School of Technology for the Arts (STA)

Immersive Media and Content Creation

Technologies such Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, 360 video are making an impact in many sectors including media, healthcare, engineering, education and retail. Immersive Content Creation is in demand in areas such as prototyping, training, simulation and entertainment.

Reports predict that immersive media is projected to reach US$209.2 billion by 2022 and is highlighted as key focus for Singapore by the Infocomm Media Development Agency (IMDA).

User Experience

User Experience (UX) is about solving problems in people’s lives and helping people to attain their goals. UX professionals deal with users’ pain points, investigate how to eliminate them, and design solutions for them.

The field of User Experience focuses on maximising user’s satisfaction, motivation, efficiency, and productivity when using a product or service.

Gamification

Gamification is a process for integrating game mechanics into something that already exists in order to motivate participation, engagement and loyalty. This can be almost anything, from your website to social media presence, day-to-day operations, customer engagement and more.

In other words, gamification introduces game design elements into non-game applications to make them more fun and engaging. It uses competition, points, achievement, rules of play, status and self-expression to encourage actions through positive feedback.

The XGD Centre’s primary focus is to promote awareness, and develop capabilities and expertise in User Experience and Gamification via projects, consultancies and training. Through these platforms, the Centre will help your organisation or business develop and adopt UX and Gamification solutions for innovation, productivity and competitiveness.

We have expertise in User Research, Design Thinking, User Experience Design, Service Design, Serious Games and Gamification. You can engage us through:

Consultancy

STA’s academic team consists of a pool of industry professionals who are in demand by the industry for their expertise. Their expertise in their fields allow them to consult with your organisation or business to develop solutions for your needs.

Projects

STA has successfully used the Student Final Year Project (FYP) platform to create prototypes for organisations and businesses in healthcare, government, education, finance, and logistics amongst others. This has proven to be a successful low-risk and low-cost model for the exploration of Experience Design, Serious Games and Gamification to provide solutions for real-world problems.

The Centre can also collaborate on larger scale engagements if required. If your projects require expert-level execution, we have professionals to take them on.

Training

STA sees training as a key component in helping organisations grow their internal capabilities. It serves to complement the project and consultancy services the Centre provides. Organisations developing UX or Gamification solutions will eventually require their staff to manage those solutions internally. The Centre has the expertise to equip your staff and help grow their skills and knowledge.

Do contact us to see how best we can help you regarding the following:

• Consultancies or Projects
• Training
• General Enquiries

Development of Windows Augmented Reality (AR) Application for Herbalife

Our staff worked with Herbalife to design and develop an Augmented Reality (AR) experience for the Herbalife Extravaganza 2018 held at Singapore Expo in May. The experience involved users interacting with dancing Herbalife mascots on a large screen.

Staff-in-charge: Jeff Hung

“Thank you for all your hard work on the AR software! It was a HUGE hit at the event with amazing participation rate. I’d like to confirm that we can share this app with all our countries so they can share the same fun across APAC.”

Amy Lim
Director, Events | Asia Pacific
Herbalife Nutrition

CHIKIT- Monitoring and Anxiety Management Solution for Peoples with Intellectual Disabilities

In collaboration with Movement for the Intellectually Disabled (MINDS), CHIKIT is a solution designed to improve the quality of life for people with intellectual disability (PwIDs). The CHIKIT eco-system helps caregivers track and monitor the whereabouts of their charges providing them assurance of their safety and wellbeing. 

CHIKIT is a joint project featuring talents from both STA and the School of Engineering. It won the Lee Hsien Loong Interactive Digital Media Smart Nation Award in 2018.

CHIKIT has also been award additional research funds to develop prototypes for further testing.

Staff-in-charge: Aaron Yong

“It was an enjoyable experience working with the students and their concept of CHIKIT certainly has exceeded our expectations. Their idea was not just a concept. They paid practical considerations for our clients with intellectual disabilities and we are excited in looking towards formulating the product and benefitting many in the social service sector.”

Jaslyn Quek
Head of Napiri Training Development Centre (NTDC)
MINDS

Virtual 3D System Art Space for Passion Arts festival

This augmented reality experience was designed and created by STA and SEG (School of Engineering). Combining immersive experience with art, the virtual Merlion was wrapped with digital art pieces by Fern Green Primary School students. The installation was launched by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong together with Senior Minister of State in the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Transport Dr Lam Pin Min and Member of Parliament Mr Darryl David at the PAssionArtsFestival 2019 at Bishan Park. This immersive installation allowed visitors to pose and interact with the virtual Merlion and snap photos with it.

Staff-in-charge: Jose de Castro

RESIST

Resist is a card game produced in collaboration with Central Narcotics Bureau to raise awareness about the dangers of drugs.

The game has been published by CNB and distributed to over 100 schools across Singapore.

Doc.SG Mobile Application

This project aims to redesign the doc.sg application to reach out to a wider group of users to share personal experiences, improve the visual appeal of the user interface and to enable quick access to accurate information. This allows users to have a seamless and personalised browsing experience for medical services.

Food Preparation e-Guide

This web-application was designed to better engage individuals with special needs to learn about personal hygiene and food handling. The e-Guide’s straight-forward and enticing content gives a good flow for these individuals and motivate them to learn more. Features like videos, pictures and customised icons and section mascots help create a form of encouragement for these unique individuals to go further while being guided by the application.

Penguin Brawl

Based on a brief to educate people about wildlife conservation, Penguin Brawl is a PC game designed to highlight the negative impact of human activities on wildlife and the resulting ‘sixth great extinction’. This fun arcade brawler, for players aged 14 and above, puts players in the shoes of Pobbles – one of the last surviving penguins. Pobbles must battle with other wild animals for globally scarce supplies of fish. The game delivers a serious message of how human action can result in an animal species’ desperate struggle for survival.

X-ray Buddies

KKH Women’s and Children’s Hospital found that young patients coming for treatment are often afraid of medical procedures such as X-rays. X-Ray Buddies is an educational game that teaches paediatric patients how the X-ray works, alleviating their fears of the machines. Players of the game will be able to interact and play with cute and bubbly characters, while learning about the X–Ray procedure by scanning picture cards with their mobile device. With the picture cards, players will be able to see the game characters come to life. Players will also be able to experience a set of mini-games that further explains the procedure for an X-Ray in KKH from a fun perspective.

Stacking Stamps

Designed to encourage young children to save, Stacking Stamps is a game inspired by the National School Savings Campaign of the 1970s. Players score points in this Tetris-like puzzle by matching at least three similar stamps horizontally or vertically. In this game, players must “save” enough points before they can advance to the next level. Players are encouraged to manage their savings by making decisions to buy power-ups or not to overcome different obstacles. Players also get to learn about the history of Singapore coins and other fun saving facts while playing.