Destony Game Trailer & Presentation Done!

One step at a time...

I just had my presentation today and I spent a lot of time preparing for the presentation and stressing out about it as there was just so much to cover that I have done over this year and I find it really hard to do with just 10-15 minutes. Particularly because my project is so broad and based on 'Game Aesthetics' although i managed to put together a presentation which i am proud of and it went really well and I managed to answer the questions in a clam and intellectual manner so I am overall quite pleased. Some feedback I received was:

"Great work on the game, everything was polished to a high degree"

"Aesthetics is a problematic word as it is very subjective"

"Would like to know how you managed to get to the certain art style you developed in more detail"

"A great critical framework, to be able to have a criteria so specific is great"

On top of that, I managed to create a more succinct trailer of my game which showcases the game in 2 min 30 seconds and shows it in it's best light. The trailer too me a whole day to create although it certainly is worth it as my other video play through of the game was 9 minutes long. You can see the trailer bellow.

Post-Inspiration: Dundee Showcase & Obsolete

DJCAD Degree Show 2013

After I handed in my dissertation, I went to visit the Dundee showcase in Dundee Univeristy in combination with Duncan and Jordanstones. In all honesty, it was one of the most mind blowing and eye opening experiences in which I saw a level of dedication to the arts and crafts from students that I have never seen before. It really put things into perspective for me that a University just a few meters away has so much talent and skill and makes me feel so inspired to keep trying and doing what I love as the students in Dundee are also doing.

Also, importantly  the showcase being 1 week before Abertays showcase allowed me to see what exhibitions would look like. I studied and took pictures of other peoples work and the way they set it up to help me again a better understanding of what looks better and how to present my work. One key thing that stood out for me was that most of their work was presented in a 3D way in which their artwork would pop off the wall due to their use of 3D foam square stickers, due to this I decided to buy my own and am excited for showcase day which is soon to come.

Although first my presentation is tomorrow and I have been working on my presentation since yesterday and am looking forward to it. The Dundee showcase video is bellow:

Vimeo Staff Pick - Obsolete

Obsolete from Smoking Robot on Vimeo.

I also stumbled upon this animation recently which I felt was really relevant to my game Destony and for future work for my game, I would love to use the same colour scheme and vibe that this short animation uses. It captures the exact feelings of trying to find the positives in a dark world and set yourself free. If I had more time, I would have loved to make a game out of these same visuals and the same emotive design, so this was a late inspiration but i thought it was worth sharing the visual significance of this.

You can see the screenshots of the animation bellow. The great use of colour contrast of golds and blacks.

Dissertation Printed!

So today, I handed in my dissertation and the feeling of relief was amazing and now I feel so much more free and able to relax a little bit. It has been 4 months in the making since I started my dissertation and to finally see it printed in a tangible form beings a lot of joy and almost a tear to my eye.

Here is what an Abertay printed and bound dissertation looks like. I actually paid £38.80 for 3 copies including the use of a £4 voucher I received from filling in an Abertay survey. Quite expensive, although I got every single page printed in colour 0.25p per page as opposed to 0.03p for black and white. 

A close up of the title page which needed to be sent in separately as a word doc so they can re-position it.  

The list of tables and list of figures which I added in towards the end to make it easier to find the where the images were.

What the colour printed sections looked like.

Some more images I added of my game once better screen shots were taken.

Business Cards Arrived!

So today my business cards finally arrived, and it came 2 days early also. I am very happy with the way they turned out, Moo.com sure does pay attention to detail and value professionalism within the way they present their business cards.

This was the box that came in the post, and it was actually delivered to the wrong place and the woman was nice enough to find me and hand it to me.

Opening of the box. Once opened, you see that there is a sample pack of all the other business cards they print as well as my 200 cards (which I think might have been too much) and a really nice and professional black box which holds around 50.

Finally, here is a close up of my cards, there are two different versions, the one with my character and the one with the User Interface. One is more for graphic design and general 2D artwork and the other is for UI, particularly for games.  

Abertay Showreel, Time is almost coming to and End

My Work is in the Showreel

Time is most certainly coming to an end, the Abertay Showreel was just posted online and my work is also in it. As an artist, particularly one who animates, having a showreel is an essential asset in order to showcase what you are capable of. Fellow artists are not naive and can tell the difference from someone with experience and someone who is just starting out with being professional pretty quickly. 

