Flinders University in collaboration with the Australian Screen Production Education and Research Association (ASPERA), is pleased to host the 2023 ASPERA Conference to be held June 28th-29th 2023 in Adelaide, South Australia. The conference is an opportunity for member delegates, academics and practitioners working in the field of screen production education and research to showcase recent successes, discuss examples of innovative work, and share insights on a range of pertinent issues. The conference is both a chance for networking between aligned academics and an important part of ASPERA’s program to build research capacity and strong pedagogical frameworks for the screen production education and research sector. The 2023 ASPERA conference will run alongside the fourth Sightlines event, to be held at UniSA in Adelaide June 29th-30th 2023.

The Business: Valuing the Screen Industry The ASPERA 2021 annual Conference was held at the NUspace at the University of Newcastle, Australia, between 16 and 18 June 2021. ​ This in-person event was rescheduled in 2021 from 2020 due to restrictions in relation to COVID-19.  The key aim of the conference was to encourage a fresh look at the value of the screen business – also known as ‘The Biz’ – from a range of perspectives, and to explore how our research, our practice and our teaching contribute to the broader value of the Screen Industry. Keynote presentations from industry added to the depth and currency of these explorations.

Making, Learning, Thinking: Screen and Broadcast Education and Research In 2019 the ASPERA Annual Conference used a new format. The free two-day conference was structured around a series of cross-institutional and interdisciplinary participatory discussion panels and keynote addresses that discussed and aimed to move forward thinking and practice on current issues in screen production, broadcast and creative practice education and research. Sessions focused on teaching and learning, research and industry engagement—or a combination of the above. One afternoon of the event was given over specifically to creative practice pedagogies for screen and broadcast.

The theme for this year was ‘ What Excites You…? ‘. The main objective of the conference was to share what excites you, as researchers, educators and creators of screen production.

ASPERA Annual Conference 2015: What’s This Space? Screen Practice, audiences & education for the future decade The 12th Annual Conference of the Australian Screen Production Education & Research Association (ASPERA), was held at Flinders University Victoria Square Campus. President’s Welcome Welcome to the 12th ASPERA conference The theme for this conference is forward looking as we anticipate changes to screen practice and education. It is both exciting and challenging to think that cheaper, better, easier technologies are able to do to screen production what desktop publishing and web publishing has done to print. Word processing has moved from a specialist to a general skill, can we expect the same to happen to screen production? Will ADOBE Creative Cloud become the Microsoft office equivalent of screen production, and what will this mean to educators who are no longer gate keepers of technical knowledge? Luckily in tertiary education we concentrate on, not so much the how, as the why of things, and so it is exciting to note that this conference program looks at innovation in collaboration and production, creative practice as research and pedagogy in an expanding field. There is input from industry and I note a panel discussion on day two in which we look at research in our sector in relationship to the broader research environment. I get a sense that in the last few years the ASPERA community has grown into itself, in that we feel more secure in our position as knowledge makers and as part of the academy. I anticipate that this year’s conference will continue that trend as we approach a position where film and screen production move from being a research tool to the subject of enquiry. Special thanks to Dr Alison Wotherspoon and the team at Flinders University, and thank you and congratulations to all the presenters at ASPERA 2015. I look forward not only to your papers but also, very importantly, to the chitchat that they produce and the opportunity to catch up with old, and make new, friends in the ASPERA community. Tim Thomas ASPERA President

