Week commencing 05 November:

With only six weeks to go until Christmas talk is turning to Christmas jumpers, Santa’s grotto, mulled wine and mince pies! Meanwhile our lovely Studio residents have been working away to launch new services and games, exhibited at Venturefest and had some great news, read on to find out more...

On Wednesday Venturefest, the business creation networking event kicked off. Venturefest is free event organised by Science City Bristol that brings together over 1,000 people, from students wishing to learn about all aspects of business, to seasoned investors looking for their next big thing, to entrepreneurs seeking funding, to designers seeking new customers, to people who are seeking solutions to particular business problems. Calvium and Opposable Games exhibited at the innovation showcase and danceroom Spectroscopy also gave a fantastic live performance. Verity and Simon attended the event as delegates and said they met some great people and the pitching sessions were really intresting. You can find out more about Venturefest at their website here.

While at Venturefest, Calvium also launched their app sprint service. They first developed this method while helping to create an app that encouraged children to explore Tooting Bec Common in London. Calvium’s developers spent a day working with public art organisation UP Projects and artist Jacques Nimki to design, rapidly prototype and scope the app using AppFurnace. It was such a great success that Calvium are now ready to roll this new fast paced and exciting approach out to other people, you can find out more information on their website here.

This week there’s been more brilliant news over at the nu desine desks as they have just had an order of 150 AlphaSphere units placed from a good friend in China. DeL has also been preparing to speak at a Children in Need event at the Centre for Additive Layer Manufacturing (CALM) in Exeter on Friday.

Opposable Games are working away to release Clockwork Racers, a multi-screen family racing game for iOS (mobile, tablet, Apple TV and Mac). They are hoping to submit the app to the Apple store next week for approval! We’ll point you in the direction of a link as soon as it’s out, but for now check out their website here.

On Friday Watershed and the Studio launched a new initiative ‘Time Bank.’ Time Bank is aimed at supporting artists, filmmakers and cultural organisations who are exploring the use of digital technologies in their work. The Watershed team will offer their thoughts, learnings, mistakes and examples of related work that we have seen and rated. We can help you think about next steps and, if appropriate, suggest potential collaborators. Watershed Time Bank takes place on one day every quarter. You can book a half an hour slot to discuss anything, or you can join us at the end of the day for an open discussion where the people who turn up will set the agenda. The first time bank will take place on Wed 16 Jan in the Studio. To book a surgery, please email admin@pmstudio.co.uk with a short description of your work and area of interest and we will endeavour to fix you up with the appropriate member of the Watershed team. You can find out more information here.

Plus don’t forget to get your thinking caps on for our Playable City Award, which is a new commission open to artists and creatives from across the world. With a challenge to use creative technologies in surprising and engaging ways, the winner of the award will receive £30,000 to create a new work which will be installed in a public space in Bristol next summer (before being toured internationally).  We’re really excited and can’t wait to see the fantastic ideas that come forward, you can find out more and apply for the award here, and follow @playablecity on twitter.

Lastly remember to join us next friday at 1pm for a fantastic Lunchtime Talk from artist Nikki Pugh. Nikki will be talking about the interfaces that have arisen out of recent and current projects: lumps of clay imparting fragments of people's stories absorbed by the city; bubblewrap creatures with tendencies towards claustrophobia; and waggling waxy pods, so make sure you don’t miss it!