Video Mapping - Week 12 [Define]

Week 12, the final week of classes!

I put together a quick video of my progress since my last presentation. This includes various mock ups for the final video layout. I'll post the scenes here with a brief overview.

Full Video w/ Commentary HERE.

The first part included my research from various sources in regards to Creative jobs in their sector.

I basically want to focus on 3D for this module, as my area of focus for future projects, and I showed some of my initial image research and ideas for the 3D models and the video layout and such. Regardless of the idea I chose.

Before I defined my final idea, I went into a little about progression. The SMILE idea was the prime breakdown here, just giving some idea into my thoughts behind the madness.

Onto my final idea! I give a little breakdown about how I want to provide a service to Twitch Streamers using my 3D Abilities.

A little look at the 6 streamers of choice, those whom I find entertaining and keep ongoing in the background throughout my working periods.

Then the concept art for each person, looking like their chibi persona's. A rough sketch to get a feel for the streamers cartoony outlook.

A montage of various quotes from various streamers that I thought have some form of impact on the audience. Each quote can be seen as iconic to the individual streamers - one of my focal points for my 'showcase' video.

Quick glimpse at my 2 3D attempts. Low poly, high poly etc. Looking at the topology, quite a simple slide here. Talking about how I approached this.

I took a look at the layouts for my final video. At this point I was entirely unsure about how to layout the video and make it flow together over an extended period of time, AND keep the viewers attention, so I came up with mock up layouts for now.

And a final montage of my mock-ups for the outro! You can get A LOT more detail in the video itself. I remind you, this is a brief overlook to refresh my memory in future. :)

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Concepts for Chibis [Define]

More for personal reference, It's a lot easier to find in a Blog space.

I currently have 6 full concepts for each character but I am only planning on making 3 final characters by the deadline due to time constraints and issues arising in my personal life that have prevented me from doing as much as I had hoped to do. In my own time, after this projects completion, I will do the remaining characters and more!

aDrive


Animation:  Shrugging wave.
Colours:  Murky green, dark blue, brown.
Quote:  "We're all a big Twitch Family here!"

DerpTyme


Animation:  Hands on her tummy, waving/rocking side to side slowly (cute)
Colours:  Orange, dark purple, Red-brown.
Quote:  "You gotta do what you gotta do."

LegendaryLea


Animation:  Overly hyper, excited waving and jump.
Colours:  Black, pink, orange.
Quote:  n/a

Nightblue3




Animation:  Head bopping, hand on the side of his headphones.
Colours:  Grey, Electric Blue
Quote:  "My advice is: If you enjoy it then don't give it up. It'll be worth it."

Okolnir


Animation:  Shy wave, shuffling her feet. Uncaring look.
Colours:  Dark brown, dark red, Cream.
Quote:  "I follow my heart."

Sodapoppin


Animation:  Happy wave of 'sassy' attitude.
Colours:  Purple, Blue, Gray, Black.
Quote:  "What do you MEAN?!"

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3D Base [Define]

The SMILE idea went out the window, as it was too off the main path.

SO, we'll go back to the original idea of Twitch integration. I'll define the idea in another post but for now, here's a look at how I've started on the Chibi base models.

Too Long!

First attempts, I had an off day and decided to try and do some modelling. That's never a good combination. It took me a full day to struggle through my first attempt at a Chibi model after looking at Jinki's 3D style and Topology. You can see the results above, and I wasn't happy with the results.

Topology

Topology is something I've always had an issue with but I needed to get it right to rig and skin properly for the commercial usage among the Twitch consumer population. I spent so long finding different images online of Chibi Topology specifically to give me an idea of how they're broke down differently compared to a normal human model.

This was important because of the low poly outcome I want to achieve.

Re-try
When I felt better I redid the base models for the characters. A lot less time spent, a lot more knowledge of topology, so a much happier outcome. These two base models for males and females below are going to be what I use as a main focal for creating the assets of each character. It should make the creation process a lot shorter for each (modelling wise).

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Smiley Face :) [Define]

It's funny how something so simple can spark an idea.

