Projects
Theatron 3 - Educational undertakings in Second Life
**** The new Theatron website is now available: http://cms.cch.kcl.ac.uk/theatron/ *****
The Final project reports are also available:
Final report of the Theatron project
Appendices to the final report of the Theatron project - (Pedagogical project reports)
Introduction
The English Subject Centre and PALATINE the Dance, Drama & Music Subject Centre are collaborating on the educational component of an exciting new project in the 3D virtual world Second Life.
**Stop press**The project involves the importing of a range of pre-existing 3D theatre models into the Second life environment and supplementing these with existing and new interpretative content and a spectrum of original interactive tools, scenarios and automated tutorials, incorporating manipulable and customisable actors, props, sound effects, lighting and scenic technologies, streaming video and scripts enabling individual and group movement/choreography.
Take a video tour of aspects of the Theatron build in Second lifewith your host: Keith Pinkerton!
1. Outside the Theatre of Pompey
2. Details of the Pompey build
3. Flying around Pompey
4. Arriving at the Festspielhaus
5. Aspects of the Hellerau build
6. Quality and detail in Hellerau
Or you might like a flyby created by Mark Childs (Gann McGann)
The new scenarios to be developed and tested will allow a wide range of Higher Education subject areas – including but extending far beyond the performing arts – to take advantage of the social, collaborative and interactive aspects of this shared virtual environment.
We are joining a consortium of organisations to undertake the Theatron 3 Project of which the lead is being taken by the Visualisation Lab at King's College. The project has been funded by the Eduserv Foundation. Further details about the project extracted from the detailed project bid are available below as project background material.
Progress to date
Following agreement on the project plan with our external funders we put out a call for 'Expressions of Interest' from the relevant subject communities in late May 2007. We have now selected 5 projects to take forwards and an outline of these is contained on the following pages (see menu bar on the right). The Five projects selected are:
Project 1 - Seeing space: Exploring scenographic principles in Second Life
Project lead:
Paul Brownbill, University of Wolverhampton
Subject Centre contact:
Lisa Whistlecroft, PALATINE
Overview:
This project will allow students to experience, analyse and evaluate stage configurations that are tied to actual theatre buildings, giving them a greater opportunity to understand how the spaces work and the possibilities each space offers to the scenographer thus better informing their scenographic decisions.
Associated with the exploration of the spaces will be a research element in the form of a WebQuest that provides the students with the underpinning knowledge, both in terms of theatre history and design.
With the results of their virtual exploration and WebQuest, students will select a theatre space from the collection and design for an appropriate text that is either historically accurate for the chosen space or subverts that convention by designing a contemporary performance environment in an historical theatre building.
Project 2 - Integrating film technologies into Second Life
Project lead:
Joff Chafer, University of Coventry
Subject Centre contact:
Lisa Whistlecroft, PALATINE
Overview:
The project will provide several theatres for students to explore in order to get a sense of space, with or without tour guides, and will allow students to explore how stage machinery and set design have developed over the centuries. It will also explore ways of integrating live and virtual performance, for example by creating animations for avatars to react with real life performers in real time using back projection, or finding ways of using multiple projectors to explore the virtual spaces at a more human scale rather than on a computer screen.
Project 3 - 'The fools' zanni': exploring prominent characteristics of the Commedia dell'arte
Project lead:
Gordon Duffy-McGhie, Middlesbrough College
Subject Centre contact:
Lisa Whistlecroft, PALATINE
Overview:
This project aims to facilitate learners’ exploration of the link between theoretical knowledge and practical understanding of the Commedia dell’ Arte. It will utilise the unique opportunities a virtual medieval open-air stage will present, in order to allow learners, of all abilities, the opportunity to recreate the distinctive staging devices and techniques of the commedia troupes.
