Ebeltoft, Denmark: Upcoming - Nordisk Barne Medie Festival workshop, 22 - 23 June '13.

As per the NBMF's website "Concept development: TV, radio, web, games – or the whole shabang?

In this workshop, Paul Tyler will focus on user experience and audience engagement and assist participants in getting their ideas out of their heads and on to the table, literally speaking! In his unique development method Paul uses Lego and Playmobil characters and a ‘hands on’ approach to work with the teams and map out the essential themes underlying the projects and their connections to audience.

Participants must pre-register for the workshop and we’ll open registration in early spring!"

London, UK: HI facilitates Digital Fashion Lab at London School of Fashion, 18 May, '13

iDROPS, the Felmish digital innovation agency for the cultural, creative and social sector has commissioned Handling Ideas to run its Digital Fashion Lab which is to be hosted by the London College of Fashion. As their website says...

"The fashion industry starts to realize the importance of digital technology. Numerous digital applications arise rapidly in the fashion world. For example, 3D printing has been used for machine parts, airplanes and even jewelry. Rings or necklaces are already being printed in 3D. Think about what 3D printed fabrics, buttons or zippers can do for the fashion world.

Digital Fashion LAB induces collaboration between talented professionals from different segments of the fashion and digital industries to explore new, untrodden paths. The LAB is spent on idea generation, co-creation, collaboration and inspirational interventions. The participants are offered a unique opportunity to explore and experiment their way to an innovative concept. Incentives and examples will stimulate them to bring forward their own ideas to develop them further with others. Feedback and coaching are supplied by mentors."

You can download the presentation here.

Copenhagen, Denmark: Chocolate company uses Handling Ideas to help rebranding.

Chocolate company 'Chocolate and Love' hired Handling Ideas for the day to map out and visualize their journey from inception to point of purchase for its award-winning, premium organic fairly-traded range of chocolate.

A husband and wife combo created fluency in product history. Mapping helped chart this flow, revealing parameters that clearly shaped the success of the product and which should be used to help parameterize the new brand.

Luckily the day was peppered with tastings, which not only kept energies high, but also educated my palate to understand the complexity of the variety of flavours. As they say, chocolate could go the same way wine went back in the 80s, with the democratization of the tasting connoisseurs. 

Keep an eye on their website for the new name to be released. Oh and it's extremely good chocolate by the way. 

Bogotá, Columbia: Upcoming - Digital+ Seminario Transmedia, 4 - 5 Sept '13.

Digital+, a nonprofit organization in Bogotá, Colombia, dedicated to promoting the convergence between culture, technology,and innovation has invited Handling Ideas to its next seminar, September 4th and 5th, 2013.

Handling Ideas to give a talk and then hold individual meetings with representatives from the industry, public institutions and educational institutions. The seminar is financed by the Colombian Ministry

of Technology for Information and Communications, Ministry of Culture, Secretary of Culture of Bogotá and the Bogotá Chamber of Commerce.

Sheffield, UK: Upcoming - Sheffield Documentary Festival, 11 - 15 June '13.

Handling Ideas has been invited to take part in the Sheffield Doc/Fest Crossover Market on Tuesday 11th June,offering the chance to meet one-on-one with interactive projects and films thatare funding and distributing in new ways. 

Sheffield Doc/Fest offers an internationally-renowned festival programme with anindustry conference and a highly-rated international marketplace. Around 2,500 delegates from the UK and the world attend Doc/Fest each year. Since theestablishment of the Crossover strand in 2006, Sheffield has become a key event for meeting international digital experts and hearing about the latest developments ininteractive media.

Aarhus, Denmark: HI to moderate at SPOT Interactive Conference, 2 May '13.

Handling Ideas has been asked by Shareplay to moderate within the Spot Interactive Conference, 2nd May, '13. 

They're posing the question 'how can interactive media experiences be created and developed for new audiences, new branding opportunities and new revenue-making?

A quick and dirty Google translation of their website says:

"We live in a world full of new and exciting technologies that are constantly changing our media behavior. New interactive media formats are gaining ground and thus new opportunities to reach the end user on alternative and engaging manner. 

On SPOT Interactive conference, you can experience successful international and Danish business people from the media industry present cases, share experiences and come up with new perspectives on content marketing and audience engagement, etc."

See photos from the here.

See video interviews here.

Stuttgart, Germany: HI to facilitate focuses on FMX World Thinking and World Building Lab, 24 April '13.

After the success of working with Inga von Staden on Power to the Pixel's Think Tank, Handling Ideas has been asked to facilitate the very first FMX-lab on Wednesday, April 24^th 2013. The FMX-lab is a forum for innovation, where professionals from different disciplines work through complex issues to build a variety of possible solutions. The topic of the lab will be World Building. The aim of the FMX-lab is to go beyond the exchange of expertise into the creation of new models for pushing World Thinking into World Building and prototyping without breaking the design. 

