Dissertation Help for Games Art and Animation

Tevin

hello everyone

My name is Tevin Henley, and I am a student studying Games art and animation at SAE Institute London. I am Currently in my final year doing my final project and dissertation that I hope you will be able to either help me with or give the relative information that will help inform my thesis. At the moment the question that I am investigating in my paper is "What creative opportunities exist in recreating a historical story/event in a 3D format". I have through many discussions began to identify that the question may be vague but this is where I am hoping you can help narrow it down.

I am looking to recreate or vaguely base a 3d animation with characters created by myself on the historical duel between Miyamoto Musashi and Sasaki Kojiro. I am trying to blend the historical fight between the two samurais and add a fantasy element to the scenario. I have seen games like Ghost of Tsushima and total war and how its based on history or have that historical element, and I was hoping to look at how creative can you be, so how much of the history and design can you distort for the character to be unique to other interpretations of that character. Or are you restrained or restricted by historical record in the way that character fights, talks and behaves, etc.

I am also not entirely sure how to structure it as I am limited to 3000 words.

I have also looked through other posts on polycount to see if anyone else has raised any kind of issue that they have had with a dissertation or a topic that's similar but the best one that I have been able to find is a concept art within environment design topic, so I am not sure how much help it would be in regards to my own dissertation.

https://polycount.com/discussion/158829/dissertation-ideas-about-envrioment-creation-out-of-concept-art

I hope you can help and that I have given enough information

Brian "Panda" Choi

Look at it through a cultural appropriation lense.

Hito

well, quite a lot of opportunities and leeway I'd say, if you can manage to retain the spirit of the source material. But that's not very easy to do. Can't say much about Ghosts of Tsushima, or Total War. But couple recent films are worthwhile considering. 47 Ronins and ScarJo in The Shell.

With the 47 Ronin from 2013, superficially it would appear to stray from the source, with the apparent focus on the romance between Keaneu Reeves and Ko Shibasaki's characters, and the supernatural elements. But it was fairly faithful to the characters, and the general run of events with the ronins plotting in secret over extended period of time before taking revenge and ending in seppuku. It was generally panned in the US, and was an abject failure at the box office. Nevertheless, it is a faithful retelling of the story and it also captured the central spirit of the centuries old story, which is loyalty unto death; both in the actions of the 47 ronins, and in this particular retelling, mirrored in the final vows between Kai and Miko. One can still appreciate this version if one is familiar with the source.

Then consider ScarJo In The Shell. On the surface it appears to adhere very close to the source material in the visuals and cast of characters. But scratch a little deeper the 2017 movie bares no resemblance to neither Shirow's source, nor Oshii's retellings. The subtext relationship between the Motoko and Batou was nonexistent. How Batou got them peepers was absolutely ridiculous. The multinational corporation experimenting to create super soldier premise is completely idiotic. And as the final insult, the brains are stolen from asians and transplanted into white bodies, appropriation on metaphysical and material levels. Unwittingly the writers skirted with themes in Get Out. It wasn't a smash hit, but it did considerably better than 47 Ronin at the box office, with the critics, and with public at large. The central theme in the original was the blurry and tenuous distinction between machine and human. ScarJo In The Shell amounts to white obsession with connecting with one's roots and origins. So while it did alright commercially and fantastically with the visuals, it has none of the spirit of the source material.

sacboi

The Bokken is central too this saga.