Self Evaluation of the past 9 months

 thought my ambitions had changed so much in the 3 years on this course, from exploring 2D animation, VR, 3D animation, but no. these 3 years have just made me realise that what I do and like to do, is tell stories. Ive just been exploring new ways of telling them..

Throughout my 2nd year I spent PPP researching VR and now in the past 9 months I have started acting on this research, forming my own opinions about this medium, voicing them and becoming active within the VR industry.

If I was going to sum up the past 9 months in a sentence it would be: ‘hey I don’t really know how to do that but il do it anyway and see how it goes’

but its from this going out my comfort zone that I’ve grown in confidence, widened my skillset and had a bloody exciting year.

So, at leeds young film festival this year I curated the whole of the VR thread for the festival…

Learning on the job actually ended up working out fantastic, and now I do know all about events management, being on the inside and seeing how a festival of such scale is run, it was fantastic! I reached out to companies for content such as the BBC, dealt with licencing for the first time, dealt with the hire of the equipment and it’s set up, and floor plans, endless meetings endless email chains, CC’s everywhere.. So time consuming but worth everything. I recommend it as experience to any of you.

Ive made some fantastic VR contacts exposure on social media through this.

And it has really changed my ambitions regarding VR and it being used in education. So many teachers came up to me saying you should take this round schools we would happily pay you! Which got me thinking about a new business venture… Why would I not want to inspire the next gen with this powerful tool!

I have been making effort to pursue this ambition by attending Edtech events like this one at Leeds digi fest.

As part of Leeds International Film festival I hosted a 360 workshop , this came about because I was in the middle of curating the VR Zone, and yet again, didn’t really know what I was doing…

I hadn’t actually delved into 360 film before! Yet was due to host a workshop, as part of a festival… 

So yet again, didn’t know what I was doing but did it anyway!

I had VR knowledge but not live action VR film knowledge as Ive only ever dealt with 3D animation and VR. Watched some youtube videos, took time to plan the schedule of the workshop then that was it!

But I did it and it went fantastic! I posted about it and got noticed from a local company in Leeds to do VR stuff. Who I am still doing freelance work for at the minute. My most recent project with them is a VR hazard detection app for Gear VR! Great fun working on real live briefs. Im also yet again learning on the job, I'm still a newbie when it comes to Unity so for this job I've had to put in a lot of hours into learning this software, its been stressful working on the project on my own with real client deadlines, but brilliant. Here is a picture from when we took the app to the workplace last week..

It was this job that introduced me to the world of business and tax!

Business? Don’t know what that is, but il have a go at it anyway.

So yeah Im now set up as a sole trader with an accountant. This was the start of my freelancing journey!

Twitter has been fantastic and the main place I have been contacted by companies to demo and talk at events and festivals. From doing Inktober in VR, I gained a lot of notice and 400 followers within that month. Following the current trend of VR and VR art has been great for exposure. At manchester science festival I met a VR team in Leeds who already knew me by my twitter logo, which really shocked me and was the moment I sort of realised about the impact of exposure. I have depleted my pack of 250 business cards at various events and festivals around the UK. 

Since last year I have been working on my confidence, and thought the best way to become a more confident speaker was to go round events and start public speaking. And from the panel talk I took part in last year I realised what fantastic exposure it is, and its weird having people approach you rather than the other way around. On top of that I really enjoy it, its an adrenaline rush and imbues this ambition to do it more and spread the potential of VR at events! 

I was so nervous because I was the only person speaking who wasn’t from a well-known company, I seem to have found myself in these situations quite a bit people think im more than I am, seeing everyone with fancy banners. I felt so out of place but after the initial …what the heck am I doing here.. I suddenly found this confidence through the passion in what I was talking about and realised that that is key for me speaking confidently! I soon forgot that there were 70 people watching me, the passion sort of drives you through.

When I have shown my showreel to industry people I usually get the comment, are you in game or in film? Like I have to specialise in one of the other, this worried me as I like them just the same and can see myself dipping in and out of both which is why I’ve probably found a fondness for VR so much as this does collide the two. But then I went for my interview at Sumo Digital, where I was speaking to industry professionals who have worked in games for years but beforehand worked in TV and film? Which really showed me everyone is different everyone finds their different ways into the industry and some go through different paths of specialisation in the process. It’s still good talking to people and finding out their industry journey but this will not necessarily be yours, everyone's different.

