Project Spotlight: Level Up! The Musical
In 2025 we worked on one of our most exciting projects to date: Level Up! The Musical, produced by Goldspun Media, in which video game aesthetics come to life on stage. The creative team behind the animation — Joanna Kalinska, Jose Lago Amor, and Ollie Hayes — are all passionate gamers themselves, so they jumped at the opportunity to blend their love of gaming with their creative work. “From the very moment I was contacted to work on this project, I knew I was going to have a good time!” says Jose. “A relatable story, combined with one of my all-time passions — it was the perfect mix.”
As a small, multi-talented team, everyone wore several hats throughout the production. In large part, however, Ollie Hayes directed and managed the project, Jose Lago Amor led the visual design of pixel art, characters, and key props, and Joanna Kalinska designed and animated the motion graphics.
With a tight schedule, the team kicked things off by going “wide and shallow” — quickly sketching a range of ideas to gather early feedback from director Patrick Wilson and performance designer Jess Watson. “Their passion and enthusiasm were infectious,” says Ollie. “They had a clear vision, but they also gave us space to bring our own creativity and imagination into the mix.”
Drawing inspiration from 32-bit graphics — think Sega Saturn or Game Boy Advance — the team used Procreate at very low resolution with pixel art brushes to create the core assets. They referenced Jess Watson’s costume designs and colour palette to keep everything cohesive. The final animation and composition were completed in Adobe After Effects, using a blend of 2D rigged animation and frame-by-frame sprite-style movement to capture that classic video game feel.
As the team had never worked in theatre before, the experience proved both challenging and deeply rewarding. “It pushed us to learn and adapt quickly,” Ollie reflects. “And that’s made the final product even more satisfying.” Unlike a typical animation project, the show needed 285 individual video files, each carefully crafted to loop seamlessly or play in sequence during the performance. From tiny 1/6-second snippets to full 5-second clips, the total run time added up to just over six and a half minutes.
As digital animators, the Steel Magpie team usually sees their work published online — rarely with a live audience. That’s why they’re especially excited to attend Level Up! The Musical at the Fringe and witness the audience’s reactions firsthand. “It’s incredibly rewarding to see our animation complement this relatable, charming, expertly crafted story,” says Joanna. “I’m so excited for audiences to share in the fun of it!”
The animation team had an incredible experience collaborating with Goldspun Media, who proved to be the perfect creative partners — passionate, generous, and always responsive. “I’ve been in awe of the creativity and dedication that the team has shown throughout this process,” says Jose Lago Amor.
“It’s been an absolute pleasure working with Goldspun Media to bring the visual language of video games to the stage,” says Ollie Hayes. “Personally, this has been the most fun I’ve had on a project in a long time. I’m thrilled to see all of our hard work come to life – alongside the incredible efforts of the cast and crew — live in front of an audience.”
Ollie Hayes is an animator and co-director at Steel Magpie.