Console for Kids Application
Planning Document
Consoles for your Teenager
Background
As Technology continues to evolve, Kids proceed to develop an interest at a continuously younger age. As a Parent in today’s society it is of utmost importance to realize and support that interest in every way possible. One of that ways is to provide the child with a Video Game Console. Video Game Consoles have been known for, or rather seen as, being responsible for adverse effects on the child’s mental health regarding aspects such as Concentration and also consuming the child’s life with unrealistic and unimportant ideologies. This view seems to have changed in the recent times as consoles such as the Wii and the Nintendo DS are being used by all age groups for playing all kinds of games and/even include activities intended to help the person playing. From Health Boosting Games in Hospitals, Rehabs and Family living rooms to Tour guides and Drawing Simulations in the palms of hands, Gaming has evolved from a narrow-minded view (from both inside developers and people not associating themselves with games) to that what it is today.
Goals
What is the mission or purpose of this project?
To create a Tutorial Like Application which will help (especially) Parents find the right video game console for their child(ren).
To create a Product, which will help Parents recognize and support the potentials of the console best suited for the intended person.
To Guide existing console buyers through the dangers
To allow Parents to study the reasons for buying the right console at their own pace and time
Who are the intended audiences?
The End Users Are The Parents, Guardians and older relatives and friends of Teenagers.
Parents seem to be relatively clueless to what console their Teenagers want or/and what console they should receive.
Since the end users come from different social and cultural backgrounds, I am aiming to accommodate all kinds of parents with consoles which tick all boxes.
What is the audience expected to achieve from this project?
The End Users are expected to gain extensive knowledge about consoles; specifically the age groups intended, the pros and contras of recent products for those age groups, possible (accidental) hazards and their circumvention.
The End User should be able to find the right product and be able to recognize the potentials that console has for the intended person(s).
What Console to Get Your Teenager?
Aspects that I will go in more details include:
Console Types
Console Description and its place in society
Safety Issues including Side Effects and their adverse consequences
Evaluation
Constraints
There are a number of constraints,
These include:
Limiting Subject Topics to Recent Consoles instead of all possible consoles used
Keeping the Textual Content to a considerable minimum since research shows that Users are able to read textual information better in printed format
PlaNning DOCUMtation
Look & Feel (Style Manual)
The Project will be a combination of Sequential and Hierarchical Layers with optional Popups embedded into the Application.
Platforms used for this project will include Tools such as Courselab, Adobe Flash and Adobe Dreamweaver. Placing Interactivity as the focal points , users will have the choice over a variety of options and guides in the Application. Each layer or Site will have its dedicated Information Section and Descriptions about the Selected Product. In addition, Charts, Maps and Images will accompany these layers to add visual guides to the textual ones, creating a broader niche for understanding.
Content on those Layers will include:
Graphs
Descriptions
Tables
Charts
Optional Videos
Optional Sound
The Main Section will clearly outline the Purpose of this Product, including a Table of contents and Links to the Main page. The Main Page will also include an optional link to variable information about their consoles which might be written in a technical manner not intended for the Main Process, but are there to inform users who are much more in tune and familiarised to those objects. To successfully interest the User into continuing to follow the guides, I will have to create a space which will work with what they already know and ease into the unknown one step at a time. The Introduction Page is a perfect way to accomplish this.
The Introduction page will include a textual and illustrative explanation of the topic to engage the user in the application. The goals of the applications have to be clearly outlines as not to confuse, annoy or/and anger the user into leaving the application. It also has to tackle or/and state an important question the end user is familiar with and can relate to; In this Case, a question along the lines of “What Console is the right one for the right age group?” Complex Wording is going to be avoided throughout to allow an easier understanding of the project/Application.
In the main menu, in addition to links to the various parts of the tutorial like guide, there will be an optional process which enables the user to take a pre test to allow the system as well as the user understand what kind of knowledge he/she possess of the topic on hand. Questions are similar to those asked in the Questionnaire above.
Most Screen are divined into two parts, the main window and the side window. The Main Window contains the Information regarding the subject including Images texts and navigational buttons. Those are used to take the user into the next application screen in a sequential matter.
The Side screen is mostly filled by the different chapters of the Tutorials which are stacked up in a hierarchical fashion. Clicking one of those chapters will expand it and display the chapter and the headers of the sub chapters within. While one chapter is expanded it changes colour and dimensions.
Another part of the windows is the top panel which is situated above the two screens mostly filling the top left corners. The Top Panel includes links to the home menu and index screens.
After the process of providing informations, the user is given a short questionnaire to ensure the successful understanding of the subject on hand. Feedback is provided throughout and is one of the main points set out to be accomplished in this project. It is vital that the user understands the subject and what it is all about. To accomplish that every extensive topic within the application has a questionnaire and feedback section to it to ensure that the user gets the information no matter if the right answer was given or not.
