=IcaruS= About

Why choose IcaruS?
Portfolio
The IcaruS Myth

Multimedia in the Metaverse

IcaruS is a team of creators of multimedia and machinima in the metaverse primarily in the virtual environment of Second Life. Providing 3-D virtual products, pre-visualizations and presentations for educators and entertainment production companies collaboratively world-wide in cross-platform social networks.

Experience:
We have a skilled freelance team for specialised work, with over 20 years experience in various industries including film and television:

multimedia developers conversant with a multitude of software packages
diverse skills allowing custom designs and interfaces for your products
computer design and programming,
multimedia
3D: modeling, digital video effects, animation and editing, cinematography
2D: graphics, logo design, editing, photography
marketing & business branding

“We can replicate anything, virtually.”

Services:
We deliver rich multimedia products over a broad range:

print (pre- and post-press production), digital video and website graphics for marketing
3D rendered graphic scenes: walkthroughs and product visualisations
VR panoramas - 360° animations from photographs or a 3D environment
3D animations - to demonstrate or exemplify situations not possible through normal means
3D scripted objects
virtual world site builds, landscaping, and textures
CGI effects and introductions for film and television, as well as for corporate events, educational and other presentations, and advertising productions
machinima
video and audio post production
fully interactive CDs or DVDs
most of our video products are available on DVD; we also create custom DVDs to meet your needs
we have produced DVD/CD-ROM products for many clients - Environment Agency, LearnDirect/UFI, BEL labs

We also can provide you with virtual interactive environments:

meeting rooms
presentation auditoriums or theatres
educational event settings
This includes script editing, props, set builds, coding, filming, editing and delivery mediums for various platforms.

This is an ideal, cost-effective solution for meetings, events and demonstrations held by entities with a global presence. A multinational corporation can have virtual meeting rooms custom designed and built to bring together staff located in offices as far apart as San Francisco, Sydney and London. On a virtual campus we build to specifications, a group of graduate students at a university in Houston, Texas, USA can collaborate on projects with students at a sister university in Bonn, Germany. We create environments in which you can dynamically and interactively deliver your message in real time, and get things done.

Above all, we deliver cost-effective, personal service
from conception to end product.

Machinima
3D
Presentations
CGI
Branding

Why use machinima?

relatively low cost animations, created in real time for advertisements, promotions or education,
create a presence in the metaverse for physical world promotion and exposure.

For quick results over traditional animation and graphics we can create the sets and avatars(actors) and shoot the footage as you would do in traditional film making but in a virtual world. It does not require the long rendering time of traditional 3D animation and is closer to physical world shooting and editing times.
For more about Machinima

3D & Pre-visualisations

Set builds, trade show exhibits, printed illustrations, prototypes, exhibition scenes, layouts...
We can provide 3D pre-visualisations in many forms. Any product visualisation can be brought to life on your web site, put to digital video for your clients to view or created in print form. Want to know what your product or building is going to look like at various stages? Show us the plans and we will build it for you in 3D - whether it is an item of furniture or a new architectural design.

With the power of 3D, there's no more death by two-dimensional, static PowerPoint education and training

With a range of projects small and large, we have established an impressive client base. Past work has included such clients as

Envirowise
AstraZeneca
BEL Labs
The Environment Agency
Rolls Royce
NEC
Viewpoint
Imagina
Syngenta (ICI)
Learndirect products for the University for Industry
DEFRA

These projects have incorporated novel ways of conveying information within a CD, from interactive quizzes for learning or research data gathering, 3D animations and walkthroughs, sample videos and other multimedia forms. We can produce a CD or DVD for you at an appropriate budget to help wow your audience! All we require from you is the information you want to go into the CD and any themes envision. We will then produce several prototypes for you and, once the green light is given, we will create your masterpiece for you!

Film and Television 3D animation and programming for film and television: in advertising, visualizations of products and set builds - before they're made - can help to envision the end product. These creations can become virtual representations of actual things and places for various purposes, like for inclusion in film or television shows.

Marketing and Business Branding Logo Design, Stings for Print, Video and Web:
First impressions are the most important.

What does your logo say about your company?
Does the advertisement page catch the eye immediately?
Is the 'look' easily recognisable as "your company"?

We go beyond the logo itself down to the fonts used in letterheads or the colour schemes on product packaging to give your business its unique brand. Tell us what you want to communicate to your customers about your business and what image you want to portray.

We'll provide several examples, whether they be from scratch or based on your existing design, then create a style-book for you that encompasses your whole corporate identity.

“Why Icarus?”
you ask, “Didn’t he crash?”
“Well, maybe…”, we reply…

Short Answer:
Because he inspires our imagination.

Longer Answer:
Myths and legends serve many purposes – and have many variations. Each tries to arrive at some truth through communication. The Icarus story tells of a man who flew like a bird to escape a labyrinth then plunged into the sea. In medieval times it became a morality tale, warning those who might reach beyond their place in society. With magical internet powers, we can now look further back in time and read that the Roman Ovid in Book VIII of Metamorphoses tells of the earlier flying Greeks using a word whose meaning is closer to “bold/audacious” and there is our clew.

Flash forward to today. Clearly the dream of flying did not go down. It soars through technology - in da Vinci’s doodles on flying machines to the Wright brothers at Kitty Hawk to Virgin Galactic’s current plans. The same inspiration dances through media from the Hebrew prophet Elijah’s Chariot of Fire to Saint-Exupéry’s The Little Prince to Pixar’s Up.

The fate of Icarus is alive and well today and to give things (yet another) twist, one Greek version of his story tells that the invention was actually a sail for a boat which he used to sail off to the idyllic island of Ikaria.

Be Inspired