Clive launches a Strange Agency

How did an experimental poet who once scratched a living as a cleaner for Hollywood star Ava Gardner come to be Managing Director of a research-led digital company? NIC MITCHELL finds out.

Clive Fencott still vividly remembers those days when he chatted about Frank Sinatra with movie-actress Ava Gardner, star of Mogambo, The Barefoot Contessa and other Hollywood classics from the 40s and 50s.

Clive was a part-time cleaner for the screen goddess and other wealthy clients around Mayfair at the time, and recalls walking with Ava Gardner and her little dogs in Hyde Park in the 1980s, just a few years before she died.

“She was very lively and very talkative, and the conversation was often about Frank Sinatra whom she married in 1951, and divorced five years later. She also had plenty of stories about other film people.”

Clive was struggling to earn a living as a 'sound poet' at the time, experimenting with poetry that used images and sounds, not just words. He was doing everything from poetry reading and performances with improvising musicians, to creative writing workshops for London schoolchildren. To keep the wolf from the door, he also did gardening, cleaning and decorating odd jobs.

His wife, Anne, had completed her psychology degree at Birkbeck College, and Clive enrolled on a course by Independent Study at North East London Poly, where he was able to design his own degree. “I focused on the philosophy of science and computer science and my BA got me a place on a Masters in Foundations of Advanced Information Technology (FAIT) at Imperial College, concentrating on new areas such as artificial intelligence and logic programming.

“I was supported by a research award and remember I was the only Poly person on the course that year and probably one of the few to get to Imperial with a BA. This was in the late 80s before the digital revolution, when there was a big push to understand the complexities of computers.

“I wanted to be part of this, and decided to try to work in the academic world. I applied for a post at what was then Teesside Polytechnic and came up and got the job.

“Until then I didn't even know where Middlesbrough was. It was the night of Mrs Thatcher's second victory, and I remember they let me go early so I could vote.

“As the train left Middlesbrough station, I had a feeling that I didn't want to leave. I knew this was the right move for me. Even back then Teesside had a very good reputation in computer science. There was a lot going on here and I just felt at home.”

He soon got involved with research in software engineering and supervised a number of PhDs in the subject. Some years later, during a sabbatical in 1994, he discovered the internet and started doing research into the potential of computer graphics and virtual environments. This sent his research career off in a whole new direction.

Clive recalls: “A student said to me ‘How do you know what's a good virtual environment?’ It was a very good question because an awful lot of virtual environments don't work very well. Even getting through a virtual door can be a real problem, for instance, and it's difficult to believe in them when things are so unreal.

“It started me thinking and I began my own research work on how to evaluate virtual reality environments and computer games in particular. That eventually led to establishing Strange Agency as a spin out company with colleagues from the University.”

Clive is the Managing Director, and his co-directors are games designer and consultant Oliver Davies and Multimedia Masters graduate Jo Clay. Together they provide specialist 'proof of content' services to the computer games industry.

Clive explains: “By drawing on our experience in the games industry and the cutting edge research carried out by our interactive digital environment research group, 'SPIDERS', we can offer rigorous, in depth analyses of computer games very early in the development lifecycle - before they are playable - and reduce both the cost and risk of developing computer games.

“To the best of our knowledge Strange Agency is the only company offering this kind of objective evaluation of games so early in the lifecycle,” says Clive, pictured with his company logo.

Strange Agency is based in the Victoria Building, the business incubation greenhouse on the campus, where many University company start-ups are located.

It was given a major boost this year when the technology finance company, NStar, pledged a £90,000 grant to support the fledgling enterprise. NStar was originally set up by One NorthEast to create a new climate for technology investment in the region. Strange Agency also won the general category award in the Teesside heat of the North East Universities Business Plan competition this year.

The Semiosphere Interactive Digital Environment Research Studio (SPIDERS) from which Strange Agency developed was recently asked by Codeworks Nitro to undertake a research project investigating computer games for older people. The idea is to explore using computer games technology to help older people exercise and to investigate the medical application of games.

“We have built a virtual environment connected to an exercise bike in which the world that people see changes as they pedal through a virtual journey,” explained to Clive.

“We have transposed people's everyday environment to the seabed and as they cycle they can see different creatures and plants under the water. As they pedal faster they rise up from the seabed. The project is looking at whether this could be a way to help keep people fit and active in their 60s by using computer games to stimulate cognitive activity.”

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