Back to the Future: Re-framing New & Old Screen Production Practices President’s Welcome Address Welcome to the 10th Annual ASPERA conference “Back to the Future: Re-framing New & Old Screen Production Practices” co-hosted by three Melbourne University’s – Swinburne, RMIT and Deakin. This year’s Australian Screen Production Education & Research Association’s (ASPERA) con- ference presents three engaging days of high quality research, some of this year’s highlights include the keynote presentations from Professor Jon Rubin, the Director of the SUNY COIL Center for Collaborative Online International Learning, followed by Professor Su Baker, presenting on the newly formed Deans and Directors of Creative Arts. The conference committee has worked autonomously for the last year planning this event, and the quality of the presentations has allowed a few streamed sessions to occur. An interesting sub-theme pertaining to notions of the PhD film is featured through two panel sessions and in keeping with the intimate and friendly ASPERA atmosphere each day will end with a round table discussion hosted by the ASPERA executive, to give everyone an opportunity to provide feedback and reflect on the day’s highlights. The first ASPERA conference was held at VCA a decade ago. Since then, the conference has been hosted by all states. My first conference was at UTS in 2004, I’m wondering if you can remember yours? Some members have been to all 10 ASPERA conferences, I wonder if there is someone who has presented at every one? As a community we are fortunate to have such a supportive and dedicated membership and it is through the conference that we are able to reconnect with each other, share stories about workload, ERA, AQF compliance and boast about our best and brightest students and their achievements. I believe these gatherings are something to be proud of and I have per- sonally found each ASPERA conference to be empowering. I am left with a reassurance that as an academic ‘I’m doin’ OK’. I genuinely appreciate my annual ASPERA fix. I look forward to meeting as many ‘new & old’ participants as possible, please come and introduce yourself and tell me how many conferences you have attended. Dr Susan Kerrigan ASPERA President 2012-2013

What Next for Documentary? President’s Welcome Address Welcome to the 8th Annual ASPERA Conference. Vice-president Howard Wroth and his team here at Curtin have been working extremely hard to deliver what I am sure will prove to be an exciting and intellectually stimulating program. The non-fictional / documentary space has always provided screen production scholars natural harbour. It’s very nature allows us to examine, test and play with the moving image’s ‘form’ and ‘content’, and their complex relationship with each other. It is also a meaning-making space that embraces innovation and I look forward to the papers unpacking how the now ubiquitous online environment has enhances and created new conversations about the role of documentary within our storytelling traditions and culture. I encourage you all to extend the dialogue that this annual conference facilitates and to submit your papers for publication in our special issue conference proceedings. Special thanks go to Gillian Leahy and Mick Broderick for their considerable work in editing 2010’s proceedings which can be found in the Text Special Issue 11. As outgoing president I would like to thank the ASPERA executive team in what has proven to be a year of consolidation and relationship building. It has been an unstable time within higher education with the demise of the ALTC and the constant tinkering with the ERA. However it is a year in which our discipline can claim to have ‘arrived’. As Mick Broderick indicated in the Text editorial, the results of the ERA prove categorically that our discipline operates significantly ‘at or above world standard’ and I can report that at the recent HASS on the Hill conference Minister Kim Carr mentioned ‘creative practice’ at least six times in his speech to humanities researchers. We can rest assured ‘they’ know how we are, what we do and how important we are to the Australian cultural landscape – now we just have to continue to lobby for fair access to the resources we help generate. Congratulations and thanks once again to all presenters (we wouldn’t be here without you) and I very much look forward to speaking with as many of your as possible in the next few days. Rachel Wilson 2010-2011 ASPERA National President

Beyond the Screen President’s Welcome Address Since it began in 2004, the ASPERA Conference has had a major impact on the profile of screen production education in Australia. Its steady development since has brought into sharp focus the scale and significance of a discipline within the Australian higher education system that had previously been receiving far too little attention. While reflecting a very diverse range of educational cultures, teaching practices and approaches to research, the association’s members have been united by a common desire to achieve greater recognition for screen production as an area of study. ASPERA Conferences have always been characterised by a willingness amongst delegates to share ideas and experiences in a generous and mutually supportive way. There are plenty of differences expressed and no shortage of lively debates. However, whether the topic is raising the profile of screen production in research or developing a better dialogue with industry, these differences have not affected the collegiality and common sense of purpose amongst participants. I am looking forward to the 2009 Conference in Adelaide continuing this tradition and would like to welcome you to what promises to be a particularly informative and enjoyable event. Leo Berkeley ASPERA President

