NewImages Festival // France

Paris most immersive venue, Forum des Images, hosts the festival of digital creation and virtual worlds “New Images” and this year the program is very much concentrated on the professional side of creative VR-making.

The NewImages Festival program (which is in constant reinvention, as the festival organiser say) gives quite a lot to explore:

• A selection of the best current immersive and interactive works (XR, video games, innovative storytelling…), numerous premieres, and a brand new VR competition.
• XR Financing Market, a unique funding market with influential decision makers, designed to encourage the production of innovative content.
• The NewImages/Kaohsiung Film Festival (KFF) VR Residency: conceived in partnership with one of Taiwan’s leading cultural events and the French office in Taipei, this brand-new initiative will help one French creator get a variety of funding opportunities to develop their project in Kaohsiung. KFF will handle all travel and accommodation arrangements.
• Industry days for professionals: discover our selection and meet the creators for talks, networking events, cocktails and private events.

Immersive and interactive experiences

VR COMPETITION

Jury: Colin Trevorrow | filmmaker, Katie Calhoon | producer, Hsin-Chien Huang | new media artist, Blanca Li | choreographer, director.

The Masque d’or (“Golden Mask”) Grand Prize and the Special Prize, worth €10,000 and 5,000 respectively, will be awarded to the most groundbreaking immersive or interactive works in competition.

7 Lives

VR Installation
dir. Jan Kounen, Charles Ayats, Sabrina Calvo, 20 min., France, 2019

Tokyo. A girl throws herself under a metro train. Her soul rises up from the tracks. Up on the platform, witnesses to the scene stand in shock. She has awoken a trauma, a painful memory, in all of them. To find rest, her soul must go into each mind, dive into their memories and help them find peace…

A Fisherman’s Tale

Stand up VR
dir. Balthazar Auxietre, Alexis Moroz, 20 min. (Chapter 1), France, 2019

You are Bob, a fisherman’s puppet that lives happily alone. After a storm warning, you must go to the top of the lighthouse and turn on the light. But, once outside your shack, you realize that things are far from what they seemed…

Abandoned Temple

Stand up VR
dir. Wei-Hao Cheng, 9 min, Taiwan, 2018

Gin, a little girl wakes up in an abandoned temple which is filled with wretched divine statues. Out of the blue, a dark shadow slides into one of the statues, and the holy goddess, Mazu, starts speaking from above. The mysterious creatures will go beyond the screen, digging into the horror secret of Gin.

Aripi

VR Theater
dir. Dmitri Voloshin, ⠀, 7 min., Moldova, 2019

This story is about an astronaut who, as a child, dreamed of flying and being free. And now he seems to be flying in the sky, but he is actually locked in the capsule of a spacecraft. One day, minor problems lead to bigger problems, causing the spaceship to lose control and crash back to Earth, allowing the astronaut to once again spread the wings of his dreams and go back to his childhood.

AYAHUASCA

VR Installation
dir. Jan Kounen, 15 min., France, Luxembourg, 2019

This mind-blowing experience is a voyage through one of the most mysterious spiritual practices on the planet. Ayahuasca, the vine of the soul. A unique chance for a wide audience to approach a cultural and spiritual mystery.

Mechanical Souls: Training Session

VR Installation
dir. Gaëlle Mourre, L.P. Lee, 30 min, France-Taiwan, 2018

A sumptuous wedding is about to take place. Mrs. Song has found a good match for Zhen-Zhen, the heir of the rich Zang family. She spares no expense and hires wedding androids to help with the ceremony. But something has gone wrong, and it’s your job, as a new Mechlife employee, to figure it out!

Mechanical Souls is an interactive, multiuser social experience, powered by VR, analytic engine, live actors, and your own sleuthing skills.

