VIRTUAL reality, sculpting digital characters using touch screen technology and even motion capture featured in the likes of Lord of the Rings and Planet of the Apes.

It is all in a day’s work for computer game design students at Priestley College.

Weekend was invited to the Loushers Lane college to see how far the course has come in seven years and how it is preparing the games developers of the future.

One of the big innovations at the college recently has been using Kinect – Xbox’s motion sensing camera – along with 3D animation software called Motion Builder to create a rudimentary version of motion capture. Motion capture famously brought Gollum to life in Lord of the Rings and has since become commonplace in big Hollywood films.

But now students can make game characters with poses, actions and gestures they create themselves by having the camera track the movement of their body.

Tutor Matt Wilson has also introduced a Wacom Cintiq tablet computer with a 24ins touchscreen which allows students to model characters as if they were moulding and sculpting a piece of clay.

Matt said: “Our aim is to keep on top of technology and the techniques that the developers use. We’re trying to follow the industry as closely as we can so the skills that we’re teaching are relevant. That’s a really difficult thing to do because the industry moves so quickly.”

Priestley College was also ahead of the curve when it came to virtual reality (VR).

It was an early adopter of the Oculus Rift VR headset and now students also have handsets which effectively become your hands in the immersive virtual world. It gives the demos and games the students are making a lot more physicality.

We got the chance to try a demo made by former Bridgewater High student Elliot Griffiths where the handsets allow you to feel as if you are climbing a ladder and swinging your arms across monkey bars.

Each year the students also do a ‘game jam’ where groups of four are challenged to make a game from scratch in four days.

This has led to some of their work being put forward for the BAFTA Young Game Designers Awards.

Matt added: “That’s down to dedication. The students love the challenge of developing pieces of work that are to a high standard.

“They’re competing against each other in a way because they know it’s a competitive industry.

“They know they’ve got to be as good as they can possibly be. It’s their dream to be part of that industry.”

Just 12 students completed the first year of Priestley’s computer game design course. Now there are two classes in each year group with around 16 to 18 students in each.

The college is also partnered with digital design studio Southern GFX where students have been given opportunities to work on live projects.

Matt said: “We’ve got an enriched games industry in the north of England. Sony has been an employer in Liverpool for many years. Now it’s getting bigger. There are independent companies in the area and smaller offshoot companies who are providing for the big games developers. So it’s not unusual for the region to have an influx of games courses.

“It’s not just about the games industry. Students can go on to work in visual effects or special effects in the film industry, the motion graphics industry or go and look at automotive design or product design. We’re just starting to see students finish their degrees who started with us. So the next couple of years will be really interesting because we’ll be able to see what they go on to do in the industry.

“You could be playing a game or watching a film they’ve worked on.”