Honours Project Podcast: Getting Personal and Developed

This podcast is a bit more personal than usual, explaining things about myself and my growth as a student, a person and an artist. It can be quite the enlightened experience when you look back and see how much you have developed or improved in any professional or personal field. Listen bellow:

Podcast: Getting Personal and Developed

So, what did I learn? (Reflective Summary)

I set out to learn and enhance my skills as well as knowledge in my personal fields, filling in the gaps of my inadequacies at the same time. How did my plan turn out?

Reflective Summary

To see more detail of my own individual Analysis, please listen to the above Audio on Personal Development.

Project: Game Aesthetics: Systemic and Visual Significance.
Project Aim: How does gameplay design and art design impact the overall aesthetic experience of a game?

The project aim was to discover the connection that visuals and systemics offer in regards to game aesthetics. In personal reflection of this, I feel that the overall project was a success not only in terms of academic research, but also within my own personal sphere.

The three main skill sets that I wants to develop and close any needed gaps of to carry out this project successfully as discussed in my podcast and previous skill gaps post are the following skills: Programming (for game design), Art (for art design) and Writing (to clearly describe the results).

1. To gain a moderate knowledge of programming/coding to carry out the full project (Systemic)
2. To advance the polish of my personal art style and visual skills (Visual)
3. To further develop my personal writing style (Research & Dissertation) 

1. Gain a moderate knowledge of programming/coding to carry out the full project (Systemic)

In terms of gaining a better understanding of programming, as mentioned in my podcast, I feel that I managed to surpass a barrier that was often present for me as an artist. That barrier was the belief that I could not code and that as an artist it is wired within my own nature. After this project, I have a newly built confidence within my coding experience which in invaluable not only within the gaming industry although within most technical sectors.

Here is an image which I saw almost every few minutes whist I was coding. The debugging console was a life saver which pinpointed every error in code and critically forced me to understand the structure of coding.

The Unity Answers forum was a pinnacle factor of my growth in knowledge as well as overcoming specific problem, there is literally an answer for almost every coding problem you can think of.

BEFORE & AFTER: From Adobe Flash to Unity3D. From basic programming knowledge to a more intermediate level of knowledge.

Understanding of JavaScipt

I feel that my understanding of JavaScript has reached an adequate level of which I am very pleased about, before this project I had never used JavaScript or never coded with anything for that matter, I was afraid of coding and filled with apprehension to even begin, although now I can say that I have a well versed understanding and am confident to customize code and create very basic code when needed which is a big ump from where I started. I now understand the format, understand variables, functions, private code and a vast array of different principles within JavaScript and this is evident within the game I have created. 

Understanding of C#

Alongside JavaScript, I have also been using a lot of C# as a lot of the functions that I expected to work in Unity with JavaScript did not work so I had to learn the basics of C# and found it to be quite the challenge although I can now confidently say that I also understand the basics of C# and how the structure works and how it is different to JavaScript. I managed, with the help of Abertay 4th Years to fix my collision function within my game for characters collecting objects by using C#.

Specific programming of Game Events

My prior experience of this was very limited, particularly during my Flash prototype development. Although that had laid the very basic foundation for me to create an impressive game with more complex functions. I am now able to program specific sounds to be connected to collisions, for example a 'jump' sound to play when the player jumps and coding the collection of 3-6 light boxes being collected to trigger the next level as well as the blocks creating a 'Game Over' Screen to show up once they hit the ground. All of this would not have been possible if it wasn't for the project and the delve into game design.

Understanding of programming Menus and Transitions

Before, I had no idea what programming the UI (user interface) would entail nor did I think much about the actual procedure of 'Game Over' and the 'Next Level' would initiate within the game. Now at the end of the project, I understand that within Unity you have to create several different scenes which would be activated once you complete a level to move onto the next level as well as the importance of scripting the Main Menu to function properly. I managed to do this all with using a script holder which would activate when the right amount of light boxes were collected or not. 

2. Advance the polish of my personal art style and visual ability (Visual)

In terms of improving my art, I feel that even though I didn't notice much change personally, when actually looking back, it shows that I have certainly gained a better knowledge and understanding of art design theory as well as my own personal style and visual skill.

