It’s been another busy week in the Studio with the REACT Books and Print teams starting to develop early project prototypes, a new film competition being launched for the Bristol Temple Meads Quarter commission and a very exciting Tron themed evening coming up at Watershed, read on to find out all about these delights and more...   

The Books and Print Sandbox projects are now over the half way point; from new ways to publish biography to the use of behavioural psychology to gather local news, the successful projects include a rich and fascinating mix of ideas and topics. All the projects have been blogging about their progress so keep up to date with all their developments here.

Opposable Games have been working on creating a Tron mini game to show at the Filmic 2013: Tron + Man vs Machine After Party, and will be testing out a pop up arcade co-curated by Bristol Games Hub at the event. It should be a really good night with the Café/Bar in Watershed being transformed into an Elec-TRON-ic neon haven; with a Tron-inspired photo booth, day-glow makeup artists on hand and other surprises up their sleeves (including prizes for fancy dress). Tickets are now on sale on the Watershed website so gets yours before it sells out.

Splash and Ripple have been developing their Heritage Sandbox project Ghosts in the Garden. Part game, part story, part immersive sound scape (accessed via a special 'Georgian Listening Device'), present-day visitors meet and interact with real characters from the museum’s gardens’ heyday, in a unique experience where history and imaginative play meet head-on. They have now received further funding to develop their prototype and are planning on installing it again on a longer-term basis in the Holborn Museum in Bath. You can find out more and watch a video about the project here.

Tim has been settling back in since his recent trip to Kenya as part of Bristol Council Culture Shift II, you can read a blog about his trip here - he’s also just launched an issue of Magma poetry magazine that he edited with Karen McCarthy Woolf. Its theme is 'The Soul and the Machine'. You can see a sample of it online at magmapoetry.com, or as a complete e-edition here.

Will Luton was on the 6pm BBC news talking about In-App purchases in Free2Play Games, you can watch it here, and his latest column for Develop magazine has just been published – he talks about when you do - and don't - need outside help from consultants. He’s also been working on his new website which went live today, check it out here.

Next week the ten shortlisted projects of Bristol Temple Meads Quarter: Gateway Project will be announced. The Gateway Project brief was launched, by Bristol Festival of Ideas director Andrew Kelly, to create work that helps visitors learn about the area and guide them on their way. An overall winner will be announced at the Festival of Ideas awards evening on May 21st, with a prize of £2,500. You can find out more here.  

Meanwhile tickets are selling fast for Give Me Back My Broken Night; a theatrical guided tour of the future of your city. Originally developed as part of Watershed's Theatre Sandbox Programme the show returns to Bristol for its UK premiere following performances as part of the European City of Culture programme in Guimaraes, Portugal. Presented by FUEL, Uninvited Guests and Circumstance, the show is part of a series of Bristol Temple Quarter commissions. You can find out more and book your tickets on the Watershed website here, but you need to be quick as some dates are very close to selling out.

Also as part of Bristol Temple Quarter commissions, Bristol Encounters 0117 Hour Digital Short Challenge launched this week. The 0117 Hour Digital Short Challenge invites filmmakers, animators, visual and sound artists from across the land to make digital shorts in just 117 hours, focused on the theme of 'Journeys' and exploring Bristol Temple Quarter. Presented by Bristol Film Office, Encounters Short Film and Animation Festival and M Shed, the 0117 Hour Challenge is now on its third edition. Register online before Thursday 11 April to participate.

Finally don’t forget to join us today at 1pm when Studio residents Opposable Games will be giving a awesome Lunchtime Talk. Last year, Opposable Games released Clockwork Racers, an iOS racing game with a twist. The game allows players on multiple devices to compete against one another with a single shared screen for competitive racing fun with an old-school flavour. Navigating the uncharted waters of multi-screen mobile gaming, development of the game required overcoming a range of technical and design challenges, and this talk outlines some of those challenges, the solutions created, the opportunities presented, and offers a bite-sized post-mortem of the project as a whole.