Observation on creativity and spatial visualisation skills of graphic arts’ students

Abstract

The aim of our research was to discover whether education in 3D computer graphics and visualisation can improve students' spatial visualisation skills and how the complex project as a design and synthesis of a 3D animation influences students' creativity. Spatial visualisation skills are extremely valuable in various professions, including graphic design and engineering, where 3D modelling and visualisation is becoming increasingly important for the qualitative execution of professional projects. Scientists define two types of three-dimensional skills, spatial visualisation and spatial orientation, where visualisation is understood as the ability to mentally rotate, flip and flip over presented images, while spatial orientation describes the ability to recognise the position or direction of objects in space. Creative process is defined as a sequence of thoughts and actions that lead to original and appropriate productions. The creative process can be discussed on two levels, i.e. macro and micro level with the related phases of the creative process: orientation, preparation, complementary stages after preparation, incubation, idea generation, production. The facultative course Advanced computer 3D graphic and visualisations is taught in the 2nd level studies of Graphic and interactive communication. Through project work, students are encouraged to use their creativity and imagination to create a visually attractive 3D animation that is also interesting in terms of content and in which they can convey the story they want to tell. For this reason, we often held individual sessions in which the teachers made profound corrections to the students' work and made suggestions for the further development of their projects. Experimental methods were: Questionnaires for self-assessment of the creativity process, whereby the students also interpreted their creative process with an illustration and the spatial visualisation test before and after the course. Regular evaluation of their project work with regard to the entire design process, i.e. 3D content creation, planning, technical approach and production, were also carried out. Results of the analysis present an interesting insight in students’ creative process, spatial ability and comprehension of 3D computer graphic that could be considered as teaching/learning guidelines in the coming academic years.