This freelance work I am being approached for is all VR based, even though I have been selling myself as an animator too. Which shows there is a demand for VR content, which I am happy about! Which made me adjust my ambition for VR, promote the fact im a VR artist and creator more on social media. After University I will continue freelancing with these fantastic companies seeing where it takes me… Hopefully getting involved with more of the theatre world of VR too, VR performances, live painting… But these are small companies I am freelancing for.. I want that bigger company on my CV my ultimate goal is a career in a big UK studio, games or film, VR or animation. That’s my ambition.

In conclusion, these 9 months have been monumental, I have learnt so much about the industry and who I want to be in industry.. And have changed a lot in the process.. I have made mistakes, and learnt from them and become a better person as a result.

But I still look silly in VR..

First VR VR conference!

Using the VR social media platform Altspace, I had the brilliant opportunity of attending a VR venture fund meetup. The first one of its kind!

I couldn't get over what a fantastic idea this was as it means people from all over the world can join in on a conference usually limited to the US. I really hope they do more of these events.

It was really interesting seeing what all the pitches had to offer, some fantastic ideas and start-ups powered by fantastic women, about to flourish in the VR world.

Study Task - Position

Specialised VR/3D Animation reel 2018:

VR ARTIST SHOWREEL:

Study Task- Research

Presentation:





Updated LinkedIn

Only 54 connections so far but every day I will aim to connect with a wide variety of people to broaden my network, like I have done effectively with my Twitter. In the space of a couple months I have gone from 16 followers to 401.

I have created a title card, the same one from my Twitter to link the two effectively, giving myself that memorable branding. I have decided to use a personal picture instead of my logo:

However unlike my Twitter I have decided to use a personal profile pic instead of my logo, this is because I want people to be able to identify me in networking events. In my Twitter I like my logo better as its more memorable. A practitioner I was speaking too actually recognised my logo from Twitter... My branding has taken a colour tied with black and white, aesthetic.. this is reflected in both my linked in and Twitter accounts.

On Twitter I have pinned by showreel to my page, so new followers can instantly get an insight into my practice. I have also utilised hashtags in my bio to attract attention for my VR.

Freelancing!

With more and more self-employment opportunities coming up, its becoming more and more evident I need to get the business ball rolling...

Ready for the world of freelance!

Its official. I have set myself up as a Sole Trader.

I went through the .Gov process and have got an accountant on hand to help with self assessment returns.. Which is a worry of my mind!

It has involved a lot of time looking and researching about the world of tax and business.. Taken from an already heptic schedule of Uni and work. But I have organised my time effectively to accomodate this as its important and my future...

I have decided to be branded just by my name. As a lot of businesses have been reaching out via twitter, so my name is how I am known so I thought to best stick with that for discoverability and exposure rather than hiding behind a brand...

It has been an exciting process so far freelancing, working on real live briefs for clients. Most of my work so far has been VR based rather than animation, which is great as it shows people are wanting VR content, there is potential within my industry specialism! Which is a great thing to learn before you properly enter the industry.

VR Zone co curator and supervisor - Leeds Young Film Festival

I had the amazing opportunity this year to curate the VR Zone for the UKs largest family friendly film festival! After loving volunteering last year, I was so excited to be put with this role for 2018!

Through co-curation I helped organise the content of the VR Zone, the experiences we had, the headsets, everything. From hire, to reaching out to companies such as the BBC asking for content. This was a huge step for me, and an unfamiliar one, which I loved! I have learnt so many valuable skills from this role in events organisation. Being ontop of email threads, the world of CCs, previously unchartered territory now a daily endeavour. 

I curated a range of experiences, both educational and entertaining!

Our experiences section included:

Coco vr

Fantastic Beasts

Alumette

Wonderful You

Apollo 11

Queen Vic - BBC

Suitable for a range of ages of children and adult.

We also had 2 X Tilt Brush and Blocks set ups, with a Google Expeditions and Cardboard Drop in. As well as Leeds University hosting a VR Drop-in with a PSVR, such a brilliant connection we made with them.

Heres a tutorial I made for the volunteers to learn how to use Blocks and Tilt Brush:

I even created/illustrated a VR Onboarding guide for the volunteers:

Posted on social media:

What a range of VR!

Here are the floor plans I created of the zone:

The Zone was such a success, it was so busy! Non stop footfall throughout Easter weekend. Making us eager for expansion next year. Friday had a stressful beginning getting used to the process, but from midday it went fantastic, once we all had a routine. 

Tech didnt fully behave, but it was easily sortable with no ones experiences ruined, which is always fantastic with VR!

