User-exemplar
(Digital Photography, London South Bank University)
(Rachie Karu)
Prior experience on SL
Rachel found out about SL a month before she joined the project. A friend of her read a book about
SL and told her about how people can have a life in SL. She found those things very interesting and
wanted to get into SL herself.
“I found out about it like a month ago just before I signed up for this course. But I just found
it really interesting. A friend of mine actually read a book on SL, and just describing how
much people can get into it and they really adopt their life style in that and spend hours and
hours, days and days. I don’t think it’s particularly healthy actually, but I think it’s very
interesting to create this virtual world you can live in it, you can actually make money
through it, there are stories of people getting married through it, so I think it’s a quite
interesting concept.”
Engagement with SL activities
Rachel was particularly interested in the idea of learning through SL. From the training session, she
could see the potential of SL for teaching and learning.
“I can see how it could work as a learning device, you know, all the presentation, slides
shows, you know, it’s really nice.”
After a few more sessions in SL, she found that SL was fun, hands-on and a new way to interact with
other students.
“Yeah, just try to get into it. I like the idea of learning through it. I think it’s quite fun and
quite hands-on, and just a new way to interact with other students and educational tools. I
think it works very well.”
A place for meeting and interaction
Rachel enjoyed the aspect that SL was not just a game, but a place for people to meet up and
interact.
“I like the way it’s not just you were on your own in a game’s concept, it is this idea of
interaction, obviously that’s the main concept in SL, you know, meeting up with people or
you know, move around and gathering, teleport. I thought that was quite fun.”
“That’s really a good bonus. That’s definitely makes it something unique. If you were just
you on your own, wondering around, it became quite boring. But the interaction aspect is
definitely key, I think to this success, you know as a programme.”
An engaging environment
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Rachel enjoyed the visual aspect of SL and the freedom of being able to fly without worrying about
falling off and getting hurt. She found those aspects quite engaging.
“Like the visual aspect of it is really nice, like how you can turn around, how much you can
see, like as I said, the movement control of your avatar, how you can move around,
obviously the movement control, that the person can fly… and there’re not many constrains
for you, not to be too careful about falling off so you’re hurting yourself. So you can just be
kind of free, and that’s quite… yeah the visual aspect is really nice, walking about, flying
about, and seeing all these things people have been created, really colourful, it’s just kind of
interesting for the eyes. All the little gages you got, taking pictures, be able to teleport from
one place to another is really nice.”
She thought the visual element was particularly important for engaging digital photography students
because they are sensitive and responsive to visuals.
“We are photography students, we’re all creative artists, visual people that turn on by things
that we see, as oppose to a group of people, Math students or something, perhaps a bit
difficult, they might not be so inclined to be involved, they might be bored or find it a bit
meaningless. But because we’re all visual students, it definitely helped us.”
The vastness of SL also invited her to explore and find out more about SL.
“And the vastness of it, it’s so huge, you know, you were in there, you were just a tiny little
dot in. This is a massive virtual world. It makes you want to find out what else there was.
Every place I go, there is something interesting to look at or something interesting, you
know, taking pictures of all, so everywhere is gonna be so interesting, I need to see all, it’s a
lot to see.”
Development of interactive object
Rachel found lots of potential of SL for building and creating things that couldn’t be so easily done in
real life.
“It was nice to see because you could do things you wouldn’t be able to do, building a story
cube with these massive blocks, obviously, you wouldn’t have the opportunity to do that.”
“I was always consciously aware of the fact because it’s a virtual world, so digital, so
computerized, so designed by someone or many people, so that’s what we’re doing our
course, designing things and developing things through digital media, so that kind of thing
engaged you further because that was just a blank screen until someone designed every
single piece of it, so that definitely interested me because that’s we do I suppose.”
She found that the group discussion was so engaging and involving because it was through the
development of an interactive object.
