Course

Well, I had fun with the web interface anyway. ::lol::

"Sehndova":http://interactive.usc.edu/members/cnie/2008/12/sehndova/.

The future has arrived, but are you ready for the world in 2010? The world I created for CTIN532: Interactive Design and World Building is a futuristic, sci-fi vision of the present. All the technology, conflicts, and sheer weirdness represented in The New Times (a fictional news publication I created as the atlas to this world) are ripped-from-the-headlines, taken from real-life news media. The world is much stranger than you thought.

2010: The New Times

2010: Stories from the Second Floor Blog

I made Los Angeles in my world

Rendered images:







Playblast vidoe (not rendered):

Thanks to Kurosh for supplying us with his "lipstick" camera and new wide angle lens to document the class Dioramas. Ala' provided camera work and production - yes, that's a glowing light stick lens holder...great images of 532 worlds.

Due by Class time Wed Nov 26th:
Draft Atlas (if an asset is not fully rendered, substitute a description) including requests for feedback on specific problems, if applicable
Posted (blog or wiki) or emailed to entire class

Due Class time Wed Dec 3rd (with Steve Anderson)
.psd layers to integrate into panorama
Use class to present drafts to Steve and get feedback

Presentations December 10th 10-1
You will have roughly 15 minutes to present your atlas.

"A Day in Highland Park"

Conceptual: This postcard is both longer and thinner (in terms of ratio) than a normal postcard, and the reason is to allow a progression and to capture aspects of a moment more than just to show a picture. A postcard like this could be one that is purchased, or one that is made from a machine. One could write on the post card, or one could send it without anything on it - the point is to receive the images, not the post card. The images provide the personality and personalization.




Absent of any text, this post card is also representative of a moment of time, with both front and back two different perspectives on the same scene.

Right-Click and save for a larger view.

This is a postcard that was sent by a newcomer to the world. Naturally, it looks very much part of our world. But also reflects some of the anxiety of being in a new place without knowledge of what it holds.

_(This is less of a postcard and more of a journal entry, which is in better keeping with my world's Atlas anyway.)_

This morning I awoke and bid farewell to my gracious Ahnorov hosts -- and I am being only partially sarcastic when I say this; they were not terribly social and merely grunted when I took my leave. Minari, my official military escort and guide while touring the Ahnorov cities, greeted me with greater warmth before leading me to the surface. But instead of swimming up towards the exterior of the Tree, Minari brought me through the Root Forest, where the space between the Tree's roots becomes far and few between as we neared their source. Eventually we broke through the water's surface within the interior of the Tree's hollow and I stared in awe at the walls of the Tree that surrounded this relatively still pool of water. Minari bid me farewell as I pulled myself up to stand on the uppermost roots that rested just below the water's surface and carefully picked my way to the edge of the pond.

There's very little light here and as such, the Ahnorov stock the area with coralight mined in ocean caves. A little dull at first glance, the mineral glows brightly when kept underwater and is a precious light resource for both the Ahnorov and the Gilorov. A near-transparent sack filled with water and a bit of coralight is more reliable than an oil lantern, as it will never go out and doesn't burn to the touch.

As I started on my way up, I noticed more light sources that lit the pathway as it spiraled upwards. When I neared one, I stopped to investigate and was fascinated by my conclusions. We know that normal plants are able to take in nutrients through their roots and transport it upwards to other parts of the plant. The Tree is apparently no exception and will transport water through its internal membranes. Fairly frequently, there are sections of the membrane that have caved into wells where water begins to pool. These natural fountains are then the source of the purest drinking water available on the Age and are a source of sustenance for both the Gilorov and the Jimarov. Adding a few pieces of coralight turns the fountain into a light source on top of a drinking source.

I had better get going... it will take me a couple hours of walking at least before I reach the lower levels of the Gilorov Flats.

A mail from a little boy of the world

The equivalent of a postcard in 2010 (or in 2008, for that matter) is the sms/text message. This image of a mobile chat is branded with the 2010 "I <3 NY" campaign to re-brand New York as the premier 21st century city. As attention increases in value as a commodity, every aspect of life is fair game for advertising.

I Imagine this conversation is a casual encounter between two people who met on the 'Social' page of The New Times.



I've also started this blog for one of my characters as a way to expand the fiction of the '21010' world

Stories from the Second Floor

The premise is that this character, Irena, was hired to write a profile piece about life on living wage in the form of this blog, that will be linked from 'The New Times' website.

It occurs to me I never posted a picture from the scene of the diorama we were supposed to make for class on October 29, 2008. So here it is! Click on it for a full size image.




Sagi, the elephant and kind of a social worker under Gaia, fell asleep while planting trees. Gaia is the Squirrel, although this is just her current avatar. And because she is Mother Nature, flowers grow wherever she is, okay?

Here is the quintessential corny postcard that gets the point across :^) Click on it to pop up the full-sized image.




(For people not in the class, we were supposed to make a postcard from our world. And similarly to people not in the class, my world changed from Alien Extradition to A Dusty River, a World similar to ours but with forces trying to restore and preserve Nature)

Send a Postcard
Due (posted) before class Wed Nov 19th

Please write or fabricate or produce:
a postcard (or your world's equivalent: scenic vista accompanied by message, address and caption)
between two inhabitants of your world(s)
or
from a visitor to the outside world

Al Yang was kind enough to bring in ENTROPIA, A COLLECTION OF UNUSUALLY RARE STAMPS, by Christian Lorenze Scheuer as an example of world design.

Week 14: By SUNDAY 11/23
This is the time to actively solicit feedback. You do not need to post the entire project, but please post (email, blog or WIKI, but alert via email) final questions, or additions or trouble spots in your presentations. This is a requirement.

Week 15: Wed 12/3,
Steve Anderson will officiate class; Your projects should be posted (either blog or WIKI) by then. I will have WIFI.

Wed 12/3 CTIN 511:
CTIN 532's offering for 511 will be a panorama set of slides representing a scene from your world (Ala' will supply a template) + your dioramas. Due date for your slide TBD.

Wed 12/10, 10-1 We will meet for final show case and feedback.

IDEO Global Chain Reaction from IDEO Labs on Vimeo.

courtesy of Mike Rossmassler:
The Rules of Quick and Dirty World Building
Secrets of Great Characters According to Six Science Fiction Authors

Great thanks to Scott, below is the one I was looking for a long time, which I think is fantastic:



Fischli and Weiss, "The Way Things Go"

1. CIRCULATION STUDY depicting:
a) P.O.V. Native/Inhabitant & Visitor/Viewer
Fixed Focal Point vs. free range of vision
The residents of the three worlds all know there are other worlds besides the one they live in. However, people in different worlds are not able to see or communicate directly with each other. As the three worlds exist for quite a long time, people already get used to their special way of communication. Their behaviors indicate that there are unique relationships among the three worlds, which have important influence on the residents’ lives. However, no one has given out an believable explanation yet.

The visitors are lack of the knowledge of the world system. Although they also know there are two other worlds, they need time and practice to learn how these worlds are related.

Perimeter / Boundaries
Actual vs. Apparent (Berming)
As people in one world are not able to watch other worlds, the boundary of each world is the physical boundary of it. For the world system, the boundary is the area that worlds are not related. In other words, the boundary of the world system starts when people's senses stop.

There is no visible bermings among the three worlds. However, the invisible bermings exist everywhere. Every action is the cause of another action in another world. Thus the three worlds seem like parallel, but closely connected indivisibly.

Sense of freedom/expanse vs. constriction
On one hand, people are quite limited on their behaviors, as they have to do certain things in order to reach some purposes. However, since this has already been their life styles, they already feel comfortable about it. On the other hand, there are still rules and relationships hidden among the worlds, so the system provides space to explore and take practice.

b) Entrances / Exits
External & Internal
Explicit & Implicit
As no direct communication happen among worlds, there are no explicit entrances or exits. However, the special relationships among the three worlds suggest the possibilities of crossing worlds. Each world is the external one for the other two worlds. As mentioned before, the edges of the whole system is where people's senses stop. The geological provinces create natural internal entrances and exits in every world.

c) Paths
fixed vs improvised paths
“as the crow flies” vs. respecting topography & habitual routes
Each world is an independent running system. There are normal paths that divide the world into natural zones. The three worlds are forest, river and mountain, which differ in topography and habitual routes as well.

2. LAWS / RULES / AUTHORITY
1) People in one world have to respect people in other worlds.

2)Do not take the actions that are already claimed harmful to other worlds.

3) Follow the instructions to avoid negative results and trouble to others.

For the forest,
4) It's not allowed to cut down trees without permission.

5)Fire is not allowed.

6)Plant a new sapling whenever a tree fell down.

For the river,
7) Do not throw everything into the river.

8) When something unknown comes out of the river, get them and record.

9)Do not move the stones in and around the river.

10) When flood comes, run.

For the mountain,

11) Protect animals on the mountain, including the dangerous ones.

12) As avalanches happen a lot, it is recommended to do energetic exercise very carefully.

The rules are all discovered by ancient residents from their experiences. They are passed from generation to generation; some become laws, some work as reference. People who breaks laws will be warned or punished. For each person, he/she only has access to the rules of his/her own world, unless there are people cross the worlds successfully. However, as visitors and new residents join in, the rules and laws change in many perspectives because of new situations and discoveries.

3. BLANK SPACE
As mentioned above, the blank spaces exist in where people have not yet figure out rules, and the places that people have no sense of being related.

I've been designing how my thesis project would work as an interactive, chaotic narrative. Here is my basic outline of events and possible interactions. For my draft presentation, I'd like to get your feedback in helping me to narrow down what I could do. I know this is a ton of text for now. I'll have images in class.
1) Which possible interactions do you find most interesting or compelling?
2) Which seem plausible to actually do (either in the next 6 weeks or semester)?
3) Which cross section seems most representative of the big picture of the story?
4) Which platform or techniques (i.e. game engine vs. Max) might work?

BASIC PLOT:
The player enters the mind of an older man with dementia, who, in the process of looking for a misplaced watch, gets lost in his own backyard. As he searches, he forgets what he was looking for in the first place. The familiar environment becomes distorted and falls apart as memories become confused with the present. Through engaging in his morphing perspective, the viewer is taken on a surreal journey that might inspire empathy for how difficult simple tasks can become under the influence of memory loss and dementia. When the outer forms of rational understanding are stripped away and turned inside-out, what is left?

OUTLINE OF EVENTS:

1. INTRODUCTION - OUTSIDE THE HOUSE. NIGHT.
Houses haphazardly stacked on a lonely hill. Camera zooms in to a single light illuminating an upper attic room.

2. 1st WORLD - INSIDE UPPER ATTIC ROOM. 3RD PERSON P.O.V.

Set-Up (pre-animated):
You are standing in the doorway of an upper attic room. An old-man limps slowly around the room with a cane, oblivious to your presence. He sets the needle down on a phonograph, hums to himself, and places labels on objects. He pins old photographs and lists to the walls in an elaborate mapping configuration.

(start of viewer control):
You enter the room to examine it & orient yourself. As you explore the room, the old man tells you what his main objective is. This triggers a change in POV as you take on his 1st Person perspective for the remainder.

What do you look at? Do you interact with the man? Which objects are active?Does the man notice you? Do you talk to him? What do you discover? How does it lead the plot further?

3. TRANSITION - P.O.V. CHANGE - FROM 3RD PERSON OBSERVER TO 1ST PERSON P.O.V. OF OLD MAN
TRIGGER: Man tells you that he lost his watch & thinks he left it by the bench outside. He explains “The Clock Test” and that he must go find it.

4. TRANSITION - FROM ATTIC TO BACKYARD
After entering the man's mind, any number of actions within the attic could portal you to the backyard.

5. 2nd WORLD - IN THE BACKYARD. DAY.
Midwest. 1 acre flat lawn with sparse deciduous trees overlooking a cliff. A black wrought-iron fence seals the boundary around the yard.

ACTIONS:
The basic direction is to travel to the bench to find the watch.

Most Basic (Quick) Route:
Walk forward along the path looking straight-ahead and the environment will remain relatively static. Get to the fence and sit down at the bench. Look at or pick up the watch.

Alternatives (detours):
If you leave the path, look in 6 directions, stop & examine, record or post notes/ pictures, then the environment morphs.

As the viewer moves along the path, the more he/she examines the environment, the more surreal it becomes. Turning in different directions affects the environment in different ways. Even if the most basic straight-ahead path is followed, some confusion will still be triggered.

6. ONSET OF CONFUSION
PHYSICAL OBFUSCATION:

7. TRANSITION TO DARKNESS - completely lost

8. EPHEMERAL - emerges out of dark environment

9. RETURN - Making peace
- Environment calms down
- Houses (memories) collapse into one or house rebuilds itself

10. REFLECTION
- Series of snapshots and reflections relating to viewer actions in the world reveals itself as an image and sound sequence

Examples of Directional Movement & additional description below:
---------------------------------------------------------

I think it self explanatory, except for the fact that it's in Japanese!

Would somebody step up to the translation task? Of particular interest to me what it says about the brains of the thing!

For a playable prototype, the portion of my world system will be three related worlds. Tasks that I plan to present of “world of world” will be:

1. The maps of three worlds.
As there are three related worlds that visitors can get access to, I will draw three geographic maps, which indicate the arrangement, environment, resources of each world.

2. The instructions of related actions.
This is the core mechanic behind this world system. Things related in different worlds are sharing the same moment and the fact that an action is done. Although I’d like the players to try around and figure out their list, a detailed official list is essential for reference and give out hints.

3. A list of DO NOT DO.
As this system also has some infinite loops and null functions, there will be a list of actions that visitors are not suggested to try.

4. Prototype.
This prototype would be an installation that gives player some idea of how this world system works.

5. A walk-through
As the prototype may only indicate one situation that happens in the world, a walk-through could allow players gen better sense of the mechanic behind this world system.

Visual Style

I would keep the idea that each player could only be in and see one world, and he has to find ways to communicate with other two invisible worlds. The style would be mysterious and Fairy tale-like.

I tried to find some pictures are like my world system, and got to a artist called Su Hsin-Tian, whose cyclical space paintings are very interesting:


Space within space

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cyclicspace/510652727/

PEEPHOLE DIORAMAS!


Choose a representative scene from your world to model within the diorama. You may use the box + peephole in any orientation. Consider scale, perspective and horizon.
Due Class 10/29

Player Experience and Goals:

The goal of “world of world” for visitors is to let them experience the unpredictables of life. The visitors would meet unexpected things happens as the result of actions from other level of worlds. Also, they would found they themselves sometimes have the magic power to control.

The “sample” world of world is a circulate system includes three main levels of worlds and several “side worlds”. When a player enters one world, he can tell which world he is in, but it takes time to figure out which level that world is at. When more than one players enters the “world of world”, they are not able to know which world their friends are in, they also could not see or talk to each other. However, they can communicate by applying the rules among these worlds. Once they understand the system, the experience began to become more fun.

The players could be assigned to several tasks that they need to finish with other people in other worlds. Thus they first need to make sure each other gets a clear idea of the system. To clarify it, the players would try something out (for example, throw a stone), and analyses what happens following. They have to be sensitive to the changes of the environment. Then they may need to create their own way to communicate with each other. After all of these prework, players could begin their main task.

Definition of the Atlas:

Players would get:

1. Three maps of the main worlds.

These give the players basic idea of the structures of the worlds. However, to understand the whole system, they have to try out and create their own map of mechanics of the system.

2. A list of DON NOT DO actions.

As any existed programs, this system also has some infinite loop that users may not want to try. Also there are actions would lead to no result (null function). So visitors will get a list of actions that may lead to these kinds of situation.

3. A guide of resources.

To help the visitors survive in this system, they could get a detailed list of all the resources in the whole system.

As the design document, there will be a guidebook of how things are related and work in this system. The book may be not available to players.

As in world of word, there are visible worlds and invisible worlds. The smallest world which accommodates the player is the visible world to him/her. The smaller worlds in it, and the bigger world which this visible world belongs to are invisible. People can see things happening either because of the actions that are taken in this world, or they are reflections of the control from invisible worlds.





