and equity and inclusion consultant with over 20 years' experience in the film, television and new media industries in Canada and abroad. Through his production company Cuiba Media, he specializes in the co-production of transmedia projects with a strong international appeal. He is co-founder of Makila, a not-for-profit media incubation platform, and co-creator of Cuban Hat, a contest for pitching presented at numerous media markets around the world. He currently sits on the board of the Alter-ciné Foundation, which provides financial support to documentary filmmakers in the South, and is now co-responsible for supporting under-represented communities at the Canada Media Fund.
For the past twenty years, Stéphanie Lagueux works as an artist, mediator and webmaster in the field of artist-run centers, as part of the team at Ada X (Studio XX), at 3e impérial, at RAIQ and at CQAM. Her artistic practice revolves around the creation of interactive and participatory experiences in the public space, in duo with Jonathan L'Ecuyer. Based in Terrebonne, she is involved in regional cultural development with the organization Art Partage, and is working to create fruitful links to promote access to the digital arts.
DAY 2 - Saturday, January 30, 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.
9 h 30 – 10 h 30 : Presenting the projects with Diego Briceño and Jean-Christophe Yakono (Yako), artist and interactive designer.
10 h 45 – 12 h 15 : Meeting and structuring workshop with Yako
Yako opens his sketchbooks and presents some of his completed and unfinished projects. Time is set aside at the end of the morning for artists to illustrate elements of their project with sketches.
A French-Canadian writer, director and producer, Yako is one of Canada's leading industry designers, at the forefront of interactive, immersive and participatory experiences, and considered one of the most innovative creative directors. He has won numerous national and international awards (Grafika, Boomerang, Gémeaux, Numix, FWA , Webby, SXSW, Comm Art, TDC, ADC...). He is a signatory of the Manifeste pour les Nouvelles Écritures, a statement of intent on digital and interactive cultural production in Quebec. After several years as a freelancer, he joined Moment Factory in 2016, then Cirque du Soleil. Today, he concentrates on black-and-white photographic creation, collaborating in particular with the dance world.
12 h 30 – 13 h 15 : Lunchtime experience - Virtual conference in VRchat (free to view on YouTube) hosted by Myriam Achard, Head of Partnerships and New Media at the PHI Centre.
LINK : https://youtu.be/yR0L2IkrUj8
13 h 15 – 15 h 00 : Structuring workshop – Prototyping with Figma
User experience mapping and prototyping
Interactive designer Yannick Guéguen will present ideation tools, scripting documents and user feedback methods based on some of the projects he has completed, including mesmots.ca, and will propose a schematization and prototyping exercise using the Figma platform.
Yannick Guéguen is a sound and digital artist, interactive designer and landscape architect. He has designed several immersive sound works linked to the territory, focusing on the creation of sensory experiences. More broadly, he is interested in mixed, alternate and augmented reality experiences, crossing several design disciplines: interaction design, game design, sound design and 3D creation. He also creates mobile applications designed to provide experiences linked to the territory, while reinterpreting the forms of sound interaction. His work has been exhibited in renowned contemporary art venues, as well as in public spaces.
15 h 30 – 17 h 00 : Presentation – Parallel Lines (PHI Centre)
Myriam Achard will present the digital turnaround initiated by PHI Centre at the start of the pandemic. Next, Daniel Fiset, assistant curator for engagement at the Centre PHI, will talk about his experience in accompanying a dozen artists for Parallel Lines, a program of 10 virtual creative residencies with artists from a variety of disciplines.
The presentation will focus on the Lignes Parallèles residency, which was inaugurated by PHI in response to the first spring 2020 confinement. During this sixty-day residency, ten laureates produced projects for a digital exhibition that was presented in the summer, and which will be adapted for a physical exhibition scheduled to open in early 2021. The artists-in-residence were invited to document the evolution of these projects during the sixty days of creation via online studios, conceived by PHI as showcases for the creative process. The presentation will reflect on the "résidence-chez-soi" and the "studio-en-ligne" as artistic forms, and address various possible linkages between the virtual and the face-to-face.
Myriam Achard, Head of New Media & PR Partnerships, PHI
Myriam Achard has nearly 25 years' experience in the cultural and communications fields. She worked at Spectra, where she was in charge of press relations for major Montreal events including the Jazz Festival, the Francofolies and Montreal High Lights. She has also worked at the Berlin and Cannes Film Festivals. For the past 15 years, Myriam Achard has worked alongside Phoebe Greenberg to develop and promote the Canadian and international avant-garde art scene.
Daniel Fiset is a cultural worker, curator, educator and author based in Tio'tia:ke/Montreal. He currently holds the position of Assistant Curator of Engagement at the PHI Foundation for Contemporary Art, where he has worked for nearly a decade. He recently completed a doctorate in art history at the Université de Montréal, focusing on exchanges between contemporary art photography and amateur practices via digital architectures. He is also interested in the intersection of artistic and pedagogical practices, critical cultural mediation and the redefinition of public art.
