Q1
About Me
& what I am good at
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i there! My name is Xia Du, you can also call me Steve. I received my B.S.E from Pierre and Marie Curie University in Mechanical Engineering, currently working in Beijing. My interests are widespread, such as music, traveling, Internet, movie, photography etc. I am always searching for enjoyable experience and exciting new feelings. Unfamiliar new environments are not so hard for me, life experience in Europe makes me self-managed and tenacious. I am a Gemini who is both introvert and extrovert; when being alone, I am able to focus on one of my interest or work for hours; when with others, I have a good sense of teamwork and social network. More specifically, my major in college taught me science and mechanical basics, such as CAD/ CAM, 3D printing, fabrication, automation etc; In addition, I learned primary skills of front-end web development, Adobe CS by myself, I love to study new techniques which I am interested in. Apart from Chinese, I speak and write in English and French. I have an instinct for well optimizing my works and an obsession for creating pleasant experience by trying out diverse techniques.
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Created By Xia Du March 2015 @ Beijing, China
Places where I have lived
Q2
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I was born and grew up in Handan, China; studied in Paris, France; shortly stayed in Rotterdam, Netherlands; currently living and working in Beijing. Everything that I experienced in these four distinctly different cities built up the first 26 years of my life. I really enjoy answering this excellent question. I truly believe that life elsewhere let us recognize ourselves better. I also traveled to many cities in several countries and is always ready to hit the road again. I truly hope that Richmond could be my next destination.
Handan
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y hometown Handan is a very common one of the 74 third-tier cities in China. Same as other members in this category, the fate of this ancient city is tightly tied up with the development of China and closely following the steps of China’s first-tier cities (Beijing, Shanghai etc). Life there is peaceful and practical, people are eager to obtain more material comfort, which used to be out of reach, whilst maintaining simple mindset and traditional Chinese thinking. I was born in the eventful 1989, in the following years, China’s economy had been developing with an amazing speed, information from abroad came in rapidly and massively, far beyond people’s absorbing capacity. When I was a child, TV was the most luxurious home appliance and only received 10 channels; cars were rarely seen and were exclusive for state-owned enterprises or government departments. However, when I was in high school years later, I could buy Nirvana’s albums and Fight Club DVD in local music/video stores; traffic jams happened in rush hours, even Bentley and Maserati could be found in the street. Changes are still happening frequently in Chinese cities, most people in my generation can hardly find back childhood memories from the places where they used to be because most parts of our cities were reconstructed. The way that Handan influenced me symbolizes how that Chinese generation was shaped by that age. The range of our life experience and cultural information is wide, but the understanding at certain points may be impetuous. Part of me is typical, dare to break traditional rules, eager to discover the world outside boundaries, wish to obtain material comfort.
Changes of Handan in 10 years at the same crossroad
Paris
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fter high school, I left the city where I lived for 18 years and flew to one of the most famous cities in the world, Paris. The first time when I stood beside La Seine, I was totally shocked by the surrounding, a respectful feeling for culture and history arose in my mind. Ironically, I never felt like that so strongly when I was in my own country which has probably the longest history comparing with all the others. I realized that sacrifice for economy in my homeland is painful and arguable. Besides its honorable respect for traditional culture and lifestyle, Paris is also an international metropolis. In “The City of Light�, I had opportunities to get in touch with people from all over the world, listen to their stories and try to understand different thinkings. As an only child far away from home, I had to solve all the problems occurred in life or study independently and effectively. Gradually, I learned how to be diligent and self-managed. Professors taught me science and technologies, experience of being in society told me how to be a grown up and be responsible for life and work. In addition, my French friends are also good teachers, their good thinking and behavior let me absorb helpful qualities which were not clearly underlined in my previous experience. For instance, greater good, such as civilization, freedom, democracy etc, is extremely important and everyone should concern; the most important goal of life is to define what kind of person that you want to be and then to make efforts for realize it; personal pursuit should be based on things you truly wish to achieve rather than the desire for greater income. After 5 years in Paris, I widened my horizon and have met nice friends. Knowledge that I had been taught makes me able to look deeper into questions and make responsible choices, analyze problems and provide solutions.
Photos I took in front of my room in Paris
Rotterdam
I
spent several months for an internship in Rotterdam. Comparing with Paris, Rotterdam is a much smaller, much simpler European city. This city has very limited natural resource and was almost totally ruined during the WWII. I think it is for these reasons, people in Rotterdam are quite sensitive to business activities, highly serious to their work and always ready to capture or even to create new chances. The Netherlands had great artists in history like Vincent Van Gogh, they are also very creative in the field of contemporary art. When I was in Rotterdam, galleries and studios often appeared in the street. Cube Houses, the symbol of this city, express the support for modern design of open-minded people in Rotterdam. At this point, I think Eiffel Tower and Louvre Pyramid might like Dutch better. The short experience in Rotterdam impressed me especially for the Dutch work attitude. Meanwhile, it also stimulated my great interest in creative design.