    

BEFORE & AFTER: From before, my lines lacked finesse and were quite messy. Now my lines are more deliberate and sparing and my use of the COPIC markers has certainly gained me a new style.

BEFORE & AFTER: From before, my digital art lacked detail and style and after my artwork has matured and become more sophisticated with more attention to detail and finer execution as well as better use of colour.

Defining Personal Art Style through Practice

My personal art style has certainly developed and matured over this whole project period. At the beginning I feel that I did have a style and it was fairly obvious to others that my artwork was created by me and had features that one would relate to my work. Features such as a certain set attention to detail, cute characters, well made anatomy and sketchy lines. I feel that now my art style has become a lot more sophisticated and I am starting to embrace more of my graphic design past within my own work which shows within my sketchbook as well as my final game. That less is more. I feel even though I have not fully discovered my style, I feel I now know what aspects of my style I would like to focus more on.

Life Drawing & Anatomy

By partaking in the life drawing sessions that were run by Abertay as well as learning to draw time and time again from reading books and using internet reference, I feel that my drawing ability, accuracy as well as sense of speed has drastically improved and you can somewhat see this within my sketch book. I feel that before I was a lot less confident in being able to draw something fairly fast, and that now I am able to draw something a lot faster without much hassle as well as it being far more accurate.

Character Design

My character deisign skills did not drastically improve as it was not the key focus, although if you look at my semester 1 work and compare it with my semester 2 work, it is evident that my work has improved and the various different designs I created of the Destony character in my sketchbook show that I have developed this further to a certain extent also. I feel that there is still much room to grow within this area in general.

Environment Design

Comparing my initial environment attempts for my Flash game as well as the initial Unity attempts of the Destony game, it is evident that this part of my own ability has improved also. I am now able to direct a theme for each environment a and merge the style, art, assets as well as music to suit that level. This is something that I had little experience with beforehand although I now feel very confident with the structure of planning from deciding on a theme, then a style and then the colours and finally creation of assets. 

3. Develop my personal writing style to convey information in a succinct manner (Research and Dissertation)

Finally, my writing is probably the thing I am most happy about improving as it has always been a big demon that I felt inadequate with for a large part of my life, despite always getting very good grades back in school. I feel that by researching, reading the books that I have read and most importantly blogging so regularly and being critical of each post that I have improved immensely  Not only that, but I have also learned to touch type within this time as well as type significantly faster. 

BEFORE: As above, I was using far too much hyperbole.

AFTER: Now I am using far less exaggerating words and actually notice when I get carried away in academic texts.

BEFORE: I would do the same as the bad above example and get the reader bored with random jargon and complex uninteresting explanations.

AFTER: Now I am able to be more succint and get to the point ad well as only mention what the reader is looking for when they skim your content.

Use of Exaggerated Language

After my lecturers Lynn, Ian and Dayna noticed my over excited use of hyperbole in my academic writing, they told me that when you are writing something academic you have to be careful how excited you get as for something to be of valid use to other academics, it has to be critically viewed and proven of it's worth rather then the horn of it's own value being blown. I did understand this initially, although somewhat got confused with using intellectual and appropriate creative words with using unnecessary hyperbole. I am really glad that they noticed this about me, as it has also made me realize how much of a passionate person I am in nature as well as being humble enough to accept my flaws. I have now effectively improved in this area and you can also see this by viewing posts from my 1st semester and comparing it with my 2nd semester posts which are far more critical. 

Succinct Writing

My writing is now full of a lot less jargon and big words with little appropriate connect, which I found myself doing a lot of the time when I wanted to sound smart. I have improved in this area and am now able to say what I wish to say with far less words and keep every sentence and paragraph with a purpose or 'one' single concept rather then being all over the place and not really saying anything worthwhile. This has improved a lot due to my lecturer Dayna who has humbled me with his academic writing knowledge as well as pedantic error checking. I am now far more confident in my writing.

Clear Methodology

The methodology of my project was quite unclear at the start of the semester and was just full of different theories that although were interesting, it didn't seem like any concrete would for form my project. Now it happens to be the case that my project has been simplified and that I know exactly what I am doing as well as writing about. This was all put into context once I created my own critical framework. Due to knowing more about my own design process, I was then able to write up a much clearer methodology in my dissertation that was succinct and to the point.

