VOCAL VOCAL VOCAL VOCAL

It's good to be vocal (°ᴗ°)

It’s with great pride that we can announce the official opening of our Canadian office in the sunny lakeside city of Toronto, and right now we’re so overstoked on all things Canada — not the least of which is the forward-thinking legalization of cannabis on October 17.

It’s with great pride that we can announce the official opening of our Canadian office in the sunny lakeside city of Toronto, and right now we’re so overstoked on all things Canada — not the least of which is the forward-thinking legalization of cannabis on October 17.

NEWS FROM THE NORTH

selfcare-game-app.jpg

#SelfCare now for Android

Montreal-based developers TRU LUV released their latest mindfulness app #SelfCare in July for iOS. As an app that transforms your phone into an opportunity for quick calm, #SelfCare has been wildly successful with a global audience — gracing the iOS App Store’s Top 50 most-downloaded games in 20 countries within six weeks of launch and ranking currently as No.26 in the iOS App Store games category. Having launched on Android this September, #SelfCare has now exceeded an impressive 500,000 downloads.

>> Download #SelfCare for iPhone or Android.

The VOCAL Times

The VOCAL Times

The VOCAL Times platforms creative-industry leaders and brings long-overdue recognition to the talents that design, create, develop and sustain brand fame. Our third issue, set to release this December, will continue the alphabetical theme into “C is for Canada” and feature all-Canadian talents and brands. Keep your eyes peeled for the release, and drop us a line if you know any Canadian’s that you think deserve a spotlight.

SOUTH OF THE BORDER

QuadPay

QuadPay: Buy Now, Pay Later

We’re warming up to make some big noise with QuadPay, the number-one payment option for millennial shopaholics. As a buy-now-pay-in-four-parts solution currently offered by some of the most sought-after fashion brands, QuadPay makes luxury accessible to those in a pinch.

Stay tuned for our upcoming QuadPay events and activations.

SeeMe

Art Takes Soho

SeeMe just tied off their third art submission competition at a group exhibition event entitled Art Takes SoHo where artist Kaya Deckelbaum was titled the first place winner, garnering herself an impressive prize package including a $5000 grant, a solo exhibition, a solo feature in Tartarus Magazine and a video feature in the SeeMe website. More news to follow on their upcoming submission contest Art Takes Miami.

BEYOND THE POND

MAN-WOMAN

MAN/WOMAN: Tokyo, Oct 18-19

MAN/WOMAN has enjoyed a fruitful September with WOMAN shows in both New York and Paris. As the leading platform to directly connect top fashion retailers, designers, and press with one another, this fashion trade show now looks towards their coming show in Tokyo with an impressive list of exhibitors from both men and women’s fashion. Register here.

And don’t forget to raise one or blaze one for Canada on October 17 as they let loose a host of inspiring new sub-industries, taking THC and CBD to OMG status.

 
Read More
Technology VOCAL Technology VOCAL

#SelfCare now for all operating systems, including your own.

Just six weeks after its immensely successful launch for iPhone that placed it in the Top 50 free games in the App Store, today #SelfCare hits the Google Play store for Android devices. Developed by the team at TRU LUV, #SelfCare’s playful innovations to digitally engage and personally disconnect are changing the game of mindfulness.

The app to harmonize your hectic lifestyle is now available on Google Play.

 

Just six weeks after its immensely successful launch for iPhone that placed it in the Top 50 free games in the App Store, today #SelfCare hits the Google Play store for Android devices. Developed by the team at TRU LUV, #SelfCare’s playful innovations to digitally engage and personally disconnect are changing the game of mindfulness.

With our lifestyle technologies overwhelming our reality, more of us are choosing to find a rare moment to shut off with a yoga or meditation class. #SelfCare flips the script, empowering your phone to become your tool and guide to finding quick calm any time. As you stay in your virtual bed all day surrounded by your favorite gentle things, you select calming tasks that generate simple satisfaction and uncomplicated harmony. Unlike traditional games that get increasingly more stressful as you progress, the #SelfCare interactions begin disorderly and awkward and become more orderly and satisfying with the simple goal of feeling better.

“We have a love-hate relationship with our phones, and often feel stressed and manipulated by them,” inform #SelfCare co-creators Eve Thomas and Brie Code. “We want to create experiences that doesn’t waste our time and that truly leave us feeling relaxed and invigorated and more ready for life.” 

