Studio blog
Posted on Thu 3 Sep 2015
Awards, festivals and testing, testing, testing - a fortnight in the life of the Studio
The last two weeks in the Studio have fallen into a few natural categories, so for the sheer joy of a tidy format - here they are all laid out nice and neatly for your delectation:

Crane Dance by Laura Kriefman. Image: Cranes by Michael Lewis
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The last two weeks in the Studio have fallen into a few natural categories, so for the sheer joy of a tidy format - here they are all laid out nice and neatly for your delectation:
Awards:
- Congratulations to current New and Emerging Talent residents, Open Bionics, who won the prestigious 2015 James Dyson Award for their 3D printed robotic hand. A lot of people have picked up the story, from the BBC to a full page feature in The Times, but for further info there is a nice write up in Wired that would be a good place to start.
- Our warmest congratulations too, to resident Esther MacCallum-Stewart who is a part of the now, award winning Journey Planet fanzine, winners of the one of the best accolades in the Sci Fi business, The Hugo Awards. Look out for an upcoming piece that Esther is working on at the moment on letter writing. Without giving too much away, it is going to be beautiful.
Festivals and events:
- Laura Kriefman is gearing up for a spectacular event featuring three of the iconic maritime cranes outside Bristol's MShed museum, as they unfold a synchronised dance with lighting and musical accompaniment. You won't need a ticket, so put the date in your diary and prepare to be amazed. Crane Dance will take place at Bristol's dockside on Saturday 3 October, 7pm.
- On Thursday 17 September, Tim Kindberg will be running two workshops in the Studio as part of this year's Encounters Short Film Festival: 11:30 Nth Screen - Multi Camera workshop 15:30 Nth Screen - Mosaic workshop Both events are free to Industry Forum Pass holders.
- Following on from a triumphant Cuisine + Colour event a couple of weeks ago at Watershed, Sabrina Shirazi is now preparing to run Edible Face Mask events at this year's Bestival in the Isle of Wight, 11 - 13 September. Foodie beauty experts will be on hand to help festival-goers whip up a mouth-watering face mask from a buffet of healthy ingredients.
- On Monday 7 September, the doors will open for the first time on Raucous' The Stick House, a dark gothic fable told through a new type of immersive theatre. The Stick House runs from 7 Sept - 17 Oct and many of the shows have sold out already so grab your tickets quickly.
- More of the programme for the No Boundaries symposium on the role of Arts and Culture has been announced, and we are delighted to share that Studio residents Circumstance will be running A Folded Path for delegates in Manchester.
Testing, testing, testing
- In just 12 days time, a pack of Urbanimals will be unleashed onto the streets of Bristol, this Playable City Award winning project by LAX is entering into the final stages of development and testing and artists Sebastian and Anna from LAX, and the production team here at the Studio are working flat out to bring cheeky kangaroos, enthusiastic dolphins, shy rabbits and diligent dung beetles to a series of secret locations around the city from 15 September.
- Pete Bennett is half way through his residency exploring resonant interfaces. This week he has been collaborating with origami artist Coco Sato to create beautifully folded paper lanterns that respond to your breath as you blow into a phone. Check out some test footage I took of Studio resident Jon Aitken learning to resonate with the lanterns here:
- And finally, we have worked with the brilliant Molly Price on and off for a few years, but these last couple of weeks we have been delighted to count her amongst our full time resident community. Molly is joining us predominantly to develop and test a proof of concept application as part of the European project, Creativ, a three year programme exploring smart fabrics and printed technologies. To get a sense of what she is up to, imagine that you could print touch sensors and active light directly on fabric – if your fabric could be turned into an interactive surface with different inputs and outputs printed in one go, on one surface. That is something that Molly, along with collaborators Diffus, Zaha Hadid Architects and others intend to make a reality within the next year.