Project 4 - Virtual Poiesis: The New Creative Pedagogy of Second Life
Project lead:
Chris Wigginton, Northumbria University
Subject Centre contact:
English, Brett Lucas
Overview:
This project will consider and exploit Second Life as a location for the teaching of interdisciplinary work across literature, writing, performance and media. In so doing it will focus on the creation of new texts which, rather than mimicking or recreating historic and textual mediations of ‘real life’, respond to and emerge from direct engagements with SLEUTH’s 15 new virtual theatre environments. Accordingly, rather than rehearsing campus based and led teaching methods, the project will investigate the potential of these environments as spaces for new pedagogic developments.
Project 5 - ‘Insubstantial Pageants’: learning about Renaissance drama in Second Life
Project lead:
Gweno Williams, York St John University
Subject Centre contact:
English, Brett Lucas
Overview:
This project will invite Level 2 and Level 3 undergraduates studying Renaissance drama on English and Theatre degree programmes to customise and develop two contrasting theatre spaces, within which they will direct and ‘perform’ scenes from up to four contrasting Renaissance plays in different genres, which they are currently studying. Every effort will be made to include both comedy and tragedy and to explore comparatively either indoor/outdoor theatre spaces or period/contemporary production, depending on availability.
Second life Theatron 3 location
Here is the Second Life URL (SLURL) for the visitors arrival area on Theatron Island (The viewing Platform):
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Theatron/13/10/52
As we are currently doing a lot of construction on the island so you may, at times, be unable to access the Theatron land. Please be patient and try again later!
Project Background
In 2002 a six-partner international consortium, led by Professor Richard Beacham, completed and launched the Theatron project, funded under the EU Telematics in Education, Training, and Research Programme . This online interactive educational module comprised digital 3D models of 19 milestones in European theatre design: the Bayreuther Festspielhaus, Drottningholm Palace Theatre, Drury Lane, Epidaurus, Globe Theatre, Greek Temporary Stages, Hellerau Festspielhaus, Medieval ecclesiastical drama settings, Medieval pageant stages, Odeon of Agrippa, Odeon of Pericles, Roman Temporary Stages, Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz (Berlin), Teatro Farnese, Teatro Olimpico, Teatro Sabbionetta, Théâtre du Vieux-Colombier, Theatre of Dionysus, and the Theatre of Pompey.
Each was meticulously researched by subject experts, modelled following rigorous standards of architectural and archaeological accuracy, and contextualised with a vast array of graphic and textual materials. Each site was represented by both a simple, real-time navigable model and a collection of pre-rendered images and animations of highly detailed models.
Users can study the critical analyses of the spaces provided, but can also independently assess the evidence on which the 3D reconstructions are based (letters, critical descriptions, architectural texts, sketches, drawings and paintings etc.). The application was unprecedented as an ICT learning tool for higher education, and widely acclaimed, winning a 21st-century achievement award as Laureate in the Computerworld Honors Program and was the subject of several case studies in the EU Digicult Technology Watch Reports.
Theatron 3 will transform this content, and additional content since created by KVL, into an extensive, content-rich range of research-based virtual environments in Second Life, generating highly innovative, interactive teaching and learning resources designed to take full advantage of the pedagogical potential of the environment.
Project objectives
The project will produce a set of complex virtual spaces, free at point of use for Higher Education, capitalising on the existing assets of Theatron and newer assets. The development of a customised open source Second Life client (which is now possible) will allow real-time navigation to be combined with high graphical quality. The 3D models will be supplemented by existing and new interpretative content and a spectrum of original interactive tools, scenarios and automated tutorials, incorporating manipulable and customisable actors, props, sound effects, lighting and scenic technologies, streaming video and scripts enabling individual and group movement/choreography. The new scenarios to be developed and tested will allow a wide range of Higher Education subject areas – including but extending far beyond the performing arts – to take advantage of the social, collaborative and interactive aspects of this shared virtual environment. Leveraging existing assets worth an estimated €1.2m and the KVL team’s expertise acquired through developing the Theatron Module and related projects, this programme of applied research into effective e-learning in shared virtual environments, together with its digital outcomes, will mark a significant advance in both the sophistication and scale of deployments of shared virtual environments in Higher Education, nationally and internationally.