Literature and Research

Reading found research and literature is something I did a lot of during semester one, although I always found it difficult to show how much research I had been doing as I had always done so much but never presented it well. Now at the end of semester two, I have recorded and written about a large amount more then I ever did in semester one and have been able to record it in a more relevant way that flows far better within my dissertation. I also have read books that I hesitated to read during semester one such as the Media Deisgn Theory Book and various other books as well. I feel that my research skills within  these areas has become more organised and I am less afraid to dig deep within the research and able to present it in a succinct manner in my writing.

That is it for my reflection, If you want to find out more, please listen to my podcast. 

Evaluation: Destiny of Destony

What was it like to Develop Destony and how were the Results?

Things are coming to a close and it's time to reflect on the whole process and development of my honours project. From what started as a simple idea has now come to fruition in a final developed game concept. In general, developing Destony was an educational and growing experience, one of which I feel I gained a substantial amount of knowledge and skill. The results were far more than I expected, having no coding experience I went in scared of ending up with nothing to show, although I managed to create a polished game with 4 levels, including an intro and an ending.

Excerpt from Dissertation:

Project Practice:

As aforementioned in the methodology, an interactive game, namely: Destony would be created with the purpose of incorporating the theories, principles, trends and information on game aesthetics focusing on the core systemic and visual values. The result of this was the created game aesthetics critical framework, and due to the systemic success of Thomas was Alone and the visual value of Tiny Wings, a lot of the core aspects of both games were fused into the creation of this game. As with Thomas was Alone, this would focus more on the polish of a simple concept, rather than an unrefined complex one, focusing on the feel and narrative immersive qualities.

 As a single developer with an artistic background, the gameplay design was minimal, consisting of a single jump mechanic and the interactive physics to move your surroundings and collect items. The game’s focus was on creating a compact experience which would represent the significant aspects of the systemic and visual, rather than creating a full game within the timescale. To incorporate the balance of challenge, small puzzles were incorporated to keep the users interest. To include freedom, the physics were enabled so that the blocks could be moved around and be unpredictable. The retention was sought after through collecting items as was the value. The immersive and feel qualities of the game were to do with the visuals of the character, the animations and subtle attention to detail.

The game was previously developed in flash a 2D engine, but was then recreated within Unity for the flexibility and the in more appropriate physics engine. During development, many decisions needed to be made for the betterment of the gaming experience. One of the first decisions that were encountered was whether the game would be 3D with a fixed front view (2.5D) or just 2D planes with a fixed front view. It was soon established that having 3D blocks moving around without certain axis restraints would over complicate the game and also impact the effectiveness of the puzzles, so it was concluded that 2D planes with a fixed frontal view would be the best course of action. 

As it often is with game development, many technical issues were encountered and addressed. The walk cycle would glitch every time you walk for more than a second, which was fixed by changing the number of runs the cycle would make per second. A fundamental problem which took a great amount of time to fix was when the Javascript for a collision code for the light box would not work, although a similar code would function within the game in C#. Another problem was that the characters collision sphere would not collect the item which was fixed by creating a box instead of a sphere.

Largely, although some problems were encountered, the project practise and implementation was carried out and established as planned. Inevitably, originally planned features were cut out and not all issues were solved to perfection, although the purpose was not to create an immaculate product but to create an aesthetic design experience which could test and bring further practise based insight into the balance of systemic and visual significance.   

Destony Evaluation

Destony, like the previously researched games is created by a single developer. The game is an atmospheric puzzle platformer with a very strong focus on story and feel. You play as a postman named Tony who previously died in a bus accident and his spirits was released in order to help those struggling with negative thoughts in their lives and help them fulfil their destiny. As you dive into their private subconscious, you can see all the blocks of negativity stored in their minds and can assist them in clearing out the negative blocks and collecting the positive blocks to progress through the game. As you progress throughout the game, the puzzles progressively become more difficult and if you don’t catch the positive block before it hits the ground, the fragile positivity fades away. 

This game, although short and very basic, holds a core sense of systemic worth and the art style really creates a sense of intrigue and wonder. The mechanic of jumping and pushing blocks out the way, although minimal, holds a substantial pleasurable response. The narrative of the game creates a sense of urgency and mission within the game as progress and tread carefully on the path to fulfilling your goals. 