The 2nd sketch shows that there are no real external boundaries of the world system, as it is an infinite loop. However, the worlds in my world system are not just copies like this.

I’d like to consider the territories as how far the “control power” could work, and the exit as how to stop this crazy control.

1.Name it: World of world.

Description: This is a world with many “mini” controllers. There are worlds in one world, and this “one world” as well as other worlds belongs to (not only geographically) a bigger world. That means, the worlds in different levels affect and even control each other.

Genre: surrealism

Media: game/interactive narrative

2. Place it:

It’s hard to define the external boundaries for this world system. The boundaries of each single world differ depend on the nature of it. For example, the boundaries of the flower world are the edges of every petal of it.

The external and internal forces are both “control”. The main world, if define one, itself is a normal world, the difference between it and our real world is the self-adjustment is faster. Besides that, more outer effects as well as interactions are happened.

3. Define your audience.

It could be a first-person perspective (to the world is third-person perspective) as an explorer who enters this world system, or the audience could considers himself/herself as part of the world—a controller.

As a visitor, the audience can explore how the world system works, how each world affects and controls each other. As a controller (one world), the player could play god for other worlds, and found mysteries happens on his/her world because of chain reactions.

4. Motivation

I am fascinated by the butterfly effect, and thinking about what if all the effects happen in real time instead of long term. Also, I am always curious about what the “boundaries” of our world. Where is this whole universe is in. If everything happens from a dense and hot state, where was it? If nothing was outside it, what is “nothing” then?

Found this on Columbia University's website in the history and development of the city of New York. It's illustrates how tightly connected building laws are to form. Something that's easily missed:

" In 1916, New York passed the first zoning law in America, and because New Yorkers did not want to cap the height of skyscrapers, they decided that they would regulate the shape of skyscrapers. The idea was that that light and air would reach the sidewalk; light and air were a major issue. So the law stated that you could build right up to the lot line on your building and you could rise up to a certain height and then once you reached that height, you had to step back, you had to set the bulk of the building back. And the height that you could build up to depended upon the width of the street on which your building was located. On a wide street you could have a street wall that was higher than if you were on a narrow street, where the first setback would have to be at a lower story. You would rise up and then you would set back, and then you could rise up some more, and then you had to set back again. There was a formula for how high you could go before you had to set back. Once you reached 25 percent of your lot area, you could build a skyscraper of any height. So on 25 percent of the lot, you could build a slender tower. So this gives New York skyscrapers built between 1916 and about 1960 their unique profile—a bulky base with setbacks and a slender tower soaring up above. And this becomes the model for the skyscraper.

Now the law stated that you had to rise up and set back and rise up and set back, and there was a formula for it, but you could manipulate this so if it said that you could rise up 100 feet before you had to set back, that did not mean that you had to do that, it just meant that once you reached 100 feet, you had to set back. You could actually set back at 50 feet if you wanted to, if you wanted to make the building more dramatic. So there was a lot of leeway for the designer in this new zoning law."

Extraterrestrial Extradition

Circulation Study

Inhabitants of the space station are free to travel wherever they can (i.e., where they can breathe, gravity they can withstand, etc) save for the Administration areas (save for the reception area or if the inhabitant has an appointment), the Bridge (unless for a sanctioned tour). As a form of politeness, they should not go into the business/private parts of establishments. Inhabitants may lock their quarters for privacy, but generally when not wanting privacy, inhabitants will allow others into their quarters. They should still announce themselves though :^)

Inhabitants waiting for trial (i.e., the player) may not access the Transportation Deck. Any inhabitant may sit in or observe a trial remotely.

As it is a space station, most of the paths are fixed (i.e., very fixed boundaries). Only in the garden/park area do the inhabitants get to wander and have freedom of choosing a path. I.E., only in the garden/park is there any sense of freedom. There are many ways to get to elevators and many elevators to choose from on each level in order to minimize traffic areas and provide alternate routes should an elevator be down for maintenance or other reasons.

Likewise entrances and exits are all very clear and all internal. The only external exit is to outer space and that is bared from the player (although they will enter through it). The garden/park area will have clear entrances but less clear exits in order to try to minimize the “space station” feel and help make it seem more open.

Rules & Laws

Well, I have this slated for later in my schedule (as it is integral to the plot). So I will only do a rough treatment here.

The rules and laws were created by the governing body similar to the U.N., called the United Species Council (USC :^) But the name is temporary until I think of a better name). The space station was built as a base to facilitate inter-species interaction. It is on well used trade-routes and serves as a center of trade as well (with particular attention to trade of different species goods). It houses the USC’s best learning center, used to help teach species about each other. As such, first contact races are usually sent to have a Embassy on this station. It is not the main location of the courts however. But aliens being tried who have no knowledge of other species or the language are sent to this station in order to make use of the learning center until they know enough to be tried. If possible, the trial will be done locally on the station, but large or special cases are send out to the bigger courts on other stations/planets.

The USC is a democratic board when every race have representatives. Not every member of the USC is on this space station, they are spread out among the allied planets/stations. At least one representative from every species needs to be present in order to vote on a motion (more may be required depending what is being voted on). It is not unusual for it to take years for them to discuss, analyze, and finally vote on something. All of the members are intellectuals of their kind and are respected. Any individual may challenge the USC, with the USC reviewing the discussion (generally an old one) and if they still disagree, they may be brought to court for a special trial to determine the result. The USC strives to be fair and understanding of all its inhabitants. It does not deal with local law unless a specific species is performing genocide or similar acts (even to other species native to their own planet). Otherwise it deals only with inter-species issues.

Penalties for transgression vary depending on what law is broken. Generally the manner laws (behavior towards different species) are not punished save for asking the transgressor to review the correct behavior. Constant failure will be met with the transgressor put on trial with a large group of entities serving as a jury to determine what needs to be done (in extreme cases, suspension from the space station, but normally just a forced class on how to be polite to different species). So small or simple transgressions are for the most part just given a ‘warning’, but worse transgressions are immediately put before a trial.

Sample Rules:

1. You should be Polite to All Entities following standard guidelines

2. If Possible, you should be polite as determined by the other entity’s culture

3. Ignorance actually is an excuse (for small things, i.e., not murder). But you’ll be sent to school.

4. You can not impinge on the freedom of another entity (obviously the court systems can though). This includes the freedom to live.

5. You should be understanding if another entity insults you. Please request that the entity read up on your species or explain to them why what they did was wrong.

6. Entities are required to wear the proper gear when entering an area not zoned for their species (i.e., wearing a mask as the atmosphere is unbreathable for them, etc). Failure to do so may result in death.

7. Some entities are just jerks. Petty grievances should not be brought to trial unless it results in the entity breaking rule 5.

8. Bring anything to the attention of USC officials for advice and consul.

9. Entities on trial will not be allowed access to the transportation zone until after their trial.

10. You may do what you wish to you private quarters as long as it is not in place specifically to bring harm to visitors. Should something be specifically dangerous to a species (not on purpose, but say you use latex paint and it’s dangerous to some species), a warning on the door must be posted to alert entities of that species. Please alert the quarter master when additions have been done so you cans schedule a quarter-inspector to determine what is dangerous.

11. Be respectful in the park. Many entities use it to relax. A smaller glen may be reserved for parties or functions.

12. Any un-sanctioned work on the space station (it’s mechanics, facilities, electronics, etc) will be dealt with harshly. If you wish to learn about the station, in-depth virtual models, maps, and manuals are available for perusal. If you are interested in working on the station, please see the Career Coordinator.

Blank Space:

The corridors would be pretty boring and repetitious I imagine. There probably are some back-access places of the station (ventilation ducts, what have you) but I sure aren’t going to use them :^).

CIRCULATION

* POV

This interactive Map has two POVs.
- Isometric view: Visitors explore the map in isometric point of view.
- First Person View: When the visitor explores a specific place on the map. The space is built in First person view.






* Boundaries

The boundaries of this world are determined by radioactivity. The range of activity of Inhabitants is bound in undevastated lands. However, some countries are trying to reclaim devastated continents.




* Paths

The paths in this world are determined by various factors such as political issues and environmental issues. For an example of environmental factor, nobody can cross the Pacific ocean because the Pacific ocean is polluted by deadly chemicals created from radioactive fallout. Also, because many countries don’t allow foreign people through their territorial waters, inhabitants often detour.



LAWS/RULES/AUTHORITY

* Who made laws?

The global wars changed almost all things on the earth. After the wars, United Governments enact a number of global laws which didn’t exist before the wars and reflect the changes. These global laws exist on the highest hierarchy of all laws and regulations of each country. The penalty for transgression is exile to the devastated lands.


* Important Laws

1. Researching and developing nuclear weapons are strictly prohibited.

2. Daily diet is limited to 300 Calories.

3. Meat is prohibited.

4. Fish is prohibited.

5. Crossing the Pacific ocean is prohibited.

6. Any discriminative action against unmutated people is strictly prohibited.

7. Pest control is prohibited because insects are the most important food resource.

8. Killing children under 5 is prohibited.

9. Suicidal is strictly prohibited.

10. It is strictly prohibited to bring any living organisms from devastated lands.

11. All people must have 2 or more children.

12. Adoption is prohibited.

13. Education about Physics is prohibited.

14. All building must be shut down at 6:00 pm for energy saving.

15. Flight is prohibited.



BLANK SPACE

Devastated lands and polluted seas are blank spaces of this world.

h2. Circulation Study

There are loose "boundaries" around each zone in Paradigm, specifically around each city as inhabitants tend to stay close to their village. While there are periodic trade "trains" that go from one village to another, generally the areas in between are unvisited and uninhabited and generally uninteresting.

Each village has its own layout, with "convenient use" paths that the citizens generally adhere to, since they are not only the simplest to travel, but usually also the most efficient. Barriers or detours will occur, but only for the sake of thwarting the player and forcing them to come up with solutions to getting where they want to go.

h2. Laws / Rules / Authority

Each village is responsible for governing itself, though the three live in relative harmony with one another and do participate in trade. Generally each village has a single authoritarian figure backed by a group of elders. This oligarchy is responsible for hearing complaints and doling out judgement according to what they feel is best for all those involved. There is no written law or known higher order that keeps people in line.

There is, however, the Mask God -- which is the player. Unbeknownst to the population of Paradigm (though there are whispers of a god that affects the world when it suits him/her), the Player is able to phase into the parallel mask world and alter people's personalities (including those in charge, which would affect their judgement on cases brought to their attention) and/or abilities.

This makes the player the ultimate authority in Paradigm, though the others are unaware of it and the player's justice is never properly credited by the citizens.

h2. Blank Space

The area between inhabited zones is somewhat blank, as evidenced by the lack of people to interact with. Generally the player's actions are focused on interacting with people, so when there are none around, the player does not have much to do.

Circulation Study:

This is a city of pomp and abundance, it likes to strut its stuff, not to say
that it's a city of artifice but a space for the beauty of efficiency. It promotes
freedom of movement so wherever you are you can only look up. The city has a center
that is car-free akin to central park. It's the only space for people to gather
and be seen by others. Being in the center of a roughly circular city has
a panoramic quality to it.

There's an 'official' road system used strictly by cars that covers most
of the key destinations. Pedestrian traffic is heavily regulated.

But there is also a hidden organic network of paths that created by the inhabitants
of the city. Partially a surface path but more underground tunnels since walking is illegal
in most areas.

The city manages to fend off recurrent dust storms through its urban density. For the outsiders
it's a mirage covered in dust. For it's inhabitants an oasis.

Entry and exit to the city is unobstructed. It's more the social norms that form a barrier as explained in
the rules section.

The entire city shuts down around noon for a long 'prayer'. So the Blank space is behavioral/spiritual.


Note:
* Need to develop more visual for the different subtleties of the physical surrounding.
* Need to break down land use and different functions.

1. Circulation Study:

P.O.V. Native/Inhabitant & Visitor/Viewer
Just as with current cities, there are few explicit barriers such as walls preventing free movement across districts, city movement is only enforced through social expectations and norms. For instance if you are a short strand wandering around in long strand districts there will be whispering among the residents surprised to see you straying from your designated district. On sight, an officer of the law will kindly ask you what business you have in the district and escort you back to your proper district. Visitors to the city exist under the same social rules as inhabitants of the city.

Entrances / Exits
Most areas of the city are fairly permeable with many entrances and exits along all main roads with only a few exceptions. Access is strictly regulated to both the high upper class and lowest class citizens. Explicit boundaries exist around the governmental buildings of both the long seer tower and the seat of government, with physical walls that restrict the public's access. Much in the same way, the short strand light confinement and prison areas are walled off from the rest of the city. Each of these walled areas have one point of entry and exit to facilitate security screenings of people entering and leaving.

Paths
The paths of the city vary greatly with respect to the districts. The Long Strand districts are built under strict urban planning, with all streets radiating outward from the Long Seer Tower to facilitate their sight of the city. The government districts lie at the center, surrounded by long strand residential neighborhoods, which are surrounded by the business districts that provide a buffer zone between the long strand districts and short strand districts. The business districts and short strand districts are much more chaotic, with random paths as a messy web among the urban sprawl. The short strand paths were not built as with grand oversight, but simply arose as those lanes most travelled by the people from one location to another.

--

2. Laws/Rules/Authority

Physics
-A new sense has emerged in the human public which allows them to see their potentials for action (referred to as strands) a short range into the future, varying from several seconds into the future to several days.
-This foresight is divided into two distinct abilities: the length of a person's strand, and their ability to see their's and other's strands. So for instance if a person's strand projects only 5 minutes into the future, if their strand sight is the norm they will see 5 minutes of the strand, if below average they may only see 2 minutes of the available strand, or if their vision is way above average, they may see even more of the strand than is available to the average citizen, seeing almost 10 minutes into the person's potential futures.
-There are regional zones which carry a greater affinity for the new sight, much like the idea of ley lines. Many of the newest cities such as Delphi, NC where the Long Seers reside and New Geneva, UT were built on these regional sites that amplify this foresight.

Religious
-The new sight is seen as a gift of God, and society has come to be led by a theocracy of sorts which is a melding of Christian extremism and new age spiritualism surrounding the new sight.
-Those people with way above average strand sight are referred to as long seers. They are seen as oracles to the government and are revered almost as religious leaders. What they see of the potental futures guide the path this society will take.
-It is an implied law that the words of the long seers is truth. Since they have the potential to see further than any others, their version of the future cannot be disputed.

Governmental
-Those people who have visible strands shorter than ten seconds into the future due to their unpredictability make law enforcement of their actions difficult and as such are to be relocated to a light confinement walled district of the city, so that their special needs may be met.
-Education is given based upon your potential for future success, namely your strand length.
-Anyone who acts out or speaks out against the long seers or the seat of government are to be seen as enemies of the state and will be imprisoned as such.
-Those citizens born with exceptional strand sight are to be trained in long seer tower to be trained to fill their future role as long seers.

Societal
-It is expected that short strands will not stray from the short strand and business districts.
-It is expected that long strands will remain in the long strand districts.
-Due to both educational restrictions imposed by law and their own lack of foresight into their futures it is a societal expectation that short strands will grow up to fill lower working class jobs.
-Long strands are generally expected to fill upper class and high government roles due to their good foresight into their own potential futures and their own ability to choose the best possible path for their lives based upon this foresight.

--

3. Blank Space

The current blank spaces of this world are most of the areas outside of the city limits. They are populated cities and suburbs under this same governmental regime, but the area of interest is this primary city of Delphi, NC since this is where the government and religious center exist. Much of what happens in Long Seer Tower and the Seat of Government is not made open to the general public making this a blank space for the average citizen.

City Rules:
This is by no means an exhaustive list of rules. The city council is more than happy to promote clean public city living by disseminating this '12 commandments' for the common good:

1. Compulsory Congeniality:
There are no strangers in this city, any claim to ignorance will not be tolerated.

2. Complete transparency:
Inhabitants of the city will carry their identifier devices at all times, measures
that disrupt immediate and constant flow of that information are punishable.

3. Customizable standard attire:
Citizens are encouraged to choose from a selected assortment (6 main brands) of highly fashionable
items of clothing manufactured for comfort and maximum transparency.

