Some snapshots of process
Oli's dad once gave him some advice: 'be careful what you get good at'.
Oli is now good at too many things, which means, if the team isn't careful, he gets a lot of thorny tech jobs to do. Here he is figuring out how to get all these phones to work as part of a game originally created by our friends at ex Machina. The bespoke software is also in German and the time zones are not aligning.
Lucas built a beautiful set model for Werewolf - little chairs, light stands and everything. Here are Hannah, Stella and Joel using it to lock in their blocking.
Joel and Oli working remotely with Tiong Hong Siah, a Malaysia-based creative technologist, on something we hope to present at Loemis.
It's a strange thing to be out in the woods with a laptop, making real-time software updates with someone in another time zone. (Also, Siah's partner thought Joel was a ghost in this shot.)
Something happening in Truby King Park ...
Brainstorming new audience cards for Werewolf. When we expanded the scale of the show recently, we needed lots more for the audience to do. One or two of these made it through - the gaspers being probably the most fun).
Technical tests at Squid space, for an escape-room type game, winter 2025. We've been getting into puzzle design as part of a large-scale project we're working on. Puzzles are a great way of thinking really hard about your audience and how they are actually going to interpret (misinterpret) something you thought was really obvious. Turns out - challenging.
Testing materials for Werewolf. The silver in the set was a new idea of Lucas's for 2026, and it presented a lot of opportunities as well as some challenges for the blackout bebause of its reflective nature. We liked the way it brought more of a sense of scale and presence to the space.
Not a crime scene, but a photo taken clearing out the storage under Joel's house. Will we ever use these legs and arms again? Who knows. It's always challenging deciding how much of your company's junk to hang on to, especially when you're relying on people's subfloor crawl spaces.
Recreating the Werewolf poster with Stella instead of Karin, late 2025. Mouce took this shot and we feel like we managed to keep the essence of it. Photo Mouce Young
The original, taken during a performance in 2021, there's Karah too. Photo ©VanessaRushtonPhotography-30
Developing games in this uncanny Back Rooms environment for our upcoming immersive project, Summer 2025-26. Michael, Meg, Oli and Joel.
A test run-though of ideas for the expanded Werewolf at the Hannah, 2025. Our big question was how it would feel to have audience members on the stage. How many, and what could we ask them to do? We settled on 8 - enough to feel special but not so few as to make you feel too exposed up there. Feels like we got that right.
After the first preview audience at Circa, Feb 2026- a strong buzz and a real feeling of satisfaction that Werewolf had kept its essential qualities while expanding from 50 audience members in the round to 230 and a seating block.
... something happening at Truby King Park.