My scene is based on the story of 3 soldiers who have landed on this alien planet. When my scene opens the first person is right next to the soldiers and you can hear the hovercraft that they just embarked their journey on not too far behind them. If you look around you can see the hovercraft parked several feet back as the soldiers make their way over to the shadowy dark mountains. Little do they know the demon is lurking in the mountains, waiting for them.

I went back and forth between two skyboxes, one reddish and hellish looking and then the blue one that I ended up choosing. I wanted a more space feel than a hell feel. When I inserted my directional light I played around wih the intensity of the shadows so that the shadows ended up being really visible on my mountains and objects just to emphasize a dark shadowy mood. I tried 3 different textures on my terrain. I wanted it to be grassy by where the army first landed; therefore, it is all green on the side that they are standing on. However, as the terrain gets closer to the mountains, I chose a more dirt grass terrain to show the grass getting more scanty. I did this so that it made the mountains look as though they are just draining of life and it is a forbidden dark place where the demon lives. Then the mountains are a very rocky and dirt texture to again emphasize they are a dangerous dark place. I had no problem with inserting my army, my spacecraft or my demon. I found it very fun to change the style and colors of my objects so that they fit perfectly into my world.

Creating this scene was definitely frustrating and required me to channel any patience I had. I am very satisfied with the outcome but each step came with its own problem and clicking one button can send you off into the abyss of the world you are trying to create. I think one of the most difficult things to do is to simply navigate the world and click on what you want to click or be where you want to be. The time constraint just added another level of anxiety because I personally am new on this platform and a lot of my time was spent just becoming familiar with the navigation system. Trying to determine the size of my different objects was a bit frustrating and trying to rotate them took me a bit of time to master. However, I had the most difficult time with positioning my first person controller and what I wanted my viewer to see when they first entered the world.

Something to note is that my screencast does not play the sounds I inserted in my scene.

Something I would be interested in learning about is making objects move throughout the world on their own. I would have loved for my demon and army to encounter each other. I also would love to learn how to make trees.

Thought exercise:

I am very interested in creating empathetic stories surrounding social justice issues such as the CGI story, Kia. I think the idea I first pitched for the 360 video would be great for a CGI scene. Through this video I hope to give someone the experience of what it feels like to be in a classroom that is in poor conditions as a result of being underfunded. Such classrooms can be vermin filled, dirty, filled with broken textbooks, inadequate lighting, and broken desks, etc. I want someone to see how difficult it is to learn in such classrooms and furthermore, how such conditions make it clear to students who have to learn in these schools that no one cares about them. By the actions not taken to fix their schools and provide them with adequate tools for a quality education they begin to internalize and believe that they are not worth the proper tools needed. Here, self fulfilling prophecies begin. This results in disciplinary problems as they begin to act out against each other and faculty and sometimes even blatantly decide to not learn. Therefore, not only do I want a viewer to see what schools such as this look like but also what happens to the young students forced in these schools by their socioeconomic position and how they are perfectly aware of what is being done to them. This video provides the opportunity to somewhat experience firsthand the issues these students deal with on a daily basis, what it does to them, and how aware they are the decisions made against them at only a middle and high school level. Maybe, by experiencing this firsthand a viewers feeling about impoverished students and students of color will change and it may convict them to take direct action against the education system as they think about the young students in their own lives-children, siblings, nieces and nephews, cousins, and etc.

When the scene opens, the viewer’s attention will be directed to the music coming from the left of them and they will see the group of students piled up in a group around a boombox. As the teacher comes in the room, the viewer’s attention will then be directed over to her as the door slams and she walks in the room. The students won’t budge and they will carry on with their conversations and music playing as they usually do. This unusual response to a teacher or authority figure will call the viewer to look around at the students and their lack of response to the teacher trying to get their attention. As the story evolves into a call and response between the teacher and the students it will direct the viewers’ attention to look back and forth between the two as they engage in a conversation. As the conversation evolves into the students discussing how they really feel about their school and the situation that they’re in, the viewers’ attention will be directed by the conversation to look towards who is speaking at the very moment. As the viewers hear different voices coming from different areas of the room it will incite them to turn around and look at those speaking. It will feel as though they are one of the students in the classroom and although they may not be able to actually engage in the conversation they can direct their attention to those sharing their opinions on the matter.