After talking to my boyfriend on Skype about this module, he sent me a smile emot. And I got inspiration.

PROJECT: Smile

The idea is a video that interacts with the audience. Communicating with them, making them feel better about themselves.

"Draw a Smiley face." That smiley face is unique. Nobody else can replicate that smiley face. The concept is the same, but the actual output will be different for every person.

The message being that we are unique, and everything we do has the chance to make an impact.

Keeping the 3D concept around, I looked at having some sort of Super Smash Bros (c) Nintendo introduction for each character as they present their message of motivation.

After presenting the idea to the class, I felt like I was going a little off the line with this idea. Focusing more on other people then helping myself. I started to think then, how can my success help other people?

I might be onto something...

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Video Visual Mocks [Define]

While I ponder about what way I want to go with the outcome for this project, I decided to make some mock ups to try and keep making progress.

The current situation is a video that looks at various areas of social media to find motivational/inspirational quotes and alike. I did some simple layouts for the DeviantART and Twitch fields:

Deviant ART:

Twitch

Each layout follows the company's colour scheme, along with visually similar layouts. I went for more poster-styled designs for these, so they can be made into infographics if necessary.

Maybe I'll take these layouts into my final outcome - we'll see.

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Sticky Situation [Define]

The finalists have been selected!

If this was a series, that's what I would have said anyway.. Glad I'm not a host.

Word selection aside, I've chosen the 6 streamers to create Chibi's for!

Sodapoppin

Chance Morris is a Streamer who's been around since Twitch's early days. His primary game is World of Warcraft, but is known for being a great entertainer more frequently under the category of "Gaming Talk Shows". He interacts with his chaotic chat, "plebs", and is known for his charity stream where he dyed his hair bright pink for a large sum of money.

He started streaming as a hobby after college, then proceeded to quit as the stream gained more viewers and he made more money. He has been streaming for 3-4 years.

Nightblue3

Rabia Yazbek is a full time streamer on Twitch for 2-3 years, streaming 7 hours a day. He is known for his informative League of Legends gameplay. He is the 9th most viewed channel on Twitch, and the 10th most followed.

Nightblue started streaming little by little between University and his part time job. People wanted to be taught the game his way, so he made his mark.

LegendaryLea

Lea is Sodapoppin's girlfriend, and she started streaming because of her ties to Soda. She deals with her fair share of people throwing insults (as fans of Sodapoppin) but she keeps streaming because it's what she wants to do. 

She graduated from UCSD Cum Laude, majoring in Physiology and Neuroscience in 2012. After completing her degree, she picked up streaming.

DerpTyme

Christine is a freelance artist/illustrator, who recently gave up her job in order to furfill streaming full time. Her small community are incredible at supporting her through difficult situations in her life, and she loves giving free sketches out to her viewers.

Okolnir (Shilin)

Shilin Huand is a freelance illustrator with a Bach degree of music in performance. She goes by the saying of 'She speaks through her illustrations'. She was widely known on DeviantART, and did commission work for game company Riot Games.

Shilin was supported for a year by her parents while she started her own web comic and enhanced her art skills, and after those 12 months she was able to create a living herself with her work.

aDrive

Daniel (Dan) is a pokémon streamer, who has only picked up over the past 12 months to become a stable streamer in his category. Dan is known for his participation in tournaments, and having highly interactive streams even with 2k viewers!

He studied a business major, before working on wal-street in the US. He decided to take that knowledge into the online community, and he's making it big. His future hopes are to work for Twitch using his business degree.

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With that settled, I was getting a little worked up over my final outcome. How can I help other people get over their self confidence blues? Hopefully I can come up with something..

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The Vast Community [Case Studies #2

After a feedback class this week, I'm looking far more positive at my approach to this project. Let's go to business.

Here's how I want to do it. I'm grabbing a list of streamers I watch myself, and my friends, along side DeviantARTists, youtubers, and some students from various courses. I'm going to create a short interview question scenario, text format and sound format primarily, and compile all the research I get. If I can, I want to look for online interviews to add to my research pack. I'm gonna send this out to the list above with a proposal of my project, and see what I can get back. I'm going to ask them in live chat and using on screen notifications (via donation to support the streamer directly) and hopefully get some positive responses.

