Mon 4 July saw Cardiff City Hall host the ClwstwrVerse programme, highlighting and celebrating media innovations made in Wales. Rhiannon Farr spoke with filmmaker Rebecca Hardy about a new genre-defining immersive app, Reel Reality, and with Yassmine Najime from Painting Practice about their virtual production filmmaking tool, Plan V.

With the Reel Reality project, director of edge21 Rebecca Hardy is exploring new ways for public engagement through screen content and a broad range of immersive technologies. With the project, users can connect with audiences in real locations and collect and curate content.

What were your motivations for creating Reel Reality?

I’m a huge film and TV fan: the person that would buy the mug, the t-shirt and loves the locations. When I’d wander around Cardiff and Cardiff Bay, you’d see loads of foreign tourists, pointing out where things have been filmed. And I thought, wouldn’t it be great if we create something that people can have on their phones, that can guide them to locations? But with more than that, in terms of being able to immerse themselves in it.

I was also obsessed with augmented reality and loved watching other people play Pokémon Go. Reel Reality grew out of fan tourism and having a way to interact in the location; we created a bespoke augmented reality film set. People can go around collecting different items of films, as well as videos and whatnot.

Were there any major hurdles for you during development?

It’s important to talk to as many fans of the film as possible, so during COVID you couldn’t go out and meet people. I did a lot of stuff through surveys and online things, and in the end, I spoke to about 250 different film fans about what it is that they want, which is great. Things I hadn’t given much thought to, like trivia and information, came out as one of the top things people wanted to know – so that went into the app. I didn’t explicitly say this is what we’re creating: I asked what is it that you would want from this type of product, and locations and information came out on top.

What was your favourite production you’ve worked on?

It was great to go into the set for Sex Education: it’s an amazing series and I really liked filming behind the scenes and seeing what people do. I do a lot of work for BAFTA award shows, and it’s always wonderful to celebrate other people’s successes.

I really enjoy being part of an industry where we can watch each other’s work and celebrate and support it. Wales has such amazing productions. It’s such a pleasure to be a part of that industry and to be able to watch it, but also support it through Reel Reality. We can signpost people through the app, and say “go watch this!”

Why was your target audience fans of films rather than filmmakers? You touched on it briefly.

The app was about supporting film productions, but not necessarily working directly with them; it was about working with fans who spend so much of their lives committed to those shows and want to find out where things are.

Bringing them into Wales and supporting their time exploring those locations is really important – we invest so much time into these things and people are going to make the effort to come down to locations. Let’s give them something they can use to get more immersed in, build their own augmented reality film set, and feel they’re part of it, even if on the fan side.

How would you like to advance the abilities of this app in the future, when it’s out of its R&D stage?

At the moment we’ve got Cardiff Bay’s location, but we’re going to be adding some new zones. I really would just love to see the app grow and have other iterations of it. So we’d have Reel Reality North Wales, Mid Wales, South Wales, and lots of different spinoffs.

We also need to take it outside areas of the UK – obviously focusing on Wales first, but using the app, you can create lots of different immersive experiences. So really, it’s to let it grow; engage with fans and hopefully with productions more as well, so we can get them to come on board. It’s at its very beginning stages, but there’s lots of potential for it to grow.

One more question: what’s the production set you’d love to visit, either in person or virtually?

I’ve not been on the set of His Dark Materials. I love the production values. If we’re thinking outside of Wales, Stranger Things or The Handmaid’s Tale – those programmes are really committed to their own identity, they know who they are and what they want to do. I’d love to go to those sets that will really embrace design. You can really have a really strong identity – Sex Education was one of those as well. 

Cardiff-based creative studio Painting Practice’s Yassmine Najime gave an insightful and engaging talk about their desktop app Plan V that can be used by hobbyists and production professionals to visualise and virtually create sets, scenes and worlds; combining VR and AR to provide a realistic sense of scale and fine detail. The studio was also named in Createch’s list of 100 ones to watch in 2020.

What pushed you to create Plan V and what was the process behind that?

I was working on His Dark Materials. When Dan and Joel were working on Black Mirror, they were using the same type of solutions ahead of time that virtual production would bring you. But it wasn’t until His Dark Materials that we actually translated that into real concrete software; obviously, it’s a heavy-on-effects series with a serious budget. So how do we make sure that we have the best quality VFX, and can sit down and visualise that throughout the series with the budget that we have?

Also, there was already a movie made before, based on the books. So you had that pressure of material that was made before you: you want to be sure that what you’re putting out there is the best version of it. And so, we started using Unreal Engine and playing around with things, including using an Oculus set. At one point, we broke [the Oculus] down in pieces, attached a screen, put it on a massive stick, and used that as a camera roaming around. The R&D process was like an IKEA type of thing – DIY style, you know? 

How long did it take to develop? 

It never stopped. It’s still developing, so to speak! I’m shipping it over to some developers this week again for new updates and upgrades. It’s one of these things like with new technologies, where phones are always updating even though they may seem finished.

Did the pandemic help or halt the success and production of the software?

I think it didn’t affect it. I’m not gonna say that it helped because the pandemic sucked. And I think an essential part of development is being able to talk to people face to face, have a cup of coffee, and have that process of talking ideas out, but also it didn’t do it badly.

The way we were working before was having guys in front of the computers developing, and the goal was to make that work as accessible as possible for people remotely. This was way before the pandemic, for ecological reasons – so we don’t have to fly a director from the US to visit a set. We were used to working remotely, and when the pandemic hit we were fine.

What’s your favourite thing you’ve worked on personally?

I’m not sure how much I can talk about it as it’s upcoming, but I was so excited to work on a project by Tim Burton. I found on Facebook one of my profile pictures from when I was 17, and it was emo me reading a Tim Burton book! I’ve always been such a massive fan of Tim Burton and his work, so working on one of his actual series is so full circle. In this industry, you don’t want to freak people out asking famous people for photos – but Tim Burton, I was happy about that. 

Finally, what is your experience being a woman in this industry?

You know, I work mostly with men and there have been times when I’ve had to remove myself from office spaces. I feel like we need to break down a lot of barriers for women in order to enable them to be fully successful in this industry, such as nurseries in the office – until we do, women aren’t going to look at this as a viable industry. I’m always promoting and talking to young women about the industry and hope to see more enter this field. If I can do it, so can you!

words RHIANNON FARR and JOHN EVANS