Helsinki, Finland: Pitch training for Finnish Animation Producers, 18 - 19 April '13.

Handling Ideas heads north again to spend two days with Producers and up-and-coming students from within Finland's animation industry. As organised by Finnish Network of Animation Producers.

Warsaw, Poland: Sources 2 Script Development Workshop, 17 - 18 April '13.

In April '13, Handling Ideas will visit Warsaw to work with writers, directors and producers from thirteen feature film and creative documentary projects as selected by Sources 2.  As per their press release, Sources 2 is "proud to announce our first workshop in Poland! The upcoming Sources 2 Script Development Workshop will be held in Warsaw with the support of the Polish Film Institute. The organisational partner is Script Forum Agency.

The workshop will gather participants, experts and guests from Argentina, Austria, Belgium, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Spain and the United Kingdom. During the seven-day session, they will develop their projects and receive professional training. The workshop will be followed by a coached three-month re-writing period and a follow-up session."

Stockholm, Sweden: Stockholms dramatiska högskola (SADA), 21 March '13.

Spent an afternoon with lecturers, researchers and financiers representing the four departments that make up SADA. Was provided with a fantastic location for mapping and visualising out their exisiting set-up, thereby helping them in their development of a collaborative research centre. Needed a big table, as like any higher education establishment, their set-up and needs are complex.

Stockholm Academy of Dramatic Arts (SADA) is a national university and offers University Diploma in Performing Arts and Media. The professional training aims at enabling the students to start a professional career directly after their graduation.

Copenhagen, Denmark: Mapping session to inject into Kids Industries' workshop

A good example where Handling Ideas can inject into another consultant company's workshop. Kids Industries were working with a major publisher here in Copenhagen and asked for some 'insight mapping' to bring in some user centric thinking around their concept development. 

Malmö, Sweden: The Financing Forum - HOW TO DRIVE A CHILDREN’S FILM & MEDIA PROJECT TO SUCCESS IN A DIVERSIFIED MARKET

Photography: Johan Ström, The Financing Forum for Kids ContentModerating Wendy Bernfeld's (Rights Stuff) keynote at The Financing Forum. Wendy's knowledge of rights management and negotiation across multiple platforms is vast and so it made sense to break this world down into its constituent parts, both for me as moderator but also for the audience.

So bolstered by the success of the 'live' Handling Ideas session at FIPA, we dived in a mapped out a world where suddenly one video-on-demand (VOD) deal can be split into twelve. The pink row of post-it notes highlights the additional layer that VOD brings to the market deliverying opportunies for both old and new content.

The Financing Forum for Kids Content is hosted by Film i Skåne and The Forum Opening Industry Day is organized in collaboration with KIDS Regio.

Biarritz, France: FIPA, Handling Ideas performs in front of a live audience.

Definitely a first for HI. Although I've ran project work in front of more than just the production team, a open workshop at the International Festival for Audio Visual Programmes (FIPA) in Biarritz meant having more eyes around the table. Having a large screen to project a view of the table helped; having French translators was invaluable. You can see a short piece on the workshop, along with an interview (in English) with me, followed by some interviews (in French) with the production team who went through the process.

Handling Ideas de Paul Tyler from WebFipa2013 on Vimeo.

Portrait Paul Tyler from WebFipa2013 on Vimeo.

Interviews participants Tyler from WebFipa2013 on Vimeo.

London, UK: iDROPS, London Science Museum, January 2013

12 projects, 3 days, 1 Science Museum. The last few days of January saw iDROPS Museum Lab 2.0 with creatives from within the museum world, mainly Belgium, coming together to develop their projects. Handling Ideas was commissioned to design and facilitate the workshop. Set out a '10 Step' plan to get participants from project goal through to creating handover pitch materials. People came with ideas. from which we paddled upstream to qualify need and aim and map out the connections and relationships from there. All in all a good solid three days, made only possible by iDROPS Corine Meijers, Nathalie Goethals, Mathias Van Compernolle and mentors Fiddian Warman (SODA), Dave Patten (Science Museum), Mitra Memarzia (IC tomorrow), Christel De Maeyer (Persuasion Technologist), Mar Dixon(Audience Developer).

Tromsø, Norway: Jabfilm's documentary 'The history of the Jews in the North/Jødene I Tromsø'

Ran a 3 hour session with Jabfilm to help them map out the various ways by which they can engage an audience with this deeply emotional story. Tried to apply the lessons learnt from Oulu, i.e. to focus on the gateways that the director wants to corral the audience through, rather than defining outcomes, one should define situations where particular influences will be present. Here's an extract from Jabfilm's 'In Development' page:

"The life and the fate of a small Jewish community in a small town hundreds of miles above the Arctic Circle.

