On My Radar: Christine Cattano

Christine Cattano, executive producer of Framestore's VR studio in New York, is a woman pioneering the emerging virtual reality field and currently serves as the primary client liaison overseeing a growing team in the VR department at the Oscar-winning company.

Last year, Framestore opened the world’s first-ever Virtual Reality Studio with an inaugural Oculus Rift experience for HBO’s Game of Thrones - one of the most popular and bar-setting VR experiences to date.

Cattano has been a key player in building up the studio since its inception last year but below takes time out to tell us about Twitter (but not tweeting), her love for Ace Ventura-style humour and why she moved over from the agency side to be closer to tech.

What’s the best ad campaign you’ve seen recently?

Hand on the holy book here, I try not to stay too current on advertising campaigns. I have this theory dating back from my interactive agency days that the majority of people that look at and react to interactive campaigns are ad people. I try to keep myself exposed to the things that keep the general population enthralled: games, film, tech, epic TV shows and music. Those areas are more likely to get the complete creative license to break boundaries, and that’s the business I’m in!

What website(s) do you use most regularly and why?

You mean besides Google, right? Twitter (though I don’t tweet), Oculus subreddit to stay current on VR, Apartment Therapy because I’m always dealing with the challenges of living in the shoebox of NYC, and Aquarium Drunkard & Ghost Capital to keep my playlists full.

What’s the most recent piece of tech that you’ve bought and why?

We’re constantly buying or blogging the latest in headsets and VR-related tech. The list wouldn’t fit here! Other than that, a new camera because producing VR keeps taking me to the most amazing places (think: Chile-Rwanda-China in 13 days!)

Facebook, Instagram or Twitter?

Insta!

What’s your favourite app on your phone and why?

Whatever the latest in super-addicting games are (right now: Alto’s Adventure, Telltale GoT) that distract me from the sights, sounds and smells of the NYC subway system, DuoLingo because I’m getting married in Italy in three months and don’t know anything in Italian but profanity. Can’t live without iTunes (will always prefer to own my music over streaming it), and certainly would fall to pieces without Maps and Mail.

What’s your favourite TV show and why?

Game of Thrones. I’ve worked on three Game of Thrones projects, read all the books twice, and yeah, total nerd.

What film do you think everyone should have seen?

From a very selfish point of view, if you want to understand my humour, Ace Ventura 1 and 2.

Where were you when inspiration last struck?

Sleeping. All revelations come to me in a cold sweat at 3am.

What’s the most significant change you’ve witnessed in the industry since you started working in it?

I’ll try not to be biased and say VR… but overall, there’s been a gradual shift from brands working with large agencies, to utilising smaller, more creative shops directly.

If there was one thing you could change about the advertising industry, what would it be?

I left working in agencies a few years back for many reasons, but the biggest was because as I started to delve more into the “interactive” space, I noticed that the most “creative” people were the ones that were closest to the tech – the makers – and that’s where I wanted to be.

Not that I learned C++ in that time, but I do hope that as advertising experiments more with emerging tech, they utilise the people that are closest to it to both conceive and create, and hopefully create things of value and staying power.

What or who has most influenced your career and why?

When I left college, I became a bit of an Ayn Rand junkie. “A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve,” one of her characters famously says. While there are many aspects of her philosophy I debate, her views on drawing personal value from hard work, productivity and achievements have always stuck with me and have often acted as a compass when making decisions and choosing people and teams to work with.

Tell us one thing about yourself that most people won’t know…

Not much, I was born and raised on Long Island... I’m by nature an over-sharer.