And once again we showed up at LCCS. 3 PM sharp, made our way via PATH train all the way to Jersey and then back. In between those two points in time, the time we were at LCCS were highly productive. The structure was relatively straightforward, as we were grouped Parsons/LCCS students to create new/old storyboards on post-it notes to showcase our ideas for, well, stories. It somehow went on a rotational basis and our objective was to merge the stories. As best I tried to do so, I wrote down key points of the stories showcased the students (as at times I was grouped up with a few) and then ultimately it all broke down to a story that one LCCS student came up with that went as a standalone and viral, growing up into Trash Trivia, leading up to which a heated debate sprawled out with not much action taken on my part. This time I was being more proactive but ultimately it came down to being a design facilitator and writing down those ideas. Despite my supporting activity here, other students kind of drove their own, ideas, logos, new students joined up. And ultimately the idea, as sharp as it became with about 6 students involved in this project (rising up from 2 at first I believe), was quite captivating to observe, especially once it was driven to winning the contest by the end of our stay at LCCS.

From the details I have gathered, Trash Trivia is an idea which merges elements from Jeopardy and Family Feud, where the center-point established is the theme of ecology, recycling and being conscious within such subjects, leading towards increased awareness. From what I could gather and figured in my head, well the main ingredients required here would be, well:

• Arduino circuit boards or equivalents
  • Big buttons (I love this example: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/big-red-switch/8vbrh7b3xl47, just because of how ridiculously expensive it is)
• Large-scale artworks and built environment (what? I don’t have a background in interior design)

Which is kinda nice, as in a way this is a concept entirely doable, from what I see also highly engaging but it needs to keep a certain grit to it, perhaps host prizes, otherwise interest could be lost quite rapidly (surrounding marketing?).

I’ll upload the notes from the stories I transcribed of other students. It’s a bit of a mess as there is a lot but I liked a lot of these stories, as they were quite imaginative, although as these started mixing up with other stories, it was beginning to be more difficult to synthesise all the variety of ideas into just one.

By the end of the week I received a phone call as I was notified, there was a meeting scheduled that I did not attend. I have kind of given up on reading emails, just glancing very briefly at every one and each incoming from all the swarm hitting my gmail shores, especially once I signed up to MFADT newsletter. That, in addition with the rrrreeal sweet mid-term-a-day schedule, kinda did its thing, that I was a bit unreachable for, well, almost an entire week I’d presume. I’m not entirely sure what is my role at this point, from what I’ve gathered I’ll be supporting from the technological part with Unity in particular. I personally really liked the idea of the hydrodrangeas and I sort of created a VR prototype for Monday’s students’ project proposals. It’s just that I was battling hours with Unity, switching between rendering pipelines, reimporting assets and in fact, adopting a custom movement script I have devised with a friend about 2 years back designed primarily for google cardboard VR. Then, also, certain event systems decided to not work in VR for some reason, so I did come up with a prototype that I was ultimately unhappy with. I’ll revise it and perhaps attach it by the end of the day (or early tomorrow with additional supporting material).

The thing with working with Unity in particular but pretty much with any bit more elaborate software, bouncing back and forth from issues related to those can become a nightmare. Whether it’s programming software, rendering lighting, working with Adobe software. One of the designerly pains that just come with the job etiquette.