Guest lecture at the University of Hull, Scarborough Campus

Me, Myself and MRI

Following on from my lecture at Huddersfield on Tuesday, today I was at Scarborough giving the same talk to students on the second year of the Creative Music Technology course. The lecture covers a wide range of projects from my time before Apollo Creative, as well as more recent work like 'Me, Myself and MRI' and the Fountaineers Project.

Apollo Christmas Card

We're proud that this years official Apollo Christmas card was designed by Jack from The Forest School whilst he was on work experience with us in the summer. 

Lecture at University of Huddersfield

Today was my annual lecture at the University of Huddersfield, talking about real world examples for interactive installations. It's an opportunity for the students to see how some of the work they are doing might be applied in the 'real world'.

I also stayed around after the lecture to provide some feedback on the students work and also to chat to Anton, who is doing an MSc by research and will be working with the Apollo Ensemble.

'Making Music with Special Children' Event

It was great to have the opportunity today to demonstrate the Apollo Ensemble to participants of the 'Making Music with Special Children' course, organised by Jessie's Fund.

Lesley provided some examples of how technology can be used as a musical instrument to enable children to participate in music making.  I was able to show the benefits of the Apollo wireless sensors, especially the Press and Dice.

Thanks to all on the course for a lovely welcome.

Charmed Lives exhibition opens at the Rotunda, Scarborough

The 'Charmed Lives' exhibition opens today at the Rotunda Museum in Scarborough, featuring touch screen interactives created by students from the University of Hull. The interactives were created over six weeks by students on the Creative Music Technology course, with mentoring and lectures provided by Mark from Apollo Creative.

You can see a brief overview of the pieces on the cultiv8 blog.

The exhibition will be on until the 27th November.

Music & Inclusivity Conference

Apollo were at the 'Music & Inclusivity' Conference at York St John University today, showing the Apollo Ensemble. We were joined by Andrew Cleaton, who has recently been interviewing people for our new series of case studies.

The Ensemble was also being showcased in a workshop run by Accessible Arts and Media.

Article in Music Teacher Magazine

The Apollo Ensemble features in an article this month in Music Teacher Magazine. It includes pictures of the Ensemble and E-Scape in use at SKUG in Norway, plus comments from Diane Paterson and Joanna Winster from the Gordon Parry Centre.

You can read the full interview with Diane and Joanna on our Case Studies page on the Apollo Ensemble website.

Student from Huddersfield joins Apollo

We'd like to welcome Andy to the Apollo team, who will be joining us for the year from the University of Huddersfield. He is currently studying on the BSc Music Technology and Audio Systems course.

Andy will be working on a number of different projects, including a software development toolkit (SDK) for the Apollo Ensemble and new foley sounds for our copyright free sound library.

New student joins Apollo for work experience

This week we welcome Tess from St. Aidan's School on work experience. We hope she'll enjoy getting to grips with the Apollo Ensemble in our demo room and producing some resources.

Student wins big!

Earlier I told you about a student from King James's School in Knaresborough who designed a triangular bubble wall as a tabletop show-piece. Well since then he has gone on to win several awards for his design.

Charlie visited Apollo Creative many times during the design and construction of his piece in order to use our knowledge of building and customising bubble walls.

His first award came at the Engineering Inspirations event held at Yorkshire Air Museum where he won the Product Design award for Key Stage 5.

Yesterday he also won twice at the Big Bang Fair held at York Minster. As a result of winning here he gets to travel down to London to compete in the National finals. Good luck!

Student samples work experience at Apollo

This week we have had a student from a local school on work experience. A year 10 student from The Forest School, has been using his interest in art to help design a new company logo, product posters and graphics for the Apollo Ensemble software.

He produced some great paintings which we will be using with the Ensemble software as background images for two of our ready made themes, 'jungle' and 'under the sea'.

In between all his other jobs this week he managed to create a Christmas card for us, stay tuned for yours!

A triangular bubble wall?

Earlier this year we worked with a student from King James's School to help design a triangular bubble wall as a concept and also build a working prototype.

