_i exist by implication_

It’s that time of year again… it’s back to school time! The adventures of my graduate class continue as we enter our second year of the master’s program. Exciting times are these…

Last year already came and went. The first semester was intense. The second was considerably busy. The third? I can’t wait to find out! I am not at all worried though, for Meredith Davis and Santiago Piedrafita are leading the way…

This semester is special though. Not that the previous ones were not, but this semester I begin to articulate my research interests towards the development of a final project. This experience will force me to concentrate my interests into a series of researchable questions which I will later investigate and work on. About time I got started on this…

Screenshot of the conference website.

This semester’s AIGA education conference, Social Studies Conference: Educating Designers in a Connected World , will be held at the MICA campus from Friday, October 17 through Sunday, October 19 of 2008.

A few days ago I was notified that my original abstract was accepted into the conference. This is my final revised abstract.

Understanding Interaction through People, Settings, and Scenarios

At NC State, the Professional Bachelors of Graphic Design prepares students to understand design from a systems perspective. Among courses that address the issue, three are dedicated to imaging. Last Spring, when co-teaching a three-credit sophomore class —Imaging II: Settings and People (Leading to Activity Scenarios)— with Santiago Piedrafita (faculty member), students were introduced to interaction and time-based media through three key ideas: settings, people and scenarios. Each was addressed through a particular investigation: a “site survey (settings);” a “subject study (people);” and an “activity map (scenarios).”

For the site survey investigation, students were asked to build annotated panoramas through layering techniques, documenting and commenting on a particular location of their daily commute. To visualize the importance of people within a system, students collected ethnographic data of other school members, which they then reinterpreted into one-minute biographical video clips and oversized broadsheets. The semester concluded with an understanding of scenarios, exploring how myriad interfaces found on various mobile platforms shape and affect interactions (scenarios) between users (people) and their environment (setting). This investigation was carried out through hand-made rapid-paper-prototypes, later modeled into stop-animation video clips.

Throughout the semester, concepts were introduced through observation and interpretative methods like annotated tableaus, visual essays, authored journals, video interviews, collaborative ideation techniques, activity maps, paper-prototyping, and stop-animation photography. These “image-making” strategies helped students visualize and actualize key aspects (and phases) of diverse design problems (project-definition-driven, project-building, project-making), understanding issues they will come to terms with when undergoing interactive and time-based media work.

• Ampersand
  Get your own stell cast ampersand
  (tags: type typography)
• PVC Pipe font & poster (pure typography) on the Behance Network
  let's look underneath the sink for type
  (tags: type typography)
• Letraset - a set on Flickr
  Nice use of letraset
  (tags: type typography)
• Bagladies - Environmentally Hip
  Some very nice tote bags
  (tags: backpacks industrialdesign design shopping shop)
• UPPERCASE - UPPERCASE journal - Type Tuesday: Typography through Forestry
  Letters made from trees. Can be seen from the sky.
  (tags: type typography)

• Beijing conjures Olympic opening epic with high technology
  The technology behind the Opening Ceremonies at Beijing
  (tags: technology information inspiration interface)
• Adaptive Path » aurora concept video
  New and various ways to consider our relationship to the technological world around us.
  (tags: interaction interactive interface internet inspiration)
• Aurora
  This is so worth taking a look at. A new way to envision the internet and its use
  (tags: interaction interactive interface internet collaboration)
• Speak Up › Let the (Logo) Games Begin
  Interesting read on the fast-turnaround logo companies.
  (tags: design logo)

Screenshot capture of the Social Studies Conference’s website.

A typical scene in my life…

April 2008… I decide to submit a draft for the Social Studies Conference: Educating Designers in a Connected World to be held at MICA this upcoming October. Deadline for submissions… July 15th. Yup, I got time.

July 14th: 6:00pm… Dammit! It’s been raining all day, internet connection has been down, and I have to submit the abstract! Tic, tock… Tic, toc…

hehehe

I submitted the abstract on time (see below)(and I even got a happy confirmation e-mail from the conference).
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As conclusion to the week… a small exhibit of all student work was made for parents to see and for the students to pick up their projects to take them home.

Some of the projections of the collaborative posters…
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Here are all 15 posters that were designed by all the groups who attended graphic design from wednesday thru friday. Every one of these was made by 4 student groups.
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A little afternoon break… Since students basically worked on the poster from 12:30 - 4:00pm… around 3:00pm I had a little exercise where we sent airplanes over into the landscape architecture area. Landscape never retaliated… hehehe