Jason Wilson - News and Updates
May 2025
Since starting work at 1956 Individuals (back in early 2024) we finally revealed to the world one of our historical museum conversational character models at the Museums + Heritage Show - our digital Alan Turing that we made in conjunction with Bletchley Park.
These are finely detailed full human screen sized AAA characters that are driven by a realtime interactive AI conversational model. The Alan Turing model contains a knowledge base that has been trained on the life and work of Alan Turing and his team of codebreakers at Bletchley Park.
The way this works is that you can verbally ask the full human sized digital character any question about their life and history and they will respond back to you as if you are having a real conversation with a living person from the past.
And while the production art was built using traditional methods, it's safe to say that I've never worked on anything quite so experimental and challenging as a technology concept. I've really enjoyed working alongside museums and passionate historians to bring to life various historic figures from the past (more to be revealed).
I was on hand to give a two day presentation at the Museums + Heritage Show to talk about the research and visual development that we put into our Alan Turing. It was safe to say that we drew quite the crowd and we were certainly the focal point of the show.
Here I am giving a presentation at the MH Show about the work and research that we put into our Alan Turing.
December 2024
Chris Sorrell and I were incredibly chuffed to read the 30 years of Playstation interview with former Sony Worldwide CEO Shawn Layden. In the interview, Shawn was asked if he had a favourite game that he helped to foster at Sony Playstation during his long years of service. This is what Shawn had to say:
This is just a personal preference. This is just a game that spoke to me when I first saw it, and I love the guys working on it – so much so we got a sequel out of it, which was also fun and fabulous and I was able to get it remastered for PS4… I would love another whack at MediEvil. The Cambridge studio guys were called Millennium at the time they were making the original MediEvil and Sony bought them shortly thereafter. The humour is kind of Tim Burton meets Monty Python though it was really hard to localise the comedy into foreign languages. If I could wave a magic wand and have one more bite at an apple, it would be the MediEvil apple.
Wow! That was so gratifying to read, that our little fantasy game had left such a great impression on Shawn, and out of all the many, many, Sony Playstation titles published during Shawn's time as CEO he chose MediEvil!
September 2023
Jason's video game design and graphic novel work is featured in a 20 page special feature of the October issue (26) of the French cross cultural arts publication S!CK.
Jason talks about how his experiences of growing up in a working class family informs his creative work; from video game art and design to his creator owned science fiction and fantasy graphic novels. Jason explains the threads and overlapping industrial themes that bind his work, from the cursed silver mines of Silverload, to the twisted gothic land of MediEvil and arriving at the social fantasy of Coal Face – The Devil in the Smoke.
Featuring many behind the scenes artworks from Jason's video game concept art and game designs, as well as his authored comic book and illustrated work.
A link to the publisher's website can be found here:
https://sick-magazine.com
March 2023
Coal Face – The Devil in the Smoke is now on sale!
An Industrial Fairy Tale by Jay Gunn. A tale of strife, escapism, video games and a demonic monster from the past.
Britain – Winter 1984.
The villagers of a divided and poverty-stricken coal mining community make a pact with a demon offering salvation, so long as they continue to dig the coal. But at what cost?
As the villagers begin to disappear, the teenage son of a missing coal miner and a mysterious girl from the past unearth a terrible secret buried deep beneath the village that threatens to destroy their lives and consume the world.
Coal Face – The Devil in the Smoke is a faustian monster story set against a backdrop of poverty, absent parents and escapism. A morally complex fantasy adventure for young adults and older readers alike.
Parental Guidance: The story contains scenes of underage smoking and the occasional mild swear word and scenes of conflict.
Parental Guidance: The story contains scenes of underage smoking and the occasional mild swear word and scenes of conflict.
Buy here (UK):
For all other global territories, please use your local Amazon for delivery.
