Creative Workshop in Leeds
Last week Hyper Island was involved in a really interesting event called The Ideas Generation Workshop, presented by Screen Yorkshire and 4iP in Leeds.
The one-day session included a series of presentations, providing different perspectives on creativity and idea generation within the digital industries.
First up was Richard Adams, from the School of Communication Arts 2.0, who spoke about the volume of messages people receive, and what brands / individuals should do to try and get their messages heard. As an example Richard spoke about the McDonald’s approach: using social media not as a channel for broadcast messages, but as a platform to respond to queries and complaints in order to manage a brand’s reputation. Richard was followed by Jodi Richmond from Leeds agency Swamp (Now Brass), who talked about a new application they have developed which gives clients real-time access to data about their digital campaigns. Jodi talked about how this new software, named Kukutoo, was helping their business break into new markets.
Daniele Fiandaca Presenting
Next up, Daniele Fiandaca spoke about digital communications and campaigns. We saw examples of some really exceptional advertisements, viral campaigns and online strategies. Here’s one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMr1HkkHKaI. At this stage I could feel the room beginning to enter creative mode, and starting think about how they could use some of these ideas for inspiration during the afternoon session.
After lunch we heard from 4iP’s Digital Commissioner, Lucy Wurstlin, who gave a great presentation about 4iP and some of the projects it has funded, including well known projects like the AudioBoo app and MirrorMe. We also got a sneak preview of some of the upcoming projects, which I have to say look very interesting indeed! Keep an eye on the 4iP website for announcements.
The Hyper Island Creative Session Action Begins
Until this point the day had been about listening and studying, but now it was time for the action to begin with the 1-hour ‘Hyper Island Creativity Lab’ with Thomas Reibke. The cobwebs were shaken off with a couple of quick warm up exercises, and then we launched into an ideas session on the latest 4iP brief related to the 2012 London Olympic Games. Each group was asked to come up with ideas for how to add interesting digital elements to the games. The ideas presented ranged from games and apps centered around Olympic sports, to online words of wisdom from a ‘Daily Lama’.
All in all we had a great day, where the mixture of presentations and activity balanced well. It was great to witness first-hand the interest and potential from digital professionals in the Yorkshire region. We at Hyper Island are now really looking forward to September, when we run our Accidental Leader and Manager courses in the region, delving deeper into the creative processes at play in the digital industries, and looking at how they can help businesses and individuals in Yorkshire maximize their potential in this ever changing digital landscape.