As of right now, I have a list compiled of the following (that will be updated as I find more candidates):

Streamers:
SodaPoppin
DyrusLoL
TheOddOne
LegendaryLea
aDrive
NightBlue3
DerpTyme
Okolnir
LoLGeranimo
Summit1g
zLadyLuthien
ffSade
Domadness

DeviantART:
Naschi (notes)
DerpTyme
Okolnir
ffSade
Sakimichan
Zeronis
Keinan Lafferty
Noah Bradley
NanFe
Loish
MagicnaAnavi (notes
MagiSapphire (notes)
viccolatte

Youtubers:
aDrive
Keinan Lafferty
Sycra
EgoRaptor
Vycal
Scott Duncan

University Students/Other:
Jennifer Lynch
Finley McNally
Patrick McCallion
Clare Melvin
Shauna O'Connor

--

These lists could be endless.. But here's to positive results! <3
I've looked into this sort of asking for answers responses before, I did it as a personal research idea to try and get answers to questions that were getting me down. Hopefully I can reach these people (and more!) to get a response that will make an impact.

I'll get back to you on the questions and any responses I can gather. 

Time to take that chance!

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Who ARE You? [Initial Case Studies #1]

"Self confidence is the first requisite to great understanding"- Samuel Johnson

[Doing a bit of a post purge today, after being sick for the past wee while, apologies!]

Gotta love some Alice in Wonderland. I prefer to work with background noise, whether it's music or a live stream, I don't like the silence. Over the past year or two I've held onto some really interesting streamers. From artists, to professional gamers, hobbyists and alike.

I have a vast library to work from.

Those who are unaware of Twitch TV - an online streaming service - I want to know where you've been hiding.. Twitch is a way for the average person to show the world their world. Their game skills, or entertainment skills. Some people get hits of 20k viewers everytime they stream. Living on a daily schedule of going for 6+ hours a day. These people can stream as a living. They quit their jobs and take a chance of making it on Twitch. So, what the hell is that all about? How did they do it? Starting at nothing and making it 'big' online. And of course, surely they had some self confidence issues. Time for me to poke!

I'm going to ask some of the streamers I'm more comfortable with about their experience, some convention interviews answer my questions so I'll poke for those and check it out that way. 

What I Know

Based on my experience with streamers on Twitch, a lot of it is about Luck. The right place at the right time and doing something that stands out from everybody else. Don't follow the crowd and just be YOU. A lot of the more high end streamers are asked how they did it, how did they started off and any tips they could give. I hear the same sort of response: Keep a schedule, interact and entertain, don't do it just because, Do it because you want to and ENJOY IT.

Consistently being active is a hard stretch but is shows dedication, reliability. Look at the amount of the younger generation is coming home and would sit in front of a computer all day watching Minecraft videos. Shocking isn't it? But it's like TV, it's entertainment on a new platform. With actual viewer interaction. If you speak in the chat, you have a chance of being 'noticed'. It makes you feel better.

The 'high end' streamers give up their full time jobs because they want to keep the consistency of streaming. Their passions drive them. This is awfully interesting. Do those truly passionate about it have more motivation/confidence to keep going then those who seek to do it as a full time job from the start?

Final Outcome Concerns.

Regarding an actual FINAL outcome for this project. I'm awfully worried. I have no idea what I'm going to do in regards to my topic, and my area of interest [Character Design and 3D.] I could do 'scenario' styles but right now, I really don't have much of a clue.. I'll get back to this point HOPEFULLY after class next week.

Still got some work to do.

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Igniting Your Passions [Presentation]

"If you hear a voice within you say 'you cannot paint,' then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced."

- Van Gogh, Artist

[Doing a bit of a post purge today, after being sick for the past wee while, apologies!]

It's Presentation time! The day we showed the class what area we would focus on, and what we had found out so far. I went over the THREE I'S in my previous post (which ended up being my main slides, go me!) so I'll look more at what I'm going to do after today. Where will this go? What is the outcome?