Gloomy Eyes

VR Installation
dir. Jorge Tereso, Fernando Maldonado, 9 min., France-Argentina-USA-Taiwan, 2019

When the sun got tired of the humans it decided never to rise again. The darkness awoke the dead from their graves. A zombie kid called Gloomy and a mortal girl called Nena fell in love and immersed in a deep connection that even the most powerful man in town could not destroy. Narrated by Colin Farrell.

Mr. Buddha

VR Theater
dir. Chung Lee, 19 min., Taiwan, 2018

When three thieves stole a hoard of precious antiques, they are forced to share their bounty with their boss and a newbie. While sitting in the car, what bonds them is not camaraderie but calculation against each other.

Executive-produced by director Hou Hsiao Hsien (The Assassin). This project celebrates the 10th anniversary of the Golden Horse Film Academy.

OPUS vr

VR Theater
dir. Michael Kovich Jr., 18 min or so (chapter 1), Paraguay, 2019

In the most crowded slum of Paraguay’s capital city, we discover an unpretentious, picturesque world, but one that is being corroded by corruption. Luis Morales, a hero in his neighborhood but a criminal in the city, is planning his greatest heist when injustice strikes someone close to him.

Pneumo Hacker

VR Theater
dir. Kuan Yuan Lai, 11 min., Taiwan, 2019

Pneumo Hacker is a VR360 cyberpunk film about an aggressive form of air pollution that contains a hacker virus. When a person is infected with it, they lose consciousness then start behaving like a psycho. The film is a metaphor about the way we constantly deceiving ourselves by refusing to see the corruption that surrounds us. While we wear our pink-coloured glasses, the world is facing an existential threat.

RocketMan 360

VR Theater
dir. Millo Simulov, 20 min., Romania, 2018

In the cockpit of his spaceship, an astronaut receives a 360-degree home movie from his girlfriend, just a few minutes before blasting off as one of the first colonists being sent to Mars to begin terraforming. The astronaut will not see his girlfriend again, and the earth may soon be unliveable. Rocketman360 is a sweet and sentimental final-generation love letter to an astronaut ready for a noble, dangerous mission.

Wolves in the Wall: It’s All Over

Stand Up VR
dir. Pete Billington, 20 min., USA, 2019

Not everything is as it seems when 8-year old Lucy’s imagination proves to be a reality. Help her discover what’s hiding inside the walls of her house in this immersive fable. Wolves in the Wall expands the mystery, where the only thing that can keep the wolves away is the belief that they are real.

OUT OF COMPETITION // EXHIBITION

VR: Vader Immortal : Episode 1
ILMxLAB, USA

Video games / VR: Ghost Giant
Olov Redmalm, Sweden

Video games / VR: Crow: The Legend
Eric Darnell, USA

VR: -22.7°C
Jan Kounen, Romain Delahaye (Molécule), Amaury La Burthe, France

VR: Accused #2: Walter Sisulu
Nicolas Champeaux, Gilles Porte, France

PXN Prize: Clit Me
Jeunes pousses: NFB x UQAM interactive school, Canada

VR: Eleven Eleven
Mehrad Noori, USA-UK

PXN Prize: Florence
Annapurna Interactive, USA

The “Off” Festival / VR: Koliseum Soccer — VR babyfoot virtuel
VR table football, Kynoa — Swiss

PXN Prize: Missing
Kylie Boltin, Matt Smith, Tamara Dean, Jono Yuen, Austalia

PXN Prize: One Last Beat
Héctor Monerris Ivorra, Spain

PXN Prize: Otis (ep. 1)
Casey Stein, Bernard Zeiger, USA

Immersive installation: Pandora
Molécule, in collaboration with Alexandre Quaranta et Amélie Nilles, France

The “Off” Festival / AR: Paris augmented, Paris revisited
AR photo exhibition, Forum des images, TV5MONDE

The “Off” Festival / VR: Ragnaröck
VR Arcade, Wanadev, ILLUCITY — France

Interactive film: République
Simon Bouisson, Olivier Demangel, France

The “Off” Festival / VR: Wild Immersion
Adrien Moisson, Raphaël Aupy, France

Also, projects from “The “Off” Festival” and “Focus Taiwan” would be presented.

