Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1509389
EDUCATION www.postmagazine.com 25 POST SEPT/OCT 2023 DREXEL UNIVERSITY Nick Jushchyshyn is the program director of digital media and virtual production at Drexel University (https://drexel.edu) in Philadelphia, PA. The bach- elor's degree program, says Jushchyshyn, focuses on "the intersection of the real world and the vir- tual world," teaching students everything from 3D modeling, animation and motion capture, to virtual production with green screen, rear projection and LED walls. Drexel, which is home to a campus of 30,000 students, partners with the Antoinette Westphal College of Media Arts & Design for its digital media program, which also offers masters degree and Ph.D programs. The bachelor's program can span four or five years and requires that student work in relevant industries for a full six months for the four-year program, or at three different times for the five-year program. "Essentially, they graduate after five years with a year-and-a-half of industry experience," says Jushchyshyn. Drexel offers four specific degrees at that level. One is in game design, which is focused on the entertainment game industry, although there is also focus on non-entertainment media, such as simulations. The 3D animation and visual effects major teaches 3D character modeling, environ- ment modeling and learning how to create visual effects for episodics and feature films. In this path, rendering speed is secondary. The UX/UI major focuses on creating a human machine in- terfaces, particularly for tablets and the web. And the digital media/virtual production major focuses on the live connection between virtual and the real world, using game engine technology for live stream virtual production. The Antoinette Westphal College of Media Arts & Design is home to two production labs. The animation capture effects (ACE) lab is the larger of the two, and is outfitted with a 25x17x10-foot, two- wall, green-screen cyclorama. It's in this space that student begin gaining experience as early as their freshman year. In addition to a Vicon motion-cap- ture system, the space has two laser projectors that it uses on a rear projection surface to create virtual environments. Across from the ACE lab is the immersive research lab (IRL), which is designed for research, individual projects and special courses. The IRL has its own OptiTrack motion-capture system, a green screen, and cameras for virtual production and virtual reality. "It will adapt to whatever projects we are work- ing on at any given moment," says Jushchyshyn of the space. In addition to the Vicon mocap system, the studio has a DCS lens encoder and a range of Blackmagic Design gear, including Studio Camera 4Ks, Pocket Cinema Cameras, and ATEM Constellation and Mini Pro switchers. Workstations also feature Blackmagic Design's DeckLink capture and playback cards to receive and sync to genlock, as well as for the ingest or output of SDI video. Beyond the production studios, Drexel is home to a half-dozen computer labs with high-end graphics workstations and large displays that students can plug their own laptops into, if they so choose. "We're pretty agnostic when it comes to soft- ware," Jushchyshyn explains. "The school licenses a full Creative Cloud suite from Adobe. In 3D anima- tion/VFX we will teach Autodesk Maya, Foundry, Nuke, Modo and Mari. Of course we're using Unreal Engine. We get our DaVinci Resolve licenses through our purchase of cameras or purchase of those full Studio licenses. The no-cost version of the software is plenty capable for standard video editing, and the Studio licenses are great for the AI features and a lot of the more advanced 3D types of things." Students begin with an introduced the digital tools they'll be using. "We're not expecting that any of these students have had any opportunity to work with these tools as high-school students," says Jushchyshyn, though he is seeing more and more coming in with summer camp experience, and that high schools are beginning to integrate some of the 3D graphics into their art programs. "We want to bring everybody up to speed, so a lot of the intro classes introduce the core concepts of how to create a 3D model based on photo- graphs or concept art. It might be using Maya or other tools." When it comes to virtual production, Drexel has an "Introduction to Virtual Production" class that is open to anyone in the university, with no prerequisites. "Anyone can come take it," says Jushchyshyn. "And that is a one-quarter class in how to create a short film in Unreal Engine. Students don't nec- essarily learn 3D modeling in that class, but they learn how to use 3D models. They don't necessarily learn how to create 3D characters, but they use 3D characters, and it will run in parallel a motion-cap- ture class, where students are learning how to use motion capture for the first time." Collaboration with the different departments show students how a production comes together. "Each of those crafts is independent of one another or focused on a single topic, but they learn how to work together," says Jushchyshyn. "At the end of a course like that, the motion-capture students have learned how to use the motion-cap- ture system, and can capture performance data and put that on to a 3D character. And the virtual production students make a short animated film… That's kind of where it starts. And then it's just continually adding more and more skills and expe- riences to the point where we have a class that's 'Live Event Virtual Production.'" Over this eight-week course, students get up to speed on running a live-streamed event. One recent event brought together virtual production experts from Europe, Atlantic City and San Francisco. "It was a virtual production event — live streamed — on the topic of live streamed virtual production," Jushchyshyn reveals. Drexel offers an "Intro to Virtual Production" class that has no prerequisites. Students have an opportunity to work on live- streamed events that span the US and beyond. Nick Jushchyshyn leads a class in one of the school's production labs.