Well first, The Three I's: The Impact, The Importance, The Internal Struggle. These guys are the core of what I'm looking at. The crippling factor of low self esteem, the importance of high self esteem to us as creative beings, and the self conflict we fight against in times of low self esteem. The bottle doesn't always stay full, not for everyone!

"I didn't want to be an Artist"
In my presentation I used the example of Noah Bradley, who does the MAGIC! The Gathering Card designs. There's a full Album of Noah's 'story' of how he got where he is. I often look back through it when I'm down in the dumps. So, I felt it should be shared here. Basically, Noah didn't want to be an artist. It's something he did as a hobby that developed into a passion. He was told to do things he didn't particularly enjoy. After starting down his own path, he got approached and appreciated for his work. All from a paint set at the age of 19. 

It's a truly moving story, it shows a lot about his mindset and what he went through getting where he is. I'll link it below.

Moving Forward
Case Studies. I want to get as many as I possibly can. Different experiences make for different stories. However, they will all share a similar aspect. All of the people I have in mind must have had to over come some self confidence issues in their time. Ranging from Artists, students in my class, online streamers, professional gamers. It's a shot in the dark to contact these people but no risk, no reward!

Using the information I plan to gather, I want to look at how we can possibly break this habit. How can what I'm gathering help out other people. My plan is to help out others in the process of helping myself. Everyone has their own path, their own opinion and experience with the likes of self confidence. How can I pull us all together? Can we make a permanent change in mindset for creative people especially?

No Resolution for you (yet)

How I became an Artist - Noah Bradley

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Looking Deeper [Research part 1]

What do you MEAN, don't look at any conclusion yet?!

[Doing a bit of a post purge today, after being sick for the past wee while, apologies!]

Well okay, research time! Part 1

Let's tackle the first problem here, what exactly IS Self Esteem?
Google informed me of a few websites with useful information. Self Esteem is your worth, your confidence in abilities and your general self and well being. Your mind set, your outlook on life. It's all about YOU.

Taking that, I'll personalize my project. I'll help myself in the process. Get myself to a better level.

Unfortunately, I found that a lot of the websites on self esteem were about tackling it. How to deal with it and progress through self esteem issues. I'm not doing that yet, I want an understanding of the actual problem and the impact of it. How important Self Esteem is, not just for artists but for everyone. 

To keep going with my research, I wanted to plan out the presentation first. What was the flow of my research into presentation format. I struggled to think about this. How do I break down Self Esteem, prior to the solution?

Below you can see my comparison table, the clash of high self esteem and low self esteem. From this I can break down the next 3 sections a bit easier.

I eventually decided to look at the impact it can have on a person, and their life. Looking at the table above, there's a fair few different comparisons between the two different sides.  POSITIVE Self Confidence is important, especially in Creative people, as it allows them to keep pushing forward. They need to grow as a talented person and believe in their abilities. A positive mindset will drive and inspire them. Allow them to respect others, and more so THEMSELVES. Nothing is more important. It allows growth.

NEGATIVE self confidence, however, is the complete opposite. As you could imagine. One bad choice, leads to a possible bad experience, leading to more bad choices and it's an endless cycle. A break in the chain is needed as a first step. Low self esteem limits the abilities of a creative person, they feel worthless and that their talents/skills aren't worth anything in comparison to others. It can become seriously unhealthy and possibly ruin someones future if they don't learn to overstep this hurdle. The negative mindset will rub off onto those around you as well.

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Leading into the importance of having confidence in one's own abilities. Looking into that will allow me to develop a proper solution to build on the self confidence of others, and more so - myself. Self Confidence is about valuing yourself as a person, seeing the benefits from your skills and abilities. It's a source of motivation in it's own right, only you can see your full potential! Confidence is yourself allows you to respect yourself, if you don't respect yourself then you won't accept others trying to respect you.

