Electric South has supported African artists from a spectrum of creative disciplines to explore XR storytelling.
Our first projects were co-produced under the New Dimensions banner by Electric South and the Goethe-Institut South Africa, with additional support from Big World Cinema, Blue Ice Docs and the Bertha Foundation.
To date Electric South have produced and supported over 20 XR productions.
Uprooted is a 360 film, following the journey of a single succulent, a Conophytum pangea, smuggled from the arid plains of Namaqualand to the bustling streets of China and luxury homes in America. The film invites us to reflect on the intricate balance between nature and humanity.
Up until the last shot, the experience in Uprooted is always from the point-of-view of the plant. Your embodied journey from being in the ground, in a box, on the back of a bakkie, on a plane, under fluorescent lights, and finally in a pot on a windowsill is all experienced from this single point of view. And all along, as your environment changes from scene to scene, your roots below you are slowly degrading…
Sands of Time is an open world VR game based in a Dystopic future, a cautionary tale about sand mining. The story follows three characters from a future civilization who crash into earth due to a malfunctioning spaceship. They are confronted by the realities left behind by humans after years of environmental destruction, a sentient AI Griot guides them through the world as they race against time and obstacle courses to collect Tanzanites; stones that hold the knowledge and power to reverse reality. The game is set in the city of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania and led by Swahili language and digital twins of iconic places in the city. The project is an educative journey that intertwines education and adventure in an empathetic experience that centers environmental consciousness, Sands of Time won the 2025 Unity Impact awards.
The project team features a diverse team of talents from Tanzania, Nigeria and Ghana, developed with the support of Electric South and Unity for Humanity. An alpha version release is on Steam and a social VR version is available on VRChat.