The Technosaurs (2005-2006)

A branded, multi-platform, educational, participatory narrative for ‘tweens’.

Co-produced with RocketFuel Inc., and the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology. Funders: Canada New Media Fund; Virtual Museum of Canada; Telus Innovation Fund.

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Four kids are lost in time. Their only contact with the outside world is through a website and fragments of phone messages, pictures, and videos. It’s up to the audience in the present to find and interpret the information needed to keep them alive and find their way home.

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The Technosaurs are a community of kids, aged 8-12, that use technology to explore the world of dinosaurs. Through a freak technological mishap, four Technosaurs get zapped to the time of dinosaurs. They’re lost in a foreign environment – they don’t know what to eat, where to take shelter, and most importantly, how to get home… and if that’s not bad enough, something is after them.

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The audience receives fragments of messages, distorted video and pictures, through websites, emails and cellphones, from the kids that provides a window into their lost world. Through games and interactive activities, and interviews with experts from leading palaeontological institutions, the audience researches, debates and collaborates to provide the kids critical information about dinosaurs and an enigmatic cretaceous environment.

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SavetheTechnosaurs.com defines a new kind of entertainment genre, built on “audience activation”. Audiences become “activated” through implication in the storyline of each episode and the series brand as a whole. In order to engage audiences 24/7, each episode is delivered using several accessible media platforms, including web and mobile, offering both a personalized and community-driven entertainment experience.