4. Efficient work:
A happy citizen is a working one! Citizens will maintain a steady income-generating
job. If the fail to secure one the city will provide them with one of many standardized
professions to keep them happily assimilated. Unemployment is a crime!

5. Relations:
No Citizen of this great prosperous city is allowed to live alone. Single people who fail to find a partner
of either sexes will be appointed one based on their profile and preferences declared.

1. Circulation -
The higher up you are in the building the more open your field of view is. The lowe floors, street/sea level are quite dark with tall visual boundaries and a definite sense of constriction, in the top floors, however there is access to open views and more a sense of freedom

Entrance to the islands is highly regulated by tolls. The tolls are meant to be prohibitively expensive for those who don’t ‘belong’ there – the idea taken from the $50 toll bridge to Burj Alarab hotel in Dubai. Those who work in the islands are encouraged to live onsite rather than commute. Their lives are rather like the crews of a cruise ship. Their entrances and exits to the building are different from those of the Residents and Guests. The lowest floor of the building, known as the docks is where residents keep their boats, though those in the penthouse are increasingly using the roof heliport as an exit.

As I’ve mentioned, the main artery of a vertically oriented space is the elevator. The elevators go directly from the docks to the top floor then drop off the other residents on the way down. Service elevators keep staff separate from Residents and Guests.

2. Laws

National Laws:
• The 28th Amendment – defines marriage as a bond between a biological XY Male and a biological XX Female
• The 29th Amendment – life begins at conception of egg and sperm
• Tax cuts for Motherhood

Local Laws
• You must pay $60 to enter the Islands
• You must separate trash into compostable and recyclable items
• Non-compostable or recyclable items are prohibited from sale
• Tax on imported, and non-sustainable food

Social Code
• Don’t take the elevator if you’re on floors 1 – 10
• You need to make at least a million dollars a year to live in the top five floors
• Don’t engage in a relationship (sexual, business, platonic, or romantic) without establishing clear roles and boundaries first


3. Blank Space
The lower floors are a blank space for the Residents on the top floors. Similarly, the top floors are a blank space for the bottom dwellers that don’t have clear reason to venture up. The rest of the country (red states, fly over country) is a blank space. The average city resident knows more about Morocco than Minnesota.

FOCAL POINT
1st person POV of character – parallels his experience
Free – navigating through normal world
Fixed – viewer controls get frozen when
man gets trapped by confusion
examining a note – leads into a cinematic memory
zooming in from a telescope in the world



EXITS
Internally
- Confusion triggered
- Humming calms confusion
Externally
- Rocking chair – place from which man calms himself

(rocking chair POV)
PATHS
Respects topography for normal perspective
Lack of ability to freely navigate through world once confusion sets in

Detours
Barriers to movement – lack of viewer control or jumbled controls
Caused by confusion & overlapping memories

RULES OF THE WORLD
Dictated by the severity of influence that dementia wields on the man’s perspective
The external world morphs to reflect the changes in his mind

1. Legibility - Text becomes unreadable/ blurry as character can't comprehend it

2. Solidity - Ground morphs from solid to dissolving/breaking up

3. Z plane Depth - Normal, Hyper, & flat
Normal = "reality", normal healthy perception
Hyper = signals transition to confusion, immersion in hyper memory
Flat = claustrophobic confusion, blankness, recorded static image

4. Spatial Relationships - Normal, inverted, distorted
Normal = "reality"
Inverted = transition - signals overlay of memory with present
Distorted = confusion

5. Dialogue - Talking to himself, utterances
Signals that the man is trying to remember or make sense of something
Lucid vs. nonsensical

6. Dialogue - Replaying Memories of Conversations
Normal
Jumbled/Distorted
Far-away

7. Phonograph Music
Close perspective/Loud – present, normal perspective
Becoming farther away/softer – distance from memory
Jumbled – distant from normal perspective
Humming tune – trying to regain normal perspective

8. Clock Sound Speed
Slow - calm
Fast - agitated
Jumbled - confused
Reminders of what he is looking for

9. Clock Sound Perspective
Close – reminds him what he’s looking for
Far – distant from original objective

10. Appearance of the Cat
Sound or image - represents a threshold into confusion or clarity

11. Time lapse/Time Passing
Lighting/Time of Day - Length of a Day
Grass/Ice spreading - A month
Summer to Winter - Seasons
Houses morphing – Years

12. Notes/Photos
Further inspection triggers memories

13. External Perspective
Morphs/brakes rules as mind gets distorted
3D becomes 2D, planes break video plane
Pseudo Stereo (maybe)

14. Humming
Challenges the dissolution of the world
Helps the man pacify the confusion & return to reality
Calms his mood

BLANK SPACE
Literal
Black video – man’s mind is lost, dark
Foggy w/ Ghost Imagery – trying to return to reality
Sensory
Quiet/blank/nonsensical – confusion
Loss of Viewer Control
Parallels man’s inability to affect/comprehend his world

It was mentioned at this weekend's 5D Conference that Architecture, of all art and design disciplines, has always been the farthest ahead of the curve. It be because of the nature of architecture, it might be because the scope and scale of architecture projects, or building a building, are so large that architects have to think so far ahead in order for the work to still feel modern by the time it's built. The point was made as a matter-of-fact, and after seeing these examples it's hard to disagree.

Evan Douglis
Design and the Elastic Mind, MOMA
Greg Lynn, New City

WEEK 7 Assignments

Thank you for posting your Atlas Table of Contents and schedules. Please add:

1. CIRCULATION STUDY depicting:
a) P.O.V. Native/Inhabitant & Visiter/Viewer
Fixed Focal Point vs. free range of vision
Perimeter / Boundaries
Actual vs. Apparent (Berming)
Sense of freedom/expanse vs. constriction

b) Entrances / Exits
External & Internal
Explicit & Implicit

c) Paths
fixed vs improvised paths
“as the crow flies” vs. respecting topography & habitual routes
detours due to:
barriers
events
overlapping paths / intersections


2. LAWS / RULES / AUTHORITY
State (at least) a dozen rules in your world.
What is their origin?
Who has authority (and how is it conferred? Transferred?)
How are rules challenged?
How judges challenges to the law?
What are the penalties for transgression?

3. BLANK SPACE
What are the blank spaces (literal, physical, sensorial, societal) in your world?

3-4 students will distribute their Atlas-in-progess to the entire class on the Sunday preceding their presentation. The entire class is responsible to read each treatment for in-depth critique. Prepare to lead a tour + discussion of your world with the aim of eliciting meaningful feedback. This is a substantial draft.

Week 10: Oct 29 Workshop I: Worlds 1-3
Distribute materials Sunday Oct 26
Ian Dallas
Amanda Tasse
Brandi Wilcox

Week 11: Nov 5 Workshop II: Worlds 4-6
Distribute materials Sunday November 2nd
Ala’ Diab
Nahil Sharkasi
Peter Van Dyke
Bryan Jaycox

Week 12: Nov 12 Workshop III: Worlds 7-9
Distribute Materials Sunday November 9th
Lulu Cao
Taiyoung Ryu
Cynthia Nie

Flatworld is at a remote location from ICT (but nearby); the address is
5318 McConnell Ave., 90066
Google Map Directions from USC to ICT
OR
Marina Del Rey Shuttle from USC Campus
Service from 8:00AM to 5:00PM, Monday-Friday
Pick up at Watt & Downey, Drop off at ICT and ISI
Schedule

Depart USC
8:00 AM
9:30 AM
11:00 AM
1:15 PM
2:45 PM
4:15 PM

Depart MDR
8:45 AM
10:15 AM
11:45 AM
2:00 PM
3:30 PM
5:00 PM

Here is a breakdown of the things that I’m planning to work on and (at least in part) complete by the 26th. There are about six things here, and I would consider the completion of 4-5 to be a success.

Wiki: The wiki portion of this project should be complete at least in part by late October, and will be broken up in to several parts.

1. A brainstorm to help shore up the series of events characterized by Disconcerted.
2. First, a layout of what I’m going to be creating, and map of the articles
3. Fill in the media and write the articles.
4. Hyperlink in and out of wikipedia to create the sense that this actually happened, and allows wikipedia to fill in the gaps of the world.

Visual Media: a series of photographs documenting some of the things that have happened (these may or may not be included as a part of the wiki as visuals)

5. Photographs
6. Possibly Video and Art (paintings, drawings), depending on time.


Visual Style: The visual style that I’m trending towards right now is in the vein of Jeff Wall, who is a contemporary photographer. His style is very vivid, with a significant emphasis on capturing a stylistic and staged moment in time. Here are some of his photographs to give you an idea of what I’m talking about.

These are all interconnected tasks which I'm planning on completing in roughly the order listed, with a goal of finishing all of them by October 26th.

Write a description of art needed for the game
To find collaborators for the game it'll help if I can clearly delineate the work that needs to be done. I'm particularly interested in finding a 2D animator for the cutscenes and a 3D creature creator to model the garden's inhabitants.

Prototype a water ripple effect
I'd like to create simple black and white ripples when players throw things in the water (sort of like this). This will also give me a nice, relatively easy project to test out the new physics engine wrapper I'll be using.

First pass on a prose story
I have a pretty good idea now of the major scenes I want to include, but I don't quite know how they're all going to fit together. Working on a linear version of the experience will help me focus on that sort of connective tissue, and in making sure that it fits with my broader goals of creating a fairytale-like world.

Detailed level descriptions
Once I have a solid idea of what scenes I want and how they'll flow together I'll need to come up with more detailed descriptions suitable for implementation. This will include a list of art and sound assets, non-player-character behaviors, and any enhancements required to the game's engine to support the design goals of the scene.

Playable (and testable) first level
Since the game is based on an earlier project, from a technology standpoint it's more or less playable now. But since I haven't designed any of the final environments (or know how they'll connect with each other) it doesn't yet *feel* like the game I want to make. The goal of the first playable level will be to have something I can give to playtesters that will enable me to gauge player response to a more exploratory, less goal-oriented play experience. At a practical level, I'm interested in finding out how often they stop to smell the roses and which ones they smell.

Some of the art I'm using as reference include:



The surreal 1954 Japanese ghost story Ugetsu is my primary visual reference for this project.



In terms of the environment design, I'm basing it a lot of it on Japanese gardens and, to a lesser extent, English gardens as well.



The simplicity of the 19th century painter Hokusai has also been inspirational.



And I've been trolling flickr for random images that capture some of the moods I have in mind for the game.

Schedule:

Oct 1 - Oct 8
-Finish Defining visual style.
-Define the aesthetics of space design for an entity whose potentialities can be seen.
---ie. Open spaces so you can see where your potentialities are travelling.
---ie. Spaces for quiet resting where you can see yourself without your potentialities.
-Produce initial concepts for building designs.
-Finalize the map.
-Start fleshing out storylines for the text in the politics and history sections.

Oct 8 - Oct 15
-Model and create images for the key buildings/locations in Maya and Photoshop.
-Finish writing storylines for the politics and history sections.

Oct 15 - Oct 22
-Layout the atlas physical structure (linking strands between pages, transparencies, etc.) and graphic layout of the individual pages.
-Write up philosophical ideas and physics of plurality sections.
-Create images to accompany each of the sections of the atlas.

Oct 22 - Oct 26
-Wrap up any final loose ends and finish the atlas.

--

Visual Style:

-I would like to keep the look and feel of much of the world consistent with present day urban landscapes, not a huge deviation with flying cars and shiny chrome like many sci-fi depictions. It is people in the urban setting of today, but with the newfound ability to see their potentials for action.

-I am imagining the visual look of individuals with their potentialities spread out ahead of them looking like a transparent rotoscoping of their movements spread out ahead of them, much like ("http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1411/570698178_03c5dbfaee.jpg?v=0"), or like an exagerrated motion blur of sorts ("http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d65/minus243degreesc/shiftingreality.jpg").

-Places of closely overlapping realities like the nuke site of New Geneva I imagine looking somewhat like a ghosted overlay of the real world, much like ("http://www.screenhead.com/funny/LarsenLarsenLarsenLarsen4444.JPG")

-The Long Strand areas would be typically newer architecture, designed around the aesthetics of individuals who are entities extended through time. This would include design around large open areas allowing the long strands to see their potentialities far into the distance ahead of them, like ("http://www.thyssenkrupp.com/ml/pb/bilder/699/07_quartier_atrium_headquarter_large.jpg"), and ("http://uk.cbs.dk/var/cbs/storage/images-versioned/32288/2-dan-DK/kilen_atrium1.jpg"). Other aspects would be construction using transparent glass walls and doors also to facilitate seeing your strand far into the future such as ("http://www.arcat.com/photos/kwikwall/113046.jpg"), and designing space to allow for orderly flow of traffic so your view of your strand is not lost among the crowd.

-The short strand areas are much different due to their low class status. Buildings are old, badly maintained and neglected like modern day ghettos ("http://www.stillsecureafteralltheseyears.com/photos/uncategorized/ghetto.jpg"). This area is walled off from the long strand districts along much of their border ("http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/85/Berlin-wall.jpg") and movement is highly restricted.

These are roughly the areas I want to try and cover for the atlas, regardless of whether they will make it to the final cut or not (since I brushed over them in my last submission):

Atlas Index
Fashion:
Explore dress codes related to transparency and opacity:
Case studies of dress in both private and public societies and how they portray the body

Conceptions of privacy in an ever growing public life: or what if there are no secrets?

Physical attributes of the public city:
Maps
Elevations of buildings
Terrain
Rituals:
inversing the public space (closed = good)
how do people weed strangers out? or maybe welcome them?
what are the barriers to entry for non inhabitants

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------->>

Here's my non-interim schedule for developing the world:

1. Week 1 of development (1 – 7 Oct):
a. Lock down visual style
b. Design world artifacts: mainly fashion and architecture (transparency and opacity)

2. Week 2 of development (8 – 14 Oct):
a. Work on the narrative part of the world:
i. Social code
ii. Peoples peculiar dilemma of not having private lives
b. Do some research for the theoretical underlying structure

3. Week 3 of development (15 – 21 Oct):
a. Begin layout of ideas (still not sure whether a magazine is going to be feasible)

4. Final week (22 – 26 Oct):
a. Crunch time! Which means putting all the atlas requirement together in a way that best conveys the main concept.

Visual Style:
Initially I was thinking about making the illustrations in a hand drawn style but right now I'm leaning slightly towards collage. will need to experiment with the different visual approaches.

Plan for Presentation

* Design of UI for the interactive map

The process of designing UI of the interactive map includes defining interactive functions and categorizing the contents of the map. UI of the map is designed with Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop and Flash.


* Building of contents

Every content is created in 3D environment with Maya then uploaded on the interactive map. The contents are shown on the map by various forms such as animations, pictures.

- Geographical map
This map is on the highest layer of all contents. All contents are linked to this map. So, from this map visitors can explore specific areas and see other aspects of the world like the political map. This map is created with Maya and Flash.

- Advertisements
The advertisements are shown during the loading time for contents. Format of these advertisements is 2D image or simple 2D animation. The visual style of them is similar to 50s advertisements.

- 3D maps
There are two 3D maps in this interactive map. These maps are modeled and animated with Maya. When visitors select a particular place on the world map, they can see the animated 3D map.

- Political map
Political map shows the relationship between countries or continents and the military information of each continent visually. They are created on 3D environment and, of which animations are made with Flash.



Schedule

~ 10/07/2008
- Making the layout of the interactive map.
- Modeling of the world map

~ 10/14/2008
- Modeling of the first 3D map
- Making the political map

~10/21/2008
- Modeling of the second 3D map
- Making advertisements

~ 11/04/2008
- Animating the first 3D map
- Making advertisements

~ 11/11/2008
- Animating the second 3D map
- Integration of all elements

~11/18/2008
- Iterations



Visual Style

Basically, almost all element of the atlas are modeled and animated in the 3D environment. But, all living things are described as their silhouette. Regarding the visual style, the main artistic concept of this interactive map is retrospect to the era of the cold war. To realize the concept, simplified cartoon shading and black and white color palette are used.

