Slamdance DIG Interactive Digital Showcase Announces 2016 VR Lineup
“Lineup Features Cutting Edge Work From Emerging Artists & Pushing Boundaries of Interactive And Immersive Digital Media”
The 2nd edition of Slamdance showcase DIG (Digital, Interactive & Gaming) will feature eight works by emerging artists working in cutting edge digital media. Projects include a virtual reality music sandbox, reality blurring installation-based video games, and an interactive dance experience that rewards movement and dancing with real-time animations.
DIG is dedicated to spotlighting new, independent artists working in hybrid, immersive, and emerging forms of digital media art. Projects emphasize touch, personal visual perspective, innovative connections between space and movement, and finding sense in uncertainty. The showcase, hosted by Big Pictures Los Angeles, opens December 2, 2016 and will run through December 10, 2016. Admission is free and open to the public.
“DIG’s purpose is to explore the landscape of storytelling and our program this year shows how a group of emerging artists are shaping its future,” said Peter Baxter, President and co-founder of Slamdance. “Our curation is coming from the core of what Slamdance is about: an open, DIY aesthetic involving alumni—artists themselves—who are committed to talent development on a local and international level.”
The showcase invites open submissions, and is programmed democratically. DIG showcase curators are: Slamdance Special Projects Manager Deron Williams, President and co-founder of Slamdance Peter Baxter, artist, curator, and operator of Big Pictures Los Angeles Doug Crocco, and DIG alumni artists Rachel Ho and Samantha Gorman.
“DIG is one island in a sea of ‘digital content’, an opportunity for artists to showcase expressive art in forms and technologies that are built to be impersonal by default,” shares Slamdance Special Projects Manager, Deron Williams. “This year’s DIG Showcase underlines the essential role artists have as creative voices in a crowded mass media landscape.”
This year’s program features: 3VR (THREE² x 3P2:VR) by FLOAT (Kate Parsons and Ben Vance) is an interactive virtual journey heightened by optical illusions and atmospheric audio, spherical hybrids act as portals as the viewer navigates through simulated aural space to an original score by Kid606;
BAD NEWS by Expressive Intelligence Studio Design (James Ryan, Ben Samuel, Adam Summerville), an installation-based game that combines procedural generation, deep simulation, and live performance. Set in the summer of 1979, a resident in an American small town has died alone at home, and a mortician’s assistant—the player—is tasked with tracking down and notifying the next of kin;
INFINIT-O, a video game by Corazon Del Sol, is a conceptual portrait on the life & influence of three generations of women artists, Eugenia Butler, Eugenia P. Butler, Corazon Del Sol with theme elements that oscillate between absurd dreaminess and narrative vehicles that explore the archetypes of womanhood;
MANIFOLD GARDEN by William Chyr is a first-person exploration game where the player rediscovers gravity and explores an Escher-esque world of impossible architecture to solve physics-defying puzzles;
NATURAL HISTORY by Lilian Mehrel and Serena Parr with original Music by Eric Beam is a wonder at the natural world through 360 degree video;
SOUNDSTAGE by Logan Olson, a virtual reality music sandbox built specifically for room-scale VR;
THE MAGIC DANCE MIRROR by Kyle Ruddick is an interactive visual music and dance experience that creates stylized mirror image of those using it with dynamic animated visuals based on a user’s movement, audio, and social interactions.
YOU MUST BE 18 OR OLDER TO ENTER by Seemingly Pointless recreates the feeling of being a prepubescent kid looking at porn for the first time through interactive fiction elements combined with ASCII styled art;
The 2016 DIG Showcase will also be featured at the Slamdance Film Festival in Park City from January 20-26, 2017.
For more information on DIG, please visit: http://showcase.slamdance.com/DIG.
ABOUT SLAMDANCE
Slamdance is a community, a year-round experience, and a statement. Established in 1995 by a wild bunch of filmmakers who were tired of relying on a large, oblique system to showcase their work, Slamdance has proven, year after year, that when it comes to recognizing talent and launching careers, independent and grassroots communities can do it themselves.
Slamdance alums are responsible for the programming and organization of the festival. With a variety of backgrounds, interests, and talents, but with no individual filmmaker’s vote meaning more than any others, Slamdance’s programming and organizing committees have been able to stay close to the heart of low budget and do-it-yourself filmmaking. In this way, Slamdance continues to grow and exemplify its mantra: By Filmmakers, For Filmmakers.
The 2017 Slamdance Film Festival that will run 20-26 January in Park City, Utah.
Notable Slamdance alumni who first gained notice at the festival include: Christopher Nolan (Interstellar), Oren Peli (Paranormal Activity), Marc Forster (World War Z), Jared Hess (Napoleon Dynamite), Lena Dunham (Girls), Benh Zeitlin (Beasts of the Southern Wild), Anthony & Joe Russo (Captain America: The Winter Soldier), Jeremy Saulnier (Blue Ruin), Seth Gordon (Horrible Bosses), Lynn Shelton (Humpday) and Matt Johnson (Operation Avalanche). Box Office Mojo reports alumni who first showed their work at Slamdance have earned over $11.5 billion at the Box Office to date.
In addition to the Festival, Slamdance serves emerging artists and a growing audience with several year-round activities. These include the popular Slamdance Screenplay Competition, the traveling On The Road screening events, the Anarchy Workshop for student filmmakers, and The ArcLight Presents Slamdance Cinema Club – a monthly cinema club partnership with ArcLight Cinemas based at the ArcLight Hollywood and ArcLight Chicago, with two screenings and filmmaker Q&A’s each month: www.arclightcinemas.com/en/news/arclight-presents-slamdance-cinema-club
In January 2015, Hulu partnered with Slamdance Studios to offer a new film collection from Festival alumni. The nascent but already profitable venture allows viewers to access Slamdance Studios on Hulu at www.hulu.com/companies/slamdance
Slamdance Presents is a new distribution arm established to access broader distribution of independent films made or acquired by Slamdance Studios. The goal is to build the popularity of independent films and support filmmakers on a commercial level through theatrical releases. In August 2016, Slamdance Presents launched the week long release of Claire Carré’s feature sci-fi film, Embers, at ArcLight Cinemas Hollywood. Steve Yu’s The Resurrection of Jake The Snake was the first film to be released by the company. The documentary reached number one on iTunes in December, 2015.
In November 2015, Slamdance announced DIG (Digital, Interactive & Gaming), a new digital, interactive and gaming showcase dedicated to emerging independent artists working in hybrid, immersive and developing forms of digital media art. Ten works were featured in the inaugural DIG show that opened in Los Angeles at Big Pictures Los Angeles on December 4, running through December 13, 2015. The show was also featured at the 2016 Slamdance Film Festival.
DIG will open December 2-10, 2016 and form part of the 2017 Film Festival
2016 Slamdance Film Festival Sponsors include Blackmagic Design, Distribber, CreativeFuture, Directors Guild of America, Kodak, Digital Bolex, The International Fusion Doc Challenge, Carhartt, Different By Design, Pierce Law Group LLP, G-Technology, Media Storage Group, Writers Guild Of America West, Salt Lake City’s Slug Magazine, Beehive Distilling, and BlueStar Café. Slamdance is proud to partner with sponsors who support emerging artists and filmmakers. Additional information about Slamdance is available at www.slamdance.com
Facebook: SlamdanceFilmFestival
Twitter: @slamdance
Instagram: @slamogram
Additional References: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slamdance_Film_Festival