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Finally, a deeper look into what I call "The War Within" which defines the internal struggle that becomes of low self confidence. It's all about having faith in yourself. Similar to a mental illness, a low self esteem will trigger the likes of anxiety, depression, and often cause people to sit inside a hole. You won't get anywhere down there! This internal struggle makes us focus on the weak parts of our being, we pick everything apart. What we do has no 'depth' or it's not 'good enough', standing up to that little nagging self inside you is damn difficult.


Remembering right now, we're just looking into what Self Esteem actually IS, how important it is. There's no solutions or 'how i did this' just yet. After my presentation I'll be looking into some cases using people I connect with online.

This is only the beginning

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My problem is YOUR problem.

Progression is key.
Just keep swimming.

Looking deeper into my problem, I did a diagram based on the problem, the impact of the problem, the importance of the problem. A rough-Class copy can be seen above. I wasn't entirely sure how to break my topic down, or what I specifically want to focus on. A start is a start.


Self esteem is a heavy, important topic. It's quite a long shot, but it's something I want to address personally. Below is a more refined version of my class notes from above. I look at the area of Self-Confidence of specifically, questions I asked myself, the possible causes and possible resolves. Just for an idea.

Over the past 6 month, I've been dealing with self-confidence issues myself. Wondering what's going to happen, I I'm going to get anywhere. It's crippling, low self confidence is very limiting. It holds us back. It stops us achieving the goals we want to achieve.


Low Self Esteem -> What's going to happen after University? Am I good enough? What route do I take?


I want to talk to Artists about their experience, how they got where they are. Was it luck? Was it hard work? This issue of self confidence is something I want to tackle and hopefully help some people along the way.

Focusing more on how hard self-esteem issues can be on certain individuals, and working on an understanding of the importance and effect of self-esteem as a whole specifically on Artists/Designers in a competitive field.

Next week I need to have a presentation prepped, I'll pop another post on my research and references. This is just my initial thoughts for now. Slight update.

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What is YOUR problem? - Definition of Design

Back into the swing of things, let's see where we can go.

Over the years the general term of "Design" has grown from something unknown and simple, a little behind the scenes work to make something different into one of the largest growing industries known today. As the years have gone by, and we have progressed through the digital age, it has also seen its own fair share of problems. 

To most people, a problem is categorized by a fault. A spanner in the works. Something that needs to be solved. Little are we aware that no matter what the problem is, from messing up dinner to a broken down car and financial issues, we all follow a simple procedure to 'resolve' the problem at hand. This is task at hand: To find my own problem, big or small, and find a long term answer.


This is the Professional Practice for Design Projects, and this is the blog for Kayleigh Singer - Final Year Student at Ulster University, Magee.

To find out more about myself you can check my profiles I'll post at the bottom.

Now, the question is 'What is YOUR problem?' little vague, so the intimidation and fear of failure is looming right now, but it also opens for endless opportunities. For example, it could be a matter of 'I can't fit into the right scene', or something even more simple 'I struggle to get out of bed early for class.' I feel like there is no right or wrongs here, just a vast number of problems that can be worked on and solved.

If I were to say my problem was 'I'm fed up of having the same meals for dinner', my resolution process would brainstorm how I could potentially solve this issue. Could I look at the design and development of a mobile app to register my food taste and provide me with a new meal? Develop a set schedule over the course of a week, a month(?) with various meals that I can choose from? A way to find out which spices will help take the food up a notch? A record system to see what kitchen experiments are working and what aren't... I'm not a food blogger here!

You could even work to solve poor communication in the workplace, help them set up a system to keep everyone on the same page. Run the business more smoothly. However, I want to look a lot closer to home.

Initially, I want to try and solve my own problem. I feel like this is a simpler route, but it does present it's own challenges. You have to try and break down your own way of dealing with life in order to resolve the problem. This project seems like the ideal opportunity to really kick things into gear.

MY problem is self confidence, self motivation. I fear what's ahead, like the majority of people and students especially (I'd imagine.) Coming to final year of my University experience, this is my chance to get a leg up and find my place among the creative industry, and with the use of this project I'm gonna conquer the fears that hold people back.. Hopefully you find use from this too!

Watch this Space!

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