Extraterrestrial Extradition

Schedule:

    While I would like to make the actual game, I need to be realistic in my goals. If I manage to do it anyway, then hurray, but let’s not put it on paper as I don’t want to be held accountable :^)

    The main thing that I would like to do is the actual ‘atlas’, the welcome-packet to the space-station. This is because it is necessary for the flash-game so making it first is not wasted effort if I go on to make the game.

    The ‘atlas’ can be divided into several key parts and these will be my tasks to complete for the workshops. While I would like to make up a easily-deciphered language for this, I will not include it as one of the tasks as I am not sure I can pull it off. It will be an aside, something to add later should I become happy with a mock-language. Until then, english will be used if text is necessary.

    Oct 1st to Oct 26th is ~ 3.5 weeks, so I will make 4 main tasks (again with the assumption that if I have time, to do more).

    Oct 8: Description of aliens(inc. appearance, behavior, rough culture, etc)
        and their planets

    Oct 15: Art of aliens and their architecture (maybe the planets as well)
        If time, maybe the walk-cycles of the aliens

    Oct 22: How the station works, how the trial-system works,
        the accepted behavior on the station
        Art of the specific areas on the station (specifically at least the
        government offices (interior/exterior), and the court-room
        (interior/exterior))

    Oct 26: Art of the player’s room and how it can be modified
        Map of the station, with attention to the different alien areas
        Fix-ups/re-dos/added details to art from previous weeks
        A rough attempt at the language just to see if it will work or not
        Assembling it all into the welcome-packet, and adding the descriptive text
        (either in the english of my mock-language if it proves either unnecessary
        to understand the text [i.e., the pictures are descriptive enough] or it is
        easily deciphered [maybe two versions?])

I would like to get the flash app of exploring the station up with the art developed in these tasks even if I don’t make a ‘game’ from it.

Visual Style:

    I can’t decide whether to go cartoon-style or try to do something more realistic. My artistic abilities are a bit of a determining factor here. Then there is the fact this will all eventually go into flash. Now while flash can import any image type, it is better to draw in flash or at the very least using vector art so that it will scale nicely. Obviously a simple drawing style will be beneficial for this (and exponentially be good for animations). So simple is a requirement, with very simple shading.

    I like the cartoon-style then for its vibrant colors and its simple style. Here is a random sample blob-monster (forgive the baaad shading. I can’t figure out how to make nice shadows for blobs... I think this is a good reason to not have a blob alien) I quickly did in flash as a rough sample.

For this class, I’m going to experiment with researching how to make a scene interactive (really basic) and to try and get some of the elements to work, using draft models and cards in Maya. I’m going to keep it as simple as possible (probably just a nodal camera with tilt/rotate/maybe zoom on one backyard view.) What I hope to accomplish in the next month is:

SCHEDULE
10/1 – 10/7
- Research: how to make 1 backyard environment interactive
- Try a package such as Unity?
- 5D Conference
10/8 – 10/14
- Create list of what needs to be in environment
- Create pano sphere
10/15 – 10/21
- Rough layout -1 environment in Maya
10/22 – 10/18
- Test to see if any of the interactive stuff works

Rough style frames are included below, however, I'm assuming I'll have to not use photos and make pretty rudimentary models in order for any of this to work in real time. Am experimenting with structure instead of style here.

The overall plan is to have a "News" style website with 5 section pages. On each there will be articles or advertising that link appropriately to other areas that model specific 'set pieces' of the world.

For example, on the main News page there will be an advertisement for the re-branding of the city and the development of new water-front property into self-sufficient, mixed use, residential/comercial spaces. The link from the banner add on the website will take you to either a 3D model or 'virtual tour' of the building and the model home.

Also, an "About Us" page will contain any addition documentation or research.

The Schedule:

Website containing the following pages, each with articles, news ticker, advertising and polls
• News
• Health
• Money
• Lifestyle
• Classified

Models of
• The Building
• Model Unit/The Penthouse
• The Clinic
• The Dock

Oct 5 – All research complete, all articles found and All written content complete
• Fictionalized articles
• Characters
• Scripted interactions
• Descriptions of key set pieces
Oct 12 – Draft structure and layout of website Complete
Oct19 – Drafts of set pieces complete
• Draft 3D model of or “virtual tour” of building
• 2D Floorplan of key set pieces

Oct 26 – ATLAS DRAFT DUE


I really like the visual style of the recent redesign of Interview Magazine, so I would like to emulate that in the website/Atlas. I particularly like the use of black&white photos washed with these vivid swaths of color. Also the serif font gives it both a classical and modern feel. See Images, fonts and color palette below:

My plan is to work on the world zone by zone, as previously defined. Save for the mountainside, each zone will receive the same sort of visual/textual treatment, including (1) overhead "map", (2) landscape portrait / visual "impression", (3) visual sample of architecture, and (4) basic written overview / "encyclopedic entry" of the society/culture that lives there.

* The Bay / Bay City ... Oct 5th
* The Forest / Forest City ... Oct 18th
* Sky Stair / Stone City ... Oct 22nd
* Mountainside and full World Map ... Oct 26th

Since I consider myself to be a talentless artist, I fear I will struggle a great deal to produce the visuals necessary for this project. I'm eager to develop some skill in producing at least "mostly" original artwork, though, so maybe this is a good opportunity... if potentially a self-deprecating one. XP At any rate, here are my compiled art influences.

* "Lost Winds":http://interactive.usc.edu/members/cnie/2008/09/30/art-influence.jpg. This is the main influence. It's not completely stylized like some other games I admire, but has a whimsical and impossibly idyllic atmosphere that I would want for Paradigm.
* "Random image that I found, Wik and the Fable of Lost Souls":http://interactive.usc.edu/members/cnie/2008/09/30/art-influence-2.jpg. Was hunting around for other inspirations when I found these... the former is an overhead map of a location in the game Ocarina of Time, but it is NOT part of the game's artwork and I'm not entirely sure who drew it. It's the map's art style that interests me, not the original game. Wik is an indie game whose demo I tried out on Steam a while back that has a mild fantasy touch to it.
* "Myst journal entries":http://interactive.usc.edu/members/cnie/2008/09/30/art-influence-3.jpg. I always liked the art of the journals in Myst, supposedly done by Atrus or various other characters. They feel so genuine and schematic. This is something I would consider using for the architecture sample pieces, as the "precision" nature of the drawings encourages thought into how the people's daily lifestyles are affected by their living spaces and vice versa.

This looks interesting. They're breaking out the maps. Unfolded

1. Look at your ATLAS Table of Contents/Format and consider what portion of your world you will be able to successfully build/present this semester. Brainstorm concrete production tasks to complete this semester. Choose 4-5 tasks/models/areas to complete by the workshops later this semester. (Remember that the workshops are sessions for you to present a rough but cohesive "draft" for evaluation and feedback allowing you to iterate by the end of this semester.) Schedule yourself to complete them in rough draft form by, worst case, October 26th (if you are in the first group, subsequent Sundays for subsequent groups). We will assign a presentation schedule for the workshops next week. Note that these tasks are self-defined and in addition to any class exercises or tasks I might assign related to your worlds. This is not an ephemeral assignment; post a concrete list with dates.

2, Start thinking about the visual look and feel of your world. If you have already chosen a style or genre, begin to sketch in it. If you are experimenting with visual style, begin by combing through printed or digital media and making a collage out of collected snippets representing color/texture/style, etc. Post a visual representation of your collection/sketches.

3. Next week we will be discussing games and game space. Please read the following articles, and submit any other postings or thoughts you’d like to contribute to the group before the discussion.

Art of Contested Spaces by Kurt Squire Henry Jenkins

Imaging Gameplay - The Design and Construction of Spatial Worlds by Bernadette Flynn


Also:
Torus and Klein Bottle Games.

And He Built a Crooked House by Heinlein on SCIFI.com

Gosh Nahil I wish I read your post before I made this!

That's ok, I'm sure we'll end up with different products at the end, right?

Anyway, here's what I cooked up:


My P/U/V Experience Goals:
Since my experience skirts the areas of reality and alternative history, I would like the viewer to make visible how collectively held notions of public vs. private policies can shape a human experience not unlike their own.

To that end, an emphasis on the taxonomy of both the public and private definition containers will be built from the outset, setting a tone for the experience. This will be achieved through extensive use of diagrams that sanction different human ‘zones’ very similar to the way city planners communicate urban notions like building use, infrastructure at the macro level down to the nitty-gritty details of how the sidewalk meets the street. This lexicon/manual will explain for example why breathing down people’s necks in subways is sometimes encouraged!

I’m also interested in the role of media in painting a certain level of cohesion in a world regardless of whether it’s espoused with what it represents, so I’d like to explore a publication idea from that world in conjunction with the manual.

My Atlas:
As I explained earlier, my atlas or as I like to call it the ‘portal’ to my world will be through two kinds of publications that customarily exist in public space: a magazine and an instruction manual. Through the mix of two types of reality/behavior shaping tools I will try to capture a sense of the world.

As with any magazine I will have to think about the various sections and the type of content that will be put into them akin to a real-world. Here’s a non-exhaustive list of sections:

- Metro: the hot spots and what to do in them (an interesting use of a map)
- Fashionista: kinda explains itself
- Health: mainly reproductive but also virology
- Politics and worldview: when it pertains to the politics of hiding and revealing.

Some Assets:
1. The fashion section in the magazine is crucial! So, I have to do some research on what to wear when you’re out in public having your private life being exposed!
2. I also would like to think about how living in a city with no secrets affects and gossip section.
3. What the rule book or manual has to say about personal space in case of a viral infection for example or when the city is in short supply of infants.

I found this cover for a book of etiquette from the 19th century. Would be nice to review the content.

I want to make a game that feels like a kids' book.

A few of the most significant features of kids' books I'm drawing inspiration from include:

* They're short. This makes every word feel important since we know the story will be over soon. It also makes them easily accessible (even for busy adults).

* They have a steady, rhythmical pacing. The ratio of words to pictures tends to be constant from page to page, and the act of turning the pages themselves limits the speed at which the book can be read. We're encouraged (or forced) to take our time. Each page follows a predictable pattern: scan the image, read the text, look closer at the image, turn the page and repeat.

* The conclusion has a strong sense of finality -- even if nothing within the story has actually been resolved, we know the adventure is definitely over. For example Alice's awakening from her dream.

* They're designed for repeat reading. In fact, *many* repeat readings. The stories remain interesting even when we already know what's going to happen in them.

* Characters tend to have clear desires. They often want something tangible and are verbally explicit about it. No one spends time wondering WHY they want to chase the white rabbit.

* There are frequent, massive changes. Often as a result of very small actions. A wish will turn a kingdom upside down overnight. Alice becomes a giant after eating a piece of cake. They create huge reversals of fortunes (eg going from predator to prey) and have a very striking visual component (eg a mountain turns into gold).

* Scenes are visually quite distinct. On subsequent pages we may move from the desert, to the ocean, to a city. We can get a pretty accurate sense of the story by simply scanning the pictures.

* Forces are powerful but ill-defined. We have no way of knowing what a creature like "the Spirit who lived in the mountain" is capable of, just that they're clearly a heck of a lot stronger than we are. Obviously this mirrors a child's relationship to the world at large.


For my game, this translates into several concrete goals:

* Being short, with a clear sense of progress.

* Being interesting and easy. Forward progress should always be available and death should be (almost) impossible.

* Having huge changes in landscape, creatures, mechanics and player objectives. The bigger the differences, the better. Scenes should stand on their own, like pages.

* Having an authorial voice in the opening and closing cutscenes that provides a dash of the omniscient narrator so common to these sorts of stories.


The world will be realized as a digital game titled "The Unfinished Swan" using some of the same painting mechanics I developed for WhiteSpace, a game I made last semester. In addition to first-person gameplay there will be 2D animation at the beginning and end that bookend the game to enhance the storybook feel and provide for visual differentiation between the Garden of Unfinished Things and the more mundane world outside it.

In addition to the game itself I'll be creating an illustrated story book designed for young readers that touches on some of the same themes and events presented in the game. The book will be developed in tandem with the game. My hope is that having to constantly remediate ideas from the game back into the structure of a children's book will give the game itself a more bookish feel.

The unhurried pacing of the book will also provide a way to explore character motivations and backstory about the world that wouldn't fit as comfortably within the more frenetic, goal-oriented format of the game. Which is not to imply that the book will be a long one. Far from it. One of the key stylistic elements of the authors who've inspired me (like Edward Gorey) is their extreme brevity. Having to distill complicated player interactions from the game down into one or two sentences and a picture should be helpful in figuring out what aspects of the experience to highlight within the game.

Player Experience Goals:

My primary goal is to give the player a unique experience of what it is to know all of your possibilities for action before you act. It will be interesting to see if this results in a percieved loss of free will or agency. I would like to provoke players to respond to their predefined paths in the game either by embracing the paths and following their virtual fate, or trying to rebel against their predefined paths simply to exert some sense of free will. Will having their actions predefined for them give them a sense of ease in knowing what their future holds or a feeling of being caged by the predefined possibilities of their action. My overall goal for the player would be to provoke questions in them as to the extents of our own freedom for action in the real world, such as whether our paths through life are as predefined as those paths that are made visible in plurality. I would also intend for the user to question topics of social inequality, and the importance of free choice based upon the disequalities that are exagerrated in this society.

What will it take to accomplish this?
Creating a novel experience in foreknowledge of their own events can be accomplished easily simply through immersion in a world in which your possible actions are already known. This occurs in Plurality by the existence of the spacetime worms of players' potentialities. Discourse about the topics of social inequality and free will will hopefully be accomplished through the "short string" vs "long string" disequality in the world, and the idea that the "long string" foreknowledge of their own actions negates and is seen as superior to free will.

How will I evaluate my success?
If players interact with their known potentialities in playful ways such as rebelling against the potentialities they see on screen, or following a potentiality down a hazardous path just because it is their "fate" I would evaluate my primary goal as successful. If they are intrigued by the storyline and relate some of the concepts to real world problems this would be satisfactory for my secondary goals.


Atlas:

Form

The atlas will take the form of a tree of branching decisions. Just as there are interconnected spacetime strings between parallel worlds in plurality, there are also strings that interconnect between the pages of the atlas. These strings show both interconnections between the topics covered in the atlas, as well as showing interconnected branching decisions that occured in the world, such as the connection between the undestoryed New Geneva, and the crater of New Geneva. These strings also map the reader's choice potentialities in a way. Just as a human in the world of Plurality can see all of their potential choices, the atlas reader can also see their potential paths from the table of contents through the contents of the atlas laid out before them.


Table of Contents

-Philosophical Ideas
---Determinism vs Free Will
---Multiple Worlds Theory
-Physics of Plurality
---Potentiality Spacetime Worms and seeing into the future
---Planetary Locations of strong inter potentiality connection
-Politics
---Long & Short Strand Law
---Governmental Appointment
---The Seers Word
---Relay Stations
-History
---The Emergence
---Vision of a Better Tommorow
---The Rise of the Seat of Governance
---The Seers
---The Construction of the Relay Station Infrastructure
---The Tragedy of New Geneva
---Short Strand Apartheid for the Greater Social Good
---Current Social Tension and Civil Disobedience
---The Reemergence of No Strands
-Map
---Overarching map
---Key Locations with 3D depictions
-----Seat of Governance
-----Long Seer Tower
-----Short Strand Light Confinement
-----Prison
-----Nuke Site of New Geneva

Assets to produce:

Artwork for depicting how a person would see their own spacetime worm potentialities.
Enumerated laws of segregation that short strands must follow.
Fleshed out storylines for the history of Plurality.
Map of the world.
3D mockups for key buildings in the world.

Atlas Structure Mockup:







(Click Images for Fullsize)

World of Apocalypse

1. Player Experience Goals

The main intention of this world is to communicate anti-war message to visitors.
In this world, visitors will realize miserable results of the global nuclear wars through various tragic scenes such as devastated lands, mutated humans and societies.
Another way of communicating this idea is paradox. In contrast to the tragic environmental setting of this world, the social and politic situations express paradox which is addressed in sarcastic ways.


2. Form

My atlas is a virtual map of the world. It is an interactive kiosk and world map placed at the lobby of the main UN headquarters in 2030. This shows numerous scenes of the world through 3D models and animations. Users can explore various areas in the world through Virtual Tour. Also, this map broadcasts current events in the world and simulates the military and social situations through interactive methods.


