Native Dancer: General Update

 Author: Ariann Rousu – Native Dancer Digital Artist

This past month, the team working on the Native Dancer Metaverse project has been making progress in various areas to further the project goals. Included in September’s agenda was presenting information about Native Dancer at UTTC’s Tribal Leadership Conference.

Included in the presentation was information about the Native Dancer project and its missions. For example, a point of focus was sharing how the project is designed to be a workforce development platform meant to offer opportunities and to encourage Tribal stakeholders and students to engage with emerging technologies in areas of Virtual Reality(VR), Big Data, Artificial Intelligence(AI), and Digital Twin systems. 

Some topics discussed in this presentation included cultural topics such as the steps we are taking to ensure cultural appropriateness when it comes to creating Native assets in a video game. Other key focus points were centered around the technology and technological tools we have been utilizing in the making of Native Dancer. Discussing the use of technology such as the xSens motion capture systems and the Udraper plugin for the Unreal Game Engine helped us to translate how this project could prepare those involved for STEM related careers in the areas of VR, Big Data, AI, and Digital Twinning.

Included in this presentation was a demonstration of the Native Dancer Grass Dancer Character fully dressed in regalia, attached to Motion Capture Data that was prerecorded using live powwow dancers. This video is also now available to view in the following link.