Navta Associates

This was the best excuse yet to take my boys, ages 13 and 15, out of school for the last couple of periods in the day. We had the opportunity to watch the “best of the best” virtual worlds projects generated by this year’s crop of ETC students—an entertaining, mind-bending, stimulating array of “experiences”.

Here’s the “official” info:

On Wednesday, December 2, 2009 at Purnell Center’s Chosky Theater, we at the Entertainment Technology Center will present the annual Building Virtual Worlds Show. From virtual reality to audience interaction and everything imaginable in between, this live showcase of the most impressive student work from the semester is truly a must-see event!

Over the course of this semester, BVW students are collaborating in four-person interdisciplinary teams to create a series of virtual worlds, each of which must be completed within a one to three week time period. We look forward to sharing a variety of these worlds with you.

http://bvw.etc.cmu.edu/content/show

If you are not able to join us in Pittsburgh, please join us live on the web at 6pm December 2nd through our webcast:

To view the webcast, you will need a broadband internet connection, and

• For Windows computers, you will need Windows Media Player 9 or newer.
• For Macintosh OS X, Flip4Mac is recommended.
• GNU/Linux computers, VLC is recommended.

CMU website

“Leadership in education and research that combines technology and fine arts to create new processes, tools, and vision for storytelling and entertainment“

The “high concept” behind both the Entertainment Technology Center and the Masters in Entertainment Technology degree is that we are based on the principle of having technologists and non-technologists work together on projects that produce artifacts that are intended to entertain, inform, inspire, or otherwise affect an audience/guest/player/participant.  The masters degree is focused on extensive semester-long project courses.  This focus allows us to tackle the much larger challenge of effectively bringing together students and researchers from different disciplines.

This program at CMU is helping to spawn a cluster of gaming and interactive media companies in Pittsburgh. It’s an exciting time in the ‘burgh, as the steel mills have disappeared, various high-tech has grown in their place.