3. Table of Contents

* Maps
By the global nuclear wars a few years ago, the world was entirely destroyed. There are various local maps in the atlas which show geographical changes of the world. All maps have multiple layers containing various interesting information

* Pictures
Pictures made with 3D rendering tools like Maya help express the world vividly.

* Culture
The global wars brought about significant changes in culture. Surviving people are intensely compete with each other for limited sources of food. People of countries hardly influenced by the global nuclear wars are brutally ruling refugees from disappeared countries. This fact raise many issues related to culture and politics. Almost all people are mutated by radioactive contamination. In this world, unmutated people are suffering harsh discrimination from mutated people. In my atlas, visitors can appreciate the cultural changes watching various commercials including TV ads and interactive ads made with animation tools.

* Politics
My atlas deals with changes in global politics as well as changes in culture. Lots of technologies were destroyed in the world. So, people have a lot of problems with food supply and medical condition. However, ironically, many countries excessively invest their all money in researching more powerful nuclear weapons to dominate the world. This power game is visually and interactively simulated in my atlas.

* Ecology
The global nuclear wars crucially influenced the ecology of the earth. Lots of organisms has extinguished. Some animals changed their habitats. Also, some animals were mutated or are in progress of horrible mutation. My atlas show the ecology with multi-layered maps and 3D models.

* Religions
In this world, people worship two things: cockroaches, nuclear weapons. To the people in the world, cockroaches mean immortality and nuclear weapon is a kind of absolute beings.

The experience goals of inhabitants of my world are pretty simple: they just live their life in and around events that consciously and unconsciously make them uncomfortable. Denial, ignorance and just complete apathy are the characteristics that allow them to do this, but not everyone simply ignores what is going on around them. It would be really interesting if this only happened for a period of days, like 7 days of disconcerted (I like that).

The overall end result of a Disconcerted event or in the Disconcerted world would be a general feeling of "That was weird, but I can't figure out why." Questions that people ask themselves, like "What's going on?" "Didn't I hear that already?" "When did that happen?" "Why is it so uncomfortable in here?" are the kinds of things I want people to be asking themselves, but only to the point where they're thinking it and not necessarily to the point where they're talking about it with other people while at the event. After the even is fine. If people are uncomfortable but can't put their fingers on why, then I have succeeded.

The atlas is a little different. I've thought a lot about how I want to start digging into providing insight into this world, and I've decided that I don't want to just rely on experiments. I would like to create a fiction around the world, and have that fiction be integrated into the presentation of the Atlas. Something along the lines of a memoir of someone who was paying attention when certain weird things started happening all over his town/city/area, and things just didn't seem right for a while. Maybe as a diary or a series of diaries.

Another idea is to have it be the memoir of the disconcerter, although I find it a little more interesting to be disconcerted than disconcerting. Another is to have a hyperlinked website that would have short stories and some related art and definitions to go along with it, and music or ambient noise. Maybe a wiki or something like that, but for this world. I'm really not sure how I want to go about presenting this concept, and even a live demonstration isn't entirely out of the picture - I should be pretty good at making people uncomfortable by the end of the semester.

One thing I'm worried about is that taking this concept interactive would make it very easy to tread back and forth on the line between afraid and uncomfortable.

The last idea I've been kicking around for the Atlas would be something along the lines of a case study of experiments and concepts (working and not working). This would include information and records of events of which disconcerted was a part. I'm not too hot on that one though.

Assets:
Book/Website/(wiki?)
- Fiction
- Events
- Soft/hard linking for the website
- some music (but I could find that pretty easily)

For the table of contents, if I were going to do a wiki:
- History
- Events
- People
- Reporting (events with a bias)
- Little easter eggs, internal references and definitions that would be linked to

Extraterrestrial Extradition

Player Experience Goals:
My goals for the player is to have a sense of wonderment about alien societies and the possibilities of alien life. I don’t know if I can pull that off though :^) As long as they start thinking about aliens as something beyond blue-skinned humans (or worse... ST:ToS Klingons... gawd, what were they thinking?), I’ll be happy. I’d also like the player to have curiosity about the world and a desire to learn about it. The story will hopefully help them along in this regard, but I want the design to also instill this.

How will I evaluate my success? If the player actually plays the game, that’s a success because they are interested. If they finish, then I held their interest that long. And if they take the time to investigate the entire world, or at least parts of it, beyond the needs of the story/end-goal, then it would be a rousing success.

Definition of the Atlas:
I hope to make a nice alien galactic standard language and then write the Atlas in this language. I actually thought of this before I heard of the Codex Seraphinianus, but I shall cite it as a successful conveyance of information despite a language gap. However I hope to make a language that can be deciphered easily, especially given the in-game guidance. But I don’t want the Atlas to be completely useless until then.

I’d present the Atlas as a welcome packet to the space station. Seeing as it is targeted to someone who doesn’t know the language and is new to the station, this fits my target audience nicely :^). So it will have to be very graphic and iconic with simple use of their language in order to convey the information. And including maps makes sense as well.

Table of Contents:
I’ll admit this will grow as I figure more stuff out, but this will definitely be there. The order may change as well, as I can’t figure out if the station maps should be in an appendix or be one of the first things presented to the player.

i. Official welcome
ii. Explanation of what the station is and the governing body
I. Conveyance of the laws and behavior the player should respect on the station
II. Explanation of the Trial Process (and an overview of the jail for those found guilty and the choice of returning home or staying if found innocent)
III. A description of the player’s room and how to customize it
IV. Explanation of how to use the base facilities (bathroom, elevator, food, etc)
V. Explanation of the language teacher and how to find it and how to use it (see Appendix C for a visual dictionary of the written language)

Appendix A: Maps of the Station (and description of the symbology used to describe the districts/areas)
Appendix B: Space Maps (maps of the Solar system and other systems (inc. ours))
Appendix C: Visual dictionary of the written language
Appendix D: Overview of the Species (and maybe their planets) on the station


Asset List:
In-depth maps of the station
A map of the station’s solar system and its relation to Earth
Profiles of the different aliens that are present on the station
A picture of each of the alien species home planets
Possibly a profile of said worlds (physically as well as the cultures of the planet)
A study of the different architecture of the different species (at least as represented on the station)
A study of the technology of the station, specifically with things the player will interact with
A description of the alien U.N.-ish assembly, their codes/laws/etc - how they function
And a set of ‘miss manners’-type behavior standards
A in-depth review of the trial process and why the things are the way they are
A walkthrough of the “quick-path” to the end-game
Figuring out what obstacles and puzzles to have
Figuring out a simple written language as well as non-visual version
Figuring out how to teach said language in-game

There is much more than that, that’s all I can think of for right now.

The goal is to allow the player to experience being a sort of god or puppetmaster for a short period of time. The main ability that the player has is travelling to the Paradigm's parallel world (the "mask world") and seeing every Paradigm citizen's personality in the form of a mask on their face. Time stands still entirely whenever the player enters this world and s/he has the ability to take one character's mask and exchange it with someone else's. By doing so, the player can directly modify the behavior of the game characters. The player may also take a character's mask and destroy it, which will result in the death of the character it belonged to.

The player must change the masks of characters around to explore and progress through the land of Paradigm. In addition to puzzles that must be solved, the player may also meet characters that he likes or dislikes and choose to exchange masks based on those reasons instead. Ideally puzzles may be solved in multiple ways, so the player's choice on which solution to use would theoretically reflect some of the player's inner morality.

The final caveat is the game's ending. The player must recognize that he is a completely unique being in Paradigm, with his exclusive ability to change other characters' masks. Eventually he will realize that he has his own mask that appears to be impossible to destroy. However, the mask is not immune to being traded away. When the player finds a character in the game whose plight seems impossible to solve through any regular swapping methods, he may choose to sacrifice his god mask to the character and "die", effectively ending the game.

It is implied that this is how the player himself came to be in the first place, as the mask could only have been passed down to him by the previous god. Thus the story has travelled full circle.

I'd like for the player to ideally be reflective about the judgements he is making about what characters will succeed and which ones will be thwarted. I want the player to be able to act to satisfy their sense of justice or compassion. All of this would depend on having a cast of characters that are realistic and intriguing and fully developed, so that the player can come to know and care for them. This means that the environment itself does not need to be very elaborate, only enough to provide a backdrop that the player can relate to, but not be completely distracted by.

Ideally I'd like to do an interactive Atlas of some sort, possibly in Flash. This would include a full world map that can be browsed/navigated, allowing you to zoom in on landmarks (i.e. villages) and see general concept art impressions of previously mentioned zones, along with encyclopedic entries on the local society and culture.

CTIN 532

First, Assignment #5 --

1) Experience Goals:
To have viewers face the pressing moral and ethical questions of our age. Viewers will explore emotionally provocative situations and environments, where they can project themselves into the ‘decision makers’s’ position.

An ensemble narrative will be embedded in the 'world' environment. The relationships between the various inhabitants of one high rise building will express and enact the moral dilemmas we’re dealing with.

Viewers will assume a “fly on the wall” voyeuristic position, with the ability to witness scenes between characters happening in the environment, as well as explore the environment itself and discover more about the world and the characters.

2) Atlas/Table of Contents

The Atlas to this world will be in the mode of a website for a tabloid newspaper (a la New York Post) with articles, art, and advertisements. Sections as follows:

I. Persistent news ticker
II. NEWS, Local
a. Crime
b. Renewable Energy
c. Biometric ids
d. Terrorism & Security
e. Rich get Richer
III. NEWS, foreign
a. Includes the rest of the country + other
b. President Sarah Palin
c. Hurricanes, tornados, floods, and fires
d. Poor Get Poorer
IV. BUSINESS
a. Privatization of necessary public infrastructure (hospitals, schools, roads, parks, etc…)
b. Government intervention of Big Business
V. HEALTH
a. Technologies that cause cancer & other problems
b. Fertility rates
c. GM Food
VI. LIFESTYLE
a. Pets: the new babies
b. Local: the new import
c. Single: the new married
VII. OPINION
a. Blogs from residents of the building
VIII. SPORTS
a. Cheetah Legs
b. Doping
c. Selective genetics for athletes
IX. CLASSIFIED
a. Seeking donor sperm/eggs
b. Seeking partners
X. ENTERTAINMENT
a. Sex, sex, sex
b. Gladiator’s Arena: Dr. Phil, Springer, Montel, etc…
c. Violence, snuff
XI. ADVERTISING
a. Pharmaceuticals – Antidepressants, Viagra
b. Sex Commerce
c. New New York re-branding campaign puts a positive spin on Climate change and

Assets to produce:
Map of the island/islands
Elevation scheme
3D Model highlighting set pieces where principle character interaction will take place
Characters (settings and moral conflicts for each)
Content for the news site/atlas


3) Other Observations --

Speaking of maps, I love this image of "How Americans See The World"



It might seem trite, but check out this TED video of Alisa Miller visually illustrating how much information Americans get about the rest of the world through the news media. Disappointing but informative...

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/alisa_miller_shares_the_news_about_the_news.html

What is the Interactive Component in the design?
An Animation Installation:
- A full-size re-creation of the corner of the attic from the film with cards pinned on the wall and scattered on a table &/or tucked away in shelves viewers can look through
- The digital animation is viewed through a life-size stereoscopic telescope or binoculars (examining close-up or internal things instead of far-away places). I might try to make a version that a viewer can explore in real-time

Intention For the Viewer:
Evoke empathy
Inspire curiosity

Process & Mark of Success:
A basic narrative structure is set up at the beginning to introduce the viewer to the character’s world. In this animation installation, the viewer can then browse physical documents - artifacts from the character’s life - as they examine his backyard environment digitally, through a telescope or binoculars. Success will be evaluated by the amount of time, ease, and attention that users devote to exploring the world. Additionally, it is important that viewers understand the basic overriding concept of the piece – a subjective portrayal of memory loss associated with aging.

Atlas:
PHYSICAL ARTIFACTS:
Cards pinned on a wall (possibly on a map) & stacked on a table or in drawers

EXPERIENCE:
Rummaging through someone’s mind as its parameters change

TABLE OF CONTENTS of CARDS:
Information & facts associated with dementia, memory loss, brain functions
Maps of External locations character has lived with dates on them – a key
Map of Internal Thoughts/ Knowledge Storage
- Drawings of the world – sketches character may have made with notations
- Lists that the character has made – memories, shopping lists, etc.
- Photos - strings attaching certain photos and documents to one-another
Physics – Traditional to surreal world
- Teleporting, ground rumbling & cracking, house breaking apart, characters appear flat &
- ghost-like, spatial relationships change
Time – Occurrence of a memory signaled by a surreal change in the environment
Stories – Simple dialogue interaction, talking to oneself, writing, drawing

ASSETS TO BE PRODUCED:
- Found Objects: Telescope or Binoculars, old photographic equipment
- Model of Installation: Digital or Physical
- Photos: Aged – Of landscape locations, stills or snapshots from the film
- Cards: Handwritten lists, Maps, Poems, Phrases, Sketches of places, Diary pages
- Digital 3D mock-up of environment with viewer navigation enabled

Click for big.

This is a little map of a space in which disconcerted is actually going to take place in a couple of weeks - I figured this would be a really good way to give an impression of what I'm thinking about in this project.

The concept works like this: users participating in Disconcerted do not know that they are participating. The information about the show is not related, and the events that take place are music/art events with no mention whatsoever of disconcerted. This is important for the setup, because Disconcerted is designed to make participants uncomfortable without their knowledge.

The space would be open for people to leave at any time, and the only thing separating it from the rest of the world is the door through which attendees enter. Any barriers to exit would have to be staged, with a pretense so that people do not know that they're being made to stay.

To the map: There are two types of objects on the map besides the layout: mics and speakers. The premise of this concept is to record conversations as they are happening and play them back several minutes afterwards from a different place in the room, just below ambient noise level.

There are several points of congregation that I mapped out based on the times I've been to the Unknown, specifically next to the bar, on the couches, and in the back areas of the stadium seating. The mics are placed to record localized conversation in the center of areas of congregation (or near to the centers). The speakers are placed to provide a relatively even ability to play back sounds of any kind - crickets or insects are another idea for this layout.

Conversations could be recorded at one place and played back from a different place to subtly confuse participants, or they could be played back in nearly the same place. Both would likely have a similar effect.

I think this is a pretty good example of what Disconcerted tries to be - for the world of disconcerted I'm thinking that the direction is going to be taking this world and having disconcerting events occurring over a period of time, unknown to its inhabitants.

The Project for Public Spaces site has information on William H. Whyte as well as newletters and projects related to observing the urban environment. I recommend looking at their Placemaker Profiles.

Christopher Alexander is an esteemed Placemaker/Designer - you are encouraged to look at his site and works: Pattern Language.

A project commissioned by Southern Exposure:

The San Francisco Emotion Map is the culmination of Christian Nold’s five-week residency and participatory art project that involved a total of 98 participants exploring San Francisco’s Mission District neighborhood using the Bio Mapping device he invented. During his residency at Southern Exposure, Christian Nold worked in the organization’s Mission Street storefront gallery encouraging visitors to stop by and use the devices during the weekdays and on Saturdays when he conducted intensive workshops. The project invited the public to go for a walk using the device, which records the wearer’s physiological response to their surroundings. The results of these walks are represented on this map using colored dots and participant’s personal annotations. The San Francisco Emotion Map is a collective attempt at creating an emotional portrait of a neighborhood and envisions new tools that allow people to share and interpret their own bio data. The map can be downloaded here.

(DUE, POSTED, BEFORE CLASS 9/24)
1) Define Player Experience Goals
You’ve explored your motivation as designer/creator of the world, now you must consider your intention for your visitor.
State your goals for visitor experience:
What insights, questions, issues, feelings do you intend to evoke/provoke?
What will it take to accomplish this? How will you evaluate your success?

2) Define your Atlas:
Your ATLAS is both our guide to your world, as well as a design document. It differs from a user manual in that we might be privy to design decisions not available to the visitor. It is an overview, and should include imagery (both 2D and 3D) digital and physical models as well as text.

