Sweet Success: Making Machinima to engage Sugarcane Farmers in discussions about climate risk
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Create World 2012 Helen Farley & Kate Reardon-Smith Digital Futures-CRN University of Southern Queensland Sweet Success: making machinima for sugarcane farmers
Machinima is the art of using virtual worlds or games to make films. Second Life has proven a popular venue for the creation of machinima for a number of reasons including the ability of users to create custom content, the facility to reuse items made by other users, and the capacity to readily alter avatars and landscapes. Though this medium is used by budding film makers to create fictional pieces and simulated documentaries, educators and researchers have also been quick to spot the potential of this form. This paper reports on a project undertaken by the Australian Digital Futures Institute and the Australian Centre for Sustainable Catchments, both at the University of Southern Queensland, to use machinima to inform sugarcane farmers’ decisions around sustainable farming practices. Managing risk associated with climatic variability is a significant challenge for farmers. This project specifically explores the use of machinima to stimulate discussion amongst farmers around how to incorporate an understanding of climate risk into their decision-making. More broadly, it considers the potential of innovative, web-based, discussion support systems to contribute to improved decision-making by land managers, regional communities, policy-makers and civil society, leading to sustainable and resilient regional areas.
TRANSCRIPT
Create World 2012
Helen Farley & Kate Reardon-Smith
Digital Futures-CRN
University of Southern Queensland
Sweet Success: making machinima for
sugarcane farmers
Create World 2012
Digital Futures-CRN
• Collaborative Research Network (CRN)
- CRN partners: USQ, ANU & UniSA
- Federally-funded: $5.1 M over 3 years (2012-2015)
- 5 projects (post doctoral research fellows, PhD scholarships)
• DF-CRN sub-themes:
- social and policy challenges in a digital future;
- participation in higher education; and
- technology rich learning environments.
Presenter
Presentation Notes
The core objective of the Digital Futures (CRN) is to build capacity (at least a 20% increase in identified research outcomes) and capability in the Digital Futures space. Through a partnership with the Australian National University (ANU) and the University of South Australia (UniSA), the Digital Futures (CRN) program will explore the future in a digital age within three specific sub-themes: social and policy challenges in a digital future; participation in higher education; and technology rich learning environments.
Create World 2012
DF-CRN Project 3 Investigating the impact of a web-based, ‘discussion-support’, agricultural-climate information system on Australian farmers’
operational decision making
• Project objectives
- to enhance farm management decision-making around climate risk
- to support sustainable (resilient) agricultural systems and rural communities
• Project partners
- Australian Centre for Sustainable Catchments (ACSC)
- Australian Digital Futures Institute (ADFI)
- ANU, UniSA & CANEGROWERS
Presenter
Presentation Notes
Project 3 is a joint project undertaken by researchers from USQ’s Australian Centre for Sustainable Catchments and Australian Digital Futures Institute. It will develop and evaluate a prototype discussion support system for the Australian sugarcane industry located in coastal Queensland and north-eastern New South Wales - a region exposed to high levels of climate variability – with often significant consequences for yield and profitability.
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Climate risk management
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Presentation Notes
Farmers make important management decisions which can have significant economic and environmental consequences. The risk associated with these can be reduced where farmers have the best available climate projections and information. However, developing mechanisms for delivering this information to farmers in a timely, acceptable and readily accessible format remains a key challenge.
Create World 2012
Presenter
Presentation Notes
This virtual discussion-support system will integrate regional climate projections and climate information with practical sugarcane farming operations. It will provide a series of discussion support Second Life machinima or virtual world movies to accurately depict scenarios relevant to real world farm management decisions ... ... and will evaluate the acceptability of this web-based system and its effectiveness in building farmers’ capacity for improved decision-making and climate risk management.
