Fun and Games
Featured Coding Games: New Ways of Educating Web Design Students View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Tatyana Iudean
As an experienced and inspired graphic and web designer, I present new methods of teaching the principles of web design and coding to the students. It is necessary for today's web designers to professionally know and understand HTML+CSS coding. Learning coding is like a learning new language. But while the misspelling in a language is usually not affecting the understanding of the whole phrase, the smallest misspelling in coding leads to the failure of the whole coding. In order to stimulate my students to understand the coding and become proficient in it, I come up with the games for them. For example, I give different HTML and CSS tags to each of the students, and then ask the whole group to form the displayed coding. Each of the students represents different tag in a page, and talks about his/her role in the forming of the page, and based on the coding we imagine the final visual design. My students find these exercises productive, as they are actively involved in the creative process of web design. I use quizzes to test my students' proficiency, and base our HTML+CSS games in class on the feedback from these.
Escape Room Pedagogy and Its Relevance to Education for Creative Professions View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Mariusz Wszołek, Jon Harman, Thomas Lewe
Design education is a well-known challenge discussed within universities. There are a significant number of factors that lead to the need to re-defining design education. Increasing the complexity of the social systems and, in the aftermath, the complexity of design challenges that designers must face nowadays is only a short example. Problems emerging due to increasing complexity require a systemic and methodical approach. Based on the challenge described, the need to adequately design education arises. The current discussion about design education's future must also consider general and relevant attitudes: creative attitude, scientific attitude and social awareness. These will not be adequately taught by focusing on tools and design techniques. An exciting approach to teaching design is growing within the field of game pedagogy, which lets the users learn by doing and by fun at the same time. Game design might be a developmental approach not only for teaching design techniques but also for being aware of concepts like the relevance of design problems, the difference in audiences, characteristics of the design process etc. This proposal will examine whether game pedagogy, precisely the concept of an escape room, finds a suitable environment for teaching design thinking, which currently is the most representative design method. In teaching DT, it is essential to consider not only skills and knowledge but also awareness and sensitivity to the social and cultural conditions of the design process. The metaphor of an escape room might be an exciting way of developing knowledge and understanding of design thinking.
Enhancing Rotoscoped Animation with Artificial Intelligence: A Proposal for the Use of Enhanced Trackable Shapes and Patterns
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session M Javad Khajavi
The implementation of artificial intelligence (AI) technology in the field of animation-making has resulted in the development of innovative tools such as Deforum and Mixamo that potentially offer new possibilities and improve the efficiency of animators' workflows. EbSynth (EbS) is another one of these tools that allows users to animate existing footage in the rotoscoped animation technique using just a few styled keyframes. While EbS is not generally classified as an AI application, it utilizes Example-based Synthesis algorithms that can be considered AI-informed according to the broadest definition of the term. Our research goal centers on the use of enhanced trackable patterns and shapes in EBS and their impact on the efficiency and quality of rotoscoped animation. We seek to identify the most effective patterns and shapes for this process while establishing workflow guidelines for EbS users. Adopting a practice-led research approach, we employ our creative practice to generate insights into the effectiveness of trackable patterns and shapes applied to rotoscoped animation using EbS. Our study encompasses male and female models performing various actions, including facial muscle movements and emotions, with a focus on patterns, trackable markers, contours, and character design shapes. Through a series of experiments and iterative analyses, we evaluate the impact of enhanced trackable patterns and shapes on the quality and efficiency of rotoscoped animation. Our findings support the hypothesis that this approach improves the rotoscoping process, offering valuable insights for artists and animators.
Featured Cross-cultural Design Approaches to Games and Gamified Applications: A Pedagogical Study on Students' Perception of Culturalization in Games View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Nandhini Giri
This empirical study aims at understanding student game designers’ perception of cross-cultural design concepts in games and gamified applications. The main objectives of this study are (1) to study common patterns in student project work that explain how students conceptualize cross-cultural game design approaches for effective player engagement (2) to develop pedagogical approaches to discuss culturalization topics in classrooms. Gamification, the introduction of game play elements such as digital animations and rewarding gameplay mechanics into non-game applications, is a technique commonly used to enhance end user engagement, enjoyment, and learning experiences with interactive digital applications. However, these approaches often fail to acknowledge the impact of cultural variation among end users. This necessitates an understanding of the influence of cultural variation on user response to gamification for diverse end-users. The data for this study was collected from 25 students enrolled in the course titled player-centered approaches to designing games. Students had a background in game development and user experience research and were asked to explore culturalization aspects in an existing game and to develop cross-cultural design strategies to re-design the experience for a culturally specific video game audience. A textual analysis of the students’ work and their reflections provide a better understanding of how students perceive cross-cultural game design concepts in existing games and gamified applications. The results provide pedagogical guidelines for discussing culturalization topics in game design education.
