A new £75 million virtual production studio is to be developed in Belfast to offer box office film and television producers world-leading technology.
Located at Studio Ulster, a virtual production campus at Belfast Harbour Studios, the facility will offer so-called real-time content production techniques using computer generated imagery, augmented reality and motion capture. The technology has already been used at the ABBA Voyage live concert at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London and on Disney’s hit show The Mandalorian.
Virtual production can enable filmmakers and theatre directors to create large-scale digitally-generated environments that performers can interact with in real-time using LED panels, as a faster and less expensive alternative to green screens.
The Belfast studio is expected to prove a big draw for film and television producers and help bolster the burgeoning sector in Northern Ireland’s which is said to have contributed some £330 million to the local economy since 2018.
Behind the studio is a consortium led by Ulster University which was selected as one of four facilities around the UK to qualify for a share in £75.6 million of government funding and £63 million of new industry investment. The move is part of the UK government’s plans to grow the creative industries by £50 billion and create a million new jobs by 2030 and the lab will be part of UK Research and Innovation’s – a government department - Convergent Screen Technologies and performance in Realtime (CoSTAR) programme.
It will bring together expertise from BBC Northern Ireland, Belfast Harbour, Northern Ireland Screen and Belfast specialist animation studio Humain.
“We are thrilled to be joining the CoSTAR Network, for what will be a prestigious group of world-leading research labs in the exciting and transformative field of virtual and real-time production,” Professor Declan Keeney from Ulster University said. “This is a wonderful endorsement of our research leadership in the sector and our investment in the infrastructure needed to level up the screen industries here in Northern Ireland.
“We are confident that our collaboration with the CoSTAR Network will accelerate the development of new technologies and techniques that will revolutionise the way films, TV, games and animations are made. We are excited to see what the future holds for virtual production, and we are proud to be playing a leading role in its development.”
The network will include a national lab at Pinewood Studios, and a new Insight and Foresight Unit led by Goldsmiths and the British Film Institute. Three regional hubs, in Belfast, Dundee and Yorkshire, are expected to contribute a combined £33 million to the economy and support 423 jobs. Partners involved across the programme include the National Film and Television School, BT, Vodafone, Screen Yorkshire and Disguise as well as Royal Holloway, York and Abertay universities.
