Screen Facilities Scotland, the organisation which represents everything in Scotland’s screen industry which isn’t a production company, has officially launched Vision Scotland, it’s first ever industry conference.
Vision Scotland is a dedicated screen and media industry exhibition and trade event showcasing Scotland’s creative production, services, facilities, and professionals to the global industry – and because they’re beautiful human beings – they’re including the games sector.
Vision Scotland will take place on Thursday 6 and Friday 7 May 2021. Although first planned as a physical event, due to the ongoing uncertainty around Covid, SFS has restructured the conference into a digital format for 2021, with the first physical event coming in 2022.
Screen & Interactive
This event is aimed at all screen and media professionals, across all specialisms. The fact the organisation is inviting the games sector is significant. In Scotland, videogames are categorised as a creative industry, not a screen industry. So while a growing number of companies across the country are using games tools (Unity, Unreal, etc.), producing technology used by both games, film and TV (D14D, Speech Graphics, etc.), or both games and film content (Axis Studios, Blazing Griffin, etc.), there’s no ‘official’ recognition of the growing convergence between the screen and interactive worlds.
Hats off to Screen Facilities Scotland for recognising the opportunity for us all.
Registration for Vision Scotland is free for industry professionals to attend. SFS are also making tickets available to students of screen and media production art and skill subjects (which we’re pretty certain will include games).
SFS’ goal with the event is to:
Promote a Strong Sustainable Offer to the Global TV, Film & Media industry, delivering growth to our members and success to our sector.”
Screen Facilities Scotland, AGM, 2020
Vision Scotland will feature a broad range of elements to provide insight into Scotland’s screen industries, highlight innovation, encourage networking and introduce new opportunities for attendees. The conference programme will be announced in the near future, while exhibitors, sponsors and partners are invited to contact the organisers directly.
Programme & Productions
The industry programme will include presentations, demos, panels and discussions, curated by members of SFS and in consultation with a group of invited screen industry sector leaders, to ensure the topics covered are relevant and of interest to the working industry community.
The screen sector in Scotland faces its own particular set of challenges. While Scotland remains a sought after location for a number of productions, the country does not yet have a world-class studio, incoming productions can access (though this is in the pipeline). More worrying is the fact that incoming productions can often bring external companies with them, leaving local companies exlcuded (or asked to provide the actual services for a cut of the fee).
So introducing the skilled, experienced and generally awesome organisations across Scotland to a global audience has to be a good thing.
Ian Pearce, Chair of Screen Facilities Scotland, and Managing Director of Supply 2 Location Scotland, told the Scottish Games Network:
In 2016, having identified an opportunity to make a real difference to the industry in Scotland, I started a business here. In a few short years I’ve seen incredible growth and joined SFS where I found a dedicated team with the desire to see Scotland become firmly established as a world-leading screen production location with a thriving local industry to support it.
There is a new wave coming to the film, TV and media industry in Scotland. Be part of it at Vision Scotland.
Matthew Cowan, Creative Director at Production Attic, and Director at Screen Facilities Scotland said:
I’m excited to be able to not only show off the range of world class screen facilities on offer in Scotland to attendees but also to bring expertise into Scotland from a range of expert speakers. We know Scotland has a compelling offer and Vision Scotland will be vital to showcasing how we can cost effectively assist all manner of productions.
Belinda Love, Coordinator at Screen Facilities Scotland and Operations and Programme Manager at Vision Scotland said:
A dedicated screen production trade event has long been a desire for member companies of Screen Facilities Scotland. The opportunity to showcase what is available here to a global audience in this way will foster increased familiarity with the Scottish Offer within the screen content production community.
We hope many new connections, relationships, and conversations are enabled by Vision Scotland.
Vision Scotland aims to reach out far and wide to sector leaders, industry organisations, media, events, and charities; and aims to attract a diverse attendance from those working in the global production community from advertising, commercials, corporate, interactive media and games, broadcast and streaming television, and of course film.
Vision Scotland registrations opens today (December 15 2020). Registration is free for industry professionals and Exhibitor and Sponsorship details are available upon request.
You can also follow Vision Scotland on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram.
We’ll see you there.
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