MADEFIRE
CREATIVE DIRECTOR STUDIO & INNOVATION
At Madefire, we developed stories and the tools to tell them. I led the creative direction across the studio and its innovation work, bringing writers, artists and technologists together around original worlds, Motion Books and immersive storytelling.
The role spanned storytelling, authoring and publishing, including a proprietary engine and marketplace built for serialised immersive stories.
Madefire began with a familiar premise: put the creator first. With Ben Wolstenholme, Liam Sharp and Dave Gibbons behind it, that premise had teeth. These were storytellers who had earned the right to colour outside the lines. Madefire gave audiences a way to follow.
Madefire began with a familiar premise: put the creator first. With Ben Wolstenholme, Liam Sharp and Dave Gibbons behind it, that premise had teeth. These were storytellers who had earned the right to colour outside the lines. Madefire gave audiences a way to follow.
The mission ran in both directions: give artists, writers and indie studios the means to tell their own stories, and expand the worlds the majors already owned. With open authoring tools, anyone could make a Motion Book and publish it to Madefire’s marketplace, alongside the heroes who inspired them. Artist or super.
The mission ran in both directions: give artists, writers and indie studios the means to tell their own stories, and expand the worlds the majors already owned. With open authoring tools, anyone could make a Motion Book and publish it to Madefire’s marketplace, alongside the heroes who inspired them. Artist or super.
Madefire began with a familiar premise: put the creator first. With Ben Wolstenholme, Liam Sharp and Dave Gibbons behind it, that premise had teeth. These were storytellers who had earned the right to colour outside the lines. Madefire gave audiences a way to follow.
The mission ran in both directions: give artists, writers and indie studios the means to tell their own stories, and expand the worlds the majors already owned. With open authoring tools, anyone could make a Motion Book and publish it to Madefire’s marketplace, alongside the heroes who inspired them. Artist or super.
DAVE GIBBONS, CO-CREATOR OF WATCHMEN
DAVE GIBBONS, CO-CREATOR OF WATCHMEN
ACT III · STORY FACTORY
NEW STORIES
The larger ambition was to tell new stories in new ways, creating worlds that could grow with the story across any screen. The studio stayed agnostic about medium much further into development than traditional productions allow. What made it tick was that imagining a story and engineering one happened in unison.
This story-first approach allowed Madefire Originals and our partners’ titles to unfold as Motion Books, in cinema, in mixed reality and in fully immersive worlds. A character, a world or a single storyline could thread across mediums and keep going past the edge of any one frame.
Batman: Arkham Origins carried the story from Motion Book to video game.
War for the Planet of the Apes extended beyond the cinema before release.
Marvel’s Black Panther extended beyond the cinema before release.
Black Widow synced haptic, spatial feedback to the story.
Watchmen extended its universe into a prequel series of Motion Books.
Batman: Arkham Origins carried the story from Motion Book to video game.
War for the Planet of the Apes extended beyond the cinema before release.
Marvel’s Black Panther extended beyond the cinema before release.
Black Widow synced haptic, spatial feedback to the story.
Watchmen extended its universe into a prequel series of Motion Books.
When Magic Leap arrived, Motion Books became spatial: stories unfolding in the room around you.
MADEFIRE ⎥MAGICLEAP
PUBLISHINGTO THIN AIR
When Magic Leap arrived, Motion Books became spatial: stories unfolding in the room around you.
MADEFIRE ⎥MAGICLEAP
PUBLISHINGTO THIN AIR
When Magic Leap arrived, Motion Books became spatial: stories unfolding in the room around you.
MADEFIRE ⎥MAGICLEAP
PUBLISHINGTO THIN AIRWhen Magic Leap arrived, Motion Books became spatial: stories unfolding in the room around you.
Our titles and the tools that made them shipped with the headset. Artists could master their own work and publish straight to the headset, no code required. The tools that let them tell a story could now let them place an audience inside it.
MADEFIRE ⎥MAGICLEAP
When Magic Leap arrived, Motion Books became spatial: stories unfolding in the room around you.
Our titles and the tools that made them shipped with the headset. Artists could master their own work and publish straight to the headset, no code required. The tools that let them tell a story could now let them place an audience inside it.
MADEFIRE
In MONO Blackwater, the illustrated world became cinema.
STEPPING INTO THE PAGE
- PUBLISHING TO THIN AIR
When Magic Leap arrived, Motion Books became spatial: stories unfolding in the room around you.
MADEFIRE ⎥MAGICLEAP
- PUBLISHING TO THIN AIR
When Magic Leap arrived, Motion Books became spatial: stories unfolding in the room around you.