Content Ideas
There are a number of content ideas the development team came up with:
Creating a fully sequential or an/video tutorial application instead of one which is a combination of hierachal, and sequential with popups
Extensive Explanations on whatever difficult language might appear
Interactive Interfaces instead of only textual content
Sound Picture Galleries, java script or/and flash multimedia content
Guide dogs
Guide dogs! After stroking one of them closeup I wanted to hear more about them. And we got what we wanted. Two Guide dog representatives, paddy and executive, and Denise a Guide dog trainer came to talk about the insides f the the guide dog for the blind association. Up to this moment, I (and probably the rest of the lass) were unawrae pf the cost levels in the guide dog market, ranging from 15,000 euro to 50, 000 neuro! I/We was/were aslo astonished by the fat that most of the funds were not from the goverment but rather from public donations. ‘Founded in 1976, we are a unique organization dedicated to providing services which bring mobility and independence to blind and visually impaired people as well as people with other disabilities. Our services include guide dog training, long cane training, courses in independent living skills and child mobility program. We also provide Assistance Dogs to families of children with autism – a first for Europe.
All our services are provided free of charge. We rely heavily on volunteers to support us through fundraising, the raising of our dogs and in many other ways.’
I really enjoyed listening to those two and was eager to beginn with the preperations for the Creative Digital Media/ Guide Dog cooperation project. Lzm
Science Gallery, Ligthwave smtn
The third Exhibition was in the Science Gallery in Trinity College, an Establishment on the Peasre Street.
For many Visitors, excluding me, it was the high point of our three-point tour, more or less due to the rather stylish and quirky Innovations which were presented to us in the Galley: From a rotating multimedia disk screening the planet of ours by spinning in swindle erecting speeds, over a Cubicle engulfed in lightsequences whenever someone said something up to a man called jakonoji who has to to admit that he was only present for about 3% of this exhibition and rather want to let the following pictures speak for themselves: Lzm
Maria Brown – Training before Training
Maria Brown, one of the Executives when it omes to Human Resoures (or so I believe) gave us ipps & Tricks shortly before we hadto be taken to the torturous minutes of fake interviews of the job of our (limited) choice. Tipps included:
Preperation
- Preparing response to be ready for the question “What do you know about our company”, over knowing the interviewer’s name and using it during the job interview. If uncertainty of the name arises, ih has to be callout and ask prior to the interview. It is essential that people can relate what they know about the company when answering questions.
Attire
- Attires have to be neat, tidy and appropriate for the type of firm interviewing the person at hand. For a better overall impression it makes sense to bring a nice portfolio with copies of a resume; Including a pen and paper for note taking, with them.
On time
- It is also essential to be on time, meaning a minimum of 5 minutes before the interview, to achieve satisfying results in the sense of better impression of the person interviewed on the Interviewer. That can be achieved by taking the route to the interview’s location prior to the date of the interview.
Calmness
- During the job interview people should be able to act as calm as possible. That effect can be achieved by maintaining eye contact with the interviewer. Before attempting any answer the questions are to be listen to entirelyand payed attention to sine that can avoid embarrassing situations.
An interesting lecture indeed Lzm
Fluid Rock…. Wha?
Ruth Mc Partlin… the Guestpeaker with youthful looks, representing her co-founded Digital Media Agency called Fluid Rock
Fluid Rock.. a full service interactive agency specializing in the development of interactive ideas and solutions made up of strong web design, database, and CMS development teams to achieve a superior collection of results in the sense of websites, marketing programs due to expertise in usability, re-engineering, the ability to work with many partners, and the experience and talent of the In-house staff and the Usage of Consultancy guidelines including Lzm
- Strategy planning
- Technology audits
- Client / customer assessment
- Online brand consultancy
- Online Marketing
Language… just systematic means of communicating???
Language… a Dublin based creative Studio, providing a quality strategic and creative voice for clients across the commercial, cultural and public service sectors. Their commitment to challenging themselves brought them, apart from other things, a series of short films and a project for the Green Party. In the 2002 they even created the new design of the ITB Logo.
David Joye… a Dublin based Creative Director, providing Language and us with inspirational feedback; Talking about the ITB project he was eager to show us the initial designs and the finished creation. Lzm
Edward Melvin…. Not another melvin….??!!!
ICAN… founded to become one of Ireland’s largest and most successful full service Digital Marketing & Advertising Agencies making investments in online advertising, search organizations, internal viral videos and web development. Using their two Provisions( ‘Engaging people’ and ‘Converting people’) and their teams skills (including experience, creativity, teamwork, planning, etc) as Guidelines they focus on a number of steps or stages( including Visual Design, Positioning, Mechanics, Storyboard, etc) to develop the idea into the finished creations.