Form
You are encouraged, but not required, to design your atlas as an artifact from your world. How will you present your collection of design documents and maps as a coherent whole?

Table of Contents
Here are some categories from today’s brainstorm that may apply to your design/world:
Maps: Where is it
Directions: How do I get there
Pictures: What does it look like
Dioramas: What does it feel like to be there
Physics: How do things move, work?
Ecology: What lives there?
Economy: What do they do?, How do they survive?
Language: how do they communicate
Arts: How do they express themselves
War: How do they settle conflicts?
Faith/Religion/Superstitions: What do they believe?
Libraries/Books: How do they store knowledge?
Stories/Science: How do they explain their world?

Begin to list the assets you will produce over the semester to render the world visible and accessible. You will use this list to schedule yourself for the remainder of the semester.

3) Notebook/Observations
Continue to be an active observer of your environment and make notes to your journal. The word for this week is CIRCULATION, notice circulation patterns in public space, within buildings, as well as your private movements referenced to the articles and discussions of this week.

Ala' found this in response to last week's mapping exercise; an eye opener for Ground Pounders...

Overview

This world describes a world just after apocalyptic global nuclear wars in the near future.


Background Story

By the global nuclear wars a few years ago, the world was entirely destroyed. A number of countries disappeared on the earth as the sea level went up. Also, the continent of America and the continent of Oceania were totally devastated.


Map



* The world is divided into two worlds: Destroyed, Undestroyed.
* Undestroyed world is divided into 5 areas based on geographical factors.
* People cannot enter the destroyed world because of high radiation or other environmental reasons like tsunami.
* Destroyed world can be reclaimed depending on efforts of people.
* Population and the number of nuclear weapons are important factors establishing relationships between the areas.


""If you need more information, download a PPT document below""
Download file

"Plurality"

(See earlier post for high concept of this world.)


Overview:

There are two traits in people:
1) The ability to see the potentialities of things and other people.
2) The projection of their own potentialities for action into the future.

Long Strands and Short Strands - If someone has a projection of their potential actions that stretches far into the future they are referred to as a "long strand", if their projection stretches only a short distance into the future they are referred to as "short strands". This ability to see further into your potential futures and make a decision based upon these visible outcomes are somewhat of a social advantage, and so the "long strands" typically rise to positions of power while the "short strands" are viewed with a stigma of being unpredictable and short sighted in their actions. This has created an extreme class division throughout the society which is reflected in the districts of the city. The unpredictibility of extremely short strand individuals has even caused them to be classified as a danger to society as the inability to see their strands creates a problem for law enforcement officials.

Governmental Power - Those blessed with both long sight and "long strands" typically rise to governmental positions as their ability to see far into the outcomes of other's actions and able to see the long term outcomes of their own actions give them insight into the best courses of action for the general public.

Seers - Those blessed with particularly long sight but not necessarily long strands gain the title of "seer" and act as advisors to those in governmental positions.

Relay Stations - Particular areas of the world are also more strongly attuned to specific alternate world potentialities. These locations are used as contact points for finding out how different the world could have been if certain global events had not occured. These areas are linked by relay stations to the "Long Seer Tower" to both amplify the seers' potential range of vision, and allow them to analyze the course of historical events that led to the current state of the world.


Major Zones:
Seat of Governance - The residence of the top governmental figures.

Long Seer Tower - Residence of the seers. The central hub for all the relay stations that connect to attuned locations of alternate world potentialities.

Short Strand Light Confinement - Walled district for those deemed hazardous to society due to the fact that they are extremely short strand individuals, thus unpredictable and difficult to regulate. They can leave the walled district but need governmental papers stating their reasons for transit between districts.

Prison - Reserved for true criminals, located within the walled Short Strand Light Confinement District.

Nuke site of New Geneva - When the ability to sense potentialities started emerging in people, the city of New Geneva was founded with the hopes that this ability to see the outcomes of potential actions would lead to an era of peace as all catastrophes could be predicted and prevented. The city was founded on one of the relay sites with what was thought to be the strongest connection to an alternate world. However, even with great knowledge of future events not all catastrophes can be prevented, this nuclear wasteland is a testament to the shattered utopia that this city once represented. Many people still flock to the remains of New Geneva as its strong connection to the alternate world allows them to (in a way) contact their loved ones who died in the tragedy by contacting their alternate selves in this parallel world.


Boundaries and Access:

There are very few strict boundaries at street level, just those of a standard urban sprawl; however, access is regulated to certain areas by social norms. For instance, it would be odd to see a short strand stray from the short strand district, and he/she would most likely get hassled and questioned if found wandering around in the long strand business or governmental district.

Access to the Long Seer Tower and the Seat of Governance are restricted access only areas as are the relay stations for strong locations of potentiality connection.

The short strand light confinement is a walled in area whose residents need an official governmental clearance to get get privileges to stray outside the wall.

Within the light confinement wall is the prison whose residents have no access privileges to the rest of the city.





(Click Image for Fullsize)

The Vertical Axis




As the global warming persists, and ice caps melt, and water levels rise around the world, scientists project the shape of our borders and coastlines will shift dramatically. A favorite anecdote I’ve heard is that water levels will rise in lower Manhattan, burying the site where the World Trade Center stood. I found this image of Manhattan underwater and was struck at how serene and alluring it was. I’ve decided to incorporate this idea into my world.

Water levels have risen, perhaps not as much as in the photo, but enough to make descending from the high rises to sea level prohibitive, or at least a major hassle. Interestingly enough the water hasn’t made Manhattan any less desirable, in fact people are excited about having more water-front property, and less traffic noise. The mayor has launched a world wide media campaign painting the city as Venice for the 21st century, the center of art, business and science. Tourism campaigns pit the new Manhattan against the world, palm, and script islands of the Arabian Gulf, not failing to mention that the ‘new islands of Manhattan’ were created naturally, unlike those garish islands in the Emirates (The city locked in a heated rivalry with Dubai).

As the city is now surrounded by even more water, ‘outsiders’ have to use bridges or boats to get in. The cost of crossing is pretty high, and set specifically to prohibit those who can’t afford it from entering.

Now that the streets have turned to canals, people tend to stay in their buildings. “Work” is a state of mind in the new Manhattan, it is ubiquitous, not a place that needs to be traveled to. Everyone telecommutes, and therefore is pretty much working all the time. High Rises have become increasingly mixed purposed (business, residential, entertainment) to accommodate. This is reflected in present day architecture and city planning – from mixed use complexes like “The Americana at Brand” and McMansions with home offices, home gyms, bowling alleys, movie theaters, etc....





The higher up, the more prestigious, the more expensive. Rooftops are social spaces, the top floors are residential, the middle floors are commercial, and the lower floors are utility, storage, and housing for service workers.

Because of the new vertical orientation of society, elevators have been reprogrammed to jet straight to the top floors first, then drop everyone else off on the way down. This way the top floor-dwellers who pay the highest rent have the shortest commute, and people who live on the lower floors will be prohibited from taking the elevator because of the long wait.

**ps Movable Type isn't letting me upload another file. I'll post the map in the morning.

I haven’t really thought about the map as much as envisaging a look for the world so things are loosely knit together so far. My ‘city’ is laid over an informal grid, there are official paths that people take through the city, but there are also bypass roads that people have built to circumvent the public eye.

The city is shrouded in fog so although it’s known to exist, yet it is invisible to its seekers. Its inhabitants are born into a classist society where only the privileged few have the luxury of a personal space. I still need to study a little bit the social dynamic in such a city given the general rule that even within an intensely public living, the 12 feet personal space needs to be observed.

The image below is larger than it seems. To view it real size, right click and save.

"Paradigm from space":http://interactive.usc.edu/members/cnie/2008/09/17/view-from-space.jpg.

h3. External Boundaries

Paradigm is an isolated "island" in the vast expanses of space. It orbits a sun like ours and likewise has one small moon, but citizens of Paradigm are not yet sophisticated enough to observe and form theories of astronomy.

The player will not experience any of this and is simply placed in the game world, likely on the border of a village, with no explanation of the world whatsoever, nor a prologue. The player would ideally have full agency from here, allowed to explore at will and interact with the inhabitants.

h3. Zones

* The Forest
** [Forest City]: a village situated in the heart of the forest.
* The Bay
** [Bay City]: a fishing village situated on a series of small islands that stretches into the bay.
* The Sky Stair: also called the "edge of the world". Though technically speaking, the edge of the world exists all around, this is a particular cliff that sticks out and over the edge of the world.
** [Stone City]: a village whose buildings are etched into the Sky Stair.
* The Great Mountain: the other "half" of the world is one large mountain, though there is a system of tunnels within it. The altitude at the top of the mountain is high and cold enough that it is permanently snowy.

h3. Barriers

Generally, passage between all areas of the world is fairly open, but there will be some instances in which the player may find him/herself blocked from continuing in a particular direction. They'll be required to solve a puzzle in order to continue on their way.

In villages, access is even more restricted, as not all people will just leave their doors unlocked for strangers to enter through. Again, the player will need to puzzle out the proper method for entering certain buildings and may temporarily lose access to one place in the process of gaining access to another.

Or not, I haven't totally decided!

The Great Mountain is not really considered forbidden, but it is relatively uninhabited, as the cold climate makes it somewhat inhospitable to life.

This is a continuation from my last post about Mr. World. Just more in depth and paying particular attention to the boundaries. There is even more awesome sketches!

External Boundaries
Well, the world is a space station in - get this - outer space! Okay, okay. Specifics, right? Going off of my idea from last week, I think a living ship is cool. Buuuut - I’m not sold on it. A hollow moon, or a real moon, or just a standard space station - it doesn’t really matter at this point I suppose. Actually it does matter, as if it was on a moon it is conceivable that the player could go outside.

For the purpose of the world (to play with Alien Culture/Architecture), having it on a moon is pointless. And we don’t want to build a huge place either, we want it contained and manageable. So ignore that odd diversion! It is definitely a space station, in space, surrounded by a whole-lot-of-pretty-nothing (aka, the “space background”).

But what would create artificial gravity if the station is alive? Hmm... have to think about that. We can always claim it creates a high magnetic field, which can attract water dipoles to fake gravity. That sounds plausible doesn’t it? Or we can just take the sissy-route and say it can make gravitons for some unknown reason.

So what separates it from the “outside”? The walls of the station. Cell walls if it is a living station :^)

What territory did the PC have to traverse to arrive there? A vast distance of space, quickly traveled with the aide of awesome alien FTL drives. Or a cryo-chamber. But we are definitely not in our solar system. Or a worm-hole. No cryo-chamber - that will imply that a lot of time has been lost and the ‘benevolent’ alien society wouldn’t punish a person before their trial.

Internal Boundaries
Here are some very, very rough maps. I took a stab at the levels of the station, although this may be serious restricted in an attempt to not go crazy with locations. The residential level is also sketched out due to its importance with ‘creating architecture/living conditions for specific aliens’.

All the things I have on me or with me are actually more defined by the society rather than me and shared within same categories by many people in the world.

----------------------------------------------------On me-------------------------------------------------

Jeans and T-shirts are the most common clothes that people wear if they can afford one. They are plain, simple, durable, casual and comfortable enough. However, if the most common wear are not jeans and T-shirts, or if we are in the 19th century's Scottish Highlands for example, I guess what people wear maybe quite different. So are the jeans and t-shirts created by me or I just have the equal (and luxe) chance to choose from the whole world clothes and I pick them? No... they are defined by this time and this society.

I wear a pair of shoes that seems too warm to the weather because of the air conditioner. Thanks to that the whole world can share something together—global warming. That also indicates how America is rich in energy. I would really feel strange if I enter a public building here without air conditioners, although I already got used to no air conditioner back home. This situation of our society decreases my toleration of temperature, and it tends to make "most" people "most comfortable" (that's why I wear warm shoes). When I was doing my summer intern, I wrote to the environment department of that company, saying that it is really a waste to have air conditioners open 24 hours and 7 days a week. Because at night time, no more than 30 people are in 6 or 7 3-floor buildings. So my suggestion was if they could add at least 1 degree at night time then may could change many things. But no reply I received. Anyway, if I have choice or we have class outside, I'd rather wear another pair of...summer shoes.

The two things on me that may be a little bit different from other people are the glasses and my jade bracelet. I know many people wear glasses, but not everyone so I used the word different. Well I have to say if we don't have written languages or if every word is twice the time of it is now, I may get rid of my glasses. Back to the basic, the reason I have to wear my glasses also have something about the educational situation in my country, due to the large number of population and the limited educational resources. In a word, I really want to throw away my glasses, if this is a different world.

The jade bracelet is a gift from my Dad before I came here, because in Chinese culture it means safe and healthy. That makes the bracelet not only an ornamentation,but stands for Dad’s love. And also it is some kind of cultural symbol. At last, just by coincident, the Chinese Character of my given name "Lu" means jade in Chinese.

So these are almost all the things on me. Like I said, they could be totally different from what they are now due to a different society.

----------------------------------------------------With me-------------------------------------------------


What in my backpack and wallet, are almost the same with most people. In the wallet there are some cards including credit & banking cards, student card, driver's license, some member cards, some cash and coins. It is basically the same with most people around me even people are far away, the only difference is the language on the cards and the heads on the cash. Ancestors created and rulers developed these systems for us, and we follow and keep on developing them. From just cash to less cash more cards to all cards to maybe no cards or cash at all (fingerprints goes for everything?), it is just a part of our social system and really not controlled by us.

In my backpack, I have an assignment planner which is like a calendar book with me. The old statement comes again: it would be different if we have different time system. One of my experience leaded me to some thought about our time system and how it affects people. Once in college we had normal 2 days weekends. Because of some emergency happened, the school just extended the weekend to a week in temporary. All the things changed suddenly. People played video games all night because they did not need to get up early the next day. Much time was wasted because suddenly everyone seems is rich of time. 2 days were spent like 1 day. That really made me begin to think about our time system. If we use a different time system, 36 hours a day or 10 hours a day, what kind of effect will be on people, both physically and psychologically? Will that also have some effect on the other things of the world?

Books, pens, notebooks, laptops... these are all school things. Again, if we go to a forest school, maybe we need some other stuff... Here is the thing, people may won't believe some stupid forest school or some countries or land they don't know, since you can't Google them! It seems nowadays that if you can not Google something, that thing does not exist. Yes, Google is a huge part of our social life now. Can you image life without it?

All the things with me. All the things are created for this specific society and time.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If you read till here you must be tired of hearing me saying"this is defined by the society", so I will not say it again as conclusion.

(retconned! I totally, TOTALLY, _TOTALLY_ changed my mind. only thing that's still the same is the idea of dual worlds. ahahaha.)

h3. Name it

* Name: Paradigm
* Media: Game / Interactive Narrative
* Genre: Fantasy
* Brief: Two parallel worlds, one "real" world and one "mask" world. The "real" world is entirely normal, but in the mask world, all the inhabitants are wearing masks that hint at some aspect of their personality or behavior. Modifying what mask a person is wearing in the "mask" world will alter the "real" world version's actions.

h3. Place it

An isolated land with a modest collection of villages and idyllic landscapes. Located on a roughly diamond-shaped planet floating in space that's much smaller than Earth, though by virtue of this being a fantasy world, the force of gravity is approximately the same as what we are used to.

h3. Define your audience

Single player game, either first or third person. The player takes the role of an unknown character that is unlike any of the other inhabitants, in that s/he is able to pass into the mask world and see the regular inhabitants' masks.

h3. Motivation

Lately I've been unusually interested in masks and their seemingly self-contradictory quality of hiding the truth while also hinting at it. This world started out as a game idea for "Intermediate Game Workshop", but has since been discarded, but since I am still intrigued by the prospect, I am salvaging it for 532. Key concepts being addressed: truth, identity, mystery, playing God, "sandbox" gaming... probably a few others.

"Plurality"

1) Name it:
Plurality is a sci-fi game that embodies the multiple worlds theory. Plurality is a world in which the potentialities of everything causal that can occur is visible. The potential paths a person or object may take are present with that person/object in the real world in the form of transparent spacetime worms. The further away the potential reality becomes from the path chosen in the current reality the more transparent the potential becomes until it eventually fades away completely. The ability to see these spacetime worms effectively reveals people's short-term future and past.

