Presentation and outline of BA7/8

These are the slides I used to demonstrate my idea for BA7/8. The top one is to show my starting points and influences. I want to outline in the post exactly what I will do for BA7 so I can get it clear in my mind and have reference to write my schedule of work.

Learning outcomes and how I will achieve them:

LO1: Demonstrate consistent knowledge and understanding of your subject area, making
detailed reference to current and emerging practice. 

I will achieve this outcome by conducting in depth research of my subject area. I will be looking at what kind of thing already exists, this will include books, films and games so that I can get a wide view of media aimed at children and get an understanding of how to develop my own narrative. This way I can also see what kind of thing similar to my narrative idea already exist so that I can think about making mine different from what is already out there. I'm also going to research child psychology around how children deal with death and what ages children really understand the concept of death.

I have also started to conduct informal surveys of people I know with children about what sort of stories they read to their children and how often etc.

LO2: Identify issues or questions relevant to your subject and adopt established research methods, clear analysis and appropriate written and visual communication through a draft research report.

When thinking about my studio work I decided to look into children's narrative for my research report as it would tie in very well. I've decided to look into the ways narrative is delivered to children in terms of video games. I'll look at things like educational games and how they are presented and why this is different from games that are purely for entertainment. I will also research how the way in which narrative is delivered has changed and perhaps how it may be in the future.

LO3: Evidence a clear understanding of contextual, historical and ethical concepts using research material from a variety of sources relevant to your own practice.

I will be researching a lot of things in order to make my narrative world and the things within it believable. To create realistic environments I will be looking at local environments myself and taking pictures/sketches to adapt to create my environments both the realistic "real world" environments and the more dreamlike "other world" environments. I will also be creating some kind of monsters to inhabit the "other world" and in order to do this I will be looking at animals that really exist and adapting these ideas to create my own while also looking at monsters that have already been created for inspiration.  

In terms of ethical concepts I will have to be very careful when deciding on the age range I am aiming at with my narrative and what kinds of things I include, for example the language and ideas I present. I think another thing to be aware of is whether or not to use any religious ideals and what kind of issues this can present.

 

LO4: Plan your learning, using a range of technologies, references and approaches appropriate to your subject.

I will make a schedule of work which includes when I will be reaching certain milestones and what I will need to do to achieve them. This will be planned at the start of the project and I will detail on this blog if/how I am achieving them. 

I'll be using a variety of resources and technologies to achieve my project including Photoshop, After Effects, Logic pro.

LO5: Evaluate a diverse field of information and ideas in order to make informed judgments about appropriate questions and potential solutions to problems.

I will show everything I found through research and the development of all my ideas through a detailed research blog. I will also condense my research and design processes into an informative design document for submission.

LO6: Communicate creatively and appropriately to a variety of audiences using spoken word, text and images.

I'll be achieving this outcome with my blog and design document by making sure they creatively and clearly communicate my ideas exactly the way I intend them to. I will also be presenting my ideas as a pitch at the end of this unit so I will try to put across my ideas in a clear but interesting way.

What I actually need to do for BA7

• Research existing material, eg. children's literature of a similar subject to mine, movies
• Research the psychology behind children dealing with bereavement
• Conduct some market research maybe a survey asking parents what they think of this sort of idea and whether it is appropriate.
• Research existing environments to adapt for my narrative
• Research animals and plants to adapt for the other world
• Plan storyboard and exactly what is going to happen when/ how much animation I'm actually going to include and when. How am I going to put the whole thing together.
• Conduct my research and plan my research report (1000 words)
• Put all my research and designs into a document which has a cohesive design.
• Become more familiar with different techniques to animate in After Effects.

This is just a bit of artwork I created as an initial idea and in order to communicate the basis of the idea for my narrative quickly and clearly. It shows the boy who is the main character and his sister as a sort of ghost or spectre. I think it shows the sort of style and ideas I want to put across through my narrative. I'll also use it as a sort of starting point when designing the characters.

It also shows my working title which is "Remember Me" because I think the main message of the narrative is about remembering someone in a positive and happy way and also the narrative surrounds the boy's fears that his sister will be forgotten.

I actually really like the style of the slides and I think I will make my design document pages have a similar design to them only a lot more detailed and developed as I only did these quickly as a basic background. I think the starry/dream like background would compliment the style of my narrative. I think it's really important for the feeling of the document to match the feeling of the content and having a well defined style is a good way to do this.