Side Projects
Video Game - Global Game Jam - January 2021 - 48 Hours
Team: Shalyn Oswald (UI Design, All Assets, Logo, Character Design), Anthony Wong (HTML, Sounds), Ben Lyubarskiy (Unity Development), Michael Cooper (Unity Development)
Theme: Lost and Found. Wanted to have some fun with finding items to rebuild a ship
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My Role
Created all color palette, UI, logo, intro logo animation, background, and some of the sounds.
Instructions
As we weren't able to finish the game, there are some pieces that didn't make it to the game, such as instructional pieces and the end-game summary.
Video Game - Global Game Jam - January 2017 - 48 Hours
Team: Shalyn Oswald (UI Design,Sounds), Anthony Wong (HTML), Apoorv Verma (HTML), Ben Lyubarskiy (Music/Sounds, Design), Michael Cooper (Unity Development)
Theme: WAVES. Decided to play with spectral waves and the look of physical waves.
My Role
Created all color palette, UI, logo, intro logo animation, background, and some of the sounds.
Instructions
As we weren't able to finish the game, there are some pieces that didn't make it to the game, such as instructional pieces and the end-game summary.
To play:
Space - Switch directions
Mouse left-click under the strings - pulls string to launch ball.
The Devil Went Down to Vegas
Video Game - Global Game Jam - January 2016 - 48 Hours
Team: Shalyn Oswald (storyline/copy; designer), Pierre Bienaime (music/sound creator), Devore Johnson (3D graphic designer), Andrew Lohmann (developer), John Meara (Unity developer)
Theme: Rituals. We decided not to just go with the expected cult theme but to tie it in with real rituals, like the one many people who struggle with a gambling addiction go through when they think it may help their odds in winning.
My Role
I wrote out the story/copy and created the storyboard. I created the home screen, seen to the left, as well as the buttons that overlay in the game.
The Story
You go to Las Vegas for the first time, only to realize by the time it is too late that you have a serious gambling addiction. You have lost all of your money and just gambled away your home. While you are in your hotel room grieving for your fate a voice begins to talk. Though there is nobody in the room, he says that he will get your house and allow you a week to pay him back within a week. If you do not, he will own your soul. You don't really believe in that stuff, so you agree. Now you begin to try to figure out what color underwear is lucky today...
THE HOMECOMING
Video Game - Game Jam - August 2015 - 48 Hours
Team: Ozan Baduklu (music creator), Carmelo Citera (graphic designer), Eduard Erlikh (developer), Michael Campbell (developer)
Theme: You Are Not The Monster. It is a Gallaga-type game that the developers really wanted to create, and wanting to work well with them I created a storyline that tied the theme to the game. I had a great time doing this!
My Role
I created the story/copy and the storyboard for the intro movie, Start screen image, as well as some of the screens/graphics in the intro. I also designed the UI layout within the game.
The Story
You were fighting an intergallactic war when you were taken prisoner. Your crew is able to hijack the enemy ship and, after looking through their data, you realize that they had joined forces with another enemy and planned to destroy your home planet. You don't have much time, so you head to the planet to warn them, but you cannot communicate with them via the ship, so you must land. Unfortunately your people don't know that it is you that is on the ship, all they see is the enemy and they try to stop you from reaching the planet. The only way to save the lives of your people is to, unfortunately, kill some of them.
Hackathons
GET IT DONE
Website - Hackathon - November 2015
WINNER - Most Novel Concept
Team: Matthew Morrisey (developer), Ammar Moheize (PM)
UX designers and product managers were given 1 day to come up with a website idea based on some API constraints. We were then to present this idea about a week later to developers and allow them to choose the idea they most wanted to work on.
The Idea
There are a lot of DIY, craft, and repair help websites out there that provide good walkthroughs of each process, but are severely lacking in terms of helping with finding the needed materials. Get It Done is meant to fix this issue by pulling from Amazon/Home Depot APIs, allowing the instruction-creator to link to the specific items needed, as well as alternatives, which would then allow the user to easily add all or some of the items to their Amazon/Home Depot cart. Essentially you are able to order your own 'kits' for any project that you could find on the website.
My Role
I came up with the idea and name and worked with the team to create a good layout; created the wireframes and logo, and worked directly with the developer.
As we only had 3 members, this project was nowhere near done by the end, but we all had a great time and ended up winning for most novel concept.
Education
What is UX (Design)?
Class Keynote Presentation - January 2016
After meeting a student of Digital Marketing at a networking event I was asked to come in and teach an hour class on UX design. I have always enjoyed teaching and helping people understand the value of UX, as it oftentimes gets overlooked and dismissed.
I created this slideshow with their digital marketing knowledge in mind and inserted a few "ux" items into it, including the time-arrow and easy-to-follow animations/transitions. I covered the different specialties of UX design, listing various responsibilities, and went on to explain a few of the methods used and the outcomes gained.
I had a lot of fun doing this and would definitely teach again!
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Edit - I DID teach, and for a while as you may know, so I keep this here for nostalgic reasons :)