WindLight is Linden lab’s new environmental effects that make light, clouds and wind render more realistically. Here is a snapshot of the Anglia Island with sparkling water, bright light and clouds.
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The latest set of students to suffer enjoy the medium of Second Life are a doing a level 1 module ‘Introduction to Electronic Content Origination that is designed to introduce them to a variety of different techniques in the creation and manipulation of images, sound and video editing. The idea is to give first year students a basic grounding in a range of applications. Second Life is used as the focus for their assignment. Students in groups of 2 or 3 have to create a scene and provide the action for a short video clip shot using Machinima techniques in Second Life.
Below is an image that shows four separate backdrops for the video clips, one is a replica of the computing lab where students have taken photos of the PCs and applied these as textures to create a more realistic image. Another is a ‘Super Mario’ style side scrolling arcade game simulation. Other props relate to a space based narrative.
MML 08 at Anglia Ruskin Cambridge Campus
79 people signed in as attendees with registrations from the following Universities:
Aberystwyth, Anglia Ruskin, Bristol, Bolton, Coventry, Derby, Durham, East London, Greenwich, Hertfordshire, Keel, Kingston, Lancaster, Lampeter, Loughborough, Liverpool Hope, Manchester, Open University, Portsmouth, Roehampton, Salford, Sheffield Hallam, Sheffield, Southampton, Swansea, Ulster, West of England, West of Scotland (Paisley), Worcester.
Additionally there were some (at least 12 actively participating) virtual attendees with one virtual presenter from Labatte University in the US – sadly we didn’t manage to make effective contact with another virtual presenter. We even had two representatives from JISC helping out in the labs and a cast of many Anglia people who helped make the day go well.
We had live internet access in the Mumford, where we were presenting, wireless in the Helmore venue and online access via guest logins for 70 people. We had a rapidly updated web page with programme details and live streaming media for the virtual visitors of the presentations. We also replicated some of this information on a display board on the Anglia Ruskin Second Life Island where details were updated live via a database and web interface.
There were 12 demonstrations or practical sessions during two hours of ‘hands on’ participation. At one time there were at least 50 people online using Second Life simultaneously in the laboratories of Digital Sciences and Technology. We were blessed with a ‘good SL day’ and network bandwidth that was surprisingly good for such a high density of activity.
Video footage of speakers and a ‘photo montage’ are available on the INSPIRE website MML08 at Anglia
In SL there are many ways to create new things. In this exercise Austin was trying to make a voice operated cannon that would rotate and elevate when given appropriate instructions. The idea was to make this an interactive tool for demonstrating rotations, quaternions and vectors for students to play with. BUT even something as simple as adapting a standard Linden script and putting a few things together requires a little bit of concentration.
So for all you yet to experience this – don’t make an object ‘physical’ then decide that you want to move a part of it and so unlink it. What happens is that all the objects that were happily intersecting each other decide that they now need their own space – BANG! We found bits of cannon on the roof of the Anglia Ruskin Building 
.
The really sad bit is that he didn’t have an up to date copy before the explosion … sigh! Remember folks, there is no ctl-Z in Second Life
A group of students have been taking a Computing module called ‘ virtual world environment applications’ .They have had to create a ‘Quiz Bot’ in Second Life that gets its questions from a database held on a separate server via an internet connection. Here is a snapshot of one of the sessions on the Anglia Island as students demonstrate the Second Life part of their applications.
Although we’d be quick to agree that you don’t really need a building in Second Life (SL) there are a number of benefits that can be gained from suitable architecture even if it is not required to keep the rain off.
Construction is certainly easier than in Real Life (RL) but there is quite a bit of skill in creating a well balanced building from a limited pallet of primitives. The images below show snapshots of the construction – note the use of coloured prims to help identify what is being worked on.
Blu Sparkle was the principal designer with Sandry Logan doing much of the work and Austin Thatcher making the odd unhelpful comment. The idea was to use the main building to create a visual statement that had the look and feel of architecture found on Anglia Ruskin campus without slavish replication. We also wanted it indicate of the sort of information and activities that it would support – i.e. a welcome, reception and information resource for the both the Island and Anglia Ruskin University.
The back of the building shows the SL influence on design. It is largely transparent to make it easier for avatars to see what is going on inside – and for those inside to see what is going on outside in the Island. The build time for the construction was two days for Blu and Sandry which includes sourcing and constructing materials, applying and aligning textures for both the outside and inside.
Finally, the computer science department is more purely SL, as it is not based on a building at all, but on a coffee flask (illustrating that computing and coffee go together). This has semi transparent walls so that contents can be viewed from outside.
Following the successful HEA sponsored MML workshop in Paisley 2007 we are setting out another event this year on March 18th 2009.
At the HEA Massively Multi Learner workshop at Paisely in March 2007, we heard about the potential of these environments and saw examples their use. At this workshop we wish to build on the growing awareness MML and focus on how these environments are being used in practice.
We would like to hear from people who are using MML systems such as Second Life in classrooms, distance and blended learning situations.
The aim is to have workshop sessions in computing laboratories where attendees will participate in learning activities.
As well as the hands on sessions we would like to have presentations that disseminate good practice – providing ‘how to’ advice on learning issues.
Resources
We can provide up to four areas of between 10 and 20 machines running Second Life which will be able to run parallel sessions for participants and observers. We can use the Anglia Ruskin Island for some activities but we expect presenters to use and demonstrate in their own environments where possible. We may also be able to provide student helpers both in-world and in laboratories if necessary.
Although we can provide resources for Second Life we would be very interested in activities using other systems such as Croquet.
Workshop sessions should involve practical activities, although given the time constraints these may be a small part of the overall learning outcomes for the activity. Whilst we’d like to see you ‘in the flesh’ we are also interested in using the workshop itself as an example of the use of blended and virtual learning environments. So we are happy for remote and avatar led sessions. We will also provide streaming media for remote participation as well as remote presentations.
Proposals
We would like a brief statement of what you would like to present with an indication of the topic, resources you require, limits on numbers of participants and/or observers and the duration of the presentation. We will aim to deliver presentations within a half hour slot and workshops will be multiples of half hour slots up to a maximum of 90 minutes.
We will be happy to discuss potential presentations and workshop sessions – please send all correspondence with ‘MML08′ in the subject line to mike.hobbs@anglia.ac.uk
Time Table
Expression of interest – topic suggestions by the end of September Outline presentation – invitation and confirmation of presentation/workshop session by end of November. Technical and timing details to be worked out by end of Jan.