“This is interactive, involving you what’s going on, you know, it’s not like lecturing
something, it’s quite easy just sit back, not really being able to pay that much attention,
while that keeps you involved, because it amuses you, like it might distract you a little bit,
but it keeps you involved in the class what’s going on, so overall it’s definitely benefit, you
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had a bit laugh for 5 minutes, do something that’s not really part of what you’re meant to be
doing in the session, but everyone is still involved, and engaged what’s going on, and then
you can go back and doing the task, switch on like 100% motivation, I think it’s really
important because people lose concentration very quickly, you only can concentrate for 20
minutes of the time, so it’s really important to keep people interest, and definitely SL does
that.”
Visual exhibition & gallery
Rachel thought that SL offered a visual place for displaying her work. Compared with real life, SL
offered an opportunity to run the exhibition with much more freedom and lower cost.
“I think Paula said something quite important, interesting about the possibility of putting
your work and stuff, just kind of options of what you can do. They’re endless, how are you
going to present them and stuff, because the cost and technical aspects in real life, you
might not be able to do something, whereas in SL, you can do it because there’s not so many
boundaries, and she was saying something about exhibiting our work in a boat and just
sailing about with all our photographs and stuff. It’s definitely interesting for that aspect,
because you can do almost anything you can think of, you can do with that quite easily, so
that’s definitely not so limiting.”
Group discussion & negotiation in SL
Rachel thought that the group discussion and negotiation went on very well.
“I don’t have any problems, we were in there, by a couple of minutes, everyone started the
task already… we were just Point a, and Point b, and then doing task, and again that was
good.”
She was comfortable with talking to people through text. She used Facebook and MSN for quite a
long time and found communication through text natural.
“I found that quite natural. Especially when we had this programme, you know Facebook
around, MSN messengers, I think these things have been around for several years, you
know, that’s not too much weird to talk to people that way.”
Rachel identified a number of advantages of communication through text. One of them was that the
ideas became clearer, more precise and thought through via text, whereas when people spoke, they
tended to say without thinking too much.
It was also difficult to control the group discussion through voice because people sometimes talked
something off the topic and they tried to speak at the same time.
Text-based communication through SL offered a platform where everybody’s ideas could be equally
heard and fairly judged. Communication through text might help shy people to bring out their ideas.
Presence through avatars provided some level of anonymity which might help people to bring out
their ideas.
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It was also good to have a record of what people had discussed if the communication was through
text.
There were disadvantages about communication through text. Rachel said that the communication
could be more formal through text than talking. In real llife, people made more jokes in the
conversation. People couldn’t see the body language, facial expressions and hear the voices of each
other through text. However, Rachel said there was always a flip side of these aspects. For example,
in SL through text, people might focus more on getting the task done instead of joking around and
being distracted by the richness of personal cues.
Overall, Rachel thought that text-based communication offered more advantages than
disadvantages, especially for educational purposes.
“I mean obviously, there always going to be advantages and disadvantages, something like
that. But definitely I think, on a purely recreational basis of kind having fun going on SL,
perhaps, that would be a disadvantage. It’s obviously you can’t see the facial expressions, to
get the whole meaning what someone was saying. But in educational purpose, I think it’s
really good because it’s not distracting, you can focus on what’s actually said. Anyone’s
equal. Anything comes from anyone you take them on the same stand whist, if you don’t
purposely do it, in a class when someone says something, you don’t take too much notice
because you think, ‘I don’t want to listen to that’, whist through SL, it’s just text coming
through your box, and you read it, and it’s all equal, how you perceive that, so that’s quite
important.”
Rachel’s personal view on group discussion through text in SL was captured in a cognitive map
below.
