Winners Announcement:

At an event in Digital Exchange on October 17th, the successful candidates of this year's Best in Show competition were announced. This year there were applications spanning five categories. They were Animation, Audio/Music Production, Digital Design, Film/Video Production and Multimedia. We were delighted with the response and quality of work submitted this year.

We would like to acknowledge the time and dedication of all the companies involved this year: Igloo Animation, Athena Media, Digital Skills Academy, Riviera Media Group, Red Dog, Gaumina, payByMobile, Areaman Productions, Prosperity and D8CEC.

The successful candidates for 2011 are:

Category: Animation
Judging & Work Placement Company: Igloo Animations
Winner: Fiona Healy, Graham Tormey and Stanislaw Buczkowski all of Ballyfermot College of Further Education.
Project Title: ‘Spiders’

Spiders is a short 3D/Flash film set in a “SteamPunk-Victorian” era depicting a conflict between a nasty little spider-catcher, Vicky, and the Spider General who rallies his troops in an attempt to end her wickedness.

This was a group project made by three students, Graham Tormey, Fiona Healy and Stanislaw Buczkowski.
Having previously graduated with a BA in Model Making for TV and Film from IADT Dunlaoghaire in 2010, Fiona Healy progressed onto the BA in Animation in Ballyfermot College of Further Education with an aim to further develop her 3D portfolio to satisfy high industry standards.

Graham Tormey is an animation student specialising in CGI. He has previously worked as a stop-motion animator for various studios and is currently in his final year of an animation degree at the Irish School of Animation in Ballyfermot College of Further Education.

Category: Audio/Music Production
Judging & Work Placement Company: Athena Media
Winner: Conor McGinnity from DCU.
Project Title: ‘The Pacemaker’

This is a radio drama. In an alternate present, a secret group called ‘The Pacemakers’ fit the population with a device that triggers their deaths when they have served their purpose to society. The story follows Alf, a Pacemaker, about to retire and his young apprentice, Minnock.

Conor McGinnity is a final year Communications Student in DCU that has specialised in Radio Production under the tutelage of Marie Louise O'Donnell for the past two years. His piece “My Dad’s Depression” was selected for RTE Radio One’s series ‘Documentary on One’ and was broadcast in September 2011. He has a keen interest in drama writing and hopes to pursue this upon graduation.

Category: Audio/Music Production
Judging & Work Placement Company: Digital Skills Academy
Winner: The Silver Lining CD project from the Sound Training Centre. Shaun Cadogan (manager), John Neary (Fundraising), Michael Heffernan and Kieran Walsh (distribution), Neil Cathcart (Finance) & Sergio de Vega Gomez (PR)
Project Title: ‘Silver Lining’

Silver Lining was produced by second year students at the Sound Training Centre. The album consists of contemporary Irish artists covering hits from 1986 - the year Sound Training Centre was founded. Album proceeds will go to the charity Headstrong - the national centre for youth mental health. The title, Silver Lining, was chosen with Headstrong in mind as it suggests positivity and invokes hope for the future. As part of this project the students organised a number of events which included a table quiz, a 5-a-side tournament, street collections, raffles and gigs. This was done to fund the project and also to raise awareness for Headstrong.

All the people involved in this project were second year students at the Sound Training Centre. The project was managed by Shaun Cadogan. Fundraising was managed by John Neary and distribution was managed by Michael Heffernan and Kieran Walsh. Finances were overseen by Neil Cathcart whilst Sergio de Vega Gomez looked after PR. There were many other students involved, each of whom was assigned a role in one of the above categories.

Category: Audio/Music Production
Judging & Work Placement Company: Riviera Media Group
Winner: Emer Landers, Trinity College Dublin
Project Title: ‘Acousmatising Nosferatu’

The term “Acousmatic Sound” was introduced by Michel Chion, and describes a certain motif or sound that is used to symbolise a character's presence when they are either on or off screen. It can appear first in a scene without the character's physical presence and it can then appear alongside the character in a later scene.

For the purpose of this film score, Emer Landers opted to ‘acousmatise’ the character of Nosferatu in earlier scenes that refer to him, making his theme more prominent throughout the film before having the most blatant playing of the motif during one of the final attack scenes - where she felt his true character is revealed.

