Advanced Interactive Media/Overview and Description 08

Students and faculty from the Oral Roberts University interactive multimedia program, in an educational partnership with Creative Animation, Inc., (CAI ) will create an interactive virtual tour of a non-profit arts organization. This tour (referred to as the Master Project) will be experienced in three ways:

1. A highly interactive web site.
2. A mini-documentary distributed on broadcast television and as a portable DVD (similar to attached DVD).
3. A game-like media presentation for K-12 students. Students would experience this element inside a portable, 128-foot surround audio/video cylindrical screen. Using Nintendo Wii controllers and actors blue-screened into a live video feed, university students would show younger peers how to interact with on-screen multimedia while they explain their roles during creation of the product. A museum curator/host could be streamed live, from their own location, onto the video screen. The surround A/V cylindrical screen would comprise of 8x16ft panels with one taken up for the entrance and one used for the chroma-key wall. It would accommodate approximately 40 children.

The third component of the master project listed above provides the primary opportunity for students in the Advanced Interactive Media Class to participate. Virtual tour media will be created in partnership, while CAI will be responsible for the video disc and TV broadcast. The website will be coordinated by ORU staff member Kyle Broderick. ORU faculty, staff and student workers will create the interactive game based on research and development from the past two years (see photo of ORU’s eighty-foot surround video screen created for recruiting during the College Weekend event each semester).

Four purposes for the master project would include:

1. The enhancement of Oklahoma’s image,
2. The continued cultivation of an education/business partnership,
3. The promotion of an arts organization, and
4. Student learning. An option for students, faculty and staff to attend the international SIGGRAPH convention in Los Angeles would provide a capstone learning experience and exposure to cutting edge ideas to be immediately implemented in this project.

This highly interactive, immersive, multimedia, multi-sensory product will be coordinated by multimedia professor Don Eland, from ORU, and CEO David Keesee, from CAI.

ORU personnel will include four full-time faculty, up to six work-award students, a class of twelve students in Introductory and Advanced Animation Classes, and a 2 or 3 student engineering senior project team. Mr. Keesee will lead a team of twenty full time professionals who would devote a portion of their work hours to this project.

Listing of all personnel who will participate in the master project:

1. Oral Roberts University faculty and staff: Don Eland, Kyle Broderick, Jared Buswell, an engineering professor, and others as needed.
2. Oral Roberts University student workers: Judah Hudson, Melissa Blum, Carolann Merchant. Multimedia, art, engineering students to be contracted upon grant funding.
3. Ten students in the Fall 2008 Advanced 3D and Animation class.
4. Fourteen students in the Advanced Interactive Media class.
5. Two engineering students enrolled in senior projects classes.
6. Creative Animation, Inc. CEO: David Keesee and a staff of 20 professionals.

Overview calendar for the master project:

The estimated number of weeks for completion is following by each activity.
Weeks Activity

Start Production
1 Refine role responsibilities
2 Order all materials
4 Finish ORU lab installation
5 Finish surround video screen
12 Collect all media
5 Edit media
1 Project evaluation one: media analysis
5 Author media
5 Project evaluation two: Test and debug
1 Student focus group for feedback
4 Publicity campaign
1 Choose schools for demonstrations
1 Present to younger students
1 Project evaluation three: Student responses
2 Archive media
1 Project evaluation four: Self assessment and future planning
2 Time buffer for delays
53 Total weeks required
5 Overlap weeks for simultaneous tasks.
48 Actual weeks required
12 Total months required for completion.

This product will see public exposure through:

1. Television and a web site (primarily the population of the state of Oklahoma): Approximately 3,579,212
2. K-12 students in Oklahoma City: An estimation of 400 per school
3. Students at Oral Roberts University:
- a. Total population affected by improved facilities: Approximately 5,500
- b. Students studying majors directly impacted by computer lab improvements: Approximately 400
- c. Student s directly involved in creative production work: 9 anticipated.

Collaborations will be required between:

1. ORU and Creative Animation, Inc. (CAI).
2. ORU, CAI and an arts organization.
3. ORU, CAI and ORU student workers.
4. ORU students and K-12 students.
5. ORU, CAI, an arts organization and Kirkpatrick Foundation representatives.
6. CAI and OETA for broadcast of minidocumentary.

Virtual environments are costly to develop and demand high-level technical skills but are more convincing than other kinds of publicity. Tours can provide one of the most effective ways to address Oklahoma’s image by allowing customers to visit the State’s outstanding features via the web, video disc, or the portable surround video experience. Systems developed for this project can be duplicated to produce virtual tours of other organizations and/or locations in the future. ORU and CAI will leverage their multimedia experience to produce a multi-faceted promotional product with great promise for the featured organization.

This project will be evaluated at five intervals:

1. Media analysis and planning Week 20
2. Testing and debugging Week 27
3. K-12 student focus group Week 29
4. Live presentation student responses Week 35
5. Self Assessment and Future Planning Week 47

Evaluation will take place using the following methods:

1. Instant on-line feedback forms for those using the web component.
2. Team debriefings at four stages of development.
3. A K-12 student focus group for feedback before final editing.
4. Quick survey cards for K-12 students immediately after live presentations.
5. Critiques of each component from outside media professionals and faculty members not familiar with the project.

Evaluations forms and procedures will be designed by Don Eland and David Keesee to include both qualitative and quantitative data. Suggestions for development of evaluation forms will be provided by administrators and staff representing the featured non-profit arts organization, all production team members and representatives from the Kirkpatrick Foundation.