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Maysam Al-Ani, a Technical Artist working on Avatars and Marketplace Assets for Meta's virtual reality world Horizon, gave a virtual talk to students studying Graphic Design at VCUarts Qatar, recently.
Al-Ani is an alumna of Northwestern University in Qatar where she earned a bachelor’s degree in Media Industries and Technology, majoring in Communication, and of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago where she studied MFA in Art & Technology.
During the talk, Al-Ani took the students through her experiences of creating innovative new media projects: 3D games, cinematics (live-action and animated films), and immersive AR and VR worlds.
The students, especially those keen to follow careers at the intersection of design and technology, were thrilled to interact with the Meta creative. Julianne Eden Pagulayan, a graphic design sophomore (now junior), shared her experience and explained how it boosted her dreams of becoming a game designer one day.
She said, “I’m keen on game design and anything to do with the game industry. Hence, the moment I heard of Maysam’s background, and her qualifications and work experiences thus far, I knew I had to attend it. The talk itself was about her education, her creative journey and how she became involved with technology and gaming. I’ve always wanted to learn C # and C ++, and I discovered she uses those programs in her job at Meta.
“It was extremely helpful from the perspective of preparing for a career as well. I learned about other pathways where the knowledge of coding can be applied. I also realized that knowing how to code and working on projects related to code is only one aspect of the industry – one may have gotten used to one program, but then join a company or project where another software or program is used. In other words, one needs a flexible mindset.”
“Something else that struck me as a creative person, was how she and other programmers often return to completed projects and repurpose or even recreate them for different requirements. I found that refreshing as this means the effort and creativity that goes into a project is never a one-off. These tips will no doubt go a long way in helping me strategize my plans to enter the game industry.”
Meta (formerly the Facebook company) builds technologies that help people connect, find communities and grow businesses”.