Edward Melvin… another one, in the long line of successful outsprings of the Melvin Clan, is a Manager at ICAN and the guest peaker presenting to us all about ICAN supplying us along the way with Tipps & Tricks for the Digital Industry. Lzm
Footage of/with Guidedogs
The Video and Photo based footage was implemented on Wednesday, 22 April, 2009, where we had the chance (or rather were forced) to get a closeup of puppies which, Karen and Denise, two experienced Guide dog trainers from the Guide dog Association brought in.
Previously parted into groups of about three (with mostly satisfying results) we were once again grouped, now into two teams; One to firstly go out in the cold, hostile, wasteland to shoot our Footage involving those two adorable puppies and the other team to stay in, in the warm, protecting hall to snap their Camera buttons at one of the dogs slumbering through a sort of fitness/condition exercise, and all in reverse. I, surprisingly enough, was one of those who had to go out and do their footage; and, even more surprisingly, I really enjoyed it.
For the period of 20 minutes, we let the two guidedogs ‘In Training’ snuffle on the Taste of Fame. Surrounded by circa 20 professional Photo and Video journalists and part time Digital Media Students those two of ‘a mans best friends’ stood proudly (and lay cowardly) in the grass feeling slightly intimidated at the beginning but more confident as time flied, due to warm words and close guidance of Karen.
Inside we witnessed a spectacle of a different sort when the two guide dogs met; The one who was previously shot outdoors(with cameras) was on-line while the other one, after he was taking are of inside by both groups, felt the need to parade infront of the ‘outdoor puppie’ to show his ‘freedom’. So it was only natural for the guidedog on-line to behave in such a way when he was let free to chase after the other one carrying the Frisbee and fighting for it to get himself out of the embarrassing moment at the time.
Surprisingly enough, Adam Conelly, an otherwise very quiet, calm and conserved Creative Digital Media Student was able to show his never before seen sense of authority when he was able to order the dogs around without having met them before.
All in all a good experience; And we were absolutely devastated at the end to let those two adorable, proud, cowardly, aggressive, competitive dogs, they are still dogs at the end of the day, let go to astonish other people of their skill and perseverance. Lzm
Images soon to be updated
Hugh Lane Gallery
The 2nd exhibition we visited was the Hugh Lane Gallery.
Located in Dublin’s city center, the gallery houses one of Ireland’s foremost collections of modern and contemporary art. We were told by the interesting securityguard/narrator/entertainer that the original collection, donated by the Gallery’s founder Sir Hugh Lane, has now grown to include almost 2000 artworks, ‘ranging from the Impressionist masterpieces of Manet, Monet, Renoir and Degas to works by leading national and international contemporary artists’.
One of the main attractions was/is the studio of Irish painter Francis Bacon which is housed at the gallery. A studio including a wild flavor of characters in different ways, it features the works of a praised genius.
We didn’t have the time (or patience) to work ourselves to the masses of paintings, but, apparently, the show features works by Andy Warhol, John Baldessari, Thomas Demand, Urs Fischer, Martin Kippenberger, Paul McCarthy, Bruce Nauman, Dieter Roth and Wolfgang Tillmans. In my (personal) opinion I thought it to be the best of both exhibition due to my Interest in the Painting Industry, but also, obviously secondary, due to the fact that it is absolutely free. Lzm
Bodies – Exhibition
BODIES
THE EXHIBITION
BODIES…The Exhibition showcases meticulously dissected real human body specimens that are preserved through an innovative process and respectfully presented, giving visitors the opportunity to view the beauty and complexity of their own organs and systems.
Reading that would normally make me salivate over the prospect of going to this wonderful sounding exhibition in town.
Which we did.
And it wasn’t as they claimed it would be.
Too small (took us less than half an hour), Too small (the building was smaller than my cousins flat…. but then again my cousin is a millionaire) and uh too small.
Also the 16 euro [where’s the euro sign?] was a little steep; Fact is that this isn’t a Irish band.
There were, however a couple of interesting stops in this fine establishments:
· We saw the complexity of veins and arteries in an admirable state in different body parts where I expected a higher or lesser quantity of those blood vessels to be.
· Interestingly enough (or should I say disgustingly enough?), we saw the embryo in its different sates preserved for us to lay our eyes on (and for some annoyingly moaning and sniggering siblings their hands or ingredients of their stomachs).
· Last but not least THE END of it. It was most enjoyable to be able to breathe in fresh air after spending a wasted half hour of my life in the world wide renowned exhibition of bodies in the ambassador, Dublin city centre. Hmm I think about suing them.
Lzm, 11/03/2009