The Australian Screen Production Education and Research Association (ASPERA) 2022 Conference CREATIVITY MATTERS: PRODUCTION. POETICS. PEDAGOGY. POLICY. will be hosted by Griffith Film School, Griffith University, Brisbane 11-13 July 2022. The screen industry is changing rapidly. There has never been a bigger boom in production and there has never been a greater appetite for content. Yet there has never been a bigger need for us to stand up and be taken seriously as a group of media production teaching institutions as our students enter a changing production landscape with increasing competition for career opportunities and funding. How can we play a pivotal role in educating students to work creatively and collaboratively in local and global scenarios, while at the same time influencing the policy and innovation that will underline their futures?

On Friday 19 June 2020 we ran a series of 1 hour Zoom sessions in place of the postponed, 3-day face-to-face conference. The sessions focused on areas of key interest to the ASPERA community, notably teaching media production within the context of COVID-19, supervising higher degree research students and ways that the Association can support screen production academics and the discipline. There were opportunities to contribute to plans for the Association’s response in these areas and provide feedback to the Executive committee about priorities.

Screen Interventions The ASPERA 2018 annual Conference was held at the VCA, University of Melbourne, Australia, between 27 and 29 June 2018. This year’s conference theme was Screen Interventions. We were interested in the ways that screen production could be used to ‘intervene’ in wider cultural, social and political ideas and debates; how interventions might be made with, by and/or for the screen; and what interventions have taken place in screen production education and research.

ASPERA Annual Conference 2016 : The Big Questions President’s Welcome Welcome to the 13th annual ASPERA conference and Annual General Meeting hosted by the University of Canberra. The presentations at this conference raise big questions for researcher-educators in screen production in Australia, as do changes currently taking place to the very constitution of academic activity. As the university sector is recast within the ‘triple helix’ of universities-industry-government, academics will be increasingly accountable to private rather than public interests. Increasingly, priority will be given to programs that can secure support from ‘end-users’. The challenge for researchers is now shifting from publication and peer review (areas that ASPERA has channelled much of its effort into) to benchmarks of impact and engagement – measured primarily in dollars. Meanwhile, high-profit transnational corporations are seeking to diversify their product by making ‘local content’ for global online consumption. Are we witnessing the beginning of an aggregation of the world’s entertainment, IT and educational industries in a scenario of total ‘engagement’? As demonstrated by a number of presentations at this conference, ASPERA member institutions and their staff are already highly engaged with industry. Industry stands to benefit directly, for example, from research into affordable virtual cinematography and into creative processes in screenwriting, editing and the actor-director relationship. Industry is engaged in helping to develop our curricula, workplace-based learning experiences and pathways into the professional world. Practice-based postgraduate research activity is becoming a very significant avenue for meaningful collaborations. Much of ASPERA’s activity has been directed to this area – through its Research Subcommittee, HDR and ECR Boot Camps, Creative Practice Research Seed Grant and the RMIT/ASPERA Sightlines projects. Of course ‘industry’ refers to a very broad range of professions and enterprises, and engagement can include communities beyond industry. Within the helix, how will funding be raised to facilitate initiatives of social and cultural value that do not attract corporate or philanthropic dollars? In the legislative literature that accompanies the ‘marketization’ of academic work, the social good continues to be reiterated especially through values of diversity, participation and equity. What can we do to improve our performance in these areas in an increasingly competitive environment? There are some interesting correlations and miscorrelations between what happens in industry and the academy. We are devoting a roundtable discussion to this matter – hoping to openly and honestly explore our best practices and the areas where we need to improve. This is NAIDOC Week. The theme for 2016 – Songlines: The living narrative of our nation – is apt for an exciting year of Indigenous screen production in Australia. Are we keeping up by embedding Indigenous content and cultural awareness into our courses? Research-led production and practice-led research interrogate the language and processes of both established and experimental practices. As Drs Glisovic, Berkeley and Batty pointed out in a paper at this conference last year, “a key value in this kind of work is the ability to communicate implicitly and differently from what can be articulated within the parameters of written, academic language”. A destabilisation of conventional storytelling by new technologies, genres and viewer/listener practices is creating a climate suited to the exploration of nonlinear and even non-narrative forms. As industry scrambles for expanded, inter-disciplinary methodologies, academic researcher-producers are able to quietly and open-mindedly explore some options. This conference attests to a reinvigoration of personal, essayistic, participatory, co-authored, hybrid and experimental modes of production. It will also prompt us to consider new possibilities for old and familiar technologies such as the university television studio. Dr Andrew Pike OAM, film historian, writer, filmmaker and exhibitor (and co-founder of the independent distribution company, Ronin Films), leads our contingent of distinguished industry guests at this year’s conference. Andrew is a pillar of screen culture in Canberra and a great supporter of independent production and screen education across Australia. The international participants in the conference include Joanna Callaghan from the University of Sussex and Trevor Hearing from Bournemouth University. Thanks to all those who are presenting here, especially to those who submitted papers to be referred for publication on the ASPERA website. Thanks to Tim Thomas and the team at the University of Canberra for organising this years’ conference and hosting the ASPERA annual general meeting. ASPERA operates on volunteer effort and we encourage all conference participants from member institutions to get involved. If your institution does not yet have a formal representative, please consider offering to take up this non-executive role. It is not onerous but provides an important point of contact. Also consider standing for an office-bearer or ‘ordinary’ position on the executive committee at the AGM. Please speak to one of the outgoing committee about this opportunity. The executive meets for two hours monthy on Skype with one face-to-face working bee each year. All positions on the executive committee, apart from president, will be open to nominations. In accord with ASPERA’s constitution the outgoing Vice President, James Vernon, will take-up the position of President for the next year. John Cumming ASPERA President Supported by the Centre for Creative and Cultural Research Faculty of Arts and Design University of Canberra