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7 The ideas become
clearer and more
precise
8 You only say the
key points
6 You say in the
head, then think
through, then alter
it a bit, then type
it ... You talk
before you think
11 Everybody was
talking at the same
time
13 We don't get
distracted ... We
get side-tracked by
little conversations
33 You can scrool up
and read it if you
forget
32 It's good that
everything is logged
30 It helps to bring
out good quality in
people
38 It's harder for
people to understand
36 Lose a bit
meaning what people
try to say
17 It gave everyone
an opportunity to be
heard
29 SL gives a
platform that
everyone is on the
same level
-
12 We're sticking to
the point using text
... Not sticking to
the point in talking
14 You can see what
everyone else said
in SL through text
34 People are more
conscious about what
they're typing
-
-
10 It's easier to
control the group
discussion through
text
-
16 Teacher has to
work harder to keep
us in control
39 SL is quite good
as an educational
tool
9 It's much easier
for people to
receive what you're
trying to say
through text
35 It's more the
formal stuff in text
... Say more joke,
funny when talking
in real life
37 You don't have
their voice or
facial expressions
28 SL gives a fresh
start
20 You put everyone
on the same level
... You would value
more from a
particular person
then the other,
although they say
exactly the same
thing
-
26 You have this new
avatar
27 You're doing it
through computers
19 You judge what
someone said on the
basis of how they
look or their voice
is more
authoritative or
confident
21 It's good to
bring out ideas for
people who aren't so
confident in
speaking ... Some
people never say
anything although
they produce really
good work
31 There is a record
of text-based
communication
24 It's easier to
type something ...
More difficult to
stand in front of
the class and say
something
-
25 People worry to
say something wrong
23 It's not like
they don't have any
ideas, but they're a
bit shy
Identity through avatars
Rachel perceived a missing body language and facial expressions through avatars and that created a
barrier for the communication. However the barrier didn’t bother her too much because she knew
them in real life. When she talked to them through SL, she had a mental picture of them and she
actually talked to the real person.
The missing body language and personal voice would make a big difference when talking to a
stranger in SL. It was difficult to identify the real identity of the person from how he or she
presented him or herself through the avatar and the way the avatar interacted.
Rachel also felt that SL as well as Facebook and MSN, is less personal than real life. She wouldn’t use
SL for having fun with her friends. However, for the same reason, SL could be very useful for
educational purpose because it was less distractive for the students. Rachel thought that for this
group of students, because they had already known each other, it was actually better to cut out
those personal cues so that everybody can focus on the group discussion and get the job done.
It wasn’t difficult for Rachel to tell who the person was behind the avatar once they started
interaction in SL and getting more familiar with each other. Rachel observed that people didn’t really
change their personality when they communicated in SL through avatars. Their characters came
through the interaction and that made things easier to tell who the person was behind the avatar.
Rachel observed that people made more jokes and humours in the later sessions just like what they
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did in real life. Their characters came through the text despite the fact they presented themselves
through avatars.
Rachel made her avatar randomly. She observed that other students also made their avatars on a
basic level. She thought that people didn’t really use the freedom to create their avatars as much as
they wanted them to be because they knew they used SL for research purpose. Another reason that
people didn’t really create their avatars freely was because they know each other in real life and
they were worried being judged by others on how their avatars look.
Rachel’s personal views on the impact of presence through avatars on identities and group
discussion were captured in a cognitive map below.
55 SL is good for
edcuation
58 I can almost
recognize who is who
just from what
they've chosen for
their avatars on
screen
62 People don't
spend time and
created their
avatars on a basic
level ... People
spend time on doing
hair and cloth, and
make their avatar
look fancy as they w
64 We're using SL
for research ...
Using SL for fun
66 People worried
being judeged by
others on how their
avatars look
63 I can recognize
who is who once I
got more familar
with how the avatars
interact
61 Their personality
is mingling with
their avatar
60 I can see their
characters coming
through the
dialogues, humour
and funny things
people're saying
65 We all know the
real person ...
Being an anonymous
person
67 We're sitting in
the same room next
to each other
47 I found it
stranger ...
Comfortable with
people you know
45 The conversation
became robotic ...
Same interesting
with people you know
50 I don't know
their characters and
style of talking and
writing ... I got
them in my head how
they say something
in text and real
life and facial
expressions
44 I don't know who
they were, male or
female, how old they
were, where in this
world they were from
59 They're students
from my course,
we're in the same
classroom
49 I don't really
know their meanings,
whether they're
joking ... You know
the meaning
42 I only get this
blank text from this
avatar ... I got
their mental images
inheritedly in my
brain
40 Missing body
language and facial
expressions puts a
barrier between the
actual person and
the person behind
the avatar
52 I don't think SL
is for recreation,
meeting up and
having fun with my
friends
53 I don't like to
speak to friends
very oftern on
Facebook and MSN ...