2) Place it:
There are no additional spatial boundaries in this world that do not exist in our own world. There are the extents of the world and other natural and man-made terrain that cannot be traversed. Temporally you are able to see your spacetime worms only a few minutes into the future and past. This is a temporal distance that varies by how close these potential selves are to your causal branch.

3) Define your audience:
This will be designed as a solitary first-person experience. In a way it is also a third-person experience as you are viewing yourself in the spacetime worm potentialities. The viewer's agency will be one in which their paths through the world are already decided for them to an extent by the spacetime worms sprawling out ahead of them as all of their potential possibilities for choice

4) Motivation:
My motivation for this world is to create an experience in which the future is a known quantity to a limited extent. This also introduces the possibility for interesting discussion of the philosophical themes of fatalism and free will.

Doesn't that title just explain everything? No? Well, this is in response to http://interactive.usc.edu/members/peggy/archives/009258.html.

Title: Extraterrestrial Extradition (working title)

Brief Desc: The player is brought to an alien space station (akin to the UN) to be brought up on unknown (because the player doesn't understand the language) charges. Under their laws, the player can not be tried until they know the standard language they use - but the player can’t find out why they were brought there or how to get home without learning the language. I like that the player should (hopefully) want to learn the simple language in order to learn about the environment and the story but this also puts them closer to Judgment Day.

Broad Intention: To make the player question the evil Hollywood preconceptions of aliens. And to make as alien a world as possible while incorporating a simple alien language to learn.

Genre: Sci-Fi/Fantasy Exploratory/Adventure (there is a story to follow, but nothing stops the player from just wandering the station and exploring the space)

Media: Game (Flash probably)

External Boundaries: The game is limited by the physical boundaries of the space station.

What is outside these boundaries: Inky blankness of space. A vacuum. Maybe a planet, but that would be unnecessary.

Audience: A player. A singular player, unique and lovable.

POV: 3rd person. 1st person is hard to make seem right (generally a 1st person POV player char has no hands or feet. Telepathy rocks) and they also make it harder to empathize with the character.

Agency: This hasn’t been well thought out yet. Obviously the player will have some agency to make changes to the environment, like decorating their room at least. Definitely, the player’s actions will determine whether they win or lose their trial - or even if they find out what they are on trial for. If there is time, they will be able to play the trial segment.

Intention for the Player: To have fun and play with what contact with aliens may be like.

Motivation: To build an alien world for someone to explore and learn about. And hopefully to have awe and interest about possible aliens, but let's not set our goals too high :^)




Here is a rough sketch of the external boundaries and what is outside it. I've decided to opt for the living ship and despite my lack of artistic ability, I think it turned out well. Mostly due to the art background I stole online from NASA (http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/spitzer/multimedia/pia09931.html).

The Unfinished Garden is a place for unfinished things and creatures.

Some of these were projects from our world that were abandoned (like the first page of a novel), and other inhabitants are things from the early days of the universe that the creator decided *should* never be finished.

The garden exists apart from our world, but occasional entrances can be found if you look hard enough in places no one in their right might would ever be likely to go.

It's being designed as the backdrop for a single player game intended for a general audience. The experience will focus on exploration and the discovery of wonderful things.

Name: The City of We (WIP)

Description: a city with no privacy, people born into a collective mind constantly broadcasting, constantly receiving thought that is crowding any mental room for personality.

Intention: subversion of the rules and perimeters of the urban experience in relation the public/private duality of space.

Genre: Sci-fi

Media: architectural study

Place: the city world is placed in the realm of everyday urban landscape. I’d say that the city is surrounded by natural barriers to entry, but also but dress code and culture. Buildings in this city have no opaque barriers; there’s visual continuity to the private space, but an infraction of the public space. Inhabitants of this city are fully covered head to toe with fabric that allows only minimal visual connection with the world. It’s also attire that obscures body features (trans-gender).

Audience: the experience I’m going for is first-person and should be presented using architectural isometric techniques that give hints for the third dimension without any hints of scale. Also, transparency is emphasized using the overlap that is achieved by this. I see this initially as a book format where I can play with cutting out parts of pages to hide and reveal parts of street scenes or home scenes. I also might include a traversable virtual space if need be.

Motivation: I’m interested in how clothing codifies behavior. At the same time, I see buildings as forms of collective clothing. I also would like to explore space through textual constructs in the vein of the memory palaces of Greek poets. So my hope is to get the V/U/P to be curious about privacy and the public sphere through these lenses.

DUE BEFORE CLASS 9/17

1. BEGIN MAPPING YOUR WORLD (An extension of last week's part 2.)
Your map should define the space contextually.
External boundaries
What separates it from the "outside?"
What territory (abstract or literal) did the visitor have to traverse to arrive?
What barriers are there to exit?
Internal Boundaries
Sketch out major zones - begin to delineate districts for activities, needs, neighborhood, categories pertinent to your work.
Characterize the barriers between the (internal) zones: Are they easily accessible? Are there forbidden zones? Is access graduated (according to time, skill, knowledge?)
Mental Map
Don't restrict yourself to a literal, perfectly rendered map, but consider your visitor's mental map. Familiarize yourself with maps of distortion based on time, proximity, need.

2. Reading for next week:
In Certain Circles, Two Is a Crowd
by Stephanie Rosenbloom

Passengers May Now Pirouette To Gate 3
by Jesse Green

DUE TODAY!!!! September 10
Declare (POST) your world:
1. Name it.
Provide a brief description including
broad intention
genre (in the sense of literary genre: fantasy, sci-fi, history, biography, non-fiction...)
media (game, sculpture, installation, architectural analsysis, monument, interactive narrative etc)


2. Place it:
Describe (and sketch) the external boundaries.
Describe (annotate) its context, external and internal forces.
(What is outside those boundaries?) Where does your world reside?

3. Define your audience.
Are you designing for a solitary or group experience?
Are you offering a first, second or third person experience?
Begin to define the agency your reader/viewer/visitor will have in your world.
What do you intend for your visitor?

4. Motivation
Briefly, what is your motivation to create this world, to create this experience for your visitors?

World Building / Space Bibliography

As of today, you have declared your worlds and you are beginning building. You should be working actively on them, each week, regardless of whether or not you are slated for a presentation. This week you are mapping. Please start your notebook/sketchbook/wiki and/or blog thread to show your progress. Don't restrict your entries to class assignments (i.e. this week only mapping) but begin to collect observations, images, scraps, artifacts, information - anything pertinent to your world.

World Declaration for CTIN 532
"2010"

It seems that science and technology has advanced to a point beyond what our current social and moral frame work can deal with. We see the disintegration of the family, genetically and chemically corrupted materials surround us, and our destination-obsession with “the American Dream” leaves us perpetually unfulfilled.

The broad intention of this world is to envision existing technologies as the manifestation of a Sci-Fi dystopian future as described by Aldus Huxley, Marge Percy, Margaret Atwood, with particular emphasis on basic human needs and interactions – sex, love, family, motherhood. In other words, we’ve arrived at the future, now what? This interactive narrative will be a work of satire/social commentary meets Science Fiction/Fantasy in the vein of Johnathan Swift and the above mentioned authors.

The center of the “2010” world is the place many today view as the bonifide center of the world – Manhattan. This isolated island seems to function under it’s own rules that have developed by the nature of the people who live there. The “2010” Manhattan is a seat of wealth, power, and status. So many people have come to Manhattan to follow their dreams, that they’ve forced the cost of living to astronomical levels, forcing anyone earning below a six figure salary off the island. The result is a wealthy, but homogenous society, and increasing commercialization and privatization of public resources. The island is driven by money, greed, status.

Beyond the shores of the island of Manhattan lie a few other small islands, and the rest of the mainland USA. There is little regard for the inhabitants of these distant lands, referred pejoratively as Bridge and Tunnel people. The bridge and tunnel people still live by traditional rules, they have quaint manners, and subscribe to traditional familial and gender roles.

The island is oriented along three axis: North/South, East/West, and elevation. Where the North/South (Upper, Lower) and East/West were the primary axis delineating wealth and class in the 20th century, Elevation is the primary axis of status in 2010. The higher floor you live on, the better. You might over hear people saying things like “I don’t stop below floor 20 after dark.”

2010 will be a solitary experience designed to give viewers a space to reflect on and consider the underlying moral questions the 21st century world.

Please click this link below and download the presentation file.

Download file

World Drawings

1. Working Title: INSIDE – OUT
To simulate the confusing cycle of memory loss & dementia associated with aging, the viewer is taken on a journey through one man’s mind as it deteriorates, turning inside-out on itself. Memories, represented by images & sounds from places he has lived, become jumbled, distorted, and disappear as he struggles to keep hold of reality.

Genre: Magical Realism
Media (Animation installation)

2. Place it:
Pictorial Landscape. The viewer travels through time, rather than physical space, as 4 separate locations are represented as overlapping stacked layers within one main world. The varied layers are revealed through animated changes in transparency, peeling away, ripping, objects falling through which break the picture plane, z-plane object depth distortions, disappearing & cracking layers, & change of viewer perspective using a lens enabler (i.e. telescope).
Locations:
1) Interior attic (look-out tower) of a house
2) Backyards - acre of land with surrounding wrought iron fenced off perimeter boundary
- Illusionary space of background matte paintings beyond the fence
- Beyond that, black space, revealed to be a floating world
a. Ohio (summer) – grass, a few trees, river rock path
b. Ohio (winter)
c. South Carolina – Spanish Moss trees, beach grass, dunes, marsh
d. Arizona – arid, desert, scattered chaparral

3. Audience.
Adults
An individual personal experience - could be viewed in group format
Part 1 – 3rd person POV – cinematic narrative
Part 2 – 1st person POV – looks like interactive narrative
Part 3 - 3rd person POV and/or lack of POV (dark space)
Agency: Viewer defines & colors their experience of the man’s perception through selection & association of provided supplementary materials – chance juxtaposition of complementary hard elements (physical cards, notes, drawings) with the film

4. Motivation – Intended viewer experience
- To enjoy a physical stereoscopic spectacle
- To imagine what it must be like for one’s familiar external and internal world to become jumbled and fall apart
- To take the viewer on an emotional journey from familiarity to confusion to peace
- To inspire empathy

When I mentioned in class on Wednesday that I had a little bit of inspiration, I wasn't kidding. I was perusing the internet one day and I happened upon a really interesting blog called Strange Maps. On it, I stumbled upon this (click for big, ~1.4mb):



It's called the Carte de Tendre (in french). Sadly, after thinking about this more I think I'm going to go with a world called "Disconcerted" instead.

There's also a 7mb version of this map here if you want to print it out and put it on the side of a building.

Thank you for your Inventory Presentations. Please post some aspect of it, with attention to your conclusions/analysis. A few of the categories that came up today were:

CULTURALLY VALUED:
Efficiency & Convenience
Preparedness (also termed: "just in case-ness")
Mobility
Access / Enablers
Communication / Connection
Workaholism
Transhuman Extenders (Memory)
Education
Technology
Entertainment (Games, Music)
Health
Privacy
Multicultures

AXIS
Proximity : closely held vs remotely carried
Opacity/Transparency
Public/Private
Individuation / Uniformity

Please add and comment to this list and analysis with your posts.

When I emptied my pockets, I found exactly 90 items. 90 things, on me while I was in class. This prompted me to think about how we think about stuff in terms of what we need and what we don't need, and how we use containers to increase the number of things we can carry without appearing to be pack rats.

Storage Containers were the first thing I noticed: bags, flash drives, computers, purses, wallets - we all have these on us, usually at least two or three of them.

The second thing was Security items - items that represent something important, but we hold onto them so we don't lose everything when we lose them. Things like debit/credit cards, where if you lose the card you don't lose all the money in your account.

This led me to the concept of Enablers - credit cards, membership cards, tickets (ticket stubs), keys - things that allowed us to do other things or go places. I had a very large number of these things, and in fact they represented more than 20% of the total number of objects that I had on me.

Presentation available here for those who would like to see it. It's in a keynote wrapper, so I hope you have iWork.

Media Rich and Socially Insulated Urban Landscape

It seems the general theme of the items I carry with me indicate a society in which we immerse ourselves in technology to maintain our connection to the world, yet at the same time we isolate ourselves from the dense social setting we live in by staying disconnected from the sea of people we are constantly surrounded by in our actual physical space. We are trying to interact in a society of thousands when we are more suited to a tribal society of about twenty close knit individuals. As a result we deal with humans as mechanisms of society with whom we do transactions, but shut ourselves off from most of these people emotionally, only reserving friendship and relationships for a select few of the thousands we mingle with over the course of a day.

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The items I carried seemed to fulfill several purposes:

1) Transhumanism
-ie. cellphones & computers
-We are striving to reach beyond the physical constraints of our bodies to stay connected through our web of technology.
-Our technology is used as a means of connecting with others despite physical limitations.
-We are immersed in a sea of fellow human beings in this urban landscape but we screen out most of these interactions as mere ambience. The connections that truly matter to us are maintained through our computers and cellphones.

-ie. maps & schedules
-We need items to help us record physical and temporal spaces that we traverse that are larger than we can feasibly internalize.

--

2) Mechanisms for streamlining social interaction
-ie. cash, credit cards, id cards
-These items function as membranes we use to mechanize our interactions with other human beings so that we don't have to get to know people in order to benefit from them.
-It's a way of making humans function as cogs in the social machine
-ie. i give money to a cashier and he gives me goods, I don't need to know him from Adam, I just need a valid form of identification and currency that we both acknowledge as legitimate.
-We live in a society of thousands necessitated by the needs in our lives that these multitudes fulfill, but we don't want the investment needed to actually foster a friendship/relationship with these individuals in order to benefit from the goods they supply. As a result we use money and technology as intermediaries for transaction.
-These items ease social transaction while avoiding social investment. It allows you to transact with people without taking the time to get to know whether you can trust them to maintain their end of the trade.

--

3) Fear of others
-ie. Keys
-We are immersed in this sea of fellow humans, but there are too many out there for us to get to know and trust.
-Social disequality and high social density create an environment in which we fear theft and so we protect our goods with locks, necessitating keys.
-Our society is composed of public and private space our keys are our means of access.

--

4) Striving for individuality
-ie. keepsakes, ipod, clothing
-We live in a society where outward appearance is valued, ie. clothing.
-We want to distinguish ourselves from the masses, keep a sense of our own uniqueness in this sea of "others".
-We want icons of our own little island of personal contacts/friendships/family/relationships so that we can convince ourselves that we have a unique purpose and are not just another cog in a social machine.
-These items give us hope, love, and emotional anchors to put our own life and day to day struggles into context. We need these emotional attachments. Even if we insulate ourselves from these attachments with most members of society we still need a small pocket of close friends and relationships.

h3. Efficiency and Convenience

The society we live in clearly values efficiency and convenience: if we can do it faster and neater, then we should. Not only do we manufacture a great many items in rectangular shapes for quick and simple storage, we make use of a great many technologies that hasten the process of entering a premises or exchanging information. The number of “cards” one carries around seems almost absurd – my wallet had far more items in it than the rest of my bag combined.

From identification to “frequent buyer” cards to regular transportation passes to simple paper cards with contact information on them, you would think that these little items would be pretty easy to lose track of, but in fact people seem to stockpile them in their wallets and forget to clean old items out. Cards are definitely a standard way to compile information.

Also in this category is my car’s Smart Key, which is automatically detected by my car when in range and allows me to unlock the car door just by putting my hand on the handle. Another similar convenience item is the BART EZ Rider card, which can also be swiped without needing to remove it from the mini-wallet that I keep it in.

h3. Preparedness

Four different mediums for money (cash, credit cards, an ATM/bank card, and two paper checks) implies an extremely well developed economy where the exchange of cash for material goods has become both extremely complicated in its excessiveness and oversimplified in process. Depending on what one is looking to purchase, one method of payment may be more appropriate than another and some institutions have rules about accepting this but not that. For an individual to be carrying all variations of payment at the same time suggests a need to be prepared (or at least feel prepared) for any situation in which one may be required to “buy” themselves out of the crisis.

