Are You a Media All Rounder?

What did you do before your studies at Animationsinstitut?

 

I became interested in computers and interactive media in general relatively early on. Whether it was Pokemon on the Gameboy Color or hands-on museums on vacation like the "Technorama" in Winterthur or the "City of Science and Industry" in Paris.
That's why I decided to go to it.schule Stuttgart after my secondary school graduation to try out and learn the basics. During my time there, I dealt intensively with the technical side of work.
I programmed my own small projects, websites and bots, attended congresses of the CCC (Chaos Computer Club) and the Shackspace (Stuttgart Hackerspace) and participated in hackathons. In 2014 we even won the Hack for Culture of the MfG.
It was always important for me to learn not only theory but to work on projects and not only on abstract systems, but to actively design media.

That's why I chose the Media Informatics course at the Hochschule der Medien when I chose my degree course.

 

How did you come across Animationsinstitut?

 

During the course of my studies at the Hochschule der Medien, I was asked if there were interested programmers for a project at the Filmakademie.
Still interested, I contacted them immediately and worked on the AniTrailer/AniPlay projects 2016/2017. I had the chance to get to know Animationsinstitut and the teaching methods here.
As the end of my studies was approaching, I looked around where and if a master's degree was possible. It was soon clear to me that the diploma of the Filmakademie offered the best environment for me personally to develop and unfold creatively.

 

Why did you decide to study Interactive Media at the institute?

 

The focus on Interactive Media has become stronger and more established over the years.
Over the years I have become acquainted with a wide variety of areas.

From a mini-job at a network company where I primarily helped in IT support and sales, websites whose design needed to be revised, QA (Quality Assurance) where software has to be put through its paces again and again, servers and databases where it's all about data processing, to UI (User Interface) development where the size and position of elements have to be exactly right down to the pixel.

The development of interactive media requires more or less all these skills and more. It poses incredibly versatile problems and in the end, that's what excites me the most: finding creative solutions to a wide range of problems.

How was the start of your studies at Animationsinstitute for you? How big was the transition compared to your previous studies?

 

During my de facto exchange semester during AniTrailer/AniPlay I was able to get to know the possibilities and the freedom at Animationsinstitut.
The difference was like day and night. After, at that time, almost 15 years of rigid teaching, exams and exams, the mix of self-organized work and support by mentors and workshops was a refreshing and almost liberating concept.

 

What are you currently working on?

 

I've just returned from a semester abroad in Denmark, during which I was allowed to work on three projects as game director together with 14 people. The longest of them, which took about six weeks of active work, is just getting the finishing touches before we release it for free on iOS and Android and submit it for awards.

 

Back in Germany, I'm helping an installation where you can enter words and then create music from them on a prepared surface. I am doing a big part of the programming and technical implementation.

 

And last but not least I take a number of ideas that have landed in my "Creative List" over the years and work out a small number of concepts to the same level. This way I can practice research and pitching on the one hand, and on the other hand I can produce an excerpt of the best concept as a diploma.

You want to learn more about studying Interactive Media at Animationsinstitut? Click here!