We want to tell the story as close to the sources as possible. From minute to minute and from day to day. In a hybrid of documentary and fiction style it is our wish that the audience, sooner or later will experience themselves in the closest possible contact with the people and the events that took place. In this context, it is not the aim of the film to tell people what to believe or think. However, it is our responsibility to ensure that the message is so obvious, that we leave with doubt or uncertainty that makes people confused about their own conclusions."

What kind of companies use Handling Ideas?

Since kick-off in the second part of 2012, Handling Ideas has delivered to fourteen clients.  Going forward into 2013, picking up an additional four new clients on the way, Handling Ideas portfolio can be broken down into four types (some clients requiring more than one type of deliverable):

• Concept and Project visualisation and mapping (x12)
• Devising and running creative workshops, Think Tanks, forums & panels. (x6)
• Pitch training for film, television, cross & transmedia projects. (x5)
• Conference talks (x5)

The client type is broad, yet with a focus towards the development and production of content within the creative industry, namely film, television, cross/trans-media and gaming. Projects owners have (or will be) connected indirectly, through companies set up to create supporting frameworks for content development, such as Power to the Pixel (UK), Film Arc (FI), Sources2 (EU), Nordisk Barne Medie Festival (DK), FIPA (FR) and Nordisk Film go TV Fond. Others have come in directly: Jabfilm (NO) and Kids and Concepts (DE) or as a follow on to a workshop: Klassefilm.

The need for innovative financing, creative and business models is reflected through the worked commissioned by four bodies set-up to fund content development: New Danish Screen, The Financing Forum (SE), the Norwegian Film Institute and BUFF (SE). Higher education featured with pitch training given to under and post graduates for both the Danish Film School and Nordic Talents as well as project mapping for old friends at KEA (DK). And lastly, a much welcomed dive into the Danish design sector was brought about by a session with local  company, Good Morning Technology.

Reaction from some of the clients can be seen at the Handling Ideas Facebook page under 'Recent Posts by Others on Handling Ideas'.

Bricks with snow...

Ghent, Belgium: iDROPS Gaming meets Fashion LAB.

When bringing two industries together that don't usually see themselves as collaborators, it helps to create a common frame onto which parties can map common needs.

The iDROPS Gaming meets Fashion LAB asked HI to come in and work with professionals to map out their production pipelines in order to reveal potential touchpoints for future cross-over. Speaker-mentors included Stardoll's Katie Bell, the London College of Fashion's Philip Delamore & Peter Hills, Cassetteplay's Carri Munden and Unity 3D's Russ Morris. The one day lab highlighed some strong cross-over themes, particularly those that revolve around that both industries focus on and play with identitiy.

Malmö, Sweden: BUFF Think Tank. Mapping a SWOT in three dimensions.

Using the 'Holy Trinity' as a frame onto which an invited panel of media proffessionals from across the Nordics, could map the variety of creative, financial and business factors that are curently shaping the children's media landscape. Those present included:

Linda Hambäck, Lee Film, Sweden

Anttu Harlin, Anima Boutique, Finland

Ida Brinck-Lund, Brinck-Lund Media ApS, Denmark

Ulf Synnerholm, Filmlance

Cecilie Stranger-Thorsen, Julia Jarl, Daniel Lundquist & Cecilia Grubb, BUFF

As per their website 'BUFF, the International Children and Young People’s Film Festival in Malmö, was founded in 1984 and is a non-profit organization. The aim was, and still is, to screen good films for children and young people as well as adults. A meeting place for people working with children, young people and film. BUFF strives to open the possibilities for more influences from Europe and the rest of the world by showing films that might never be screened otherwise. In the cinema we get to meet different cultures, hear foreign languages and tag along on endless adventures. BUFF considers children and young people to be the most exciting resource we´ve got, our future.'

Oslo, Norway: NFI - Break on Through - Inspirational Seminars on storytelling in a digital age

Delivered "To go forward we must first go backwards: tools for paddling upstream" as one of two talks to set up three case stiudies for the Norwegian Film Institute's 'Break on Through' seminar.

Here's the text for the event "When it comes to Transmedia, a story isn't necessarily our starting point. If we start there then we must paddle our way upstream to find our theme. Only then can we start to develop for multiple platforms. So when we expect our audience to interact, then we can no longer think of ourselves strictly as simply storytellers or content makers. We are becoming designers. We design journeys for audiences, pathways through platforms and models for businesses. To engage we must become relevant and accessible through understanding the motivates and habits of our target group. This talk introduces tools that can be used to combine combine story, content and technology in order to deliver offerings that respond to these needs."