THOUGHTS

We won first prize in the Social / Gaming category at London's XR Hackathon!

What is a Hackathon?

A hackathon is where a group of people come together for a few days and create something. As this was an XR Hack, everyone was focussed on developing experiences in mixed reality (combining physical and digital elements). This Hackathon was organised, facilitated, and sponsored by Meta, XR Bootcamp, Innovate UK, and PwC. 

At PwC's headquarters in London, over 160 XR developers came together, created teams, and made some incredible prototypes, including an AI-driven British Sign Language app and a calligraphy app. 

What we made

In under 3 days we created Chaos: a social co-located mixed reality game where you act as Agents of the Gods participating in an eternal vertical tug of war between Mount Olympus and the Underworld. 

We wanted to explore physicality and presence in service of enhanced social activity - in a way that is only possible through mixed reality. We set out to create an active and chaotic game for 4 players, in which your physical space turns into a mythological battleground. 

What makes it XR?

Constantly asking ourselves the question of "Why XR?" was fundamental. We combined the physicality of social interaction with collaborative problem solving and fun storytelling mechanisms, which can only really be done in XR. 

We utilised Meta's Presence Platform, particularly the Scene API, as well as the standard Interaction and Audio SDKs, as well as passthrough. We also used spatial anchors. 

Who made it?

I was very fortunate to be on a team with some incredible people that I have worked with for the past few years:

Katie Eggleston - UX / UI Designer

Lauren Fitzpatrick - Game Designer

James Hosken - Creative Technologist and Developer

As for my contributiuon, I produced the project and did the sound design. 

Reflections on my first Hackathon...

I had so much fun at my first Hackathon: the organisers fostered a lovely, community-orientated energy, the Hackers were very friendly and collaborative, and the Mentors and Judges were so helpful and encouraging. With all the redundancies impacting developers and studios at the moment, I came away feeling optimistic about the future of the XR sector. There is a huge amount of talent, understanding, curiosity, empathy, and creativity out there - the things that people were able to conceptualise and prototype could really revolutionise the way we use mixed reality for entertainment and skills-building.

Some lessons and rules we collectively applied for the Hackathon:

Be flexible 

Ideally you want to create something that impresses the judges, which can force teams into a corner: you want to create something that is really ambitious and pushes the boundaries, but you only have a finite amount of time. Keep the scope under control and be frequently reviewing it so that you have an end product/prototype you can demonstrate. While it’s important that the creative/technical vision is the true north, you need to be agile and flexible in how you reach this.

Have a strong timeline

Set milestones per day, and stick to them!

Assign (and stick to) roles

Assigning roles within the team is very important - it means the work is divided evenly between you all. For example I finished all the sound design about halfway through the Hack, and then focussed all of my attention on the presentation and monitoring the progress of the others.

Communication and time management

Maintaining frequent communication within the whole team is crucial - we had check-ins every few hours to monitor progress against the scope, live unblock each other, and keep each other sane!

Access requirements

These are long days in the same space (often without natural light) which can get very intense and overwhelming - checking in with each other isn’t just about the timeline, it’s about making sure everyone is ok, not too stressed, staying hydrated, and taking access breaks if necessary. Don’t be afraid to reach out to the organisers for additional support as well.

Don’t forget the other submission requirements

We had to submit an APK, provide a walkthrough or live demo, present a pitch deck, present a 60 second trailer video, and fill out a fair amount of information on DevPost. Don’t leave this to the last minute! We dedicated the final day to the video, finalising and rehearsing the pitch deck, preparing all the DevPost requirements.  

Quiz the Mentors

The Mentors are there for a reason - don’t be afraid to ask them as many questions as possible. Obviously they have to remain impartial, but you can ask them to look at work in progress, discuss the submission and judging process, talk through your pitch deck with them, and ask them to act as a critical friend and ask the uncomfortable questions so you can prepare for all eventualities. We had some amazing Mentors with a diverse range of backgrounds which really helped.

Presenting to the Judges - have a back up plan!

I would highly recommend a back up plan if you can’t get the prototype to work live with the judges - went spent a little bit of extra time and effort filming and cutting a walkthrough video just in case we couldn’t get it to work in the moment. Thankfully we didn’t need to use it, but I felt more comfortable having it there.

Understandably, a Hackathon is very demanding on the venue’s WiFi network. Make sure you have everything saved locally on at least 1 or 2 devices just in case the internet fails you at the last minute.

Final Words

It takes a village to organise these sorts of events - logistics, catering, people management, securing sponsors, judges, and mentors etc. Huge thanks goes out to:

- XR Bootcamp, Ferhan Özkan and Rahel Demant for organising the first ever Global XR Hack.

- Meta, Innovate UK, and PWC for sponsoring and supporting the London Hack, particularly Asha Easton, Amy Chao, Jeremy Dalton, and Roberto Coviello.

- Sean Rodrigo for bringing the XR community together with his infectious personality!

- Our mentors for their provocations and guidance over the last few days: Zack Brisson, Mo Sayyar, Nigel McAlpine, Maruša Levstek, Ju Zhang, and Gregor Finger.

- The judges, for giving up their time, especially Zac Drake, Alex Rühl, and Sam Watts from the Social Gaming category.

Finally, a huge thanks to Lauren, Katie, and James for an amazing collaboration - we went into the Hackathon wanting to make something together, and I am so proud of us for making Chaos! Thanks also for putting up with my constant questions, requests, and for giving you an ear worm!

What next?

Watch this space! I’m really curious to try out some of the other creations from the London XR Hack - get in touch if you have something you want to share.

I’m also looking forward to seeing projects from the other XR Hackathons!

Want to talk some more? Get in touch.

Excerpt taken from the plenary session on A.I. at the AEC Congress 2023

My position statement:

"As a multimedia artist, I have used AI as a tool to facilitate an aspect of my creativity. I cannot give a binary answer to “how I relate to AI”. I understand the concerns relating to artistic integrity: copyright ownership, discoverability issues, evolution of employability, the changing artistic field, the changing business model of the music sector. The future will look different for me and my peers.

In a survey EPASA and the AEC produced earlier this year, we asked the question: “Which technologies do you think are disrupting the artistic field?” Unsurprisingly, the number one was AI. Anecdotally, I know of so many people using AI to do some, if not all of, of their academic work. So this poses the question - what will happen to academic integrity, if students aren’t using their critical, analytical, or research skills in this way?

It requires a mindset shift. I am generalising, but I know there are concerns from the community about how to approach AI in artistic education. The sector has been here before, facing different challenges, such as digital streaming - we just need to adapt our mindset and look for the opportunities. One way to address this is to look at how you curate learning and assessment in response to the use of AI - it's crucial. 

How are you preparing emerging professionals for the future? The World Economic Forum produced their Future of Jobs report earlier this year, and found that the top 10 core skills for workers include: analytical thinking, creative thinking, resilience, flexibility, agility, motivation, self awareness, curiosity, empathy, active listening, leadership. These are transferable, cognitive skills which I know we can attain from studying artistic courses. So, as artists, we already have the advantage!

Collectively, if we approach it right, I truly believe we have an opportunity to pivot into the imagination age: where creativity and imagination become the primary creators of value in society on many levels."

With thanks to the AEC, Ine Vanoeveren, Luc Döbereiner, Orla McDonagh, and Paul Craenen.