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    "Bring history alive" : exploring the evolution of Flying Apsaras in Mogao Caves : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Design at Massey University, Wellington, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2019) Dai, Xinyue
    This research project explores a visualisation framework with an educational purpose for digital heritage, by using a digital story-telling format. It examines a visualisation that demonstrates the historical evolution of the flying Apsaras - one of the main characters of ancient grottoes in Mogao caves, located in Dunhuang province, China. Culture and religion merged in Dunhuang, an ancient city in the middle of the Silk Road. Dunhuang was influenced by multiple cultures - from the West and East, and it was in this context that the Mogao Caves was established. On the wall paintings, the flying Apsara was a vehicle through which cultural changes in a thousand years were shown, through changes in their appearance. Now due to the environmental problem and over-visiting of the Mogao Caves, visitors can only explore a limited number of caves and have difficulty understanding the stories in the faded and incomplete murals. This project thus examines art style transformation of the murals, extracted representative symbols, and patterns and colour sets of each dynasty reinterpreted in a digital narrative with a modern aesthetic. The methodologies used in this project encompassed historical analysis, character design, and experience design that includes information design. The design output provides an accessible framework for other designers engaging with a digital heritage like the Mogao Caves. Also, by extending this project, potential functionalities of digital narrative could be explored for educational purpose.
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    Pilot : navigating personhood within science fiction : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Design in Illustration at Massey University, Wellington, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2016) Moore, Bo
    Representations of the 'other' in media often exist only to further the narratives of the 'dominant' for the benefit of an assumedly-dominant audience, and are otherwise unseen or misrepresented. This results in the other being denied genuine reflections of themselves at a social and cultural level (Diaz as cited in Donahue, 2009). Through visual analysis and design, this research explores the nature of the term personhood - defined as character and qualities regarding who can be a ‘person’ - through media representations of both the human other and the fictional alien other. The alien within science fiction is visible as a reaction to our very human history of colonialism (Diaz, 2014) and in particular to the categorization of the human and non-human other. The resulting characterisation, relationships and narratives of the alien become limited by its adherence or lack thereof to the features of the dominant human. This manifests in how personhood is ascribed in media (according to gender performance, sexuality, race, physicality and other categories) to both aliens and their real-life reflection, the human other. Pilot culminates in an interactive intervention blending film, game and literature within a two-player character-driven narrative that discusses settler-colonialism, relationships and personhood through the lens of both the alien and the human other.