The product was designed to fit on a table top as a corporate showpiece. It includes the air pump and the lights in a small compartment and was seen as a smaller, more affordable bubble wall.

Various changes were made to the original design (top right) as issues were encountered, such as the removal of one triangle to save space, but the final product looks great. The movement of the air bubbles was interesting, something which we hadn't expected!

News: "All that matters..." is gardening!

The Malvern Spring Gardening Show opened today, with a Show Garden designed by Lindsay Warwick featuring Apollo Creative bubble tubes.

Lindsay is a graduate landscape designer who was shortlisted for the Chris Beardshaw Scholarship. 'Atom' is the theme for this years scholarship gardens, celebrating the UNESCO year of Chemistry. 'Chemistry ... all that matters' is Lindsay's interpretation of this theme, as she explains in her brief for the design:

"Chemistry ... all that matters showcases some of the elements we might associate with science. A blend of art and education, the garden pays tribute to the test tube rack and dusty chalk boards that were features of chemistry lessons for so many of us."

"An iconic atom sculpture stands adjacent to a circular pond. Rivers of meandering electrons flow, winding their way through space and weaving around the base of the test tube feature that bubbles proudly away at the back of the garden."

Lyndsay received an RHS Bronze Award for her efforts, as well as having a great deal of public interest in her design.

You can read about the preparation for the event on the Apollo Projects Blog.

Chemistry ... all that matters is complete!

The Malvern Spring Gardening Show opened today and we travelled down to have a look at Lindsay's finished garden. The results were great, with food dye the bubble tubes really turned into test tubes. Lindsay won a bronze medal from the Royal Horticultural Society and attracted a lot of attention from the public, especially after encouraging people to write their own messages on the reverse of the blackboards.

The show is on until Sunday, be sure to get down if you can.

Behind the scenes at Chemistry ... all that matters

We've just received a behind the scenes picture from Lindsay which shows the garden taking place with the 5 bubble tubes at the back. Food dye was put into the water in the tubes so that they have a brilliant colour, even outside in bright sunlight when LEDs wouldn't be very effective.

You can start to imagine them as test tubes already!

Behind the scenes: Test tubes for Chemistry ... all that matters

For Lindsay Warwick's show garden we've adapted our existing bubble tube design to allow them to be used outdoors. They now have more bubbles, and all 5 tubes run from a single pump!

The test tubes are taking shape!

Chemistry ... all that matters

We have been approached by Lindsay Warwick, a graduate landscape designer who, as part of being shortlisted for the Chris Beardshaw Scholarship, has been asked to design and build a show garden at the Malvern Spring Gardening Show 2011.

'Atom' is the theme for this years scholarship gardens, celebrating the UNESCO year of Chemistry, and 'Chemistry ... all that matters' will be Lindsay's show garden.

Chemistry ... all that matters showcases some of the elements we might associate with science. A blend of art and education, the garden pays tribute to the test tube rack and dusty chalk boards that were features of chemistry lessons for so many of us.

An iconic atom sculpture stands adjacent to a circular pond. Rivers of meandering electrons flow, winding their way through space and weaving around the base of the test tube feature that bubbles proudly away at the back of the garden.

We will be donating five bubble tubes which will resemble the test tubes at the back of the garden. We'll also post some interesting behind the scenes pictures as the garden takes shape.

The Malvern Spring Gardening Show takes place at The Showground in Malvern, just outside of Worcester, on 12-15th May 2011.

Everyone a music maker

Today I was at a conference at the National Centre for Early Music in York, aimed at making music in early years settings. I helped Andrew Cleaton present a talk on the use of music technology, covering both the pros and cons.

The talk concluded with a look at the Apollo Ensemble equipment, featuring the Hub together with a number of wireless sensors and switches. Particularly popular with the audience was the EnsembleDice, which was used to trigger animal sounds and images.

You can see more about the conference and the other interesting talks at: www.ncem.co.uk/earlyyears

Bubble tube at LGI

It was great to receive a letter and card from the Children's Oncology Ward at Leeds General Infirmary, to whom we donated a bubble tube before Christmas.

The tube forms part of a play room, helping children and their siblings who are undergoing treatment.