Second Life Memory

Project Description:

Course: Introduction to New Media GRA121

Each student submitted a proposal for how they would build an environment in Second Life which is based on an early personal memory they had. Using modular building components, the students then constructed a well-crafted and complex environment which utilizes the free-form mechanics of Second Life. All components were constructed from scratch, using only primatives developed by the individual student.

The key features of this project were twofold. First, students were to identify simple modules which they would carefully craft and then reuse throughout their project. Second, was a unique use of the Second Life environment to execute their projects. Students were to create a "dream-like" environment which could not be built in real life; their world should be expressively virtual in its nature, purpose and function. This behavior of a virtual environment was key to class discussions on how the "computer layer" impacts the "cultural layer".

Students were to keep in mind the teachings of Marshall McLuhan's "Medium is the Message" while building their project. Following the 5 layers of user-experience design discussed in class readings, students determined what the message of their environment is and how to guide people to experience it.

This project is from an introductory course, comprised of freshman and some sophomore level students.

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Damian Accident 1

This student's earliest memory was of a car wreck as a child. While proposing his project in class, there was a discussion as to ways which he could design his environment to emphasize some of the new media characteristics of the Second Life building experience. Damian decided that he would over-dramatize his experience as is often characteristic of a game environment, and build a frozen moment in time of a car crashing off a high bridge. Further, by creating a moment frozen in time, it subverts the animated virtual world behavior of Second Life.

This image is a simple view looking from above the vehicle crash.

Damian Accident 2

This student's earliest memory was of a car wreck as a child. While proposing his project in class, there was a discussion as to ways which he could design his environment to emphasize some of the new media characteristics of the Second Life building experience. Damian decided that he would over-dramatize his experience as is often the characteristic of a game environment, and build a frozen moment in time of a car crashing off a high bridge. Further, by creating a moment frozen in time, it subverts the animated virtual world behavior of Second Life.

The bridge was built at a dramatic height.

Shaun Computer 1

"Representation of a huge part of my past. I was trying to convey how small we are in the world of computers and how complex computers are. I feel we take for granted what computers do for us and how complex they really are."

All components were textured with images taken of the student's original Apple IIe.

Shaun Computer 2

This internal image shows how the student chose to complicate the internal body with simple modules.

Victoria Gameboy (outside)

This student's earliest memory was of her fifth birthday when she received a Nintendo Gameboy as a present. She designed a massive Gameboy structure as the vessel for holding an archetypal child's birthday environment. In order to enter the interior, avatars flew through the green screen. The interior was built to a scale larger than avatar size, to elicit the feeling of children at an adult size table.