Screen Explosion: Expanding practices, narratives and education for the Creative Screen Industries Personal or shared, networked, broadcast, cinematic or virtual we participate and are surrounded by an explosion of screens, screen narratives, practices and cultures. This conference is celebrating the multiplicity of screens and the impact they have on production and output in the Creative Screen Industries. We will be debating how traditional creative screen practices are endorsed, challenged, changed and reconstituted by the diversity of large and small screens, that are now common in our everyday lives. The Screen Explosion program will showcase 16 sessions on Australian and International Creative Screen Industries. Creative Director of Innovation at the University of Newcastle, Jeff Julian is our keynote speaker. Jeff is a Futurist, he develops content & intellectual property for companies like Apple, American Express, Adidas and Nike. As a conceptual designer Jeff has worked with Hollywood’s ‘A-List’ including Ridley Scott, the Wachowski bros., David Fincher and Brian Singer. Jeff’s keynote will broaden the discussion about the global creative screen industries and Australia’s future. The three day program showcases 35 presentations including international papers. Professor Frank Millward, UoN is presenting on London Memories, a participatory content project explaining the processes involved in capturing user content for online platforms designed to engage and grow community social networks where memories are associated with a site. From Spain, Elvira Calatayud is presenting on a webdoc OResponsables, in which we see a completely different perspective to that presented by the mainstream media about the Valencia (Spain) metro accident of 2006 in which 43 people were killed. This is also the first year we have had an animation stream and Damian Candusso, CSU, who has worked as a Sound Designer on Lego Movie and The Great Gatsby, will address ‘The Battle of 3-D Film Volumes’. Jane Shadbolt, UoN explains the ‘Digital ± Analogue’ process of making stop motion animation and Steven Murdoch, Swinburne, is presenting on ‘Agent-Oriented Modeling in the Production of 3D Character Animation’. The dynamic and expanding world of documentary narratives will be revealed through the sessions on New Documentary: New Methodologies and Database Documentaries. An Interactive Documentary workshop on Thursday afternoon will showcase the Korsakow open source software, lead by Dr Adrian Miles from RMIT. Please reserve your place to avoid disappointment. Activities have been arranged for each evening including a Newcastle Creative Screen Industries talk followed by dinner at ‘The Edwards’ (local restaurant owned by a member of Silverchair). The conference dinner will be a highlight on Thursday evening at The Regal Cinema, where The Underground Epicureans will serve a 3 course meal and films will be screened during the courses. Samuel Hutchinson’s Honours films about Newcastle’s Creative Industries and Dr Donna McRae’s PhD film ‘Johnny Ghost’, will be screened. A short Q&A Donna will follow her film. Dr Susan Kerrigan ASPERA 2014 Conference Convenor

