Milestone #1: the Pitch

1 Description

The first stage to developing and publishing a product is to pitch your idea to a producer or executive producer. We are going to simulate this activity. For this milestone, you are required to create an idea for a project, develop a simple prototype, and pitch your project to the class.

2 Ideas

Coming up with a project idea is going to be both a fun and challenging task. One major factor to consider is the scope of your project. It’s going to have to be relatively simple, so you can complete it in one quarter. This doesn’t mean that your project is going to be boring; I hope that the second project has shown you that even a simple project can provide a lot of creative "meat" for the user. A tiny keyboard synthesizer can keep a user occupied for... well, years, really. Try to focus on ways in which a project could take an existing idea in a new direction, by providing programmability or a unique interface.

As we progress through the class and learn more about music and sound it is almost certain that your idea will go through many changes (hopefully to make it better). Also, the way the product works is often quite different than what you had envisioned. So, realize you just need to come up with a good idea that you can improve on and don’t try and initially design a massive and full-featured product.

Those of you planning to create pieces of music have a challenging task; convince us that you’re going to create something really cool, by (for instance) playing snippets of other songs, talking about how your song might be structured, and how you’re going to program it.

3 Presentation

You are going to present your project idea to the class in lecture or lab on November 11th. You will have 5 minutes to do your presentation and a few minutes to answer questions from the class. Minimally, you should have:

• A PowerPoint (or equivalent) slide presentation.

  Remember, the point of the presentation is to convince the class you have a project idea that should be "funded". Try to convince the class that your idea is:

  • Fun

  • Intriguing

  • Innovative

• Concept drawings of your product.

It’s really easy to make a bad presentation! Please take a look at these presentation tips:

• http://presentationsoft.about.com/od/classrooms/tp/student_tips.htm

• http://www.gearfire.net/creating-impressive-class-presentations/

4 Deliverables

You are responsible for delivering a 5-minute PowerPoint (or equivalent) slide presentation that pitches your idea to the class. You will be graded on your presentation’s organization, quality, and content.

You may use your own laptops to do your presentation. If you would prefer to use mine, be sure to email me your presentation before noon on November 1st.

5 Assessment

Your presentations will be graded using the following rubric:

• Organization/Clarity (12 pts)

• Compelling Pitch (12 pts)

• Idea Pragmatism (10 pts)