Emer recently completed a BA in Music at Trinity College Dublin, where she specialised in the area of Music Technology. She was ranked top in the class in 2011, and awarded the Geoffrey Singleton Prizes for two of her final projects. Her main passion is in music for Film, Television and New Media and she currently pursuing a career in composing for this area. She is currently working on a number of music projects and an Android app for children.

Category: Digital Design
Judging & Work Placement Company: Red Dog
Winner: Mary Fannon, NCAD
Project Title: ‘Walk Dublin’

Walk Dublin is a way-finding design project for pedestrians in Dublin City Centre. The visual language is inspired by Celtic Illumination. It is designed to define a unique sense of place and to illustrate the Irish character of the city. The maps show the compact nature of the city and encourage walking by indicating clearly how the city connects.

Walk Dublin consists of:
• a unique, Irish identity and visual language
• a sign family designed to encourage walking
• a series of maps which work as a linked system
• a proposal for a digital platform for linked maps that are interchangeable from day to night

The compass map simplifies the city into quarters.
The colour code of the compass map is reflected in the pedestrian signs in each quarter.
The Schematic map functions as a day or night map. It divides the city into a 5 minute walking grid.
The Street map works as an underlay to the schematic map. It is designed to give detailed street information and simplify the appearance of walk routes.
Mary Fannon is a Masters Graduate from Visual Communications in NCAD 2011. Her specialist area is way-finding design with a background in print and finished art. She graduated with a BA Hons Degree in Visual Communications from Limerick School of Art and Design in 2000 and has worked in the design industry until commencing the masters’ course in 2009.

Category: Film/Video Production
Judging & Work Placement Company: Areaman
Winner: Keith Bogan
Project Title: ‘Carousel’

The design of the ‘Carousel’ revolves around the idea of the evolution and futility of war. Since the dawn of time it has been mankind’s nature to command and conquer, and though it may appear that our way of thinking has advanced throughout the years, we will always have that destructive primal instinct.

Keith has always been very passionate about music and he constantly jumps at the opportunity to combine both his interests of design and audio.  For his final college piece he created a music video for one of his own songs.

As Keith researched the history of graphic design, he found he was drawn to the bold shapes and modern industrial materials of the Constructivist Movement so he decided to pay tribute to the art style by creating a war driven motion graphics piece.

Category: Multimedia
Judging & Work Placement Company: Gaumina
Winner: Aoife Hester from IADT
Project Title: ‘Analogue Futures’

www.analoguefutures.com offers help and tips and aims to encourage people to put aside any fears or doubts that they may have in relation to analogue photography. Users are invited to upload and share their analogue pictures online and may get their work published in the Analogue Futures quarterly showcase magazine, which is sent out to all members for free. The images that were used in this project are the Aoife’s own. To see the site in full, visit www.analoguefutures.com.

Aoife Hester has recently completed a BA Hons Degree in Visual Communications Design at IADT. She has a keen interest in both design and photography, having recently showcased and sold her photographs at exhibitions around Wicklow. She hopes to work in a digital design environment, which incorporates web design and/or photography.

www.aoifehester.com

Category: Multimedia
Judging & Work Placement Company: payByMobile
Winner: The Audiolise Group from DkIT: Ros Madigan (Project Manager & Social Media), David Dooley (Design & Software Programming), Pauric Freeman (Audio & Hardware Programming), Ciaran Rabbitte (Research & Documentary)
Project Title: ‘Audiolise’

Audiolise is a project that lets the user create an audio piece in accordance to the inspiration that the user has taken from viewing a piece of art. The process begins with the user immersing themselves within a particular piece of art and then interpreting their ideas and feelings into an audio soundscape.

The team of students worked with a team of Irish artists, both emerging and established, on this project. They acquired hi-res digital images of eight different paintings from eight different artists. From a simple navigational interface, a user selected an art piece and then utilising a tablet computer and touchpad mouse the user was able toggle information on the paintings/artists and create an audio soundscape - their interpretation of the art pieces.