Create World 2012
Machinima • Machinima … using virtual worlds to make films
Source: davisthomas.com.au
Source: wired.com
Presenter
Presentation Notes
In the broadest sense, machinima is making movies from video games. There has been a long history of gamers using their gameplay to make short movies on all sorts of topics. World of Warcraft players recreated the Biblical scenes starring a gamer Christ. But the problem with using games is that the actors could have their heads lopped off in a raid at any moment. And there are a limited number of looks that an avatar can take on. Not everyone needs to look like a character from the Iliad, or Middle Earth, or some other fantasy world. However, machinima is a low cost alternative to using real filming techniques. Film crews are not needed. There are no expensive trips to exotic locations. Actors don’t need to be made. Just gather a few friends with some alts or ‘alternative avatars’. And elaborate sets are easy to create. Image: An epic story derived from the World of Warcraft game, Terran Gregory & Ezra Ferguson's film The Return, a finalist in the best picture category, offers an Iliad-like tale of warriors away from home.
Create World 2012
Second Life
• A virtual world
• User-created content & virtual marketplace
Phil the Phoenix Source: USQ in SL (LindyMac, 2010)
• Avatars can be customised & manipulated
• Screen capture software – e.g. FRAPS
• Recorded soundtracks
Presenter
Presentation Notes
Second Life is a sophisticated online 3D virtual world which provides a popular medium for creating movies (machinima) using gaming software. It is a place where anything that can be imagined can be created. However, it differs from massively multiplayer online roleplaying games because it has no requirement for gameplay and the content is created by users rather than by the owners of the game. Second Life avatars (characters or ‘actors’) and settings can be readily contextualised by creating custom content or reusing items made by other users. Users retain copyright for any content they create and the Second Life internal currency, the Linden dollar (L$), can be used to purchase items from other users. The Second Life marketplace is a place where users can by products created by other users. Anything from gothic castles, industrial sheds or even whole towns. For just a few hundred Lindens – the equivalent to about $2.50, you can buy a whole French village. With the emergence of Second Life, there was unprecedented opportunity to make machinima because it became so easy to manipulate the virtual sets and customise the avatars to any role. Once the scenes are created, they can be captured with screen capture software such as FRAPS. Sound also can be recorded. Second Life uses voice-over IP just like Skype, so machinima makers are able to capture the soundtrack as well as the visual footage just like with live film making or a soundtrack can be added afterwards. When avatars are spoken through, their lips move which is also a bonus for Second Life machinima makers. Type Second Life into a YouTube or Vimeo search box and you’ll reveal hundreds of machinima made by users.
Create World 2012
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Presentation Notes
Second Life is currently used by a wide range of educational institutions, including universities, libraries and government agencies. For example, Virginia Tech Biomedical Imaging Division uses Second Life as a virtual training environment for the use of CT scanners; University of San Martin de Porres of Peru has developed Second Life prototypes of Peruvian archaeological buildings; and a number of countries (e.g. Sweden, Serbia, the Maldives) have Second Life virtual embassies.
Create World 2012
Virtual worlds & education • Second Life as a teaching and learning medium
Source: SMH 2009
Source: USQ in SL (LindyMac, 2010)
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Presentation Notes
Educators have been quick to spot the potential in using virtual worlds in their courses. Des Butler from QUT’s Faculty of Law used a series of machinima in his law courses. The series of Air Gondwana provided students with a blended learning environment in which to learn negotiation skills needed for the practice of the law USQ Law Faculty uses second life to enable students to develop legal advocacy skills and in assessment for external students
Create World 2012 Source: stephanierguzman.com
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Presentation Notes
Dramatic arts students will act out Shakespeare’s plays, perfect in every detail but without the huge costs of time and money associated with building elaborate sets, costuming actors and providing a venue for an audience.
Create World 2012
ACSC APN project - India
• Funded by the Asia-Pacific Network (APN)
• real-life climate-based scenarios depicted through 2nd Life avatars challenging participant farmers about on-farm decisions that involve seasonal climate risk.
• Aim: to stimulate discussions at farmer-oriented internet kiosks in agricultural regions in India and on line with farmers and support staff.
• 2nd Life/eLearning distance education methods trailed with farmers and farm advisers in Andhra Pradesh, India
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Presentation Notes
The Asia Pacific Network (APN) for global change research project facilitates the development of an interactive and customisable web-based climate portal. This portal will transmit and disseminate timely climate information to farmers in key regions of India. The Indian Government, in providing thousands of computer terminals and facilities across regional India, provides enormous opportunity for this web-based initiative to improve the sustainability of Indian farming communities.
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• English scenario video • Hindi scenario video • Telugu scenario video
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Presentation Notes
Machinima was also used by members of the project team to help Indian farmers make decisions using climate information provided by the Australian Centre for Sustainable Catchments. This was the first time that they used machinima and to good effect.
• any synthetic video discussion-support tool must be customised appropriately if this approach is to gain widespread uptake.
• BUT ... issues with aspects not necessarily related to core climate and crop science:
– farmers' dress
– informal interactions within a discussion environment
Presenter
Presentation Notes
The farmers were delighted to see themselves portrayed on screen but thought that they looked too young, were wearing the wrong clothes and where was everybody? All of these factors need to be taken into account for subsequent machinima. When the CRN came along, the project team decided to try the same approach – using Second Life machinima – to show sugarcane farmers how they could access climate information from the USQ website and how they might take this into account for their decisions around farming.
Create World 2012
Sweet success – developing machinima for Australian sugar farmers
• Set: ... a typical Australian sugarcane farm ... coastal mountains, Queenslander, shed, machinery, dog
Presenter
Presentation Notes
In the context of this project, Second Life characters and machinima have been created to deliver consistent scripted conversations designed to stimulate discussion about using climate information to address climate risk. It was decided to employ outside contractors, under the supervision of Australian Digital Futures Institute staff – to make a prototype machinima. The company chosen were Top Dingo, the people responsible for Telstra’s presence in Second Life. The whole set exists in the sky above USQ island and was made by Top Dingo designer, Noel Jacobson. I It is a shed full of equipment and machinery. Sugar is growing in the fields around the shed. You can see the homestead in the background and look past it to the hills characteristic of coastal Queensland and northern NSW where sugar is grown.
Create World 2012
Sweet success – developing machinima for Australian sugar farmers
Avatars ... sugarcane farmers
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Presentation Notes
Getting the right look for the farmers was important. They typically wear King Gee work wear, a battered hat and boots. If the sugarcane farmers can’t relate to the avatars that are supposed to represent them, they are unlikely to buy the premise of the machinima.
Create World 2012
Sweet success – developing machinima for Australian sugar farmers
• Script: ... typical conversation designed to stimulate discussion about using climate information to make farm management decisions.
• Machinima: Top Dingo
• Link: Sweet Success
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A script was written by new PhD student and (whoever it is Neil works for) that would provide an introduction to the series. It is the sort of casual conversation that would typically happen when farmers get together. As the machinima starts, an old ute drives towards the shed and the conversation begins … At this point, show the machinima.
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Sweet Success - evaluation
• Potential to provide a relevant engaging technology rich learning environment?
• Readily adapted for different farming systems and locations by using culturally appropriate clothing, language and settings?
• Able to be disseminated widely and cost-effectively?
• Effectiveness as a capacity building tool?
• Contribution to sustainable land management?
Presenter
Presentation Notes
Once created, these can be readily adapted for different farming systems and locations by using culturally appropriate clothing, language and settings. As such, this platform has significant potential to provide relevant engaging technology rich learning environments which can be readily adapted to different situations and disseminated both widely and cost-effectively.
Create World 2012
Acknowledgements • Team members:
PhD candidate: Neil Cliffe (ACSC, USQ)
Research Fellow: Kate Reardon-Smith (ACSC, USQ)
ACSC (USQ) researchers: Roger Stone, Shahbaz Mushtaq, Torben Marcussen, Tek Maraseni
ADFI (USQ) researchers: Helen Farley, Joanne Doyle, Neil Martin
DF-CRN collaborators: Janette Lindesay (ANU), Adam Loch (UniSA)
Industry collaborator: Matt Kealley (CANEGROWERS)
• Noel Jacobson & Amanda Hassett, Top Dingo ... www.topdingo.com/
This project is funded through the Australian Government’s Collaborative Research Networks program