MADEFIRE ⎥MAGICLEAP
When Magic Leap arrived, Motion Books became spatial: stories unfolding in the room around you.
Our titles and the tools that made them shipped with the headset. Artists could master their own work and publish straight to the headset, no code required. The tools that let them tell a story could now let them place an audience inside it.
- PUBLISHING TO THIN AIR
When Magic Leap arrived, Motion Books became spatial: stories unfolding in the room around you.
MADEFIRE ⎥MAGICLEAP
When Magic Leap arrived, Motion Books became spatial: stories unfolding in the room around you.
Our titles and the tools that made them shipped with the headset. Artists could master their own work and publish straight to the headset, no code required. The tools that let them tell a story could now let them place an audience inside it.
MONO: BEYOND THE FRAMENARRATIVE DESIGN and world building ACROSS MEDIUMs
MADEFIRE ORGININAL ⎥MINICASE STUDY
- MONO: BEYOND THE FRAME
NARRATIVE DESIGN and world building ACROSS MEDIUMs
MADEFIRE ORGININAL ⎥MINICASE STUDY
MADEFIRE ORGININAL ⎥MINICASE STUDY
MONO began as the marquee original for Madefire Motion Books. An agent in service of the British Crown, he served as its weapon for the most dangerous missions of the Second World War.
- MONO: BEYOND THE FRAME
NARRATIVE DESIGN and world building ACROSS MEDIUMs
MADEFIRE ORGININAL ⎥MINICASE STUDY
MADEFIRE
In MONO Blackwater, the illustrated world became cinema.
STEPPING INTO THE PAGE
MADEFIRE ORGININAL ⎥MINICASE STUDY
NARRATIVE DESIGN and world building ACROSS MEDIUMs
MONO: BEYOND THE FRAME
MADEFIRE ORGININAL ⎥MINICASE STUDY
NARRATIVE DESIGN and world building ACROSS MEDIUMs
MONO: BEYOND THE FRAMEMONO began as the marquee original for Madefire Motion Books. An agent in service of the British Crown, he served as its weapon for the most dangerous missions of the Second World War.
The story moved past the war and picked back up on the cinema screen. Instead of a hero’s welcome, MONO vanished into exile, far from the brutality of man. Haunted by memories of the vicious years of fighting, a broken soldier found peace in the wild.
MADEFIRE
STEPPING INTO THE PAGEIn MONO Blackwater, the illustrated world became cinema.
You stood inside a comic as it unfolded around you, blurring the boundaries between illustration, cinema and play. The film screened at Sundance and SXSW.
You could read MONO’s story, then watch it unfold. Now you move through it
You stood inside a comic as it unfolded around you, blurring the boundaries between illustration, cinema and play. The film screened at Sundance and SXSW.
You could read MONO’s story, then watch it unfold. Now you move through it
MADEFIRE ⎥MAGICLEAP
STEPPING INTO THE PAGEIn MONO Blackwater, the illustrated world became cinema.
Madefire Studios and the Technicolor Experience Center opened that world to participation: a VR film you play, bringing together motion capture, animation, interactive game design and ambisonic sound. The story moved forward only as you took part.
MADEFIRE ⎥MAGICLEAP
You stood inside a comic as it unfolded around you, blurring the boundaries between illustration, cinema and play. The film screened at Sundance and SXSW.
You could read MONO’s story, then watch it unfold. Now you move through it
You stood inside a comic as it unfolded around you, blurring the boundaries between illustration, cinema and play. The film screened at Sundance and SXSW.
You could read MONO’s story, then watch it unfold. Now you move through it
MADEFIRE
STEPPING INTO THE PAGEIn MONO Blackwater, the illustrated world became cinema.
You stood inside a comic as it unfolded around you, blurring the boundaries between illustration, cinema and play. The film screened at Sundance and SXSW.
You could read MONO’s story, then watch it unfold. Now you move through it
You stood inside a comic as it unfolded around you, blurring the boundaries between illustration, cinema and play. The film screened at Sundance and SXSW.
You could read MONO’s story, then watch it unfold. Now you move through it
MADEFIRE
In MONO Blackwater, the illustrated world became cinema.
STEPPING INTO THE PAGE
MADEFIRE
In MONO Blackwater, the illustrated world became cinema.
STEPPING INTO THE PAGE
MADEFIRE
In MONO Blackwater, the illustrated world became cinema.
STEPPING INTO THE PAGE
MADEFIRE
In MONO Blackwater, the illustrated world became cinema.
STEPPING INTO THE PAGE