🌎Macro Project

MACRO PROJECT (Final Project) In addition to assignments (i.e. micro assignments, process blog posts, and readings and viewings) over the course of 12 weeks, each student will be conceptualizing, developing and building an independent Virtual Reality (VR) experience.

• This project should address issues relevant to immersive VR design.

• This project should provide to its visitors:

  • physiological comfort – they feel safe, comfortable and relaxed

  • a sense of presence – “Presence is a psychological state or subjective perception in which even though part of all of an individual’s current experience is generated by and or filtered through human-made technology , part of all of the individual’s perception fails to accurately acknowledge the role of the technology in the experience.” — International Society for Presence Research, 2000

  • interest – there is no possibility of down time, so hold the visitor’s interest throughout the experience

  • a suspension of disbelief – the willingness to sacrifice realism and logic for the sake of enjoyment

  • guidance – creating an environment that provides clear directional cues and/or instructions (if needed)

  • autonomy – (a level of) independence and freedom to make decisions, to act and to explore

• This project should represent individual student interests within the realm of VR and should showcase her/his/their areas of creative, conceptual and technical strength.

• This project can take many forms: a fictional narrative, an architectural environment or landscape, a motion capture performance, a user-interface, a documentary, a game (although this course is not focused on VR game design), or another experience proposed by the student and approved by the professor.

• There are several phases to producing the MACRO PROJECT. In total the project will account for 50% of the semester grade:

  o 5% MACRO PROJECT PHASE 01

  o 10% MACRO PROJECT PHASE 02

  o 15% MACRO PROJECT PHASE ALPHA*

  o 20% MACRO PROJECT PHASE BETA*

*What are ALPHA and BETA versions? ALPHA is a very early version of an application that may not contain all the features that are planned for the final version. Typically, a software application goes through two stages of testing before it is considered finished. The first stage, called Alpha Testing, is often performed only by users within the organization (the DM-GY 9103 Virtual Reality class this semester). The second stage is called Beta Testing. An applications’ BETA is an officially released version (final project for DM-GY 9103 Virtual Reality) which includes most of its functionality. The beta version is intended for external testing (target VR platforms during final critique) in order to identify configurations that cause problems, as well as collect requirements and suggestions from users (classmates and guest visitors).