I like to talk to
them on the phone or
f2f
51 I found SL less
personal like
Facebook and MSN ...
Talking somebody on
the phone or
face-to-face is
personal
54 SL is useful for
work-based thing you
don't need too put
emotion and
character, but focus
on get things done
57 It's good to cut
out the distraction
56 People focus on
the task and not
talking anything
else ... People
spend lots of time
socializing
43 Speak to people I
don't know in SL ...
Speak to people I
know in SL
Socialization in SL
Rachel talked to others quite a lot in real life during these SL sessions. The things they talked about
were mainly to do with technical skills such as how to do things and how to get to a place.
“But I think the majority of that was kind of saying, ‘I don’t understand’, ‘how do you do
that’, or ‘how did you over there’, or ‘can you show me how you take a picture’, or
something, it’s more technical thing, and maybe that’s the same for the others. In the
second and fourth week, we get a better understand of how it all works, so you can just
concentrate on what you’re doing, you have to communicate through that way.”
“Yeah, I went to… she just send me the link she took some pictures of monkeys. I was sitting
next to her so I could see that from her computer screen and I said, ‘where are you? I want
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to see the moneys’. Then she just send me to teleport link to teleport me where she was. So
that was quite fun.”
“I mean if it was like within SL, ‘I want to go to that place you were last week, how to get
there’, then their avatar can show your avatar, something like, ‘follow me’, or send you a
teleport, so you can technically help people through SL. But at the very beginning, it was
more like doing something to do with toolbar, so their avatar couldn’t point to your toolbar,
so it’s more obvious to them just look your screen and say, ‘press file, search’, that kind of
thing. But once you kind of get over that, learn the basics, it was really fundamental stuff
you need to get the actual communication, then after that, you can learn through SL.”
She thought that everyone sat in the same room next to each and use SL together was fun and
amusing.
“That was quite funny. Everyone would be laughing at the same time, you know in real life
through this little joke that is happening in SL. That was quite amusing.”
“And that was nice to have all the other people that I knew in SL at the same time because if
someone in the room found something, then we talked to us through SL say, ‘oh, I found
something really cool! Come and look at this.’ and send the link or whatever, that made it
really quite easy.”
Learning how to use SL
Learning basic skills
Rachel found that the training guide was very useful. It helped her to familiarize herself with the
basic movement controls on the keyboard.
“I found that helpful, definitely. I just practising it, because it’s just educating your fingers,
like not having to think, ‘oh, go forward, go backward’, just doing it…It’s what you’re
starting, then you don’t have to think about that anymore, involved in your
surroundings…you were just naturally going through the controls and don’t think about that
so much.”
She read through the training guide thoroughly point by point, and practised those basic skills such
as movement, teleporting and communicating on her own.
“I just read through it. Then basically went through point by point, and then when on SL saw
the correlations between the two, then practise it basically. I got practising a few hours this
week. It’s been quite fun, just wondering about, just go places and taking pictures, things
like that.”
“Yeah, the basic movement, like walking around, teleporting, and how you communicate
with one or another, that sort of thing.”
After practising basic skills on SL for a few hours , Rachel still found that the basic movement was
hard at the beginning.
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“I found it quite hard to get the basics of it. Last week it was kind of practising, getting this
little avatar, whatever, I found it hard to move around and understand how it works. But I
think that’s just one of little hurdles. Then it’s kind of quite open to you.”
“It does take a quite long time just navigate. That’s only the downside at the moment for
me, if I was doing educational things through it, I could spend a good few hours in SL only
get an equivalent of half an hour’s real learning, just because it takes a little bit time to get
on places, but I think that maybe that will be quicken, you know with my knowledge of the
programme…”
She observed that other students had the same problems during the first SL session.
“We’re were all still in the same room and everyone is kind of bumping into each other,
getting confused and having not knowing how to get into this. It’s quite amusing, and
everyone has done a bit practising before we go to the session, but still we found it a little
bit hard… but I think I’m sure like this week we’ll have more logical stance on it and be much
better, hopefully.”
Although Rachel found basic movement was a bit harder for her, she thought that it was good to
have a certain level of sophistication to be able to do more complicated things in SL.
“They were meant to be that complicated because if it was just a straightforward backward
and forward, then you wouldn’t be able to do very much of it. So you need to be able to look
around to be able to change the camera angles, and this sort of thing, to make it more
comprehensive, to make it more realistic.”
Rachel didn’t play computer games very much. She thought that it could be much easier for
somebody who was engaged with playing computer games a lot.
“So it’s just a bit of getting used to it. I don’t play computer games, but I know some of my
friends are always on computers or play-stations, or things like this, maybe they would find
it easy to pick it up, just from a more, you know hands-on computerized way of thinking. I
don’t generally do that sort of thing. I just found a little bizarre to begin with, but now it’s
fine.”
She said that for her parent’s generation, it would be much harder for them to get used to this idea
and it would take lots of time to get them started doing something in SL.
“I know for instance, if it were for my parents, they’re not that old, they’re like 50’s, if they
try to get in SL, they would find it very weird and strange because they only have mobile
phones, and they don’t really use computers, games that sort of thing, so it could be very
hard for them, it could take them up to a few weeks before they started doing it.”
However, for her generation, being able to use the 3-D virtual world is the way to look forward. It’s
also good for her to be prepared for that change.
“But, you know, our generation with technology … this is the way the world is moving
forward really. So people are prepared for that, and assuming that as it was, so… I think it’s
really a good idea.”
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Rachel really enjoyed the face-to-face training session. First of all, it was fun and interesting to see
each other’s avatars.
“I just found it really enjoyable. It was really interesting. The time went really quickly, and
the guy is really amusing. It was really a good fun to see our characters.”
She learned about new functions in SL, such as landmark which she found very useful.
“What I supposed every time you go into it, it becomes a little bit familiar with way you can
go, you can save the locations you’ve been before that you thought good, so you can get
there without too much trouble because obviously it’s this mad massive virtual world, you
know several levels and it’s really hard to find things that you’ve found once without save
them. That option is a good idea.”
It was good to be shown how to do things by somebody who had plenty of experience on SL.
“I think it definitely helped… because he was saying when he first went on SL, there was no
orientation island to start with, and obviously you didn’t have anyone to show you how this
is all done, it took him ages to figure out even how to move, and realize he had a little… you
know, the map, search options, and stuff. So it definitely helped. He just took away a couple
of hours to wondering around, just say, ‘this is how you do it’, showing us from the screen,
make it much simpler. So that definitely did help.”
It was also good to be guided through SL by a tutor who can keep students on track.
“I think it worked with me to actually learn material through a course or something, but
obviously there is a slight danger that you get distracted because you’re too busy into
changing hair styles, different cloths, going little other things that was on offer. But as long
as you can have your teacher there in SL with you and there was a time slot that you
wouldn’t be able to wonder off kind of things.”
Difficulties in using SL
She didn’t experience many technical problems when using SL, apart from moving things around was
a bit difficult for her at the beginning. But with some practice, she made progress quickly on SL.
“No, not really, just obviously at the beginning, things like technical problems like moving
things around, and stuff, but that was soon cleared up. Once that is kind of more obvious, I
think it’s all quiet, you can do what you want, just how much you want to progress on that. I
mean I don’t even know half, even tiny bit of SL, I’ve been on it for 10 times also, so I know
there is a lot to discover, change and involve….but I didn’t really find any problems apart
from the initial, not knowing how to use it.”
Another difficulty Rachel experienced was how to search and find useful information on SL. It took
her a little while to figure out that SL is not a place simply for replication those places in real life, but
a unique place on its own.
“I did find it quite hard because first I was a bit confused because SL is not just a second
world. It’s the only unique world, so I was kind of looking for places, search and type in, you
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know London, Eiffel Tower, Paris, none of these things coming up, and I found that bizarre,
then I realized they’re just unique islands people have built.”