Challenge 4/5: The balance of skill and challenge is amply accomplished with the playful nature of exploration and experimentation. The physics of the game create quite a challenge as your goal of reaching the positive blocks without letting them fall and can sometimes require skill and planning. The game can be contently played as time flies by as you find joy in jumping around and accessing one positive block to the other. Although it being a prototype, the sense of challenge is certainly not in full bloom and more features could be added.

Freedom 4/5: The game allows you to have a certain level of creative freedom to explore and effect your environment differently each time you touch the blocks from a different angle, velocity or even height and allows the player to define their own outcome. You are able to move around freely around the environment and there are no time restraints, although you are only limited to jumping. Despite this, the mechanic is pressure sensitive and requires certain jump heights to pass certain areas of the game.  

Retention 3/5: The game has enough content and story to keep the player engaged and content within the prototype. The freedoms to explore and effect your environment have quite an addictive nature all throughout the game. Each time you fail to collect the certain blocks, you are motivated to try and try again until you succeed. Although the game can become slightly repetitive when you collect blocks which are too easy again and again as well as the game lacking depth within the content and the amount of levels.

Immersion 4/5: The story creates an emotive vibe which is translated from the start of the game as you progress throughout. The visuals have a really vibrant and soft nature to them which draws the user within the experience. The world that is created has a really psychedelic dreamlike feel to it and when playing, you can get a sense of magical fantasy. The immersive qualities could be further expanded with more polish to the story, although after seeing the cut scene of the game and understanding the story, you begin to feel a connection with the purpose of the experience.  

Value 4/5: The game manages to balance the rewarding system very well. As you play throughout the game, 

you know that collecting 3 white blocks will bring you to the next level, each block you collect gives off a satisfying spark and make you feel you are progressing throughout. The general sense of the game is very pleasing, from the visuals, music to the polished jump, you feel that the game has had a lot of consideration put into it. There are also some small glitches with the re-spawn and game over screen which can slightly dampen the experience. Once you complete the game you are left feeling that it was too short being a prototype, and having more features and varied levels would create further value, although there is certainly much value within the game.

Feel 4/5: The feel is familiar to many early platformers, it’s a simple and barebones experience, although the simplicity maintains a sense of polished influence throughout. There is a certain amount of harmony in regards to the character, blocks and environment; the characters have box shaped body, although there is harmony within the spherical look within the eyes which unite well with the clouds and rounded aspects of the environment. Overall, the game has quite a unique feel in comparison to other platformers, one of a certain polish which certainly could be expanded on for an even more pleasing overall experience.   

	RATING
CHALLENGE	4
FREEDOM	4
RETENTION	3
IMMERSION	4
VALUE	4
FEEL	4
TOTAL (Mean)	3.8

  

Table of results for Destony

In assessing all the factors of Destony, it is apparent that a lot of the game aesthetics are clearly well thought out and executed and incorporate prior research of successful games. The challenge, freedom, immersion, value and feel all score a high rating due to the certain level of polish created within several aspects of the game. The story, the art style, the programming of the simple jump mechanic are all done with meticulous attention to detail which potentially separate this game from other traditional platformers. The incorporation of physics and the innovative concept of collecting fragile blocks bring great prominence within the aesthetic experience of the game.

Although, to its detriment, it is also evident that it is a prototype and not a finished game. The retention factor suffers due to the certain lacking features such as a limited amount of levels, small glitches and program heavy features due to it being created by an artist. Despite these drawbacks, the game is certainly a well thought out prototype with much potential and values the majority of the elements presented within the framework.   

My Game is Finally Finished

Hard work beats Talent, when Talent Fails to Work Hard

That is one thing I wholeheartedly believe in, it isn't about how talented you are or how much you know, it's about the mindset and attutude you have when you do whatever you do. In regards to coding, it was something of a dream to me, somehting I felt I could never do or even slightly fathom. The brackets, the syntax, variables, funcations etc etc., they all scared me away.

Now after 8 months of learning as well as struggling to use Unity 3D pretty much alone (of course the Unity community and Internet were instrumental in my development), I have learnt so much and think back to when I started this project thinking I should play it safe and just draw or just do concept art of design stuff so I can land an easy job. Thinking back to those thoughts I am glad I didn't opt out and stuck with creating my own game. 