The volunteers which I trained up everyday were amazing, couldn't have hoped for anyone better! For them to learn a whole new piece of technology, and have the confidence to onboard children into it and have the knowledge to look after them whilst in it, is so amazing and they did great.

I even made a VR experience out of the best Tilt Brush/Blocks works:

All the childrens' works can be viewed here:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/cdbDucQakKM8mHxK2

4 Sparks Campaign

Through my work at the film festival, I got put forward to be a face of this exciting new campaign. A campaign to bring Channel 4 to the leeds region.

I am very passionate about this area, Channel 4 coming to leeds would bring wealth, innovation and more culture to Leeds.

It was great to take part in a campaign against so many talented creatives in the industry.. In a way I stood out as I'm not in the industry yet like everyone else in the shoot was.. But it was great to stand amongst them, make contacts and get some exposure, representing Leeds Film.

Media coverage: 

https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/news/bringing-channel-4-to-leeds-will-spark-a-creative-revolution-young-yorkshire-stars-back-campaign-1-8807555

Rise & Design - Applications of VR

I attended an event In Bradford all about applications of VR.

Speakers included:

https://www.virtualresolution.co.uk

Based near Halifax, Virtual Resolution are one of the UKs largest 3D animation studios. Their clients include football clubs, hotels, retail, residential and academia. Matthew will give us an insight into the power of Virtual Reality to bring projects to life, particularly those that are still at the development or design stage, giving stakeholders and clients a vision of the future.



Shannon Harvey, Production Park

http://productionpark.co.uk

Shannon will tell us about the work flows developed at Production Park for pre-visualisation of Live shows and events, including discussion of AR/VR headset and handset applications. She'll also tell us about recent development of immerse spaces for interactive VR experience without glasses for groups and “social immersion”.



Shaun Allan, Chief XR Officer, hedgehog lab

www.hedgehoglab.com

Shaun has a background in games design and has been working in the field of 3D and virtual reality for over twenty years. This masterclass will give an overview of the current technology and capability, as well as a look
into the future of this ever changing world.



Paul Forster, Peel Interactive

www.peelinteractive.co.uk

Their work encompasses immersive 3D experiences, films and animation, interactive games, and augmented / virtual reality for clients as varied as Alnwick Garden, Marella Cruises, Drax Power Station and the RSPB.
Paul will give us an insight into the creative process, and the challenges of bringing such varied experiences to life.

A fantastic mix of work! I really liked the exploration into interactive CAVE projection systems by a couple of the speakers. It was great to meet and make some exciting new contacts.

Coop Innovations at VMC

At the Visual Media Conference in Leeds I really enjoyed exhibiting VR for a fantastic local VR company, cooperative innovations.

For a day at the conference I was immersing a range of professionals into a beta version of the cooperative RPG VR game Raiders of Erda.

It was a fantastic day representing a brilliant company! Lots of people came to play and love being immersed in the world of Erda for a day.

Speaker - Northern Media Summit 2018

It was so thrilling to speak at the northern media summit last week!

Public speaking is something I have been wanting to elaborate on, its a great way of getting yourself out there and people approaching you for a change. I'm not a very confident person at heart, so by putting myself forward to these events I feel it has helped me grow, become more confident as an individual, which is what I wanted to achieve. The more and more of these I do the better I become. Yes, I was not as confident as everyone else speaking there, but it was my first time doing something properly like this, besides a panel last year. I still had to browse notes on my phone whereas everyone else was noteless, but the more I do, the more confidence I get, soon I hope to talk without notes, and not get that sudden brain blur!

I presented about my VR projects, my research into VR psychology, my VR art, VR curation at LYFF and VR storytelling.  

After the event it was great to network and talk to other media creatives and powerhouses of the north, and get a lot of compliments on my VR work.

I met a fantastic woman called Shelley Langan who posted this about me on medium:

"Rosie Summers, VR freelancer, spoke passionately to the Leeds audience about her VR study findings, where 100% of the participants said they left the experience feeling an emotion was elicited. Rosie was a powerhouse of enthusiasm, and really hit home the point that engaging with VR technology can help communicate depth in any story you wish to tell. (As an aside: she also paints in 3D live…unreal!)"

https://t.co/KDu9O8EF2h

Hosting VR @ Leeds Digi Fest

It has been a particular passion of mine, bringing VR into the classroom, ever since its popularity at Leeds Young Film Festival.

