Thanks for the insightful feedback on my last letter. I’ve enjoyed every conversation. These letters are a means to share what we’re learning and kickstart new conversations, so please hitusup@makemake.com with your reactions, questions, and provocations.
All of us have been drawn to this industry so we can invent things and create. And now is the time to do that with the future. After 34 years of building powerhouses—a52, Elastic, MakeMake Entertainment, Primary, Rock Paper Scissors—we did something many told us was crazy. We dissolved the walls. We combined our world-class expertise into a single, multidisciplinary studio designed to liberate creatives and the creative process, all united by the pursuit of Re-enchantment.
MakeMake is one of the only places where you can participate in how the whole machine works (instead of just learning a small piece of it). Knowing how it works is essential if you’re going to change it. Silos hold back talent. By removing the walls of the traditional process, we now have a massive new playground for creatives. Directors are influencing prototyping; artists are shaping world building; strategy and story infuse entertainment IP. When we remove arbitrary limits, the resulting creativity is explosive. But - and this is a theme from our conversations over the past weeks - surely we need some structure? So what does that look like?
Basketball’s triangle offense offers an answer.
Before the triangle offense, most basketball plays were pre-scripted, players occupied fixed roles, and the goal was often to force the ball to a star scorer in a predictable way. With the triangle offense, players simply worked within a defined spatial relationship (a triangle), read the options that emerged, and responded intelligently in real time. This was radical because it distributed decision-making across the whole team and it created conditions where the right play could emerge naturally. Any player could be the initiator depending on position and timing. This might seem obvious and natural, but it was revolutionary. And Phil Jackson used it to take the Bulls to six championships and the Lakers to another five…
This is what we’re doing at MakeMake. We have three highly porous and interdependent groups: Story, Narrative Design, and Production. That’s our triangle offense, all operating as a highly porous unified intelligence.
Story incorporates strategy and creative development across entertainment and brand work. Narrative Design incorporates world-building, prototyping, game design, motion design, animation and vfx. Production incorporates physical production and post.
(And Editorial is across everything.)
In my next letter, I’ll talk more about these groups and how they work together.
Angus
P.S. In keeping with the basketball metaphor, check out this NBA Finals work we just did for ESPN.
