This week we hosted the first day of our Digital Producers Lab, a development programme we’re pleased to be running in collaboration with National Theatre Wales and Arts Council Wales. Here’s a brief outline of what we got up to…

The day began at 11am with coffee and welsh cakes at National Theatre Wales’ offices in Cardiff’s beautiful Castle Arcade. We structured the day around understanding the programme, getting to know each other, and better understanding the process involved in each other’s practice, so spent the first hour running through the programme design and confirmed speakers, which include:

- Kate Tyndall, author of Jerwood publication The Producers, Alchemists of the Impossible, on The Role of the Producer
- Ian Hargreaves from Cardiff University on Policy and Business Models, he wrote a great Manifesto for the Creative Economy
- Juliet Bradshaw of TLT Solicitors on Understanding Intellectual Property
- Sarah Ellis of the Royal Shakespeare Company on, Midsummer Night’s Dreaming from a Producers Perspective
- Kim Plowright, freelance producer, on Endings
- Rachel Coldicott of Caper on Cultural Entrepreneurialism
- Seth Jackson of Strange Thoughts on Working with Artists and Brands
And lots more.

After a quick group photo, NTW's Katherine Jewkes and I went on to explain that each day of the Lab will be a little different, covering different aspects of producing. So our first day ‘Setting the Scene’, will be followed in November by:

Day 2: Overview of Producing
Day 3: The Producers Skills
Day 4: Nurturing, supporting and enabling creatives
Day 5: Finding, talking to and looking after an audience
Day 6: Looking to the Future
Day 7: Financing Your Project

By the end of the programme, we hope that everyone will have picked up some new skills and thought a little differently about the process of producing digital projects, as well as becoming part of a supportive network of practitioners.

Next stop was a truly delicious lunch at Madam Fromage, after which the brilliant John McGrath (Director of NTW) cajoled us into taking on a bit of acting, in an attempt to help us get to know each other better. After taking on the roles of Politian’s and TV presenters, it became clear we were all in the right jobs!

The last part of the afternoon was all about our projects. Each person in turn (you can see a list of participants here) described a project they had produced, covering methods of working, audience, learning points, funding, marketing, value and impact. It was an enriching and enlightening session. Already questions were arising such as:

- How do you budget for digital projects? And where’s the money?
- Is there a pay off in spending large amounts on marketing?
- An experimental project can still be considered successful, even if it economically fails - what are the other success factors?
- How can you ensure audiences understand the meaning of works presented in public space? Does it matter if audiences ‘don’t get it’?
- Can digital projects change organisational cultures? Where’s the business model?
- Are there things that we can do, to encourage City Councils to be more responsive to digital projects?

We’re encouraging everyone involved to share a bit about themselves, post links or thoughts about day one and the projects they presented on our Digital Producers online group, which you can find on the NTW Community website, so please do head over and have a look. You can also visit our evolving Storify (rounding up tweets etc. from the programme) here

It was a great start, and we (at Watershed) are really looking forward to welcoming everyone at Pervasive Media Studio in November, and continuing the conversation.