Evaluierung einer Masterarbeit

Titel
South African Botanical Art: A Study of Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Imagery

Autor
Tamlin Blake

Datum
März 2001

Universität
University of Stellenbosch

Link zur Masterarbeit


Gestaltungshöhe
Die Masterarbeit ist sehr schlicht gehalten und wissenschaftlich formatiert. Es gibt keine zusätzlichen Designelemente o.ä. und im Text sind keine Bilder eingefügt. Diese sind ausnahmslos im Anhang zu finden. Direkte Zitate werden durch Einrückungen im Text hervorgehoben. 

Innovationsgrad
Der Autor behandelt in seiner Arbeit aus dem Jahr 2001 die Gesichte, aber auch die Zukunft der botanischen Kunst in Südafrika. Es wird daher keine neues Thema behandelt, aber ein Einblick in einen spezifischen Bereich der botanischen Illustration gegeben. 

Selbstständigkeit
Wie Selbstständig diese Arbeit einstanden ist, ist für mich schwer einzuschätzen. Bei den Danksagungen erwähnt der Autor die finanzielle Unterstützung durch die National Research Foundation (Südafrika) und die University of Stellenbosch. Er beteuert aber zugleich, dass seine Meinungen und die Ergebnisse der Arbeit nicht durch diese Finanzierung beeinflusst worden sind. 

Gliederung und Struktur
Die Arbeit ist in viert Kaptitel zzgl. Einleitung und Fazit gegliedert. Im ersten Kapitel wir der Begriff Botanische Kunst definiert. In Kapitel Zwei widmet sich der Autor dem Thema der kapstädtischen Gesellschaft, sowie den Pflanzenbildern des 19. Jahrhunderts. Das dritte Kapitel behandelt zeitgenössische botanische Kunst in Südafrika und im vierten Kapitel beschreibt der Autor seine persönliche Erfahrung mit verschiedenen Herangehensweisen an die botanische Kunst.

Zusätzlich ist ein Literaturverzeichnis, sowie ein Anhang in dem Biografien verschiedener KünstlerInnen, ein Bildverzeichnis und ein Katalog der Arbeiten des Autors. 

Der Text selbst ist sehr übersichtlich gegliedert und strukturiert. 

Kommunikationsgrad
Der Autor schweift beim Formulieren seiner Sätzen kaum aus, was den Text sehr gut lesbar und verständlich macht.  

Umfang der Arbeit
Die gesamte Arbeit umfasst 142 Seiten. Wenn man jedoch die diversen Anhänge, sowie Abstract, Deckblatt, Literaturverzeichnis o.ä. abzieht kommt man auf 75 Seiten puren Inhalts. 

Orthographie sowie Sorgfalt und Genauigkeit
Gut verständliche Formilierungen. Keine negativen Auffälligkeiten. 

Literatur
Der Autor hat für seine Arbeit 87 verschiedene literarische Werke herangezogen. Darunter befinden sich Geschichtsbücher, Botanische Aufzeichnungen, Bücher zu botanischer und afrikanische Kunst, usw. 

Es wird zum Teil sehr alte Literatur verwendet, die Älteste darunter von 1829. Am häufigsten wird jedoch Literatur in einem Zeitraum von 1980-2000 verwendet. 

“Video game genres and their music” – an Evalutaion


About the Thesis:

“Video game genres and their music”
by Pieter Jacobus Crathorne
supervised by Prof. Winfried Lüdemann
submitted at University of Stellenbosch
in the Department of Music
in March 2010

I chose this specific thesis as this was the main inspiration for my bachelor’s thesis, and because I have been a fan of computer games and been fascinated by their music for over fifteen years.

Design:

Although this thesis was written in the general field of art & design, it is not styled in an outstanding or revolutionary way. I can imagine the University of Stellenbosch has predefined templates for Microsoft Word that each student utilizes for their project, to adhere to a general style the university pursues. This has the benefit of having a consistent style along all published theses but dispossesses students of their own branding.

Innovation:

For todays standards this theme is not innovative anymore as game studios nowadays often hire renowned composers and orchestras for their music. However, before 2007-2010 (the thesis was published in 2010, but was started in 2007 or earlier) computer game companies were just beginning to do so. And as Pieter Crathorne himself wrote, earlier games just had programmers develop the music and not musicians compose the music. Of course, other resources already existed on music in computer games, but nothing had been going into as much detail as Crathorne did. And the main chapter, comparing games in genres and the genres themselves, had not been touched before at all.

