Matt Jakob is a Senior Creative Technologist at Imagination and leads the Labs department. With the digitalization of the creative industry reaching a saturation level, it's becoming increasingly important for agencies and design studios to find new ways to emerge and differentiate their offering. In his presentation in the Technology Theatre at the Event Production Show on 12 February 2014, Matt looked at how and why technology and innovation are proving to be a successful strategy to win this contemporary challenge. Drawing from Imagination's vast portfolio of projects as well as showcasing some state of the art case studies his talk featured a series of interactive materials and hands on prototypes.

1. Matt Jakob
Senior Creative Technologist
IMAGINATION Ltd.
{e} matt.jakob@imagination.com
{w} www.imagination.com
{t} @mattjakob

2. My role at Imagination
• Creative Technologist
• Labs

3. TECHNOLOGY AS
A CREATIVE
COMPETITIVE
ADVANTAGE

4. TECHNOLOGY &
CREATIVITY
(three definitions and relations)

5. TECHNOLOGY
CREATIVITY

6. ANALYSIS
SYNTHESIS

7. TECHNOLOGY
CREATIVITY

8. BRUSH
PAINTING

9. TECHNOLOGY
CREATIVITY

10. PROBLEM
SOLUTION

11. UNDERSTANDING THE
CONTEXT
(reframing to change
context of problems)

12. M. McLuhan
Understanding Media, The Extensions of Man
(1963)

13. TECHNOLOGIES
ARE DEMOCRATIZING SO MUCH
EVERYONE WILL/IS ABLE
TO CREATE

14. DIFFERENTIATION

15. WHY INNOVATION IS RELEVANT
TO THE EVENTS INDUSTRY
>Clients
>Trends
>Logistics
>Creativity

16. STRATEGIES
(tools for the differentiation)

17. TOOLS
PROCESSING / OPENFRAMEWORKS / ARDUINO / KICKSTARTER

18. TOOLS
PROCESSING / OPENFRAMEWORKS / ARDUINO / KICKSTARTER

19. TOOLS
PROCESSING / OPENFRAMEWORKS / ARDUINO / KICKSTARTER

20. TOOLS
PROCESSING / OPENFRAMEWORKS / ARDUINO / KICKSTARTER

21. TRENDS
ROBOTICS AND ELECTRONICS
>Sensors (RFID, thermal, luminosity, presence, capacitive, …)
>Microcontrollers (Arduino, …)
>RaspberryPi
>Drones

22. TRENDS
ROBOTICS AND ELECTRONICS
>Sensors and computing components are already extremely small
and affordable  ubiquitous computing
>We will have unprecedented amounts of data available
(customers insights, security, crowd monitoring, …)
>New creative tools with an emphasis on interaction and
uniqueness

23. TRENDS
AI AND AUTOMATION
>Artificial Intelligence (AI)
>Machine Learning
>Computer Vision

24. TRENDS
AI AND AUTOMATION
>AI will help us greatly making sense of the data provided by
ubiquitous computing
>Environments and objects will be able to seamlessly and
automatically adapt to surrounding conditions
>It is estimated that in 15 years manual labour jobs carried out
by humans will be reduced by 80%

25. TRENDS
3D PRINTING
>3D printers (MakerBot, Canon, …)
>3D scanners (often the same manufacturers)

26. TRENDS
3D PRINTING
>The Chinese market currently based on assembling ‘cheap’
materials / components will have to compete with
companies/industries printing the products by themselves
locally
>Printable materials (esp. with nano structures) will become
increasingly strong and efficient  possibilities to print
architectural structures and components
>3D printers will become larger, faster and cheaper

27. TRENDS
VIRTUAL AND AUGMENTED REALITY
>OculusRift
>LeapMotion
>CastAR
>Occipital

28. TRENDS
VIRTUAL AND AUGMENTED REALITY
>Designers and architects will be able to correctly anticipate
many logistic challenges by immersing in 1:1 scale models
during the design process
>Augmentation/Digitalisation of the space will mean responsive
architectures and open possibilities to custom/dynamic
environments (signage, …)
>Virtual Reality will become an important feature in the gaming,
entertainment and retail industry

29. CONCLUSION

30. THE CHALLENGES OF INNOVATION
>Events
 lots of pressure (time / audience)
>Innovation
 associated with uncertainty
>Many companies are driving high profits with Innovation  lead
the market to inevitable changes
>Our socio-economic dynamics will change massively (how we
shop, transport, entertain, …)

31. HOW TO APPROACH INNOVATION
AND TECHNOLOGY
>Innovation happens at the edges and intersections of different
fields
>Accept failure and include it in your plan
>Be brave ;)