The Daily Bulletin Archive

Elaine Polvinen, professor, Technology, will offer a totally online course during the fall semester that uses ANGEL and the Buffalo State virtual island in Second Life. The course, FTT 495: Intro to Virtual Fashion in Second Life, will meet on ANGEL and in the virtual world of Second Life on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m. Polvinen has been teaching fashion projects in Second Life as part of Web-enhanced courses, where students and the instructor worked together in Second Life during class, for three semesters. This will be the first time the course is offered entirely online and in world.

Polvinen will guide students through a series of introductory fashion projects and conclude with a virtual fashion show. Students will learn the basics of the 3-D world of Second Life. They will learn how to navigate, communicate with others, and create fashion-related projects. The course includes introductory multidisciplinary skills for 3-D virtual fashion design, brand development, presentation, and fashion-show production. She hopes to involve students from other campuses in this experimental virtual-world teaching project.

At Buffalo State, Second Life is installed on the fashion CAD lab computers in Caudell Hall 311, and laptops with Second Life software may be borrowed from E. H. Butler Library. Butler Library will also have Second Life installed on several computer stations in the library for fall 2008. Students may also download the free virtual-world application of Second Life to their own computers.

Polvinen also offers a series of video and audio tutorialson the introductory functions of Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop. She developed FTT 304: Adobe Pattern Development for Industry several years ago at the request of a global retailer. FTT 304 teaches students to use Photoshop and Illustrator to create original motifs for printed textiles based on current trends, industry standards, color impact, and marketability.