A Monkeystack and Shackleton Epic Expedition production, Thin Ice VR is 20-minute world-first historical re-creation documentary VR experience presented by Tm Jarvis AM supported by the South Australian Film Corporation, Screen Australia, Adelaide Film Festival, Torrens University, Kathmandu and One Ocean Expeditions and Documentary Foundation Australia.
Thin Ice VR, currently in production for release in 2021, will offer an unrivalled immersive experience that will leave viewers in no doubt about the devastating effect of climate change.
Monkeystack was commissioned to develop a large scale touch screen climate change interactive for the Changing Climate permanent gallery display at the Australian Museum, Sydney. We ‘twinned’ the development, with two identical screens and servers located in both Adelaide and Sydney meaning the Museum exhibition team could play as we built. The capacitive screen is 98” and can manage 50 simultaneous touches providing an interactive play space for up to 5 visitors at one time – which is a good thing as the interactive shows 139 animated character scenes, that trigger 135 card decks, containing 312 double-sided digital cards covering 110 climate change impact facts!
The exhibit was launched on the 28th November 2020 as a part of the Museum reopening.
Photo Credit: Abram Powell © Australian Museum
Our collaboration with Michael Cusack and Princess Pictures for Koala Man was just the beginning. YOLO Crystal Fantasy is the next chapter, and with the series being commissioned by Adult Swim, part of the giant Cartoon Network in the US, what a chapter it is. It is the first time that Adult Swim has commissioned a series outside of the US!
This time around, Justin Wight (Monkeystack Director) Co-Produced the series and Monkeystack put together a team of 19 to produce the 8 x 10min episodes for the first season. We think that it’s one of the largest 2D animated series ever produced in South Australia.
For over 10 months, our talented team produced the series that follows the surreal misadventures of friends Rachel and Sarah as they traverse the strange land that is Australia. (Sarah attempts to look for social acceptance and love while Rachel wants nothing but partying and chaos.)
It premiered on Sunday, August 9 at midnight US ET/PT on Adult Swim. You can check out the whole series if you’re clever (or in the US!).
Content Warning. The series is rated TV14LV in the US so not suitable for children under 14.
Monkeystack partnered with Killerfish Games another excellent South Australian indie developer to produce War on the Sea. The game puts you in command of warship task forces, supply convoys and submarines as well as tactical use of aircraft to secure the South Pacific during World War II and is inspired by the classic computer games “Great Naval Battles” and “Task Force 1942”
The Monkeystack studio produced all of the 3D models and textures for a full fleet of destroyers, aircraft carriers, cruisers and battleships as well as planes, submarines, torpedos and depth charges. All of the models are authentically recreated from hundreds of drawing, plans and reference images.
War on the Sea is available on the Steam Store to download and play on PC and Mac.
In a bid to move away from the perception that they only work with police officers, Police Credit Union engaged Monkeystack to develop a new mascot for their brand. In the six years since, POCU has surprised his TVC, web and in-branch audience with his unique universe and all that live in it – all the while telling the story of PCU and their excellent financial and insurance services and products.
Directed by Grant Sputore and starring Hilary Swank, Clara Rugaard, Rose Byne and Luke Hawker, I Am Mother is a Netflix sci-fi thriller about a teenage girl, who is the first of a new generation of humans to be raised by Mother, a robot designed to repopulate the earth after the extinction of humankind.
Monkeystack produced the on set practical screen content. On over 15 various screens we crafted animated sequences for the interactive door panels and touchscreens, various computer boot up sequences and all of the screens on the robot ‘Mother’ by Weta Workshop.
The film had its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival on 25 January 2019 with distribution across Netflix in several countries on 7 June 2019. It was nominated as one of the thirty-four feature films in competition to be nominated for the 2019 AACTA Awards.
As part of the Hedonism exhibit at MOD. (Museum of Discovery at the University of South Australia), Monkeystack produced F.A.B.L.E, an AR led experiential game about consent that visitors navigate via a phone app.
Monkeystack was engaged by Austroads to produce a library of Hazard Perception Test (HPT) videos and supporting material.
This library includes 197 animated videos for motorcycle riders as well as car drivers, providing materials for the world’s first motorcycle-specific HPT.
Shown to reduce the likelihood of crashes, the computer based HPT measures a driver’s or rider’s ability to recognise potentially dangerous situations on the road and respond appropriately. The test is part of the licensing process in NSW, South Australia, Victoria, Western Australia and Queensland.
The signature installation of the 2020 Adelaide Fringe Festival, Yabarra – Dreaming in Light, ran at Tandanya National Aboriginal Cultural Institute from 12 Feb to 15 March. For the 31 days of the Fringe, from 10am until 10pm, over 40,000 people experienced the creation story of Tjilbruke, as interpreted by Karl Winda Telfer and the Williams clan in one of the most complex indoor projected experiences created in Australia.
“Dreaming in Light tells the story of Tjirbruki, but there are so many other elements – the stories of the stars and the ancestors are so important … It’s about looking after and caring for our environment and protecting these few open space places we have left.”—Karl ‘Winda’ Telfer
Quirky and edgy-cute, this animated short was aimed at the public to encourage them to learn first aid, linking in with World First Aid Day. It was part of a series – Band-Aids Can’t Fix Everything.
The clip has over 122 000 views on YouTube making it the most viewed video on the Australian Red Cross YouTube Channel. It won many awards for our studio and it also became AdWeek’s ‘Ad of the Day’, was featured by Australian Creative, B&T, Campaign Brief amongst others in Australia and raved about by international publications Huffington Post, Little Black Book and Ads of the World.
Monkeystack worked with Defence SA and the Australian Space Agency to create an animated chronicle of Australia’s long association with space and space activities.
The History of Space in Australia takes audiences from the early days of Woomera in 1947 through to our current contributions to space exploration and the global Deep Space Network. Working with archives, libraries, museums, historians, agencies, personal collections and cultural leaders in Australia and internationally to produce the animation which is what we believe the most accurate, animation and video depiction of the topic from an Australian perspective in existence. We commissioned South Australian composer Chris Larkin to create the moving score.
This 9 minute video had its first official premier at the International Astronautical Congress in Washington in October 2019.
Are You Tougher than Your Ancestors? is a fun and immersive living history series that pits the skills of today’s kids against the exploits of children from Australia’s past, to find out how they measure up! Monkeystack was commissioned with Flying Kite Pictures and Sticky Pictures to produce the animations for the entire 10 part series.
The first episode aired on ABC ME in June 2020 and has gone on to win an AEAF Special Merit Award and was awarded the Professional Jury’s 2nd Prize – Best Live Action TV at the 37th Chicago International Children’s Film Festival for the episode “Cameleers- The Original ‘Ghan’ Trains”. This award makes the show eligible for the Oscars!
You can watch the series on ABC iView or purchase episodes from the Australian Children’s Television Foundation.
We have been working on several projects with Trinity College since the launch of their new Innovation and Creativity School in 2019. Well, we say working but playing is a better word to use!
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At this time we thought that we’d write to all of our Monkeystack community and give you an update on what we’re doing to keep the studio running as smoothly as we can.
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Electric Dreams is a celebration of immersive storytelling brought to Adelaide by Crossover Labs. As a part of the Adelaide Fringe, the event is an eclectic collection of some of the world’s best virtual reality experiences, and a conference featuring leading international artists and creative technologists.
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The Australian Film Institute held the Australian Academy Cinema Television Arts awards in Sydney in early December, and although we were not able to attend, we are proud to have worked with some of the nominees and winners.
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