Week-long staff, student and alumni exhibit takes over ACMI

Swinburne is coming to ACMI with a week-long program of interactive, thought-provoking digital media experiences from Swinburne students, alumni, lecturers and researchers.

Titled Swinburne: next gen_now, the non-ticketed program will run from Saturday 3 September to Wednesday 7 September 2022 in the Swinburne Studio and Gandel Digital Future Lab.

As ACMI’s Major Academic Partner, Swinburne is recognised as a leader in the creation of next generation digital experiences that allow students to produce, create and engage using advanced technology. Swinburne: next gen_now showcases the university’s capabilities in screen, media, film, television and design.

Visitors to ACMI will don the VR headsets, gloves and superpowers to create their own superhero. The experience is a collaboration between Swinburne, ACMI, celebrated technology artist Stuart Campbell aka SUTU and award-winning VR studio VISITOR.

A week to look forward to

Liam Burke, Associate Professor at Swinburne University of Technology, said they are excited to reaffirm the university at the cutting-edge of digital media.

“After a false start last year due to a snap lockdown, to say we are excited to launch next gen_now is an understatement. Our partnership with ACMI enables us to further our goal of bringing people and technology together to provide transformative research to the industry and advance screen culture,” says Professor Burke.

The program is packed full of interesting talks, VR experiences and showcased films and games. Highlights include:

• Next gen_filmmaking: Join Max Schleser to zoom in on the growing community of smartphone filmmaking
• Games Arcade: Walking through the Swinburne Games Arcade you’ll see a collection of work produced by several student teams from the past five years
• Superheroes: Realities Collide: Answer our call, don the VR headsets, gloves and superpowers to destroy an alternative Melbourne before it swallows our own city in a cloud of anti-matter!
• Aurora Australis Ultimo Choro: An immersive visual and sonic feast of three-dimensional environments and spatial sound visualising and sonifying the last grand Antarctic dance of the Aurora Australis, its crew and expeditioners.