Course

"One page proposal for Microsoft Surface.":/members/cnie/2009/04/1_page_proposal_for_microsoft/cnie-ms_surface_proposal.doc

For the "Shake, Rattle and Roll" 1-week project.

A box with a wiimote attached on the side of the interior, sending data to a laptop that is blaring a version of Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Let You Down". When the box is turned to different orientations, it toggles the volume of three different tracks of the song (harmony, rhythm, vocal).

Due to the uh... temperamental nature of connecting wiimotes to personal computers, this requires a Mac to play. Run the "DarwiinRemote" app first and check to make sure it's receiving wiimote data, before running the "WiimoteMusicBox" Processing sketch.

"cnie-1week-WiimoteMusicBox.zip":/members/cnie/2009/03/wiimote_music_box/cnie-1week-WiimoteMusicBox.zip

Presenters: 2nd Year MFA students in CTIN 542 and CTIN 548
Time: Wednesday, March 11, 6pm-8pm
Location: USC's Robert Zemeckis Center for Digital Arts (RZC),
Room 201 Zemeckis Media Lab (ZML)

Title: " Shake Rattle and Roll - CTIN 542,548 Second Year MFA Combined One-Week Interactive Design Project, Spring 2009"

Instructors/Jurors: Mark Bolas, Perry Hoberman, Steve Anderson.

The Challenge: Keyboards contain the arms, wrists, hands and fingers to slight taps along a tiny plane. Mice confine the entire body to slight motions along a plane – reducing intent to inches. Screens constrain our backs, necks, and heads into Nixon-esque postures – eyes fixed forward, shoulders slumped. It is time to break free from the bondage of our systems and engage our bodies in the interaction. It is time to Shake, Rattle and Roll!

Your assignment is to conceive of, design, and produce an interactive experience in which the body is not a mere spectator, but a central element of the experience. The experience should engage the body and be one or more of the following: surprising, shocking, bewildering, addictive, amazing, exquisite, thoughtful, provocative. Students are to incorporate the box, in some way, to create an interactive experience that transpires in between .002 to 200 seconds. Engagement is a two-way street – we move, speak and sweat while we also hear, see, feel, touch and smell. Think in terms of the whole body, and a full range of sensory possibilities.

For 542: a 1-week project about the idea that music can inform a user's choices. Made in Flash.

"cnie-1week-the_music_box.zip":/members/cnie/2009/02/the_music_box/cnie-1week-the_music_box.zip

Description: one of five music tracks randomly plays. User picks a word and a scene plays, and it may or may not make logical sense depending on whether or not the user selected the appropriate word for the music that's playing.

Ended up being a little more about recombinant narrative than I liked, but kind of fun anyway...

For 542: Two 1-week projects combined into one 2-week project. Looking at the topics of "alternate methods of doing work in games" and "user-generated content".

"The Hatchery":http://hatchery.metaminstrel.net

Description: create an account. Buy an egg, wait x time, get something fun... or not. Upload your own images to become possible options for other people to discover.

Please download this Processing file.

Download file

Ways to Fail in My Project


- Personally:
A. Inadequate communication skill: I have a language barrier. It is a big problem to me an international student from another country not using English. What’s worse is that the barrier sometimes makes me shy and passive. That’s more likely to interfere my communication with other people. Consequently, it could ruin my thesis project.
B. Lack of creativity: I worked in the game industry more than 6 years as a designer. I think my work experience has side effect and has been obstructed my projects. When I worked I had to design only commercial things. Sometimes, I was supposed to imitate existing successful games to make money. I think that could have badly influenced my creativity. In previous projects, I focused on just mediocre ideas. I have to get over it.


- In general:
A. Lack of communication: We’ve had only a little communication about our projects and things we’ve been doing. I think more communication will be required for our thesis projects to make it more creative.
B. Lack of skill set: To make physical things or digital things, proper skill sets are needed. Of course, during design process, it doesn’t seem to be a problem. However, without enough skill, nobody can complete his or her projects.

World Press Photo


The photos cover a huge range of issues from political issues and wars to entertainment. Some of them deal with entertainment issues. I think those could help my thesis projects in more philosophical ways.



This photo proves a theory that the archetype of entertainment originated from rituals. Also, it talks about one of the most controversial issues in current entertainment industry, intellectual property. The photo of Bungee jump shows various aspects of entertainment.




For me, this photo is really impressive. This photo shows a kind of narrative created by an ecosystem. It is similar to the way sandbox games create their storyline. Out of the system of the game, the narrative is created unintentionally.

Phtojournalistic Image

For 542: 1-week project on "dead air". Made in Flash.

"cnie-1week-dead_air.zip":/members/cnie/2009/01/dead_air_one_week_project/cnie-1week-dead_air.zip

Description: type in your name and pick an option (ala a personality quiz) to get a specially tailored television sitcom opening.

