The background
We can bring anything to life visually. Using the latest technologies, we aim to bring our stakeholders closer together by presenting an honest (preferably realistic) image of changes in the physical living environment.
We like to think ahead, want to innovate, and look for opportunities in the digital world around us to make our products more beautiful, interesting, smarter, and clearer. One of these opportunities is Visual Twinning: a digital, interactive environment that tells our client’s story. What that story is depends on the client, but often it involves changes taking place in their surroundings.
This led us to Unreal Engine: a platform that gives us the tools to take our projects to a higher level—making them more visually appealing, faster, clearer, and more interactive. But that also raised a question: how should we approach this? Figuring this out, finding applications, and coming up with ideas takes time. That’s why we presented this question to the CMD students:
How can we make a Digital Twin more vibrant in the context of area development issues, so that potential future situations capture the imagination better and become more recognizable?
The question
Nine students, divided into two groups, were eager to take on this challenge for us. So we gave them two different assignments:
To group 1: Create an interactive online visitor center.
To group 2: Come up with a fictional spatial planning project and add interactivity and vibrancy to it.
There were a few key points of focus:
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The environments needed to be lively
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The environments needed to be interactive
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The project had to be developed using Unreal Engine
The content, approach, and execution were all up to the students themselves.
Collaboration
In my role as internship supervisor, I was the students’ point of contact within The Imagineers. I facilitated meetings, answered their questions, provided feedback, and translated the company’s wishes. This led to a collaboration that, from both sides, was experienced as enjoyable and educational. The fact that we as a company are familiar with the digital world, modern technologies, and developing digital products made communication easier for everyone. We understand the terminology and how such projects are set up. At the same time, this also posed an extra challenge for the students. Because of our expertise, we set the bar high, which sometimes made us quite critical.
Although the collaboration ultimately went well, one of the groups ran into motivation issues due to miscommunication. This resulted in some intense discussions in which the teachers also had to step in as mediators. However, this incident actually led to smoother cooperation in the second half of the period, and the group of students managed to bounce back impressively to deliver a great final product.
Result
The outcome can be described as twofold. First of all, we as a company gained valuable new insights and ideas that we can eventually apply in our products. We also gained a better understanding of the (im)possibilities and the challenges that still lie ahead. In addition, the close collaboration with CMD has strengthened our ties with the program.
The students indicated that by challenging them in the way we did, their knowledge of and enthusiasm for Unreal Engine definitely grew. For one of the groups, it was also an important learning experience in understanding just how crucial good communication with your client is.
Endproducts
Both groups ultimately managed to deliver a great final product, which, as mentioned, we are studying to potentially incorporate into our own products. The first final product is a visitor center, and the second is a spatial planning project. They are shown visually below.
Endproduct 1: Visitor center
Endproduct 2: Spatial planning
Conclusion
Fun and educational. That’s how I would summarize the collaboration with the students. But does it end there? In our opinion, definitely not. We will continue to actively collaborate with both educational programs and other companies and institutions. As far as we’re concerned, there’s potential for a new partnership with CMD. Besides these activities, we also keep developing ourselves in the areas we excel at—namely, visualizing the world of tomorrow for our clients to help them tell their story as honestly and realistically as possible.
Would you like to collaborate with The Imagineers? Then get in touch with us!