Photos: First Look at Immersive Production LOST ORIGIN at Hoxton Docks

Immersive pioneers Factory 42 have teamed up with Almeida Theatre and Sky to create Lost Origin: a new immersive and interactive world, using innovative digital technology.

Situated at Hoxton Docks (55 Laburnum St, E2 8BD), Lost Origin is a unique mixed-reality experience where audiences explore parallel worlds in small groups of six people, uncover vital evidence and discover intriguing secrets. Lost Origin opens to audiences on 21 November 2021 for an exclusive limited run until 4 December 2021, with press performances from 10 - 14 November.

This collaborative and multidisciplinary research partnership is majority funded by UK Research and Innovation's (UKRI) Audience of the Future programme as part of the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund's Audience of the Future initiative to explore new types of audience experiences. It brings together world-class storytellers, technology companies and academics, to explore and pioneer cutting-edge immersive experiences through ground-breaking storytelling.

The production team unites a broad range of disciplines - from theatre set designers to gaming coders and animators and special effects talent with credits spanning The Hobbit, The Matrix, Harry Potter and The Hunger Games.

The immersive experience turns participants into undercover investigators who need to crack a mystery, which is set in the illegal dark web marketplace. Guests weave their way through differently-themed rooms on their extraordinary mission to solve the enigma.

A mysterious London warehouse hides a lost truth that is fighting to be heard. 

Your skills and imagination are needed to be part of Wing 7, a secret undercover unit.  Your mission? To covertly enter the headquarters of Origin, a warehouse in Hoxton, recently revealed to be a front for an illegal dark web marketplace.

In this live story experience, you journey through a multitude of spaces in teams of six; working against the clock to right a wrong and decide a fate. 

John Cassy, Founder of Factory 42 and Executive Producer, said: "For a very limited amount of time Lost Origin offers audiences a chance to step into the unknown, and enter an intimate and magical new type of immersive experience designed by a unique creative team. We're hugely grateful to UKRI and our other partners for having been given the opportunity to bring the worlds of art and technology together to explore innovative ways to tell stories and create a new type of audience experience".

Rupert Goold, Artistic Director of Almeida Theatre, said: "It's exciting to be joining forces with Factory 42 and Sky, two pioneers of their fields, on Lost Origin. At the Almeida, our ambition is to interrogate the present, dig up the past and imagine the future and this project ticks those boxes. Dani Parr, our Director of Participation here at the Almeida, was the perfect person to be the Creative Director of this experience and bring together the latest interactive technology to create a new form of storytelling."

​​UKRI challenge director for the Audience of the Future Programme, Andrew Chitty, said: "The integration of immersive technologies, AI, projection mapping, haptics and new forms of interactive technologies into visitor experiences, from museums to theme parks, is incredibly exciting both creatively and commercially. While the pandemic has kept us out of venues, Factory42 and its partners have been working incredibly hard to bring these technologies together in a dynamic, creative and at times astonishing live experience. Anyone who is interested in the future of museums, galleries, immersive theatre, storytelling and technology will get a glimpse of that future through Lost Origins."

Lost Origin's creative team is as follows: Dani Parr (Creative Director), Hannah Wood, Story Juice (Writer), Michelle Feuerlicht (Executive Producer), John Cassy (Project Lead and Executive Producer), Alice Helps & Julie Landau (Set Design), Nick Ryan (Sound Design and Composition), Peter Mauder, Phonotheque Ltd (Augmented Reality Experience Music Composition and Sound Design), Jo Mackie (Live Producer), Ross Phillips (Creative Consultant), Jess Bernberg (Lighting Designer), Kate Bunce (Costume), Will Burton (Casting Director), Hugo Sterk Ltd (Set Construction), The Production Family (Technical Direction and Production Management), Stephen Stewart (Software Development Director), Sucharita Ghosh Stephenson (XR Producer), Maciek Sznabel (Art Lead/Animation Director), Maria Robertson (Main 3D Animation), Stephen Nevin & Niccolò Temperanza (3D Art), David Addis (Lead Programmer), John Foster (Magic Leap Design Lead), Zeno Rawling (Magic Leap Programmer), Mike Golembewski (Interactive Design and Development), Vytautas Niedvaras, Andrew Sheldon, Callum Walsh (Digital Tech Support and QA).

Lost Origin is part of the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund's Audience of the Future programme, which is delivered by UKRI. Through this programme, the government is supporting the best UK storytellers to research, develop and create new forms of stories, performances and experiences. Lost Origin is a research and development project designed to push forward state-of-the-art immersive entertainment. As part of this remit, the experience uses Magic Leap (an American company specialising in innovative augmented reality headsets) to bring mixed reality into live theatre. Similarly, the experience is a rare use of Volumetric Capture technology in a theatrical setting. For more information on this programme please click here.

Lost Origin is the final deliverable from the partners who make up this project and have been exploring the future of visitor attractions and experiences. Previously, the partners plus the Natural History Museum and The Science Museum have delivered dinosaurs and robot themed mixed reality experiences in the Metro centre in Gateshead. They also worked together to create two augmented reality mobile fun learning apps for younger children. For more information on the Industrial Challenge Strategy Fund, click here.

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