UPDATE:

Here is a video play-through of my finished game:

Destony Opening Animation

I believe that every great game takes full advantage of it's immersion abilities. Other than reading a book or reading text, to actually visualize and understand the characters and their roles within a game help the user to connect. In order for Destony to stand out from the crowd of games and to increase it's value and immersion, I wanted to have an opening animation to create more polish. Luckily help was at hand, as my family is from an enthusiastically creative background and both of my two brothers animate fora living.

Kensei Thomas 

Kensei, my brother was the perfect person to ask for something to be animated. He lives sleep and breathes animation and I told him about the opportunity to create something for my game early on and he was keen to help out, he was placed 2nd place within the famous red bull Canimation competition  losing out by a hair to a university graduate and he was only 18 back then.

You can see the entries here: http://canimation.redbull.co.uk/index.php/gallery

His Canimation animation is bellow: 

It was hard to convey the story of my game exactly as I wanted it as it is quite a unique concept having a ghost person jump into the mind of others. How that would go about happening and other things were unclear at first, although after meeting up with him in London (my home) and explaining it to him face to face and directing the process, he got the idea.


The above video is the final version that my brother sent me, the guitar music in the background he actually played himself as he plays the guitar as often if not more than he animates, which is a lot. In being critical about the video, my only main gripe was that the ghost could have been made slightly more transparent at the start. Also there were no sound effects which I thought would have really brought the animation to life. So I decided to add some:

UPDATE: video with added sound effects.


I feel that watching these two videos, with and without the sound effects show the power of audio and it's impact on the visual significance. In conclusion, I am very grateful and happy that he could contribute to my game and I think the opening animation explains the story in less than a minute in a creative and playful way.

Supervisor Meeting: Dissertation 2nd Draft Feedback

The last meeting with my supervisor before the submission. My supervisor has been a great help in assisting my growth and developing me as a student. The MDA framework, articles by Clint Hocking and a lot of relevant material was discovered due to my supervisors knowledge and research area which at time overlapped with my research so I am glad he was my supervisor and his critical opinion always makes me rethink my approach, particularly in writing and designing a worthwhile experience.

The last meeting consisted of a massive run down of my 2nd draft and the corrections and feedback. This took up the whole 30 minutes and it is evident that there is always room for improvement and being a perfectionist I try to improve and close the skill gaps, in this situation, particularly to do with the dissertation. The meeting ran over the allocated time although the next student Micheal was ok with waiting a little while longer as I showed Dayna the latest progress of my work. Overall he was happy with it and gave me some crucial feedback for the last week before hand in.

Here is what we discussed in detail:

 Meeting Agenda:

·        Dissertation 2nd draft corrections and feedback.

·        Dissertation word count and how to get it down.

·        Show your most recent .exe file of the game and ask for feedback.

·        Learning contract needs to be signed again.

·        Honours Project Supervisor Meeting diaries need to be checked before the hand in.

·        Honours project hand in Questions:

o   What is needed?

o   1^st semester work included?

o   Include the blog? What sort of posts?

Progress Report:

·        The Dissertation was drafted a 2^nd time to further maximise feedback and assist in creating a well-polished academic piece of writing.

·        The dissertation has improved and there is little or no use of hyperbole or any unsupported terms.

·        The game now has a main menu, options menu, credits, blinking eyes for the boxes, explosion animations and the collecting of items brings you to the next level.

·        A new promotional poster has been created to showcase the game and to improve my personal aesthetic ability as well as compliment the game.

Agreed action points:

·        Send a final version of the dissertation that is print ready before submission to double check for any major errors.

·        Try and cut down on the word count by putting the analysis of Tony Wings and Thomas was Alone into the appendix, or by rewriting a few sections to decrease the word count.

·        Restructure the placement of your methodology.

·        Create a video of the gameplay for you game as the markers may not have the right software to play your game and it would be easier for them to assess.

·        Print out your work in silk or matte, as shiny posters can distract from your work when there is too much glare.

Why Business Cards?

Business Cards

Time is coming to a close on this computer arts degree, and it is time to start printing out the appropriate materials for the showcase and to create a gap of opportunity for employment.