Further enhancing your #SelfCare experience is the ability personalize your virtual sanctuary with unique additions contributed by guest artists working in themes of self-care, updating your space to reflect the evolution of your goals and outlook. The more time you spend on yourself, the more self-care techniques are unlocked for a deeper and more impactful practice. This Android release of #SelfCAre coincides with the introduction of a new in-app minigame in which you tend to your bedside plant and heal the discolored spots on its leaves.

To develop #SelfCare upon an evidence-based foundation, the team collaborated with research advisor Dr. Isabela Granic — creator of the renowned anxiety-reducing children’s game MindLight, Professor and Chair of Developmental Psychopathology at Radboud University in the Netherlands, and Director at Games for Emotional and Mental Health Lab.

Download #SelfCare on Google Play or the App Store.

For more information visit TRULUV.ai. 

For all media inquiries contact VOCAL.  

 

 

Read More
VOCAL VOCAL VOCAL VOCAL

It's good to be vocal (ツ)

While the days might be slowly getting shorter, the list of exciting VOCAL happenings never does. As with every summer, our intentions to visit our homies scattered far and wide have gone largely unrealized, instead reprioritized by jetsetting for client engagement and the making of great projects.

While the days might be slowly getting shorter, the list of exciting VOCAL happenings never does. As with every summer, our intentions to visit our homies scattered far and wide have gone largely unrealized, instead reprioritized by jetsetting for client engagement and the making of great projects.

Luckily, if you’ve missed out there are still some good times to be had. And we hope to catch up over a few umbrella drinks before the sun decides to set on the summer.

 
unmoored.jpg

Unmoored (ending soon)

In partnership with Listen and Microsoft’s ongoing In Culture initiative, VOCAL recently supported the launch of Michael Chin’s Unmoored mixed-reality installation in Times Square. Stroll around the enormous animatronic sculpture and experience a virtual future where global warming raises the sea level to engulf the city. It’s truly terrific and terrifying, and there’s still a little time to check it out.

>> Download the app before you go: iPhone or Android.

 
SelfCare.jpg

#SelfCare: Changing the Game of Meditation

It’s been a long day, and you just want to be at home. Luckily your personal space is now in your pocket; step inside to find your calm. #SelfCare allows you to reset in just a few quiet minutes, recharging your outlook from within. Developed by the team at TRU LUV, #SelfCare is currently available for iPhone and coming to Android later this month.

>> Download now & turn up your chill.

 
woman.show.jpg

WOMAN Show: September 15–17

If you want to know what’s up in the world of female fashion check out WOMAN Show. Returning to NYC, this seasonal event is an intelligently curated and widely trusted platform driving relationships between brands, buyers and retailers. Spring Studios, 50 Varick St NYC.

>> Resister Now

 
See.Me.jpg

Art Takes SoHo

The global art-curation platform SeeMe returns to NYC for a pop-up exhibition during this year’s Tribeca Art Night. Passionate artists are invited to join the SeeMe community and submit works for consideration to be part of the exclusive one-day Art Takes Soho exhibition on September 26, at 45 Lispenard Street. If you know a brilliant artist, get them involved.

>> Submit your work before September 16.

 
13Bonaparte.jpg

13 Bonaparte NYC Store

Our dear friends at 13 Bonaparte are getting set to launch their second stateside store — the first in LA, this new one in NYC. Doors are set to open on September 6 in the lead-up to this year’s Fashion Week; be sure to check out their latest creations at 1 Rivington St, New York, NY 10002 (map).

 

Issue No.3

We’re currently sketching out the next issue of The VOCAL Times, focusing on the great creatives of Canada to celebrate the opening of our Toronto office. If you know of some amazing creative talent we should check out, shoot us a suggestion here.

As always, the classifieds section is for anywhere and everywhere, so if you’ve got a position you’d like filled email us here.

 

More details to follow on the next issue of The VOCAL Times and the print-edition launch event in Toronto. Peace out, with a piece of advice: it’s always good to be vocal.

 
Read More
Technology VOCAL Technology VOCAL

A Virtual Experience to Calm Your Reality

“#SelfCare is an antidote to a stressful world and a phone full of bad news, FOMO, and more stress,” say co-creators Brie Code and Eve Thomas. “For 3-5 minutes you can escape to a calm and soothing room, do some relaxing, meditative tasks, and return to your life refreshed and ready to face your stresses.”

TRU LUV launches #SelfCare, the app to harmonize your hectic lifestyle.


Today the innovative developers of therapeutic technologies at TRU LUV released their latest digital companion #SelfCare, a game-like app that allows you to reset, recharge and reemerge anew. In this world ruled by digital overload, TRU LUV takes your phone past being a tool for personal betterment and onto providing a truly restorative immersive experience — one that replaces mindless scrolling with mindful intention.

