Title: Hit Confirm: A Lecture on Character Design for Video Games
Description: This crash course into the history of character design for games will explore how character design has evolved throughout the various generations and why characters have been designed the way they are. Certain contributing factors that will be explored is genre, technical limits, setting, and target audience, as well as others. – Workshop Instructor Tyrone Barnes
Title: An Uncanny Connection: Comics and Video Games
Description: Talk with Jake and Jimmy about the relationship comics and games share. We will discuss the history of comics and games as new media. See how these two mediums inspire and interact with one another to form a larger narrative universe. Compare and contrast the structure, art, and writing of these mediums. – Panel/ Workshop Instructors Jimmy Horner & Jacob Heagy
*Art Way Alliance
Introducing children to a different mode of art. Working throughout the Metropolitan area with schools and partnering with other organizations, Art Way Alliance's initial goal is to host workshop programs of varying length for children and teens who want to learn how to draw comic books and/ or manga and anime, a Japanese style of comic books and cartooning respectively. Kids will learn the history behind the style and become acquainted with notable examples of the art. Art Way Alliance has partnered with mainstream Professional Comic Book Artists and Independent Artists who are willing to devote their time to teaching the art of drawing and producing sequential art.
website: http://www.artwayalliance.org/
Jake Heagy
Jake went studied Animation and Interactive Media at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. It was there that he was introduced to the concept of “game design” and truly fell in love with it. He learned that he didn’t have to rely on video games solely to create fun experiences for his audience. That is when Jake started thinking about a career in tabletop gaming. Since graduating, Jake has taken some freelance work in animation and game design. He’s worked with a diverse team from all over America on an app game (that later lost funding and was shut down) and has worked creating educational animations for Pearson textbooks. Currently, Jake is working on a few pet-projects, most of which are with his colleague and close friend, Jimmy Horner. Jake’s most passionate project right now, is a board game that he hopes to market this upcoming summer.
Tyrone Barnes, II
works as a Multimedia Designer at Lockheed Martin. He has a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Animation and a Minor in Interactive Design/Game Development from Savannah College of Art and Design. Tyrone currently attends the Academy of Art University, San Francisco, CA, where he is earning his Master of Fine Arts in Illustration. http://sycrosd4.deviantart.com
Jimmy Horner
Inspired by animations and comics from an early age, Jimmy Horner found his passion by becoming an animator based in Baltimore, Maryland. He works with both physical and digital mediums to create his comics and animations. Jimmy has taught art in several settings including merit badge counselor for Boy Scouts of America and a teacher at Hagerstown Community
mediums to create his comics and animations. Jimmy has taught art in several settings including merit badge counselor for Boy Scouts of America and a teacher at Hagerstown Community College's College for Kids Program. In college he majored in Visual Arts with a concentration in Animation. After graduating from UMBC, Jimmy started creating medical animations and advertisements at a company called VueCare Media. One of his animations was aired on Fox after winning two spots in the Gotham Fan Trailer Competition. Jimmy continues to spend his time working on animations and small comics for the web.
