This week lets take a look at how you prefer to digest learning content! We have a team actively working on new content for our community and they would love to hear your preferences on digesting learning material. Do you prefer videos, or text? Maybe it depends on the subject matter? Toss a vote on the poll above and elaborate in the thread!
What are some resources that you’ve found valuable when working on furthering your game development skills? Apart from our official “Learn” resources there is great content out there, feel free to share your favorites with everyone here!
Text and images by far. I’ve yet to encounter a video where I didn’t end up skipping up to thirty minutes of preamble, only to have to constantly pause and skip around because people think that, for some reason, video is a good format to present code in.
Personally I agree video isn’t the best format to present code in, but I would argue it’s a great place to provide bitesized learning. This channel does a great job of using video to present concepts to you, while also tackling some of the code.
A transcript only does half the job when video is involved because you lose out on key visual information. You end up having to scroll through the video regardless to get all the information you need.
To be completely honest, the only benefit of video I see over text and images (both static and animated) is that it’s easier on the person making the tutorial or guide.
Video is fine if it’s high level and more about the theory. The moment I am trying to follow along or am coming back to look something up, it’s useless. At that point I would much rather have text that I can actually search.
I agree with video being mainly for a nice overview of what you can do.
The way I think I like to learn is to first see many different possible things that can be done, and when the time comes, hopefully I’ll remember something I saw and start searching in greater detail.
Videos can be a great way to just show off things, and then have a link to a more detailed text guide on everything that was talked about. I think it would also be more relaxing for the video maker to make the videos since the video is just to demonstrate and they can use the text guide as a fallback for anything they missed in the video.
Dont get me wrong, video can be great for explaining things in detail. It might just depend on what kind of mood I’m in for whether I want to read or watch something =/
It can also depend on the topic and how visuals might help explain the topic. If your text guide is trying to explain something that requires motion, such as explaining collision penetration/resolving etc…, then a video might help bring the point across better, either that or use a gif in your text guide.
It also really really depends on how good the speaker is in the video and how smoothly the video goes. Text might be easier to do in that regard.
Videos - but they have to be structured in a good way. The split up in the respective chapters that are currently on the YouTube channel are pretty good, IMO. A video simply can’t leave out as many steps as a written tutorial can. Too often I saw explanations where a step was missing or not explanied well enough. IN video I can see what happens even if it’s not explicitly said. Also, personally, I am a visual learner.
Yet the most ideal thing to have would be a video along a short written summiraization to revisit the things from the video. I know that this at least doubles the work, though. Watch the video for overview and the way it’s done. Then work the written tutorial along the way. After all you do have an overview and know what the goal is. More learning hooks for your brain to attach to.
Either way I have to comend the whole Unity learning team for the material they provide.
It’s super cool to have access to so many things. To see from the creators how features are intended to be used. To have access to this without a paywall. Of couse this is ultimately to promote Unity but it works very well and I would hope other companies did the same thing for their products.
It depends on the stage of learning. I don’t think a user interface can properly be taught without video. At the beginning I found the pre-recorded tutorial videos to be by far the best learning resource. I probably still prefer it this way, although text and images would probably be enough now for most things, since I know where everything is by now.
Text and images for me, as well. Especially as a main source. I do enjoy videos, and live training some times, though. Learning is always good, and having a good teacher/presenter can be a nice bonus.
Projects have their benefits, too.
I agree with @Billy4184 that it depends on what exactly is being covered. For an interface small focused videos would be good I think.
For covering “how to do [this] or [that] in Unity” from a game dev perspective I would appreciate it if the material covered each way of approaching the “problem” along with the pros and cons of using each method.
I’m as (maybe more so) interested in the “why” as I am the “how”. I think having a deeper understanding of the thought processes at work behind the engine / api would be beneficial in general to everyone. “This is what we were thinking when we implemented this. This is how we expected this to be used. However there is an alternative… for example you can also use this next approach and here are a few reasons when it may be the better choice in Unity”. That kind of thing.
For most topics, I prefer text and images because I read faster than most people can talk. Also, it lets me search to the proper place when I want to refer back.
Videos are a good supplement when you are showing off something visual. Shaders, UI, lighting are the type of things where a single static image may not convey enough information.
I tend to think of the learning in a university setting. The video works as a lecture to introduce you to the topic, but when you’re out actually doing and getting into the nitty gritty, that meaty text book is what you need by your side.
Additionally, I think videos work well for presentations such as the GDC archives, but that is because those lectures are to educate you about a specific area. They rarely have detailed technical information; just high level concepts.
This is how I learn for Computer Science and Game Programming. I have re ordered my list from my favourite to my less favourite ways of learning.
Ask a Friend that will understands your question and your problem the most, because some university programming theory is very hard to understand.
Text and Images from a textbook that is written for a university format. Usually, those university format textbooks have more harder stuff to learn with. Also, understanding your textbook can help you in a computer science written test by a lot. Many people prefer textbook, because usually your professor cannot teach more harder stuff or more clearly within a too short hour lecture.
Reference Code Samples or Project, I usually need the reference code samples to know what should I do to make my project will work properly. But, you should never use your code reference if you do not know what will your code reference suppose to do with.
Online videos and online resources, because you can easily find some online video tutorials to quickly learn some basic programming. Also, online video tutorials can be easier to understand than a textbook.
well actually live Videos. I better take some time and learn that slowly than produce non sense code or build small Errors, which i can’t find them in first eye catch. Many of the Videos arent that quite good. But on unity i see only Videos which are related to their stuff. Udemy and some youtuber like Brackeys catch These all round up. So thats why are Live Videos or catchs better then text with some Pictures.
Personally, I prefer text and images. I love documentation, but I understand that a lot of people find it dense and somewhat hard to understand. Videos are great when code is typed on-screen. However, videos tend to err on the beginner-end; it’s difficult to find anything for more complex topics.
Wikipedia is good for concepts and theory if you can get through it. It’s got some phenomenal explanations; I wrote my Dijkstra’s Algorithm implementation almost entirely based off Wikipedia’s explanation of it. Textbooks are great, too, and some of them may have code snippets.
I try to avoid StackExchange and forum code, because half the time I have no idea what I’m copying/pasting. I prefer slow and understandable to fast and unintelligible.
I must be the only video lover here. Whenever i try to read text 20 minutes in i’ll be dozing off, must find the willpower to read extremely long volumes of text lol.
Then, go to a library to study your volumes of texts, because it will help you focus in your studying like me even though I already passed my 1st year computer science, I will still go to library to study a head in case I will fail school at fall 2017.
There are different learning types. I am more of a video learner myself.
Though it also really does depend on the subject.
As I said earlier - I think if possible the two-fold approach of videos and accompanying written form would be ideal. At least for subjects like Programming. As soon as it’s visual I think videos are often better than text.