... and other miscellaneous assignments Mark gave us for 542.

h3. Ways to Sure-Fire fail a thesis

* Not setting and meeting deadlines
* Forgetting and/or losing sight of the original goals of the thesis
* Lack of willingness to adapt the original thesis into something else
* Getting hung up on unimportant details
* Underestimating how much time a particular task will take
* Not setting aside time regularly to just work

h3. World Press Photo that "grabbed" me

"Massimo Siragusa, Italy, Agenzia Contrasto.":http://www.worldpressphoto.org/index.php?option=com_photogallery&task=view&id=1145&Itemid=187&type=&selectedIndex=0&bandwidth=low

(caption) Hot-air balloons float over the main entrance to the Mirabilandia, in Ravenna. Covering some 750,000 square meters, it is one of the largest leisure parks in the country. Leisure time in Italy is taking on a more commercial tone to the traditional simple family excursion to the country or seaside.

(items in bold are things I would like to incorporate into my own thesis)

* freedom
* escape
* *encapsulated in your own private pod, but also sharing in a larger experience with others*
* dots of vivid color
* *individuality/customization of your own space*
* something you don't see every day; an experience you don't have very often
* something people always want to try, but can't find time/money for
* memorable
* playful
* serene

h3. Photojournalistic image of self... from the future... looking back on now?

p=. "!/members/cnie/2009/01/27/self-portrait_thumb.jpg!":/members/cnie/2009/01/27/self-portrait.jpg

This week's assignment in CTIN542 to start thinking about ourselves, our current state of progress, our thesis, and reasons we might fail in the process of developing and executing our thesis. As a prompt we were asked to visit the the World Press 08 exhibit at the Annenberg School, choose a photograph that resonates with our Thesis ideas.



This photograph by Christoph Bangert shows a German training exercise for troops in Afghanistan. The disparities between the natural landscape and the training poster, to me represents what happens many times in games that aim to represent content in the real world. The result often has more to do with the designer's own world view than the realities of the situation. The image represents what I would not want to do with my thesis

Thesis Idea 1) a game that explains the current economic crisis - a 5-15 minute experience that would give you the same information and level of understanding that reading a print article or watching a news package would. This idea is currently the front runner. My hope is that it would be faithful to the realities of the content, and would give a 'reality-check' on what it means to be 'middle-class' in 2009/2010.




This image by Olivier Culmann represents the communal and universal experience of getting immersed in narrative. The images taken from different places in the world speak to the power of television. I am deeply interested in how that power gets transferred with the rise of new media.



Thesis Idea 2) trans-media narratives that use multiple platforms, exploring what is the optimal narrative potential of mobile, webisodes, forums, games, blogs. ie: Taking the example of "Heroes Evolutions", what parts of that story are best told through the tv show, or the graphic novel, or the games, or the webisodes?

Thesis Idea 3) using multiple screens to illustrate causal relationships in a branching narrative. If you could see discrete moments in time simultaneously across multiple screens, how would that effect your understanding of causal relationships in a narrative or effect the choices you make to influence the narrative?

Three technologies to learn -
1) Flash
2) iPhone Apps
3) VXML, or other mobile technology that can initiate/receive calls and SMS messages




We were also asked to create a 'photo-journalistic' image of our current selves as we would remember ourselves 5 years in the future...(still not really sure what this means.)



This photo represents how I might look back on my graduate school experience. I feel pretty isolated and like I'm not really enjoying my experience, being in school, being in LA as much as I should. Perhaps I'm taking things too seriously, I'm too wrapped up in my own thoughts... This assignment made me think of something Oprah Winfrey said, "...I weep for the woman I was in my 20s." Five years from now, I don't want to feel like the best is behind me, but rather that the best is yet to come. I accept that I may stumble through this period in my life with the hope that better things are on the horizon.. Which brings me to the next assignment -- reasons I (or anyone for that matter) might fail in the next 18 months...

GENERAL
-Fuzzy ideas – not concrete
-Under/overestimating scope of project
-Not creating a digital prototype early enough
-Not having enough crew
-Not knowing how to manage your crew
-Poor time management
-Inability to communicate/articulate your idea to other
-Inability to get others excited or interested in your idea
-Doing something that’s been done
-Not setting the bar high enough
-Setting the bar too high
-Not asking critical questions
-Not listening to critiques from others
-Not listening to advisors
-Losing interest, losing passion


PERSONAL
-Giving in to family pleas to come home to Chicago (because no work gets done in Chicago)
-Balancing (or not balancing) work and personal life
-Not working with a skilled programmer
-Choosing something that is important and relevant, over than something I’m personally passionate about
-Not taking time to take care of myself, keeping healthy, getting enough sleep, eating well, exercise, etc...