One of those aspects, is the business card, a handy way of exposing what you are capable of within a small 89 × 51 mm piece of card. This was actually the first time I have never created a business card throughout my whole life, as back in collage we had created products and printed CVs which were showcased rather than business cards. Reflecting back on that experience, business cards are quite appropriate, for several reasons.

The following article discusses why I feel business cards are so important, not only for business but also for personal use: http://www.sessions.edu/notes-on-design/resources/design/why-business-cards-still-matter-in-the-digital-age/

Yes, it may be true that we have mobile phones and other means and methods of displaying and passing our contact information  although being able to brand yourself sufficiently counts for a great deal. People expect business cards from people who run a professional or freelance business, without them, it can insinuate that you do not take your business as seriously as other business owners.

Another key aspects of business cards are their ability to catch someones attention as well as to present your personality in a straight forward manner. Particularly for graphic designers and web designers, it opens up the playground for them to showcase their skills to the client which alone could possibly land them a job.

Why are they still being used today?

When I was in the process of creating my business card, the thought came to me, which was why are they so popular today among all the other methods of sharing your contact information and with new ways of sending business cards without manually typing in the information from a card. Methods such as 'bumping' or using QR codes don't seem to have clicked on fully as of yet.

This following articles discusses this situation:
http://www.networkworld.com/community/blog/why-business-cards-still-beat-%E2%80%98-bump%E2%80%99

It starts to ignite some sense when you think about it, if handing over a business card takes a few seconds to accomplish, as opposed to asking if the person has the said technology or software to 'bump' or take photos into software that register the details, this would prove cumbersome to many, particularly the more traditional parties.

Developing a Business Card

Having never created a business card, although having a very strong graphic design background, I started to do my research. My supervisor Dayna suggested a very useful website called Moo.com, which was the website which really made the whole process so simple and educational.

Creating a business card is not as simple as just created a design and that is it, you also need to consider the bleed, the printing quality, file format, the text quality and of course how you as a person wishes to present yourself.

Moo.com luckily offer out templates to clients with the correct file format, which they suggest is best with the use of a vector-based PDF. Pre-flight your PDFs using the 'Adobe PDF/X-1a' pre-set. It should also be with a CMYK colour format as opposed to RBG. All of these things are essential for achieving the maximum results in printing. 
Moo.com has a great slideshow which also details bleed, safe areas and trim within printing:
http://uk.moo.com/help/faq/yay-nay.html

Find their templates and design specifics for quality print results:
http://uk.moo.com/help/faq/templates-and-guidelines.html

Designing a Business Card

Ronan Quigley an audio student who helped me develop the audio for my game wanted a business card developed, so I decided to help assist him.

Before I designed my own, I designed Ronan's card as his design request was a minimalist design approach which seemed like a good experimenting option for designing my first business card.

I used Adobe Illustrator to create both business cards as I know from experience as a designer that vector based graphics (graphics which can be freely manipulated without loss in quality) are a lot more crisp when printed.

For Ronan's audio based business card I drew around an image of headphones with the pen tool. 

The concept was that the cable of the headphones would connect to the other side displaying the cable end. A minimalist approach, although a successful project in which I gained some key skilled in creating a business card.

I used the knowledge gained from creating Ronan's card to create my own one. I personally feel that creating a business card, most people go for 'less is more'. I also feel that if everyone is going for less is more, then I feel the 'less' ends up being 'less' as it is over saturated by many others who part take in the same concept. So I decided to go for a completely different direction.

Using Illustrator again, I decided to create a quirky and creative design which represents who I am as an artist. After a lot of research on other business cards out there, I then brought in all the collected resources into illustrator for inspiration, and then mocked up my own design concept.

Finding the right font and the right colours was the most time consuming aspect. As I started to polish the design for my details side, I realised that my design ability has grown so much within the past year, not only through practice  but through admiring the interface of windows 8. the trend in graphic design at the moment seems to be in using solid colours and clear sharp text, this is evident in windows 8 and was my main inspiration for the design.

After much tweaking and adjusting, I finally created something I felt really represented my art style and ability. Something that was dynamic, colorful with attention to detail. I then spent some time customizing two pieces of my art for the back cover. 

Bellow is the final result which I am happy with and quite excited for them to arrive on the 17th May: