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| The Academy of Art University in San Francisco, CA |
From our friends at the Academy of Art University...
The Academy of Art University Has Found a Positive Way to Use Augmented Reality
Art schools have certainly evolved more in the past decade than any other branch of education. Only 20 years ago, the average art school was merely a place to learn painting, music, singing, and possibly a talent more useful like clothing design. Art schools still offer common subjects like music, acting, and painting; however, now, beginning in recent years, art schools are a great place to learn a useful trade that will benefit a person, financially and creatively, for the rest of their lives.
This is more apparent with the Academy of Art University more than any other. One such instance of art benefiting society is the Academy's School of Game Development, which is using augmented reality to come up with ways to benefit society.
The students that study in the School of Game Development created an app called Tenderfeels. Its job is to monitor the residents of one of San Francisco's most poverty-ridden neighborhoods - Tenderloin District. Citizens of this district can tell the app how they feel with the app. This data is being used by city officials to come up with solutions to help the people of this poverty-stricken neighborhood.
Users of Tenderfeels also have the data available to them. They can see where a resident marked a certain emotion and what caused it. This allows the area to reflect on their living situations, or perhaps evade a particular area altogether.
"It's actually taking on real-world, real-life issues to try to make the city a better place," said Steven Goodale, one of the teachers at the Academy of Arts University's game development school. According to Steven, the app can easily be modded to work with any other city.
As a member of the San Francisco community, and a valued part of the neighborhood, the Academy of Art University is using its program to give back to the community. The goal of the program is to turn Tenderloin District into a more livable community, more akin to the rest of the city.
About the Academy of Art University:
Students who attended the Academy have found employment with Pixar, Microsoft, Electronic Arts, Adidas, and much more. Students are able to enter into literally dozens of different industries with an education from the Academy.
The school was created in 1929, and it has become known for its innovation and creativity. The goal of the Academy is to prepare professional artists for real world jobs. They teach students how to take their passions and use them productively, whether it is clothing design, advertising, or entertainment.
The Academy has also offered online art courses online since 2002.
What is Augmented Reality?:
Augmented reality is the process of overlaying digital objects in front of a real world background. The term can also apply to auditory changes to real life sounds and geological movement of your device according to your real world location.
The most popular example of augmented reality is Pokemon Go, which uses a geographical location and overlays digital images over real world video on a phone screen.