Methodology
Over 24 months, King’s Visualisation Lab will be responsible for overall project direction and management, content provision, quality assurance for architectural modelling and pedagogical resources, and will intensively collaborate with other partners to design educational scenarios. With colleagues in King’s Digital Consultancy Services , KVL will develop non-profit economic models to secure the long-term sustainability of the digital resources, while safeguarding the principle that access should be free at point of use.
David Kaskel, Managing Director and CEO of Languagelab.com, a pioneering Second Life-based language school, will be responsible for coordinating in-world modelling and scripting and for the collaborative development of educational scenarios. Over the past 18 months, with a start-up investment now approaching £250,000, Kaskel has directed the building of a highly sophisticated virtual city in Second Life, populated by qualified and experienced language tutors, and containing inventive teaching and learning materials, interactive tutorials and scenarios designed fully to exploit the possibilities offered by the Second Life environment.
Kaskel will oversee the building and scripting. He will work with plan and test pedagogical resources in consultation with the project’s Pedagogical Advisory Group (PAG, which will comprise Beacham, Denard, Baker, Blazeby, Kaskel, Whistlecroft, Lucas and 5 small-project directors) to determine the pedagogic goals and how best to achieve them within Second Life. He will also serve as the point of contact between the SL modellers and KVL, ensuring good information and feedback flow is maintained. He will manage the development of the new product on a modular, site-by-site basis, so that technical and pedagogical test results from sites completed early in the project lifecycle can rapidly inform the development of later sites.
Several small teams (2-3 people) will model a set of theatres (2- 5 depending on their complexity). Of that team at least one person will specialize in textures and another in building, the latter an architect. Prior to building all textures will be transferred and the floor plans will be laid out. There will also be at least one meeting with the content specialist to discuss how the built structure will be used. The initial construction of each theatre will take an estimated 60 man hours. After the initial modelling is complete it will be reviewed by the content specialists (Prof. Beacham and Dr. Denard), who will produce a punch list of required changes. There will then be an additional estimated 20-30 hours of refinement.
Concurrent with the above work Kaskel will meet with PAG and at least one scripter and animator to explore teaching tools as well as customized content such as animations, voice recording, and machinima. This process will be iterative, with each site incrementally conceptually refined, a prototype developed, and deployed for testing.
Relevant links
- On the 20th September, 2007 Hugh Denard presented an update on the Theatron Project at an Eduserv meeting in London. You can listen to his podcast now..(and imagine the visuals!!)
- Second life education wiki
- You Tube video: Seriously Engaging : The New Media Consortium in Second Life
- You tube video: Ohio University Second Life campus
- Eduserv in Second Life
- King's Visualisation Lab
- 101 uses for Second Life in the College classroom (PDF)
- July 2007 “snapshot” of UK Higher and Further Education Developments in Second Life (Eduserv foundation report) (PDF)
Getting started in Second life
Below are a series of useful video tutorials for those wanting to get started in Second life (courtesy of http://pacificrimx.wordpress.com/)
- Sculpted Prims Demo - 2:44 mins
- How to make a Sculpted Apple - 5:04 mins (Torley)
- How to use gestures - 9:47 mins (Torley)
- How to manage your inventory - 12:25 mins (Torley)
- How to use HUD’s - 9:46 mins (Torley)
- How to change your appearance - 9:19 mins (Torley)
- How to open and sell boxes - 5:36 mins (Torley)
- How to use the building grid - 9:51 mins (Torley)
- How to fill in your profile - 14:51 mins (Torley)
- How to send and create a notecard - 4:58 mins (Torley)
- How to use Undo - 4:51 mins (Torley)
- How to make a flag that waves in the wind - 8:29 mins (Torley)
- How to make tiny prims - 8:35 mins (Torley)
Other English Subject Centre funded 3D / Animation projects
- Virtual Reality Literary Magazine
- New Tools for Creative Interpretation: An Investigative Study using Digital Video and Computer Animation
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