In a collaboration between the College of Arts and Letters and an acting course on Michigan State’s campus, I worked to help students learn how to capture the essence of a character when in a motion capture suit. This was a very exciting and educational experience for both the dancers and my team, as working with the capabilities of the motion capture suits forced the tech team to work alongside the actors to create fluid movements and fitting atmospheres. In the next coming weeks, we plan to work with the actors to “act against themselves”, prerecording themselves as a creature to later insert into a scene using Augmented Reality programming so they can act with themselves.

Faced with an accessibility flag, a professor reached out to the accessibility team in which I worked. Reviewing her course, we identified crucial pain points to her teachings and access to resources when it came to designing her course. Realizing an important conversation about accessibility and learning goals presented itself, we formed a small team to talk at the Accessibility Learning Conference as a keynote speaker. This was an important project, as many crucial conversations occurred when forming this team to make it feel like a safe space for those involved to have a deep conversation about topics that are oftentimes left unmentioned. Our talks explored what a graphic design class would look like for the visually impaired, focusing on the intended meaning of content on learning platforms and how to communicate that to students.