I thoroughly enjoyed the 3 studies that I completed over the past few weeks. I found that not only was I learning things about Max significantly fast, but I was also learning things about myself which I didn’t expect upon starting these studies. In regard to the creative process, I think that this might be the most challenging aspect of creating interactive art. I often found myself spending a lot of time trying to come up with an idea for this study. An issue that was always present was thinking my ideas were either too simple or too hard, and as a result I believe I wasted a lot of time. This was also due to the fact that my confidence with Max isn’t very high because I’m still learning how to use this software. But I think that the most important thing that I took out of this experience would be to set yourself ideas or goals for projects that might be ambitious, because in the end of these 3 studies I achieved things that if you had asked me to do 2 or 3 weeks ago I would have definitely said no I can’t do that. Although my 3 studies might not be fully functional or working to its greatest capacity, I have learnt more in the creative process than anything else which is ultimately the most important thing.

What I have learned about the techniques of interactive art is that there are no bad ideas. I realised from the start with this study that just because an idea can be perceived as simple, doesn’t mean that the end product is boring. An example would be my first study. Originally, I thought that this would not be a very good piece of work because it was a simple idea with a simple end result. But I had a really fun time not only making the piece but also using it. And it felt great to make something that worked how I intended it to be. Using Max has made me realise of all the various things someone can create with a simple bit of software, and seeing people in class create some really cool things has opened my eyes to interactive art. It has also been an interesting experience to see how us as humans interact with art through these studies. By making this study a tactile experience it has made realise how important it is for us as creators to think about how we want our audience to interact with our art. I think a good example of this for me would be study 3. Comparative to study 2 I wanted study 3 to be a lot more interactive which made me think of how I would approach such a task. As a result, I put human interaction first on my list of priorities when setting about the task. Because of this I think that study 3 was my favourite piece of work, because I understood what was needed in the interactive art making process.

What I would consider successful about my work so far would be that I have set myself a goal of just being able to have somewhat of a finished project as I am still learning the ropes with Max. I wanted to make sure that my work was at least 80% functional as I’m still learning how to use Max I don’t think it is quite possible for me to have a piece of work that I am fully happy with yet. I think what has also been successful is the fact that I have set myself challenges with these 3 pieces of work, and they have all come together in a way that I am happy with. I have come to the realisation that a piece of work being successful doesn’t necessarily mean it has to be functional to its highest degree. It could also be successful in terms of coming up with a great idea. This for me was study 2, as we came up with a great idea for our project, but ultimately, we were limited by our knowledge of Max so our finished product was pretty rough.

How I believe my work could be improved is just with some more projects to create. I feel as if I have a good foundation with Max in terms of knowing the basics, but I would like to expand my knowledge and set myself some even more difficult tasks to really push myself and see how much more I can learn. I often found myself outside of class going onto forums and various other websites to see if anyone else had posted things that I could use in some of my projects. I also found myself going onto YouTube and watching some tutorials for things such as the synthesiser I made for my third study. I think that one thing I can seriously improve on is fine tuning my projects to make sure that they are 100% functional with no faults, ultimately this is my end goal for this semester.