Week 24: constructive feedback

The fact that there have only been two formal teaching sessions a week made me feel a little disconected from the course as a whole, and although I have been going into the lab most days to work on my projects it's not as effective as having tutors there to help. The hardest part of the course for me has been working with 3D studio max. Having never used this software before I was really thrown into the deep end when we were asked to create all these high spec models without any clue how the software worked at all. And the size of our class meant that one to one time with the tutor was limited to the odd five minutes here and there, and figuring out how to do things was a case of trial by error. I would like more in depth tutorials on how to use max next term and more formal taught sessions during the week.

I really struggled with getting the blogs done every week, I think they're a really good idea because I dont think I could handle doing essay's, but it's been easy to push them aside because there's no direct or imediate feedback you get after completing them. I think we should get feedback for them perhaps a couple of times every term to make sure we're getting them done and that they're being done to the required standard.

Having guest lecturers who actually worked on games was really cool and gave an indication of what we sould expect if we ever get into the industry, but understandably they were a little thin on the ground. I dont mind lectures because its just a case of sitting back and absorbing information without having to do any hands on work, so I would have liked more even if they were just based on aspects of video game culture or case studys of successful art direction in games.

The drawing classes on the other hand have been the most effective part of the course for me. I started off thinking they were just going to be a repeat of what I had already learnt on my art foundation course and so didnt take them too seriously, but Chris has really pushed us and encouraged us to work in a more advanced way. The amount of critiques and informal assessments were a little daunting for me but I understant thet they are beneficial in the long run. I'm looking forward to doing more 3D work next term, and more work outside the studio. Some sessions using Photoshop would be really helpful for me as well, also an extra drawing class every week would be fine by me.