This year, Access Creative College – the UK’s leading games, music and media college – has teamed up with metaverse specialists Condense and venture capital fund LocalGlobe to launch a fully-funded Metaverse Development Scholarship Programme. We discover more…
This year, Access Creative College (ACC), Condense and LocalGlobe have announced the launch of a fully-funded Metaverse Development Scholarship Programme to start in September, responding to the growing diversity problem within the tech sector and in metaverse development. According to Tech Talent Charter, only one in ten A-Level Computer studies students is female.
Access Creative College – the UK’s leading games, music and media college – has teamed up with metaverse specialists Condense and venture capital fund LocalGlobe, to offer up to eight fully-funded scholarships. The successful applicants will take part in a 12-week programme, full of rich and intensive study.
Condense, which was founded in Bristol in 2009, is the only company in the world with the end-to-end capture and streaming technology to live stream real-world events, like music and sports events, into 3D applications. The company uses cutting-edge computer vision, machine learning and proprietary streaming infrastructure to capture and embed live 3D video (Video 3.0) into any metaverse game, mobile app or platform created with Unity or Unreal Engine. After recently raising $4.5 million (£3,809,430), it has opened the world’s first metaverse studio in partnership with Watershed – Bristol’s cultural cinema and creative technology venue – to give established artists and emerging talent access to the technology. The studio is a “metaverse-first” event space, and can also accommodate a live audience.
Video 3.0 gives fans completely new experiences online. Audiences can attend gigs or sporting events with friends, with the freedom to move among the virtual crowds and get up close to the action. Because performances are live, fans can interact with the artist – a digital step forward from holding a banner at a gig – and artists can respond in real-time, giving shout-outs, answering questions or performing a requested track.
To coincide with the launch of the scholarship, leading Bristol artists Dread MC, Badliana and Lebo, were also invited into Condense’s cutting-edge metaverse environment to perform. Using a state-of-the-art 360-degree camera rig constructed by Condense, the three artists each stepped into a virtual landscape to record their own performance. It is the creation of these virtual landscapes and their live-streaming capabilities which Access Creative College are now offering the chance for students to study.
Condense, which was founded in Bristol in 2009, is the only company in the world with the end-to-end capture and streaming technology to live stream real-world events, like music and sports events, into 3D applications
Jackson Armstrong, Executive Head of Marketing at Access Creative College, said: “What better way to celebrate the launch of this new scholarship programme than by having some of Bristol’s brightest upcoming artists perform in the metaverse, which our scholars will be working to produce.”
Successful scholars will learn how to stream live events into one of the world’s most exciting new technologies: the metaverse. The successful applicants will take part in a 12-week programme, full of rich and intensive study, completely funded through the scholarship.
Jackson continued: “When it comes to board positions within leading tech companies in the UK, the statistics are deeply concerning with the lack of gender split and those from ethnic minority backgrounds. We’re excited at the prospect of helping to change that through this new scholarship programme.”
Successful applicants will receive college accreditation and certificate; hands-on experience with the latest technologies and techniques; real world industry skills to support the next step in their career; high level of exposure to local employers; a potential career with Condense at the end of the 12 weeks; and a £1500 bursary (dependent on learner performance).
CEO and co-founder of Condense Nick Fellingham explained: “The Bristol scene has long been a world-renowned melting pot of different cultures and music and, in the last few years, it’s become a hub for games development too. Now we’re going to put Bristol on the map once again with the world’s first metaverse live streaming studio to bring together the energy of live events with the massive scale of the metaverse. The Video 3.0 infrastructure we’ve built takes out the technical complexity of streaming live into the metaverse, so people are free to put their creativity in. Video 3.0 is going to change not just how we experience live events online, but fundamentally how we engage with each other.”
Condense harnesses the feelings of connection you get from seeing your favourite band, artist, team or sports star perform live, while introducing an unprecedented level of access, participation and inclusion never before seen – all while providing artists, rights holders and metaverse platforms the opportunity to create completely new revenue streams.
Ziv Reichert, partner at LocalGlobe (recently ranked the UK’s number one seed investor by Dealroom) adds: “Hundreds of millions of people are hanging out in immersive 3D platforms like Roblox, Rec Room, Fortnite, Sandbox, Decentraland and VRChat; attending virtual events, socialising and being creative. At the same time, player demand for live entertainment inside these virtual worlds has never been greater. Condense has built the infrastructure to connect the two – now music artists, sports stars and creatives can perform and play live in the metaverse, to the largest stadium audience imaginable.”
Find out more at: accesscreative.ac.uk and condense.live
Featured image: (L-R) Bristol artists Lebo, Dread MC and Badliana were invited into Condense’s cutting-edge metaverse environment to perform
