Hololabs will be in New York City for MontrealX Developer Showcase

On December 4th, 2014 Hololabs will be joining nine other Montreal-based indie developers to showcase our games in the Quebec Government’s Rockefeller Center office.

We will be there with Papercade, and Astrid will be moderating a panel discussion on the games industry in Montreal.

This event is organized by Rogue Counsel, with support from Alliance Numerique and the Quebec Government Office in New York.

For more information about who else is participating see the full event details over on Rogue Counsel’s site.

Papercade at the October MRGS Craft Meetup

The evening of October 16, 2014 we will be presenting Papercade at the October edition of the MRGS Craft Meetup. Held monthly, these meetups focus on the craft and experience of designing games.

Throughout Papercade’s development we have often sought feedback from local game developers and enthusiasts. Our presentation on Thursday will be a discussion on the evolution of Papercade as a result of this feedback and - now that Papercade is live on the App Store - what type of improvements can be made to create a better in-game experience for our budding creative community.

We hope to see you there!

Papercade at Critical Hit 2014

Coming up this Monday (July 14) Mike will be at Critical Hit to chat about all things Papercade. He will also bring along a few iPads with the playable alpha for participants to try out!

For those of you wondering what on Earth we’re talking about, Critical Hit is a fantastic program here in Montreal that is dedicated to ‘catalyse the development of experimental games.’ Each year they focus on a different type of game design, with this year’s theme being ‘game jams.’

At Critical Hit 2014, participants game jam in one week intervals, pick their favourites, and then continue developing those selected into polished experimental games.

As we work on getting Papercade ready to launch we have also been inspired by game jams. The amazing creativity and expression that come as a result of the structure and atmosphere of game jams are what inspired us to create the PaperJAM Challenges currently featured in Papercade.

All in all we are really looking forward to sharing stories, tips, and contributing to the Critical Hit community.

Mike to Speak at Symposium IX in May

Hololabs Co-Founder & CTO Mike Wozniewski will be speaking on a panel at the International Symposium on Immersive Creativity taking place from May 21 to 25, 2014 at the SAT here in Montreal.

Mike will be participating on a panel on the theme of tools and workflow with fellow panelists Greg Hermanovic, Anton Marini, Xavier Buffoni, Quentin Bleton, and Barry Threw. The panel will be moderated by Miller Puckette of the Center for Research in Computing and the Arts.

If you will be in town and want to connect with Mike at the event send over an email or leave us a note on the Hololabs Facebook page.

NFB Presents McLaren Wall-to-Wall Featuring Kid Koala and Hololabs Collaboration

Photo Credit: National Film Board of Canada (NFB)

In honour of innovative film maker Norman McLaren the National Film Board of Canada (NFB) has commissioned seven artists to create projection installations around Montreal.

We are excited to announce that in collaboration with recording artist Kid Koala we have an interactive installation at Place des Arts in downtown Montreal entitled Phonophotopia.

Inspired by Norman McLaren’s film “Dots,” anyone can place ‘dots’ (coloured blocks) on a film strip conveyor belt and watch as they come to life as they are projected onto Théâtre Maisonneuve at Place des Arts.

Phonophotopia runs from April 11 to June 1, 2014 in the evenings.

IGDA Montreal DemoNight Wrap Up

IGDA Montreal DemoNight was amazing! We sure had a blast. There were something like 600 people in attendance at DemoNight, and 25 games were showcased. IGDA Montreal has put up a photo album [Facebook] and a full video recording of the night (we’re at 1:19:11). Plus, our pals at Flip Side Culture posted their own recap video the other day.

Also: Papercade was featured as a top pick from the night by Montreal culture magazine Cult MTL and by the original self-proclaimed hipster-nerd Mariko on her site Gamerwife. We’re flattered!

[gallery]

i love you.. (at Hololabs Studio)

We're Hiring! Game Developer (Unity 3D) Edition.

We are expanding our development team in order to complete two upcoming F2P titles for mobile platforms. Candidates should have an interest in social, casual and mobile games.

Required skills:

• Highly organized, self-motivated, with strong problem solving, troubleshooting, and analytical skills;
• Intimate knowledge of Unity3D;
• Highly competent in C#: should understand coroutines, events, delegates, singletons, etc.;
• Experience in game programming concepts: 3D math, colliders, physics, character controllers, GUI, cameras;
• Experience with some popular Unity3D packages: NGUI, Playmaker, FingerGestures, AStar (path planning), Vectrosity;
• Can self-manage, work in an agile environment (e.g., SCRUM), and track progress;
• Familiarity with version control (Git).

Other relevant skills (not required, but nice to have):

• Design experience (e.g., Photoshop, 3DSMax, Maya, etc.);
• Experience writing shaders;
• Animation (Mecanim, animation controllers, rigging and retargeting);
• Experience developing cloud-hosted applications, working with web APIs, networking, parsing JSON, data persistence, and database/CMS interaction;
• Knowledge of web application programming (HTML5, responsive UI, RESTful APIs, JSON, AngularJS, Bootstrap, Javascript, jQuery, etc.);
• Mobile app development (iOS/Android): XCode, C++, NDK, Obj-C;
• Bilingual (English/French).

Is this you? Get in touch! Send over an email with your CV to info@hololabs.org.

Hololabs launches "Hollowfields" installation at the International Digital Arts Biennial

Hololabs was commissioned to create an interactive art installation for the 2012 first edition BIAN Montreal art festival and Maison de la culture Ahuntsic- Cartierville.

Using real-time point-cloud data from a Kinect controller, participants’ bodies and motion were tracked and projected as patterns of 3D computer graphics onto a series of translucent screens. The resulting experience for the audience was the ability to control a large immersive 3D environment with micro-movements of their own bodies.