Independence:

As this thesis does not have a project associated with it, it only consists of literary work. Thus, the author had to work on the thesis independently. Also, writing about the games’ music implicates having knowledge about the game, hence he independently played all of them as well.

Outline and Structure:

Pieter Crathorne developed a thought-through and understandable structure. While first giving a very basic overview of the theme and purpose of the study, he then starts with topics about music in general and steadily dives deeper into the computer game theme. Along the way, before the main analysis the author explains every bit of information, he will look at including differences between sound and music as well as defining genres as these often can be up to the listener’s (or in case of games the player’s) interpretation. The main section, analyzing all the games and their music, is divided into genres and sub-categorized into games, with comparisons in-between genres and with other genres in the “discussion” section. The conclusions are then summed up in the final chapter. The only issue I have with this thesis’ structure is the number of main chapters, which I believe could be reduced by combining some of the introductory chapters. Other than that, I was very pleased with the structure, so much so that I completely copied it and applied it to my own bachelor’s thesis.

Degree of Communication

Because Pieter Crathorne wrote a long and thorough introduction, I believe also people who are not directly from this scene understand most of his work. A background in gaming is not required at all, but I believe at least a little bit of knowledge about music might clarify parts of the thesis.

Scope of the Work

The thesis has 55 pages of actual content (= excluding front page, abstract, table of contents, bibliography and appendix). As there are no pictures in this thesis, I would categorize it as upper medium-sized. Because of the great explanations in the first few chapters, a shorter version would not have been possible and actually not been useful at all, as cutting content would just confuse the reader.

Orthography and Accuracy

In my opinion, Pieter Crathorne did a very good job keeping the thesis understandable and accurate. I did not notice any syntactic errors while reading through it (though I am not an expert, especially on commas) and all sentences were semantically coherent.

Literature

As this thesis is mostly about music in games, a big part of the literature is made up of video games. Crathorne cited 28 games in this thesis. That being said, there are 46 papers and articles listed in the bibliography, many of which come directly or indirectly from the game developers & publishers themselves. I do not know which citation style has been used, but all the citations follow the same style and include access dates wherever online media was used.

Source

Direct Link:
https://scholar.sun.ac.za/bitstream/handle/10019.1/4355/crathorne_video_2010.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

Downloaded from the Stellenbosch University Library
https://scholar.sun.ac.za/handle/10019.1/4355

Thesis Evaluation – Mobile Applikationen in der orthopädischen Rehabilitation

The master thesis was written in cooperation with a fitness start-up in Graz and aims to show how several problems can be solved in and after orthopaedic rehabilitation with the help of a fitness and health app (Kendlbacher 2019, 8).

Title
Mobile Applikationen in der orthopädischen Rehabilitation

University and year of publication
Karl Franzens University Graz, 2019

Level of Design
The design of the work itself is structured but no importance was given to making it look appealing – whether colours, additional illustrations, etc. The design of the app (the outcome) is not up to date and is confusing.

Degree of innovation 
The idea behind a fitness app is nothing new, but the requirements within the app are different, which can increase the degree of innovation. To what extent, I cannot judge.

Independence
She wrote her thesis with the support of a start-up in Graz.

Outline and structure
She has worked hard on the topic, which is clearly noticeable. She has structured and organised her work into several sections. The work is clearly structured and the division is logical.

Degree of communication
It is clearly and simply structured. The author makes it clear what the thesis is about. 

Scope of the work
The thesis has 76 pages. The scope of the work is large in terms of research, but the design of the app (the final product) is clearly lacking. Unfortunately, the app was not realised but a low fidelity prototype was created and the section describing the app is very small and briefly formulated.

Orthography and accuracy
The work is error-free in spelling and comma placement. The language is good. All sources have always been cited. Abbreviations have been marked with a number and described in more detail at the bottom of the page.

Literature
The literature varies greatly between years of publication. The paper was published in 2019, there are two sources published in the same year (6 pages of bibliography). 

Kendlbacher, Julia. 2019. Mobile Applikationen in der orthopädischen Rehabilitation. Graz: Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz, 2019