IW21 draws to a close

As Industry Week 2021 draws to a close, we want to thank everyone who came along, got involved in the virtual events and engaged with our brilliant guests over Zoom. Every year, we want Industry Week to be as good as it can for you, our students, and we’re confident this year – our first online event – didn’t disappoint!

There really was something for everyone with 74 events geared towards our budding musicians, live and technical events technicians, film directors, actors, games artists, VFX stars and graphic designers.

We saw well over 14,000 bookings from students and staff throughout the week – our Confetti community made the most of the amazing line-up and booked onto lots of talks.

The week was rounded off with a series of fantastic talks on its final day.

Russell T Davies

Russell Davies OBE – screenwriter extrordinaire – delivered a fantastic talk for students (and die-hard fans of Doctor Who among staff teams).

Within his session, he spoke in depth about the success of recent production It’s A Sin – the moving series following the HIV/AIDS crisis in the 1980s which Russell explained was there to “remember those who died, to love them again”.

He went on to speak about the difficulties of editing within a lockdown, before speaking more generally about working in the industry and and the importance of being honest within your work.

 

John and Brenda Romero

Brenda and Jon Romero talked about how they discovered their love for games when they were younger and how they started their company based on this. Brenda gave great insights – like the fact that women actually buy the most consoles, and that within the last 10 years, the rise of careers around gaming has been huge. She touched upon the rise of Esports teams and how it’s now filling stadiums and it’s going to continue to grow.

Thank you, Jon and Brenda, for sharing your insights, hearing your industry expertise and experience has been invaluable!

 

Steve Albini

Steve discussed his journey to where he is now, including his career in recording and how he gained clients to become an engineer, and went on to buy a studio of his own.

He went on to discuss his experience as a musician and how he currently works with artists as a producer.

He spoke about how he learnt by ‘doing it for real’ to learn from the process and how that has shaped his personality and approach now.

 

Jon Burgerman

NTU alumni – and world-renowned artist – Jon Burgerman spoke to students about his path from university into the world of art, and his journey along the way.

With his distinctive style, and list of impressive brand collaborations, this event was a real winner for our graphic design students, as he spoke about the importance of creativity and how having ideas is actually good for your brain!

 

Have a look at some of the images captured throughout the week below…

We’ve been busy on social media posting about our amazing events, and can see that students have been taking to these channels to express their enjoyment of the events too!

Some of our favourite student reactions are here…

And it’s not only students who have been raving about this week’s events – our guests have really enjoyed the experience too, taking time at the end of their talks – and taking to social media – to let us know what a great event this is. We even got a retweet from Noel Clarke himself (yes, really!)

OnDemand

Lastly, we want to say a huge thank you to all of the guests that joined us for this exciting week of events – and to all our students for attending and enjoying. We hope you come away from this week feeling inspired and excited for your futures in the creative industries!

Are you interested in attending events like Industry Week as part of your studies? Book onto a virtual open day to find out more about our offer at Confetti.