“#SelfCare is an antidote to a stressful world and a phone full of bad news, FOMO, and more stress,” say co-creators Brie Code and Eve Thomas. “For 3-5 minutes you can escape to a calm and soothing room, do some relaxing, meditative tasks, and return to your life refreshed and ready to face your stresses.”

The setting for #SelfCare is as simple as the process: Let’s stay in bed all day. In your virtual bedroom, surrounded by your favorite gentle things, you select calming tasks that generate simple satisfaction and uncomplicated harmony. Awaken your slumbering cat and give it some deserved affection, sort your laundry by color, indulge in a tarot card reading, or nurture your favorite plant. It’s your safe, comfortable space where you give yourself permission to feel better.

Unlike traditional games that get increasingly more stressful as you progress, the #SelfCare interactions begin disorderly and awkward and become more orderly and satisfying. There are no levels of difficulty, no winning, and no losing. The goal is simple: To feel better.

To build #SelfCare upon a solid, evidence-based foundation, the team collaborated with research advisor Dr. Isabela Granic — creator of the renowned anxiety-reducing children’s game MindLight, Professor and Chair of Developmental Psychopathology at Radboud University in the Netherlands, and Director of the Games for Emotional and Mental Health Lab. “It’s the marriage of science and design that is the game changer,” says Dr. Granic. “Ultimately, it’s that science-design integration that will motivate people to take control of their own emotional resilience, building self-care practices that prevent the development of anxiety and depression while also promoting general well-being.” 

As your #SelfCare experience progresses you can personalize your virtual sanctuary with unique additions contributed by guest artists working in themes of self-care, updating your space to reflect the evolution of your goals and outlook. The more time you spend on yourself, the more self-care techniques are unlocked for a deeper and more impactful practice.

Download #SelfCare in the iPhone App Store.

For more information visit TruLuv.ai. 

For all media inquiries contact VOCAL.  

Read More

Most Recent:

Blog
Feel the Pride

For the month of June, NYC Pride welcomes WorldPride as it marks the 50th Anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising and a half century of LGBTQI+ liberation. To celebrate this moment, The Ally Coalition have created an emotive community-driven sound and light experience featuring a soundscape by St Vincent, and generated by user messages. The experience is powered by Microsoft AI technology that explores powerful feelings of hope, anger, joy and determination.

Accelerating the Future of Fashion

London College of Fashion, University of the Arts London is continuing its collaboration with Microsoft to inspire the next generation to rethink, redesign and revolutionize the future of the fashion industry. Leveraging Microsoft’s cutting-edge Mixed Reality, Artificial Intelligence, and IoT technologies and LCF’s industry-defining mentors, selected students were invited to participate in a semester-long intensive course that culminates in a final showcase of their prototypes this June.

Hollywood Dream Machines: Petersen Automotive Museum x Microsoft

The Petersen Automotive Museum announced today that its upcoming “Hollywood Dream Machines: Vehicles of Science Fiction and Fantasy” exhibit will spotlight a unique and immersive mixed-reality experience powered by Microsoft HoloLens. The display, named “Hollywood Dream Machines: Worlds Reimagined,” will be centered around the iconic Time Machine from “Back to the Future” and the famed Warthog from the “Halo” franchise. Opening May 4, 2019, the experience will offer guests an inside look at these legendary sci-fi machines.

AI Powers Music Mood at Sister City

Sister City, a new, meticulously designed hotel in NYC that embraces technology to offer guests a modern respite, debuts a first-of-its-kind lobby music score. Inherent to Sister City’s founding ethos was the question of its sonic landscape — Sister City asks what new shapes music can take as a site-specific, living extension of the hotel, and looked to Brian Eno’s Music For Airports and John Cage’s concept for “4’33”” as touch points for these conversations.

Chris Cole's Rail Jam Invitational

We’re excited to announce a new action sports music festival Gnarlytown set for June 22 in San Pedro, CA, co-founded by veteran pro skateboarder Chris Cole in partnership with John Reese of SGE and Nitro Circus. Set at the scenic LA Waterfront Berth 46 in San Pedro, CA, Gnarlytown will combine the perfect blend of action sports, punk rock, and craft beer tasting.

NAO Takes Fans Into “Orbit” With Interactive Music Video Powered By Microsoft AI

Microsoft has announced another partnership through their ongoing In Culture program that supports today’s most innovative creatives, this time with English singer-songwriter and rising star NAO. Together they are producing a never-before-seen interactive and personal music video to support the “Orbit” track on her new album Saturn released late in 2018.