MAGIC
All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
E C O S YS T E M TECH CENTER
Opportunities For Underserved
PROBLEM • There is growing interest in the development of content • • •
specific to (Mixed Reality-XR), ANIMATION and VFX. There are limited options for people interested in learning how to develop VR & AR games and experiences VR & AR startups have difficulty finding quality mentors, workspaces, and a community to help them develop their product Most students in South Los Angeles after-school programs, colleges and school systems are challenged in how to develop training to address the increasing demand. All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
C A S E S T U DY
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C A S E S T U DY 2
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C A S E S T U DY 3
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C A S E S T U DY 4 nts e v c/e r v u/
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Build and connect and a vibrant community of Crenshaw artists, engineers, managers and designers to help curate the worlds largest collection of African American Military Artifacts and untold stories from the collection of Anthony Powell and HomageUSA.
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C A S E S T U DY 5
OUR WORK * OUR NETWORK
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OUR ASK
Dakar seeks from JPMorgan Chase , the use of a physical space inside the to incubate our Magic Xchange, until we can fund our permanent home in the Crenshaw Corridor. This phased plan will allow us to create our first cohort of 20 students from VSEDC who in many cases bring their own hardware and software licenses to increase the value of their capacity to work, while reducing the cost of their apprenticeship. This cohort will learn the nuts and bolts of how to become a force-multiplier in growth areas of digital media. The outcome of this experiential training will produce a Junior integrated marketing and advertising consultancy for student clients, and by student mentees. We’re in discussions with The Vermont Slauson Economic Dev Corp. to recruit select candidates for The Best Buy Teen Tech Center, and will match them within Destination Crenshaw businesses that most need and value use our tool belt of digital solutions. Their ultimate value will be their delivery of free yet invaluable services to those local Crenshaw small business that may not know what there needs are, and have no knowledge of how to implement growth and scalability to their business plans and brandwidth. All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
O U R S TO RY
HIS STUDENTS WERE ALREADY AT RISK. THEN THE PANDEMIC CAME Kevin Clark is founder and executive director of the Dakar Foundation for the Performing Arts, which sponsors mentorships, workshops and career development for homeless and at-risk students. Clark says funding has dried up and, worse, he’s lost touch with a number of students who were displaced by the pandemic. “The opportunities for us didn’t fade away,” Clark says of his foundation. “They just fell off the cliff.” Clark is featured in a special episode of Second Opinion, a video series produced by L.A. Times Studios in conjunction with the L.A. Times newsroom. All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
O P P O RT U N I T Y • The VR & AR industry is expected to grow into a $108B market by 2022. • While there are many skilled artists, engineers and designers in 3D games, VR & AR have unique needs. • There is a shortage of the “hybrids” who understand how to extend their knowledge from other industries into the VR & AR space. • There are very few training and development programs that can help existing 3D designers, modelers, and developers learn to create VR & AR code, sites, experiences, content. All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
PROPOSAL • Create a space in the Crenshaw Corridor for people to connect, learn & share about developing great VR & AR games, VFX, apps and experiences
• Focus on training apps for enterprise & corporate • Create a cutting edge rapid prototyping laboratory • Provide access to mentors & experts in the industry • Startup training resources • Seminars and community events All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
MAGICIAN-SHIP
• Be mentored by the worlds largest society of open source software developers and VFX creatives ASWF
• Take full advantage of the location near Silicon Beach to draw from the best talent and latest technology
• Leverage the vast network of VR & AR developers through Founder and Partners, and Access VFX
• Draw on the brand, experience and methodology that
created one of the top video game training programs in the world
• Introduce our community into the world of creating Non Fungible Tokens
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GAME MAGIC ALUMS
• • •
Patrick Hagar, Lead VFX Artist Velinda Reyes, Art Lead Sergio Gil, Art Lead
• • •
Ross Kaylor, Senior Level Designer Robert Moffat, Lead FX Artist Charles Stalie, Dynamic Environment Artist
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GAME MAGIC ALUMS
• John Palarmachuk, Lead
Environment Artist • Ruben Morales, Dynamic Enviro Artist • Charlene Au, Senior Environment Artist
• Josh Leyshock, Senior
Technical Artist • Steven Guevera, Senior Technical Artist • Kristy Moret, Level Designer
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MODEL • Offer free lecture series/networking events “Meet the Makers” • Create a Twitch channel “Shark Tank” pitch program for XR apps,
and include other social networks to form a full “digital ecosystem” with authority in the XR , animation, and VFX spaces.
• Free production software from The Foundry for VFX projects • Produce highly successful teams & products • Showcase work to studios • Celebrate success
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MODEL “Meet the Makers” Speaker Series
SERVICES
XR “Shark Tank” Project Based Game Dev.
Studio Access
XR+ Virtual Production Training R&D
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• Skill Specific Workshops • Production Consulting • Project Management (Agile, Kanban) • XR Talent Agency • Team Building/Matchmaking • Student Agency Service • Entrepreneurship • Financial/Bus. Literacy
T W I TC H • The most important platform for Millennials, Generation Z, and Alpha’s and future college students • Amazon purchased in 2014 for close to $1B • Up until now mostly video game streaming and esports • Content is expanding into new areas • Fortnight Player Ninja now makes $500K per month from donations & sponsors • Currently there are few official college broadcasts focused on educational content All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
CUTTING EDGE PLATFORM ALIGNMENT
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PLAN • Plan & Schedule Speakers • Search community college system for most promising applicants
• Website Planning / Digital Ecosystem (Main Site, Slack Channel, other S/N sites)
• First group of project pitches • Mentor/Teacher outreach • Program Launch • Seek/Secure Sponsors & Partnerships All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
COMPETITION • USC Institute for Creative Technologies (http://projects.ict.usc.edu/mxr/category/blog/vir tual-reality/) • Expert Dojo (startup training and workshops) • Shared Work Spaces (e.g. UploadLA) • Online Course Sites (e.g. Udemy) All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
KEVIN CLARK • Digital Pathway Initiative (DPI) A program designed to expose its students to:
– Mentors – learn-by-doing experiences • To help prepare them to pursue entry-level positions in broadcast, digital media creation, production and more • Through a curriculum designed to meet California state education certification requirements.
ERIC T. ELDER • Media Arts Entertainment Professional 30 years. • Founded one of the first & top Video Game training programs in the world in 2001. • Had 90%-100% placements rates at AAA developers, Electronic Arts, Sony Santa Monica, Blizzard, Infinity Ward, Rockstar etc. • Currently a shortage of trained Unreal talent • Job opportunities in games, virtual film production & XR
T E A M /BOARD OF DIRECTORS • Julian Sarmiento, Creative Director, Digital Domain • Kimberly Archer, VR Marketing Partnerships Facebook/Oculus VR • Theron James, Team Flow State Hacker, Riot Games • Kevin Brown, Art Director, Microsoft Hololens All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
METRICS • Placement of participants into the XR & related industries • Increased interest in community college design & CS programs due to presence of XR Wizards Lab • Number of successful apps to market All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
SERVICES 1. Workspace Access, PC + Apple lab 2. Consulting 3. Matchmaking Services 4. Coaching/Project Management 5. Specialized Custom Workshops 6. R&D for Large Tech Firms 7. XR Talent Placement Agency All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021
S TAT U S / T I M E L I N E • Q1
2022 : Secure Approvals &
Funding • Q3
2022 : OPEN LABORATORY
• Q4
2022 : First wave of content is
delivered All Rights Reserved, Kevin Clark © 2021