Design And Content Creation

Features a compilation of the best articles from GameDev.net on game design and content creation. Features invaluable information and ideas for anyone who wants to learn how to shape a great game idea into an actual functioning and fun game. You'll learn game design mechanics, benefit from invaluable professional insights into successful game creation, discover how to make good game art even if you're not an artist, and even explore the tools and techniques that make for awesome game audio. All articles have been updated to comply with the latest technology.

With digital content published across more channels than ever before, how can you make yours easy to find, use, and share? Is your content ready for the next wave of content platforms and devices? In Designing Connected Content, Mike Atherton and Carrie Hane share an end-to-end process for building a structured content framework. They show you how to research and model your subject area based on a shared understanding of the important concepts, and how to plan and design interfaces for mobile, desktop, voice, and beyond. You will learn to reuse and remix your valuable content assets to meet the needs of today and the opportunities of tomorrow. Discover a design method that starts with content, not pixels. Master the interplay of content strategy, content design, and content management as you bring your product team closer together and encourage them to think content first. Learn how to Model your content and its underlying subject domain Design digital products that scale without getting messy Bring a cross-functional team together to create content that can be efficiently managed and effectively delivered Create a framework for tackling content overload, a multitude of devices, constantly changing design trends, and siloed content creation

Making learning and development (L&D) content inclusive and accessible for everyone is not only a good thing to do, it's the right thing to do. Designing Accessible Learning Content provides evidence-based advice on designing digital learning content that ensures all learners are included and are therefore able to perform to their full potential. This is a practical guide on accessibility for anyone involved in the design, creation, development or testing of online learning content. It provides detailed guidance on how to meet the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines making it essential reading for L&D professionals, instructional designers and course developers who need to comply with legal accessibility requirements. Using the author's 'eLearning Accessibility Framework', Designing Accessible Learning Content demystifies sometimes complex technical accessibility standards and provides an easy to follow contextual framework uniquely designed for learning content created using any authoring tool. This book also demonstrates how creating accessible learning content can improve usability and provide the best possible learning experience for everyone. In addition, it offers essential background information such as a focus on disability, an overview of assistive technology and an exploration of the case for digital accessibility. This guarantees that L&D professionals have the vital background knowledge they need to make sense of accessibility before they begin practically applying the principles. With online checklists, learner case studies, and industry perspectives, Designing Accessible Learning Content is an essential handbook for all L&D professionals seeking to harness the benefits of accessibility in order to improve their learning content for everyone.

Enrich your virtual existence by mastering the techniques and tactics the experts use to create jaw-dropping SL content—everything from buildings and vehicles to clothing, landscapes, and animations. This official, exclusive guide from a team of Second Life content-creation experts was written with the full support of Linden Lab and features in-depth instructions for creating beautiful content and putting it to work in-world. It’s both a practical, step-by-step guide and a creative session with some of the most artistic and talented minds in the Second Life community. CD included.

Good content isn’t magical—it’s thoughtful, creative, and well researched words put together with finesse. In Strategic Content Design, you’ll learn how to create effective content, using hard-won research methods, best practices, and proven tips for conducting quantitative and qualitative content-focused research and testing. “This is me, shouting from the rooftops: Strategic Content Design belongs in the hands of absolutely anyone who cares about content in UX—by which I mean EVERYONE.” —Kristina Halvorson, CEO and Founder, Brain Traffic Who Should Read This Book? Content professionals of all types—copywriters, strategists, designers, managers, operations managers, and leaders of content people. It’s also useful if you’re part of a user experience or product team, including UX writers, researchers, and software developers. Takeaways Realistically assess the current state of your content. Learn how to write content research questions. Create a content research study and evaluate your content’s effectiveness. Identify which specific words or content elements to test. Determine which research methods and tools are ideal for your team’s content research needs. Elevate the role of content design in your company, proving that content is key to creating an outstanding customer experience—and improving your bottom line. Create a content research roadmap. Learn from professional content people in case studies that highlight practical examples.

This book teaches you all you need to know to create effective web sites for businesses of all sizes. It’s packed with useful tips and practical examples. First you are taken through the planning stage, including overall site structure, grouping content, using content and language effectively, and planning for accessibility. Next, you are shown how to effectively design the different parts of your site as well as how to add specialized improvements, including feedback forms and search functionality. The examples focus largely on CSS and HTML, but the principles are applicable to any site and some useful Flash examples are also provided.

The very word "digital" has acquired a status that far exceeds its humble dictionary definition. Even the prefix digital, when associ ated with familiar sectors such as radio, television, photography and telecommunications, has reinvented these industries, and provided a unique opportunity to refresh them with new start-up companies, equipment, personnel, training and working practices - all of which are vital to modern national and international economies. The last century was a period in which new media stimulated new job opportunities, and in many cases created totally new sectors: video competed with film, CDs transformed LPs, and computer graphics threatened traditional graphic design sectors. Today, even the need for a physical medium is in question. The virtual digital domain allows the capture, processing, transmission, storage, retrieval and display of text, images, audio and animation without familiar materials such as paper, celluloid, magnetic tape and plastic. But moving from these media to the digital domain intro duces all sorts of problems, such as the conversion of analog archives, multimedia databases, content-based retrieval and the design of new content that exploits the benefits offered by digital systems. It is this issue of digital content creation that we address in this book. Authors from around the world were invited to comment on different aspects of digital content creation, and their contributions form the 23 chapters of this volume.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • At last, a book that shows you how to build—design—a life you can thrive in, at any age or stage • “Life has questions. They have answers.” —The New York Times Designers create worlds and solve problems using design thinking. Look around your office or home—at the tablet or smartphone you may be holding or the chair you are sitting in. Everything in our lives was designed by someone. And every design starts with a problem that a designer or team of designers seeks to solve. In this book, Bill Burnett and Dave Evans show us how design thinking can help us create a life that is both meaningful and fulfilling, regardless of who or where we are, what we do or have done for a living, or how young or old we are. The same design thinking responsible for amazing technology, products, and spaces can be used to design and build your career and your life, a life of fulfillment and joy, constantly creative and productive, one that always holds the possibility of surprise.

In his mind, he's a superhero. In the real world, he might just destroy his high school... Waldo would rather fantasize about defending Earth from aliens than face the drudgery of his junior year. But when the comic-book nerd falls for the most popular girl in his class, the only shot he's got is to level the playing field... Teaming up with two fellow outcasts, Waldo devises an unconventional plan to get the girl of his dreams: bring down every other cool kid that stands in his way. But as the truth about his classmates surfaces and his own fame grows, he fears his dangerous takedown is spinning out of control. Is Waldo destined to be the hero of his fantasies, or will he blunder his way into accidental villainy? The Amazing Adventures of Waldo is a charming standalone YA novel. If you like clever heroes, fantasy meshing with reality, and plucky underdogs, then you'll love Tashawn Blount's heartwarming tale.