Update on The Signal and the Noise

Since the initial proposal I have made two visits to Dr Darren Logan at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute. On the first visit I gathered information from all aspects of Darren’s research looking at genetically programmed behaviour in mice. Part of this involved looking at the technology used to store and sequence genes via the Illumina sequencing machines at the Sanger, their data centers and the various types of visualisation software used.

Darren ran me through how the coding process worked in living things and provided me with many useful details that allowed me to go away and develop further research for the project. He took me on a tour of the Sanger Institute and we met with another scientist to discuss how the sequencing computing technology and statistics analysing tools work.

As a result of this meeting I was able to develop the concept further and began to create a top level script for the film as well as developing some initial visual material for the storyboard. On the second visit to the Sanger we went through the first draft of the script in detail and reviewed some of the visual material, Darren gave useful input into the script and was pleased with how it is developing. He also provided me with some further ideas that I am now adding into the script and some additional sources for visual material in 2D and 3D that I intend to include in the film.

Next I need to make the changes to the script and develop some further visual material for the storyboard. I am meeting with Darren again in early January, where we will prepare for the presentation at the project’s roundtable at the end of the month, and I am also taking Darren to a range of East End galleries to view some relevant exhibitions.

Charlie Tweed, December 2012