End Of Year Review

Its ten to eleven on the day of final hand in, everything is complete and signed off on and I’m already planning what cake I’m going to buy myself in celebration of getting everything finished in time. Though all I really want to do right now is sleep for a week it’s also a moment of reflection and I feel like I’ve come a long way this year, easily as far as the first year if not further; I have learnt entirely new skills in UDK and CryEngine and I’ve built on existing skills.

The first development piece I produced this year

The last development piece this year

This year I developed drawing and digital painting skills and I’ve improved my Life drawing by leaps and bounds. We’ve had new tutors and the learning experience has only improved with many more perspectives on our work. Working in groups taught me a lot about organisation and in the end was probably the most enjoyable, productive and most satisfying part of the year.

 

We’ve developed presentation skills and listened to employability lectures and combined with the live briefs and professional briefs we’ve done we’ve learnt a lot about professional practice and with that I feel like I’ve improved my time management and organisation alongside the artistic skills that I’ve improved.

Now that I am over halfway through my university education and on the cusp of starting my final year I find myself thinking about the process of University education itself and its uses and purposes.

Universities now seem to be mainly a means to an end, with the job market as it is it seems that you need a diploma to get any job and the University is a means to that end. However, Universities are more than that, they’re tools for learning and that’s learning in every sense – academic and social and university to me provides a unique experience that cannot be found anywhere else.

Universities were originally groups of scholars. They were quite elitist organisations in the pursuit of scholarly matters but as the times have changed they have become places where important research was conducted and were solely dedicated to curriculums like philosophy and sciences, they have evolved from that in the modern age to include every type of subject and open up to a broader range of students but the prejudice towards the academic subjects is still sometimes present.

From my university education I personally expect myself to learn new skills and develop old ones. With the help of the tutors I’m learning modelling and engine work and I’m developing my digital art, drawing and sculpting abilities. Besides these I also expect to learn skills like time management, responsibility and confidence to speak and present. Even from the university experience as a whole I am learning life skills and building up connections and relationships.

From my three years in uniniversity  I am going to get a diploma (Hopefully) but I’m also going to get a bank of skills, both specific and general  that I can apply to a broad range of careers and ventures.