Creativity: The measurable and immeasurable President’s Welcome Address Welcome to the 9th annual ASPERA conference and Annual General Meeting hosted by Queensland University of Technology. This year’s theme of Creativity: the Measurable & Immeasurable promises to provide engaging and thought provoking papers and discussion, as creativity, after all, lies at the core of what we attempt to foster and develop in our students at every level. At various stages in history, hunger, isolation, meditation, abstinence and even self-mutilation have been considered as pathways to creative inspiration, but hopefully we are no longer pursuing such extreme approaches. I can remember once a group of people who believed they had formulated a simple and less dramatic “recipe” for creativity, or at least for generating creative works. I would suggest, however, that if they really had discovered that elusive formula, they would be fabulously wealthy, more famous than Edward de Bono, and in all probability, lauded as the greatest alchemists of all time. But the challenges to encourage creativity and perhaps control it are still the subject of much conjecture, research and exploration. In this context, Sean Maher, Geoff Portman and their team have arranged a program that features a truly wide-ranging group of presenters from our member institutions and the wider community who will undoubtedly stimulate us to consider and possibly challenge some of our concepts about creativity. As outgoing president I would like to thank the ASPERA executive team for their continued work in what has been a rewarding and progressive year. I believe that ASPERA has reached a stage where it can extend its impact and support for its members, and the executive have put a number of initiatives in place this year which will hopefully assist in that future development, several of which we will announce at this conference. I encourage everyone to engage in the dialogue that this annual conference facilitates and to submit your papers for publication in our combined 2011 – 12 conference proceedings, and wish everyone an enjoyable and rewarding experience. Howard Worth 2011-2012 ASPERA National President

New Screens, New Producers, New Learning President’s Welcome Address Welcome to the 7th ASPERA Conference at UTS, Sydney. ASPERA’s 2010 conference kicks off with a pre-conference industry panel session, Forecasting Media Futures, where six of Australia’s most interesting media experts will discuss what, where and how we will be consuming media in the future. The following three days allow ASPERA delegates to explore the diversity of research interests, pedagogical challenges and opportunities that we are currently facing. Panels and presentations will range form the current issues facing the media arts sector, ERA, teaching and industry, creative practice research, 3D animation and aesthetics, ethics and documentary, internationalising Australian media production curricula and the digital archiving of student films. The ASPERA conference in my experience is always a wonderful opportunity to meet and catch up with old friends and potential new ones. It is a time to meet with generous and interesting colleagues with whom we can share our research, experiences and concerns. I hope you find this year’s conference as stimulating, interesting, enlightening and as enjoyable as I know I will. Alison Wotherspoon ASPERA President

RMIT University’s School of Applied Communication welcomes delegates to the 2008 Australian Screen Production Education and Research Association (ASPERA) Conference. This year’s conference begins with a public event which explores the relationship of universities that teach film, television and video to the screen production industries their students wish to enter. This event will no doubt stimulate ongoing discussion throughout the conference as it covers topics such as new technologies and industry practice, screen production and research, post-industrial media and a diverse range of learning and teaching issues. A number of RMIT staff will attend the conference along with delegates from ASPERA member institutions around Australia.