Project Canvas Development Diary
All Out Productions & Stardotstar (aka The All*Stars)
Diary 2: May-June
Having won the Project Canvas brief to build a visualisation of Radio 1 working on IPTV The All*Stars (a collaboration of Manchester radio producers All Out Productions and digital designers Stardotstar) were really chuffed but couldn’t help but feel a little apprehensive by news that Sky were spitting the dummy about the Project Canvas collaboration and had asked the Office of Fair Trading to look in to the competition elements of it. As we wondered whether the project would even go ahead we kicked back and watched some tennis... on Sky Sports 2, a rugby match... on Sky Sports 1 and the repeat of a 20/20 cricket match... on Sky Sports 4 (irony anyone?). Then news came back that the OFT had popped BSkyB’s pacifier back in. And having also been approved by the BBC Trust, Project Canvas was back on! Good news.
It’s always a sobering prospect to write a proposal with the main aim of winning a gig and then realise you’ve got to deliver the product but Vision+Media and the BBC ran a very helpful ‘kick off’ meeting where all successful companies were able to assemble, share the ideas that were going to be made and generally get comfortable as a collective bunch of clients and providers. We learned details about the technical specification of Project Canvas, I nodded lots about Flash 3, Action Scripts, + + something or other and looked towards Gez from Stardotstar who was also nodding but a little more confidently (the point here if I’m not doing sub-text too well is to reinforce how converging media draws on so many disciplines and how important collaborations like ours will prove to be).
Here we were also introduced to our assigned BBC mentor Michael Gray, a producer from Audio and Music Visualisation. Sitting and going through our proposal it was great for The All*Stars to hear his valuable feedback, take on board his suggestions and also be really encouraged that he basically thought we’d nailed the brief. From here on in we’d be running our progression and decisions past both Michael and his guy at Radio 1 interactive Alistair to ensure we were working with the end client efficiently. It’s proved really useful to have this open channel and is bound to be to the benefit of both our individual production and the success of Project Canvas as a whole.
The All*Stars signed our contracts with Vision+Media and we set to work. We met to have the meeting that began the translation of our proposal in to the structure and the schedule for building. Another All*Star joined the group in the form of Eliza (Stardotstar’s project manager). We don’t have one of those at our radio production company All Out but we now want one! Everyone should have an Eliza (who, incidentally, has now become a Nick - stay tuned for news on that) especially on a collaboration when there are so many people with differing roles, opinions and where the right decisions need to be made and deadlines need to be stuck to. And, on that note, I can heartily recommend the web-based project management system Basecamp we’ve used. It’s kept our files, communications and deadlines thoroughly organised and accessible.
In this pre-production period we all balanced our respective day jobs as well as working hard on developing and finalising the wireframes for this project (and these being my first such plans, quite a headmash too!). I looked at them via Glasgow where I was recording a Radio 4 series with Nicholas Parsons, All Out’s MD did it via South Africa and Memphis, Tennessee (also making programmes) and Stardotstar’s Guy and Gareth did the bulk of the hard work in amongst making tonnes of other digital stuff and putting together more pitches for future business. And that’s where our two essentially different business are very similar. Because working life in an independent production company is about spinning lots of plates effectively, it’s rarely single-project focussed but rather juggling development, production, pitching, running companies etc. It’s tiring but the variety and creativity of our work makes it fully worthwhile.
We met to discuss the final wireframes in advance of the freelance Flash developer beginning work on the project and there was real satisfaction of this collaboration working and an anticipation of getting the thing built.
We would have had another collaborative beer but, quite frankly, we were too busy.
So, it’s all planned and signed-off, let’s build this thing...
Lyndon Saunders
All Out Productions
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