DAY 3 - February 6, 2021, 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.
9 h 30 – 10 h 30 : Presenting the projects in the presence of Diego Briceño and Katherine Melançon
10 h 30 – 12 h 00 : Meeting and workshop with Katherine Melançon
Recent works and developing a content strategy to communicate your projects
Artist Katherine Melançon will first present some of her recent works (ISEA, Elektra, PHI).
Next, a collaborative workshop will enable artists to explore different content strategies for promoting their projects on social media.
Katherine Melançon is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice focuses on non-traditional processes, tools and materials, as well as on the encounter between the natural and the technological. In a loop between experimentation and results, she seeks to question materials and explore their journeys through cycles of metamorphosis between the virtual and the material. She obtained an MFA from Central Saint Martins in London, UK, and has exhibited in Canada, the United States and Europe. She also holds a bachelor's degree in communications - interactive media from UQAM, and has been working in digital communications for over twenty years. Katherine lives and works in Montreal, Canada.
12 h – 13 h : Imagine 360 with Daniel Grozdanov
Virtual tour of Art souterrain's exhibition
Co-founder of imagine 360 with Waël Chanab and a specialist in cinematic capture for virtual reality, Daniel Grozdanov is responsible for putting the Art souterrain installations online to enable a virtual tour. He will briefly present the different sites to be explored, the technical challenges and the tools used to offer an interesting virtual tour. Enjoy your visit and your dinner!
13 h 15 – 15 h 30 : Structuring workshop – Stories of a Near Future
Creating narrative experiences for the near future
With Léah Snider and Jonathan Bélisle
Case studies of interactive installations on two industrial sites, one on the Gaspé Peninsula's Banc-de-pêche-de-Paspébiac National Historic Site and the other under development for Parks Canada on Montreal's Lachine Canal. These two creative projects are staged with the help of Calmr une plateforme de création d’expériences augmentées fait sur mesure par Jonathan Belisle, entrepreneur culturel en médias interactifs depuis plus de vingt ans.
This presentation will also give bootcamp artists the opportunity to think through their projects using the interactive design tools of the Calmr platform.
Léah Snider is a doctoral student in art education at Concordia University and is actively involved in projects that promote engagement in public space.
The director Jonathan Bélisle has been a web entrepreneur for over twenty years. He's an interactive director, a passionate UX writer, a creative technologist and an inspired teacher. After studying cinematic narratology and mastering visual thinking, he fused them with ethnographic and service design methods to playfully approach complex problems related to mobile and interactive storytelling experiences, connected objects and media. He is co-founder of UX MTL, professor of experience architecture at INIS and founder of his Hello company, Architekt. He is the creator and entrepreneur behind Wuxia the Fox – wuxia.ca. He is now working with the video game firm Behaviour.
16 h – 17 h : Artist presentation – Plongeons
The artist Sven and the developer Paul Gascou-Vaillancourt will present a photographic installation as well as the augmented reality application Plongeons, available via the AppStore. This project passed through bootcamp in 2018 and was showcased at TOPO en vitrine in September 2019.
DAY 4 - Saturday, March 6, 1 p.m. to 5 p.m.
PM : Pitching the projects, with Diego Briceño, Michel Lefebvre, Ghassan Fayad (KngFu) and Marie-Hélène Parant.
16 h – 17 h : Artist presentation
Barometer - Rumors and whispers
Artist Daria Marchenko and developer Sylvain Aubé present the transmedia project Barometer, who passed through the bootcamp in 2018. Bar conversations are recorded around a few typical everyday hashtags.
Originally from Moscow, Daria Marchenko has lived and worked in Quebec since 2007. Photography and video are central to her professional ambitions, and she collaborates with various media as a freelance photographer, videographer or photo director. Her professional and artistic practice includes photography, videography and work with sound and websites.
Her academic background includes a bachelor's degree in photojournalism (2007 - Moscow), a bachelor's degree in film production (2016 - Montreal) and a master's degree in media communication (2011 - Montreal). From 2014 to 2016, she lived in Hong Kong, where she discovered a passion for documentaries and took her first steps in cross-platform visual production with a smartphone app, "Occupy Alarm", with the Hong Kong pro-democracy movement Occupy Central as its focal point.
Sylvain Aubé is a web consultant specializing in Drupal. Before joining the media team at UQAM's Laboratoire NT2, he was an integrator for Whisky Echo Bravo between 2009 and 2011, as well as a freelancer. A Drupal fan since 2007, he has also worked for a number of cultural institutions, including SAT (Société des arts technologiques), the Daniel-Langlois Foundation, the Oboro artist-run center, the Conseil québécois des arts médiatiques and Agence TOPO.
