World-first cinema capable of measuring audience response to open in Bristol

One of the world’s most innovative cinemas, capable of monitoring audience reactions like never before, is coming to Bristol.

Officially called an Instrumented Auditorium, the 36-person 150m² cinema will have state-of-the-art monitoring equipment to record data on audience members and how they react to the content they are watching and hearing.

It’s due to open in May next year at the MyWorld creative hub at The Coal Shed on Avon Street, St Philips, as part of the University of Bristol’s new Temple Quarter Enterprise Campus.

The project, which has received a £400,000 funding grant from the Wolfson Foundation, will record audiences’ biometric responses to what they’re watching and hearing, including their heart rate, eye movement and brain activity.

Researchers will even be able to monitor the electrical properties of people’s skin to gauge their subconscious emotional and sympathetic responses.

These new insights will underpin future commissioning, directorial and production approaches to new content creation using emerging creative technologies.

There is also enormous potential for future applications of this research, for example linking individual differences in response to mental health, including conditions such as anxiety and depression.

Iain Gilchrist, Professor of Neuropsychology at the University of Bristol, said: “If we want to understand whether a new experience or new technology is working, we have to ask the audience.

“The Instrumented Auditorium will allow us to stream data that captures audience responses moment by moment, providing unique insights that take us way beyond current questionnaire-based methods.

“This is the first fully instrumented facility of its kind in the world, which is exciting not just for us as researchers but for those working in the creative sector, providing insights which will shape the future of film, television and beyond.”

The auditorium will be just one of the world-leading research and development (R&D) facilities at The Coal Shed on Avon Street, where MyWorld will be based.

MyWorld is led by the University of Bristol in partnership with 12 other organisations, including Bristol Old Vic, Watershed, Aardman Animations, the BBC and BT.

The new facilities, alongside training and production activities, will open a world of R&D to creative organisations, big and small, in the region and beyond.

Paul Ramsbottom, Chief Executive of the Wolfson Foundation, said: “From our beginnings, the Wolfson Foundation has been committed to funding infrastructure for high quality scientific research as well as for performance spaces.

“This innovative project at Bristol brings these two interests together, and we look forward to seeing what research emerges from MyWorld about audience response to immersive and digital performance.”