XR Financing Market

NewImages’ XR Financing Market is a unique funding and co-production market, entirely dedicated to original, immersive content. It brings together artists, producers and key industry figures sharing a common purpose: to create a meeting space where future immersive art masterpieces can be discovered, pitched and financed.

List of projects on festival web-site: https://newimagesfestival.com/en/industry-days/selected-projects/

Art installations featuring XR component (10 projects)

AKIA
Dark Euphoria (France)

After The Fallout
Sam Wolson (United States)

Bedlam
DVgroup (France), Minky Productions (United Kingdom)

Captured
Fantomatico Oy (Finland), DPT (Canada), Quicksand Game Lab (India)

Hush
Final Cut for Real (Denmark)

Nerd_Funk
ALLLESSS (Netherlands)

Out of the Box
Matadora Films (Australia), StartVR (Australia)

Petrichor
Pernickety Split (Australia)

Sea Of Tranquility
Providences (France), Providences (France)

Spring Odyssey
Tulipes (France)

360° video (3 projects)

Albrecht’s Gift
Maru VR Productions (Estonia)

Sex Buyers
Day For Night (France), Be Films (Luxembourg), Be Films (Belgium), Da Prod (France)

VoyeuR
La Générale de Production (France), Tarantula (Luxembourg), Turbulent (Canada)

XR interactive narrative (26 projects)

Beta Aquarii
Da Prod (France)

Bioluminescence
IKO (France), Reynard Films (Germany), Prefrontal Cortex (Germany)

Cosmos Within Us
Satore Studio / Satore Tech (United Kingdom), a_BAHN (Luxembourg)

Dreamin’Zone (DMZ)
Zéro de conduite Productions (France), Ciné-Litté Productions (Germany), Kynoa Studios (Switzerland), Studio Yog (South Korea)

FLEE VR
E*D Films (Canada), Sun Creature Studio (Denmark), Final Cut For Real (Denmark)

Finding Alice
Evaro (Australia)

Graceville Prolog : The awakening
Movie Design (France)

Griffin
Webspider Productions (France), Sebastien Tixador (Belgium)

Lovecraft’s revery
Pages & Images Productions (France), Backlight (France)

Mechanical Souls — The Series
Digital Rise (France), Serendipity Films Ltd. (Taiwan), DVgroup (France)

Minuscule: Tropical Heist
Nexus Forward (France), Futurikon (France), Parallaxter (Belgium)

Missing 10 Hours VR
Match Frame Productions (Hungary)

Missing Pictures
Atlas V (France), ARTE (France), BBC (United Kingdom)

NORN, the 9 Daughters of RAN
Norn Studio AS (Norway)

Néphélé
Floréal Films (France)

Shock The Monkey
a_BAHN (Luxembourg), Lucid Realities (France)

Terrain
Dirty Bacon (Switzerland), K5 (Germany)

The Dream Builders
Femme Fatale Studio (France)

The Bear, the Tiger and the Dragon
Iralta VR (Spain), Komitern (France), The Farm 51 (Poland)

The Fun of Fear
Studio Bento (Australia)

The Hangman at Home
Late Love Production (Denmark), Miyu Productions (France), National Film Board of Canada (Canada)

The Lost Botanist
Eden Labs PTY ltd (South Africa), Tulips and Chimneys (South Africa)

The Merry Widow
Compagnie Blanca Li (France)

The Roaming
DVgroup (France), Normal Studio (Canada), La Prairie (France)

The Starry Sand Beach
Lucid Realities (France)

Tumpie
Seppia (France)

XR game (1 project)

Pagan Peak VR
AnotherWorld VR (Germany)

OTHER ACTIVITIES

NewImages have a whole bunch of different activities with a great variety of speakers and special events.