So, I hosted VR at 'Edtech in the classroom', an event part of Leeds Digital Festival. It was great boasting of VR's educational potential at this meetup to a range of teachers. But also networking with a range of teachers from a range of schools in the Leeds area.

I demo'ed the creative potential of VR through my work as a VR artist. It was great giving people a go at creating art themselves.

It was most peoples first times in VR and I love giving people new experiences into the virtual realm. I got interest from a lot of teachers and companies also dealing with the edtech realm.

Pathways 2018

I enjoyed attending Pathways 2018 at SHU.

A variety of speakers covering a range of creative media pathways.

I really enjoyed the Sumo Digital talk from Jim Woods and of course a talk from Epiphany VR.

I really loved Epiphany VR's emphasis on theatre in VR, something I am really interested in. I look forward to possibly collaborating in the future as a VR Tilt Brush artist.

https://www.epiphanyvr.co.uk/

VR Arts Lab 3

Another fantastic VR Lab!!

the 3rd installment of this fantastic lab. 3 days of virtual creativity!

Here is our group video:

Unfortunately our group had a lot of set backs with both illnesses and lack of coding expertise. But we managed to still make something..

This lab had a focus on women. Inspirational and pioneering women. With the brief to create something highlighting the inspirational work of these female individuals.

Luca playing through our experience...

Our team was called 'suffrajitsu' as we had the brief of creating a VR experience surrounding the work of the Suffragettes and how they changed society.

Our experience started by being faced with a ballot box, but unable to vote. Then images and scenes of the suffragettes' struggles come towards you like a conveyor belt one by one. After you have gone through the whole timeline, your faced with the ballot box again, but this time able to vote.

It was fantastic working with a team of brilliant and like-minded VR enthusiasts, we had a good mix in our team but it was unfortunate we had illness drop-outs and access to technology was a struggle to us. We made a great working prototype.

PDF of our process:

VR Manchester - VR Quiz

This was a great night, nerding out with my VR pals at a VR pub quiz.

It was great catching up with everyone, meeting some new VR folk. But most of all it was fantastic winning the quiz!

We had a fantastic knowledge of VR between us, but it was pretty close between our team and another team.

Whats even better is that we won some free VR games, which I cant wait to try out.

Manimation - Nov 16th

Manimation has been AMAZING. I have got sooo much out of today and it has been most enjoyable. I have been funded too attend via Leeds Film in prep for co-ordinating the VR Zone next year, and it has been most valuable for that.

It was great talking too companies such as Sumo Digital, Brown Bag, Studio Liddell, Factory, CHF entertainment, Silo games, Arcus studios, Flipbook and Mikinnon and Saunders, especially in the 1 to 1 session at the end of the day, like an interview session.. Throughout the day, meeting the head of VR at Studio Liddell was also very enjoyable and having a go on their Rift.

The VR talk was great, if not a little short, with some great considerations of the future of the medium too. It was fantastic meeting Alison Norrington from Story Central too, who is eager too help with some workshops come LYFF next year.

VR Arts Lab - 17th-19th Nov

Bring on round 2 of the lab!

Day 1.
It was very exciting to arrive back in the Shed, ready for some VR making.. The brief was set, to create a storytelling VR experience influenced by Ready Player 1. (one way or another) This day was all about idea generation and narrative stimulation, and really considering what makes good and bad VR. I even did a presentation of my 31 days in VR for Inktober. Our team this time is very balanced, a perfect and even match of skills. It took us a while to finalize on an idea and make everyone happy and passionate but we finally got there!

Day 2.
With the foundations of our idea established it was time to create. Our idea, inspired by chapter 19 of Ready Player 1, explored a room where a person lays motionless within their dirty, unkempt apartment. The narrative is one encouraging discovery. The spectator is the author of the narrative, by exploring the environment you uncover pieces of the narrative surrounding this person, why they have abandoned the real and who they are. If you go close to the person, you can actually take off their headset and from lifting too your eyes, you see the world they are viewing, which is infact new memories. This motionless individual is plugged into a software called 'Replay' a software that lets you 'replay' your memories and in doing so, change them. From this we piece even more of a narrative together from this person... I feel our narrative idea really targets what VR storytelling is all about and is tailored very well for it

My part in the production process is the 3D creation of environmental assets, and UV mapping and texturing, ready too export to Unity.

Day 3
Production continues, assets are combined and full interactivity added. We had a little complication getting my materials across from the FBX files but I soon resolved that. I also created our teams production diary video, as well as the stitching of the 360 video memory experience.