Team Audiolise are: Ros Madigan (Project Manager & Social Media), David Dooley (Design & Software Programming), Pauric Freeman (Audio & Hardware Programming) and Ciaran Rabbitte (Research & Documentary).

Ros Madigan is well used to the role as project manager and is comfortable leading both small and large teams of people. Ros has much experience working with teams of people during his time with his Media Society in DkIT, which won local and national awards. Ros' interests lie in TV + Radio, social media marketing and PR as well as video production. Ros recently set up his own media production company.

David Dooley is a man well used to all things aesthetic. David has a long history of top quality design work ranging from brochures, posters, campaign branding and even beer bottle design. David's services have been in high demand in the past few years with many freelance jobs coming his way. David is not only a one trick pony with a large skill-set in video and audio production, most notably with his own, 'The Floor is Lava' TV show on YouTube. David can be found at www.daviddooleymedia.com

Pauric Freeman is the musical mind of the group. Pauric is now studying in Trinity College Dublin, completing a Masters in Music and Media Technologies. Pauric has been a long time pioneer of electronic music and his passion for all things audio is apparent in his work. To see a selection of Pauric's work see http://soundcloud.com/pauricfreeman

Ciaran Rabbitte was the research brain in the group with all his findings helping aid the group in every aspect of the project. Ciaran is vastly interested in Film Production with a Masters lined up for next year. Ciaran produced many short films as well as documentaries in his time at DkIT most notably producing the documentary/walk-through of the project 'Audiolise'. See http://youtu.be/g0plVSuRenU

Category: Multimedia

Winner: Pedro Bretas

Project Title: Into Brazil

IntoBrazil was designed by Pedro Bretas as part of a research and practice project for a Masters in Visual Communication (2009 - 2011) at NCAD / The National College of Arts and Design in Dublin.

This project aimed to study the concept of experience customisation and how to collaborate with interactive design in order to promote the tourist regions of Brazil. It was a multidisciplinary project, which involved: art direction, concept design, branding, illustration and technical realization.

The website allows users to create a virtual travel experience to Brazil and explore touristic cities.

http://www.intobrazil.net/

Category: Multimedia
Judging & Work Placement Company: Gaumina
Winner: Ray O'Neill
Project Title: ‘Close Connections’

Close Connection is an exploratory look at how new media technology can be utilized by couples in long distance relationship to help them to communicate in more natural ways then traditional methods.

The purpose of Close Connection is to bring couples in long distance relationships closer together. By exploring new media technology I have developed two prototypes that could be used in the context of long distance relationships.

My intention for this project was to suggest more natural means of communication that one would have with a partner and try to recreate intimate moments in their relationship as if they were together.

The aim of this project is to utilise new media technology in an attempt to help maintain intimacy in close personal relationships that occurs over a long distance.

The project intends to help couples in long distance relationship overcome geographical separation and allow them to experience intimate moments similar to when they are together.

Category: D8CEC Administrative Placement
Judging & Work Placement Company: Digital Hub Development Agency
Winner: Madou Suzanne Manga

As part of Best in Show 2011, The Digital Hub extended the search for interns to include those with administrative skills. We sought applications from the Dublin 8 Community Education Centre (D8CEC) whose office is based on campus in The Digital Hub.
Following a review of all the applications received Madou Suzanne Manga Anengue Ngono was selected to work alongside the marketing team at Digital Hub Development Agency for four weeks where she had a chance to put all her skills into practice.
Dublin 8 Community Education Centre (D8CEC) is an independent, not-for-profit organisation set up in 1997 to provide second-chance education for adults in south-west inner-city Dublin. Its Trustees are the Christian Brothers and it has a voluntary Board of Management. It is funded by a variety of agencies, including CDVEC, Dept of Community, Rural & Gaeltacht Affairs, Dublin City Council and The Edmund Rice Trust.

Some of the courses available in D8CEC are: Basic English, Personal Development, Junior Cert English and Maths, Social History, Spanish, ESOL (English for speakers of other languages), Art, Computer Skills, Office Skills, Bookkeeping and Payroll. Courses are provided in response to the expressed needs of the community and vary from term to term.

Courses are part-time, learner-centred, FETAC accredited and available free to adults in the Liberties community.

For more information see www.d8cec.com