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About the Program -

The Serious Game Design Online Program is comprised of  intensive, instructor led, modular courses that have been designed by experienced production artists.

The award winning Digital Animation Program at Cerro Coso College is now in its seventh year of offering a State Approved Certificate in Digital Animation, which has been delivered entirely online since 2001 in courses that are intended for students who want to "learn anywhere, anytime" to train for entry level employment  in Serious Game Design, Design Visualization, or Motion Graphics.

The program features an intensive focus on preparing students for entry level employment in Serious Game Design, Design Visualization, or Motion Graphics through the delivery of courses led by experienced production artists that are currently working in these related industries.

Course tools include instructor facilitated discussion groups, Moodle workshops, wikis, blogs, live webcasts, course ebooks containing full screen digital video demonstrations of each course tutorial and project, on demand help-desk, and a complete range of student learning support services [library, counseling, admissions and records, etc.].  The course lectures are webcasted in Macromedia Breeze, Camtasia, RealVideo and Quicktime formats. 

In addition to standard course textbooks, most courses in the program also utilize course ebooks that contain CDROM of very high quality digital video demonstrations of course lessons and projects, and include files, and other course materials that are required to complete the course assignments.
The program has been designed to afford students the opportunity to develop the necessary foundation skills, master the tools and processes, and nurture their artistry and creative vision.  In this project-based curriculum, students undergo standard production experiences that reflect industry needs and current industry trends.

Students develop professional skills in pre-production, story-telling, modeling, rigging, texture art, lighting, character animation, special effects, simulation, technical direction, game design, game prototyping, object oriented programming, render management, production management, and portfolio production as they prepare for entry level employment as a junior game texture artist, game environment artist, game character artist, or serious game developer using Virtools Dev.

The online curriculum design is based upon industry production pipeline workflow, sequenced from fundamentals, through all essentials, to advanced techniques.  The online instruction is organized by a program website, with a consistent, efficient interface that allows the learner to accurately track their progress, navigate resources, and study intensively. 

Course Delivery Technologies

Lessons – step-by-step demonstrations of game design production techniques, with screenshots, in html/pdf.  Each lesson is also demonstrated in Camtasia, full-screen resolution, digital videos.  Lessons are not tutorial projects, but instead are tightly focused demonstrations regarding the execution of specific production skills.

Projects – project examples that tie together the use of a set of features as would typically be found in production.  Projects are demonstrated step-by-step.  Each project is demonstrated in Camtasia, full-screen resolution, digital videos. 

Macromedia Breeze Live Presentations – the course instructor provides live webcasted online group study sessions that augment the instruction within a course.  Students can connect to these live webcasted sessions using WebCams [IP video], a web browser and microphone, or a web browser and telephone.  These live web meetings are all archived for easy access by students that are not able to attend live.  The Breeze Live study sessions contain text, images, animations, models, diagrams, charts, hyperlink references.  During the Breeze Live study session, the instructor can "screen share" his/her desktop and actually use the software to answers questions or clarify techniques during the web study session.

Web Discussion Forums  – the instructor monitors and facilitates an online discussion board, answering questions posted by students to the course, lesson, and module and projects that they are working on.  The discussion forum features allow students to clarify their problem or question by attaching screen shot images, scene files, rendered DV to their posts.  The web board also provides a collaborative working environment for student teams and their project leaders to facilitate the team-based game production project work that is a component of each course in this program.

Image of alumni game artist

 What does a Game Artist Do?

During the concept stages of development, game artists create concept sketches and illustrations.

During production, game character artists  model, texture, rig and animate the characters.  

Game level artists model, texture and animate environments, vehicles, props, special effects, and interfaces.