A freshly purchased blank notebook and palm sized moleskin, along with a variety of pencils and pens, have two associations. By keeping such items, we place value on information and – especially – the task of giving it a permanent form. At the same time, we demonstrate distrust of the functionality of our own human brains. We acknowledge that our memories are fallible and that we are not always able to remember all things we hear or see reliably and accurately, so we are more comfortable in writing/noting down the things that will be important to recall later.

h3. Communication

There is only one item that ends up falling into this category, but it implies a whole boatload of possibilities. My cell phone (which happens to also function as a pretty decent camera in brightly lit areas) contains a list of friends, family, and other contacts I deem important enough to merit storing their phone numbers. This single item suggests a dire need to be connected with other people, or at the very least a need for the ability to become connected to any of the people stored in the address book. Conversely, as the item is left on all the time and only turned silent during meetings (i.e. class time!), the cell phone indicates a willingness to be contacted by others, to be available to their queries and concerns.

I find it interesting that I actually make very little use of my cell phone, and yet I feel rather vulnerable without it. Just having the ability to contact others goes a long way in making me feel more secure. The fact that the cell phone has become an increasingly common item for everyone to carry around is telling of the sort of society we are becoming: increasingly dependent on nearly instant access to just about anyone.

My messenger bag also comes with a pocket especially for a cell phone, which is something that many bags are doing these days, making it easy to access when it needs to be answered.

h3. Workaholism

The laptop suggests that our society values technical proficiency and that we enjoy widespread technology that is relatively advanced and available to us at all times. The portability also implies that people value the ability to get work (and play) done anywhere and everywhere we might find ourselves. The power adapter suggests that it is not unusual, or that individuals are at least prepared, to spend extended hours away from wherever home is and will want to keep busy for the duration.

The iPod shuffle, another increasingly common technology item in society, can mean a number of possible things. One idea might be that people use music to avoid from feeling idle when walking or waiting. Another is the distaste for silence and requiring music to fill it in. Yet another theory is the desire to isolate oneself from unknown others: a stranger is much less likely to approach and make small talk with you if you are wearing those signature white ear buds. (Here’s a paradox in the making: we are tightening the bonds with those we consider friends while simultaneously increasing the gap with those we want no connection with.)

This is a visualization that encapsulates how I'm thinking about the objects in my immediate surroundings in relation to the world I inhabit and move through.

I tried to employ a system of color and proximity to the body to informationally display how these objects relate in terms of use and relation to interaction with the body.

No earth shattering realizations there except that I decided to add some terms to the ‘keywords-that-describe-inventory’.. well Inventory!

Some that I particularly like are Superstition and Relevance, a third favorite is Opacity.

Superstition: I hold a rock in my bag to bring me luck. It's also a memory holder; it's a ssociated with stories about being in a place where it got picked up and recontextualised in others it traveled to. It's an irrational object.

Relevance: since I'm split between two worlds I carry things that I inherit from engaging with them. Although, they're persitient objects with actual functions, they're irrelevant without their context. eg. keys, ID ...

Opacity: a black container such as a bag that holds objects of value fades into the background, invisible.

(For the full resolution, right click and save)

I uploaded the Power Point presentation file of my analysis. If you download the file, please click the button below.

Download file

Analysis of things I carry with me

for CTIN 532

• Appearance – 23 items of clothing, make up, accessories. 4 kinds of lipstick, gloss, balm, etc. 3 perfumes, 2 scented lotions. Might need to change or refresh appearance throughout the day. Indicates that society has standards and expectations for ornamentation and appearance.

• Just in case items – band-aids, shout wipes, pain killers, tampons, etc…. it’s necessary to carry things that there is only a slim likelihood that we’ll need or use. This indicates that there are certain minor dangers in our environment that might be harmful, and these items offer protection and remedy.

• Money – the wallet is full of club cards, items with little to no utility or purpose. They serve as a reminder of where to spend money. I also carry 5 different kinds of money (cash, credit, debit, etc..), as there are many opportunities to spend money, and each may accept only certain kinds of currency.

• Supplemental memory – laptop, iphone, USB drive, business cards, journal all store information that we might need to recall at any point in the day.

• Weather – glasses, sunglasses, cleaning kit, sweater. We need light protection from the elements. These items are more about comfort than about protection from danger, Although the sunglasses protect from harmful UVA/UVB rays.

• Sustenance – tea in travel mug, granola bar, gum. We are mobile creatures and carry food with us. There might not be places or opportunities to stop and eat.

• Variety – there are at least two of every kind of thing, signifying a glut of choices and things; also 2 kinds of id, 5+ kinds of money may signify a lack of security or confidence in our society. When we're asked to identify ourselves, we're often asked for 2 forms of id. We carry extras in anticipation that things might not work.

• Garbage – Almost every item, or daily transaction has a disposable element that generates waste – chewing gum, food wrappers, receipts, parking tickets, disposable containers, etc. There is an overwhelming amount of disposable waste in our daily lives. It’s only appropriate to dispose of these things in designated trash or recycling bins, which is not always convenient. Hence, this garbage ends up in my bag.

(This is a response to the CTIN 532 Inventory Homework assignment, http://interactive.usc.edu/members/peggy/archives/009175.html)

Seeing as this is a blog post, it is going to be more ‘bloggy’ than my actual presentation. First off, I think it is silly to assume you can get a complete picture of a society by the items one person carries on them. Even the items of Average Smoe is only a picture of the world of Average Smoe. I’ll agree that it gives you a picture of part of society, particularly (for us) a slice of the Electronically-Advantaged Graduate Student. We only had items with us that had to do with our daily lives at school. I mean, books and games are a big part of my culture and I had neither on me. And for the world, TV is a supreme beast of our (or at least America’s) culture and I doubt any of us had a portable TV on us. I don’t applaud the strong presence of TV, don’t get me wrong, but you can’t deny its sickly grip on everything.

Anyhoo, I’m getting off topic here. Plus making myself a wee-bit of a hypocrite (I like to watch *some* tv after all. And play games on it! Squee! TV, you’re my bestest friend, let us never fight again!)

First comment will be that I was surprised, when you itemize everything on oneself, how much more you carry in your pockets than your backpack. Although having small things like credit cards, more credit cards, individual keys, etc, count while not counting each individual sheet of paper in a notebook may not be a fair. But whatever :^) All I can say is the wallet is a wealth of items, as I am sure the happy thief is aware of.

And now onto the actual assignment.

I’m not sure how to talk about climate as clothes would be a good indicator of this but... with A/C it totally screws up your results. I would say, since I was wearing a t-shirt and jeans, that it was 70-80 degrees out (knowing my taste for clothing, I am not sure what another person could say about it. For example, I used to wear shorts in Massachusetts when there was four feet of snow outside. I was teased about it, but anyway, the point is that one would have assumed the temperature to be toasty and warm when in reality it wasn’t and I was just being a silly (and possibly lazy?) girl. Dang, this is a run on parenthetical statement of doom. To summarize: it is difficult to tell the overall climate from clothing without knowing a little bit about the person wearing it. This is why we do giant studies on thousands of people and don’t just look at one person as the overall average is generally fairly correct). Back to the point, with A/C (and heating) I can’t tell you anything about the real climate. It could have been below freezing or above melting outside but I’d be dressed for where I’d be spending the majority of my life - in climate controlled wonderfulness. Which is maybe the point. But there is no way to tell I was dressing for A/C and not the climate of the location just from the items I was carrying with me. So I feel I must say that my clothes tells me that the day the inventory was taken, I expected to spend my time in a moderate temperature and a dry climate (no umbrella, raincoat, etc, so rain was not expected - again, I either live in a dry place, had a weather forecast, or was spending my time indoors).

I do have some interesting, and true, observations from my belongings, although again, I stress that had I not known that the overall judgement from these belongings were generally accurate I would have to have my caveat that a single sample is not an accurate description of the whole group).

I had $2 bucks and 3 credit cards and a debit card in my wallet. I think this points to the culture I live in to be a fairly cashless one, and I’d have to agree. How often do we use cash for anything? Seems to me, we don’t if we can help it. I theorize that it is the natural evolution of our society in an attempt to not make us liars when we tell beggars we don’t have any cash on us. :^) In reality, this is more likely because physical money is loosing its worth, and a natural result of the transition from gold -> money representing the gold ‘in the bank’ -> money representing digital money ‘in the bank’ -> the digital money.

The cell phone is the most interesting ‘cultural-item’ I had with me. It gives us the ability to talk to anyone else out there in the world with a (working) phone, no matter where in the world they are - at any time. This is supreme access! The fact that I, and every other person (I think...) in the class has one just shows how prevalent a cellphone is in our society. Indirectly, it also speaks of our affluence as we can all afford the evil service fees. So, we’re all middle-class and above people, I’d say.

The computer is another thing we all had on us. If that doesn’t speak of affluence or horrible indebtedness, I don’t know what does. Anyway, the computer speaks volumes about accessibility of knowledge in our society. You, again, have to extrapolate beyond the mere ‘computer’ object and actually go in to its usage, but I think it is fair to consider the internet as a derivative of the computer. But you can also consider the past were only the wealthy and the priests could read and write, and now any of us could write a book! But back to the internet - anything we want to know, be it how to make chocolate dipped ants to how a nuclear reactor works, is at our fingertips (although I hope we take into consideration the source of such knowledge to gauge its validity).

The fact my backpack has a special pouch for the computer and a little strap to keep it tucked in and safe leads me to conclude that our society is so computer-centric that we make special considerations for it. By a company mass producing backpacks with such things means that computers are very prevalent in our society, as is our desire to keep them with us and keep them safe.

My bottled water (and lunch, although it was in the fridge, I still brought it with me to school) shows that we are a mobile people, going far away from a source of food and water and hence having to bring some with us. This of course disregards restaurants, cheap/forgetful people who skip lunch, and stuff like that. But if I were to look at the items themselves, this is a conclusion I would draw. I would also say that the fact I had to bring bottled water with me means I expected to find no source of drinkable water anywhere near me, so this would mean that clean water is probably an issue in our society. In truth, drinkable water should be a better term. Why does the fountain water taste soooo bad? Minerals in the source or chemicals they put in it to clean it. Either way, there is no source of drinkable water for me at ZML unless its in a packaged little bottle from some random town’s water reservoir.

We are also a society consumed with fear. Sure, anyone can say this, and it would still be true. But what items, dear public, do I possess to draw this conclusion from? I had no weapons on me (even my leatherman knife was in my closet), no mace or anything like that. What I had was a set of keys. Sure, I’ll admit it is perhaps exaggerating a tad, but we all lock our cars, lock our houses. We are afraid that we will be robbed in our absence (in fact, we generally lock these things even when we are in them, but I have no object that can point to this). We seek to protect that which is ours (hence my screen protector for my beloved mac and its hard cover case). Not that its bad - we’d never have a society that would be free of people breaking in and robbing stuff (note though that locked doors hardly deter a determined thief, but it does give us peace of mind and discourage the standard thieves to go find someone with an unlocked door). But look at how our technology is making better and better locks to safeguard us - my car key is backwards, a rectangle with a center part carved down to make it unique and un-duplicatable by standard means. My apartment key is electronic. No longer are standard keys (and their locks) what we depend on anymore.

Then there is my little CPR kit I’ve carried with me since High School. It contains gloves and a little rectangle to use when doing mouth-to-mouth so you don’t get any nasty germs when saving someone’s life. I mean, again, its good, there are diseases out there you can catch with blood and saliva contact. But I am so safety-conscious I have it with me. This also speaks of society as a whole - we are aware of diseases and we have lots of them. It also speaks on how connected we are as a people - diseases and illnesses that were constrained to one part of the world are now found anywhere. While before we only had to deal with stuff from our climate or whatever, we now have all (or at least many.... and we made some new ones ourselves to boot) the diseases and illness of the world (mad cow, avian flu, apparently still the Bubonic Plague, etc) to contend in.

And somehow my conclusion from looking at my inventory is that we live in a world that is actually really small, with the use of our technology in a mental sort of way with phones and computers, but also in a physical sense with planes and such (sadly, I didn’t have a plane ticket with me. I did have a receipt from a airport restaurant though, does that count?). It’s like we have made ourselves all squeeze into a two-bedroom apartment even though there are like 50 of us. Sure, I can find out what all of us have to say on what to have for dinner, but such close company makes me think you are all giving me diseases and are going to steal my crap the second I turn my back. And it actually does increase the chances of my getting sick exponentially (although I don’t take into consideration medicine, as in reality we live a lot longer now than a hundred or especially a thousand years ago, despite the increase of exposure to diseases). Yay!

Although I reiterate that looking at one day’s belongings for one person is never an accurate description of the society that the person lives in. And one must know something about the items and the society they belong to in order to draw any correct assumptions. Although with many samples you can draw some conclusions, but how 'correct' they are may never be determined (of a society you know nothing about).

Thank you for reading all this!

Declare (POST) your world:
1. Name it.
Provide a brief description including
broad intention
genre (in the sense of literary genre: fantasy, sci-fi, history, biography, non-fiction...)
media (game, sculpture, installation, architectural analsysis, monument, interactive narrative etc)


2. Place it:
Describe (and sketch) the external boundaries.
Describe (annotate) its context, external and internal forces.
(What is outside those boundaries?) Where does your world reside?

3. Define your audience.
Are you designing for a solitary or group experience?
Are you offering a first, second or third person experience?
Begin to define the agency your reader/viewer/visitor will have in your world.
What do you intend for your visitor?

4. Motivation
Briefly, what is your motivation to create this world, to create this experience for your visitors?

World Building / Space Bibliography

Word for the week = INTENTION
The Spaces Around You
As you move around this week, think about the spaces you enter in terms of the designer's intention:
Was this space (or object or tool) designed for its current use?
If not, how was it transformed to serve another purpose? What are the clues (visual and otherwise)?
Were any compromises made or did the original space provide useful/unusual features?

Your world proposal:
Set an intention for your world design, taking into account your motivation, i.e. your intention as a designer and student as well as considering your viewer's experience.
As a designer, what is the broad intention of your space or world?

"world." Kernerman English Multilingual Dictionary. K Dictionaries Ltd. 01 Sep. 2008.
cited in Dictionary.com

This is your class blog
Please check it regularly and use it to post assignments, and any observations / musings relating to class and space. (i.e If you happen to wander into a space that was originally designed for a completely different purpose - use this space to record your observations about it..)

WEEK 1 ASSIGNMENT

1. ATLAS
Begin thinking about the world and the space you will design for it this term.
Begin with intention. Are you:
Creating a setting to experience/deepen/cause emotion? (Memorial/ sadness/grief/memory, Utopia/hope, Dystopia/despair, Monuments/Pride..
Modeling/simulating/exposing an inaccessible region? (Visualization, Exploration)
Facilitating training / access / information gathering / meeting? (Beacons, Negotiation Spaces, etc)
Analyzing land (physical or metaphorical) use? (Public/Private)
Creating a setting for a narrative, play, challenge, competition, cooperation, negotiation?

You will commit to an idea by Week 3, September 10th.

2. INVENTORY
Work on your inventories. What do the things you have (had) with you this morning say about the world we live in?
Address the environment and landscape in terms of climate, ecology, physics, dimensionality, mobility, knowledge systems, access, identity, economy and culture. What can you add to this list? How do they overlap? Represent your analysis in any media, but it must include some written text and indicate relations and value of the qualities depicted. Please post a version of your analysis and prepare for an in-class presentation for next week, September 3rd.

3. SPATIAL ANALYSIS
Week 3: September 10th: Brandi Wilcox / Cynthia Nie / Bryan Jaycox / Ala’ Diab
Week 4: September 17th: Peter Van Dyke / Taiyoung Ryu / Ian Dallas
Week 5: Septmeber 24th: Nahil Sharkasi / Lulu Cao / Amanda Tasse

4. Reading: Jared Diamond excerpt for discussion next week

Syllabus (note: new version with dates for FLATWORLD changed)
Atlas
Spatial Analysis
Jared Diamond excerpt

Just a test post to ensure that crossposting to 532 works.

This is the 08 CTIN532 Class Blog