“I did find quite hard to find stuff, but then once I found, I kind of type into theme park,
something that came up with wonderland….like shops, little things you can do, I took
pictures there. I thought it was really fun, but it was a little bit… what you need to get over
the concept of it.”
She identified a limitation in taking photos in SL from a photographer’s point of view. In real life, the
job of a photographer is to take a portrait of a person by capturing his or her expressions or what
you want them to be in a more dynamic way, whereas in SL it’s all about to capture what has been
created there already. For this reason, it’s harder to distinguish the work of one photographer from
another in SL because they all look very similar.
“It’s kind of preliminary kind of photography, it’s kind of go out and taking pictures of what
you see, so you just shooting and getting pictures, which is good and building up your
collection, they’re nice images visually, but I just think it’s not really, it’s not your art that
your capturing, you’re just recording someone else’s design, you know, when you’re taking a
picture of someone’s avatar, you’re just recording what someone else has made of that
avatar, whereas in real life, you’re going to take a portrait of a person, and obviously that
what they look like, that’s how they would ….this world, but then you capture their
expression, you capture what you like you want to see them, but obviously again, I did find,
especially in the last week of the course with the technical aspect, I’m realizing that you can
change the time of the day, and that fits the light and when you got really progressed with
the camera control, get out really zoom in and stuff, then you can get really nice qualities of
images, but it is a little bit flat because it’s on a virtual level.”
“I just think taking pictures, I mean capturing what was already there, and obviously, that is
what photographer is. But because you got less control of your camera in terms of just the
function or stuff, it’s harder to distinguish your work from the others, like when we made
the story cubes, I found it quite notable that everyone’s images are on the same kind of level
because we were all using exactly the same camera, taking pictures of exactly the same kind
of graphically design things, and SL is massive, still some of us getting the same images, so I
found that really bizarre, people went to the same place together or something, but they all
look very similar, whereas if we all went out in real life, obviously we do this and we come
back to the classroom, ‘right, this is what we got’, everyone’s work is completely different
and they chose different…techniques, colour techniques, what cameras they are using,
exposure time, and technical aspects of photography, and they come out and look very
different. In SL, they’re all look quite similar, only the subject matter differentiate. So from
that aspect I think it’s a little bit, limiting. But then obviously you can take pictures in real life
and upload them into SL, then you got endless options again.”
On the whole, Rachel’s initial experience in SL was quite encouraging. She thought that SL was such
an exciting and interesting place to look around and had great potential as a learning environment.
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“I don’t know, also obviously I’ve only been there a few times, it was quite exciting, I want to
look around. Once you got over that, the first initial excitement of it, you could just going
into your classroom in SL and you know, learn for an hour for online students.”
She thought that the level of complexity of SL engaged learners enough to carry on, not to give up.
“Yeah, but engaged you enough to carry on. It’s not, you know, you’re the beginner, and it’s
too hard and you just give up. It engaged you, interested you, so you want to get there. And
I’m sure, you know that happens really quickly, there is a huge difference in my ability
through SL just in the last two weeks, I’ve only been there a couple of times. So I think if you
were going there a few times a week for a learning purpose, within 2 weeks, you have no
problems at all for the technical aspect of it. So I think, and it needs to be that level of
complexity to be interesting, because otherwise, it’s too easy. People don’t, people like
challenge.”
Although for this small group of six volunteers who didn’t find SL very difficult to learn, Rachel didn’t
think that it would be too much challenging for other students in her class. They’re all technically on
the same level.
“I don’t think, just knowing the group who did in SL and knowing everyone else in my course,
definitely, that wasn’t the top technical people that volunteer themselves. It was a random
mixture of the class that turn out, so I know when I think about people in my course, not
have problems with SL.”
“I mean some people are gonna find it a little harder than others, that’s always gonna
happen, but I’m sure everyone would be able to get there relatively quickly, just on a equal
level with us, we’re just kind of good, average of the rest of the group.”
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