One of my photos took in the Netherlands
Beijing
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ith the end of my study in Europe, I came back to Beijing, a city which is both traditional and modern with its distinctive Chinese characteristics and vibrant international atmosphere. In China, the new world’s largest economy, Beijing is the political center, cultural center, economical center and educational center. In such a versatile city, every domain is relatively developed and keeps growing rapidly, providing millions of opportunities and attracting people from other regions of China and other countries. Meanwhile, the city has a population more than 20 million and over 5 million automobiles; fierce competition, together with nearby industries and heavy transportation, leads to huge living pressure, serious traffic jam and scaring air pollution. In Beijing, my topic of life turned to knowing the society (more precisely, typical Chinese social environment) while working. During this latest period, I obtained rich experience about this society and became more professional. Further more, my understanding about my own life is more profound and specific, this includes self-knowledge, family responsibility, social responsibility, career goals and internal mindset. In general, life in Beijing makes me a mature grown up who is more and more seasoned in professional environment, helped me reinforce the resistance to living pressure, keeps reminding me one of my favorite quotes “Keep your eyes on the stars, and your feet on the ground”.
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Some traveling photos
London
2014
Bangkok
2014
Monte Carlo
2013
Barcelona
2012
Berlin
2011
Grenoble
2010
Reasons that make me apply Education
Creation
Profession
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Passion
Q3
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Unlike most of international applicants do, applying to several schools simultaneously for higher success rate, the track of Experience Design in VCU Brandcenter is my unique option. My target is clearly focusing on this particular program.
Passion
I
know myself first as an “appreciator” who enjoys all kinds of elegant and smart creations. On the opposite, perfunctory or unsatisfactory user experience can easily makes me uncomfortable, when this comes to me, I will naturally begin to think about how it could be done better. I am a person who is keen to discover beauty and to seek better experience and love to share with others. Secondly, I think I am also a “thinker” and “practicer”, when I come up with some ideas, it is a pleasure for me to approach to unfamiliar new methods or tools to build up the figure in my mind and learn by doing. In fact, I found this process is full of satisfaction and extremely interesting. For example, I used to fine tune my Keynote slides for whole nights in order to bring more pleasant visual contents along with my presentation; instead of downloading a passable image on the Internet, I prefer to retouch or create my own illustrations which fit in better with the theme; at the end of searching for methods to refine my work, I surprisingly found out Prezi and can not wait to try it out. However, I also clearly realized that fiddling with digital tools and basic design concepts is just some helpful tricks, my desire for profound knowledge has been becoming stronger and stronger. As user experience is an important field and has significant meaning in companies, why don’t I take this passion seriously and turn myself from an amateur to a professional? After had been searching for quite a long time, a conversation with two Chinese Brandcenter students, Qin Yang and Yichi Zhang, brought me a piece of inspiring information: the track of
Experience Design in VCU Brandcenter, a relatively new track of this reputed ad school. During our chat, I was so interested in Qin’s major. I showed them some of my small works and expressed my wish of combining my passion with my future career. They both suggested that I should consider Experience Design (former Creative Technologies). In addition, I learned that VCU Brandcenter is very openminded, it welcomes all kinds of background. After searching more by myself, I realized that the XD track in Brandcenter is probably the best place on earth that I should be for making my dream come true. My decision of applying to VCU Brandcenter has been made and received support from my family. VCU Brandcenter is a highly reputed advertising school, graduates from there are qualified persons who are ready to begin their career in ad industry. Ad agencies were born to create impressive branding services, they have to be early adapters for new technologies and new media in order to keep vibrant and creative. Identically, when they serve their clients, technical or innovative features of products or business mode are always the main starting points of branding. In this regard, I think creative technologists or experience designers are definitely important roles in ad agencies, so person like me who is less in mass communication but more technical may also be helpful. More than that, I firmly believe that creative design and user experience will be the keys to success for enterprises, it will be especially true for those in China. For this reason, I think graduates from experience design could find opportunities in numbers possible places.
“Thank you Guys! ”
I
know Yichi Zhang since our childhood, he is an international student on CBM in VCU Brandcenter. Even though we have been quite distant from each other, living on different continent, since junior high school, we are always best friends. He introduced me Qin Yang and Jiapeng Song, two excellent Chinese students on Experience Design in Brandcenter from whom I received useful suggestions and information during my application. They are all great representatives for VCU Brandcenter!
Q4
Future In
addition to the content in the previous page which is mostly focus on subjective motivation, I did some research about UX design in order to better develop my future plan if I would have the chance to become an Brancenter graduate in Experience Design. I would like to warm the following part up with a short story. Since I was little, my father loves to build useful objects even furnitures in his “atelier” (a small storage), sometimes he also creates some small projects of art for fun such as painting, Chinese calligraphy and even engraving on empty eggshells. As an auditor, he made three wooden chairs, with tools like vernier caliper and level gradienter, during his limited holiday. “Best way to relax,” as he said. I am always wondering if creative craftsmen were required and respected in that period of China, my father must be one of the best. I must be highly influenced by this creative man, he was my only superhero before Marvel comics were introduced into China. Luckily, modern China is globalized and much less restricted by government, more and more people are well educated, various products (domestic or import) and better income ensure a broad range of choices and keep consumers elevating their taste of lifestyle. When the comprehensive experience conveyed by products or services becomes a major factor for clients, I think this is the time to find back the worship for craftsmanship in this ancient but newborn country. In modern words and broad sense, experience design is rising up. Companies (especially IT companies) who are able to deliver outstanding user experience harvest successful results. As a matter of fact, China it self is also planning to turn “Made in China” (or the less annoying “Designed by John Doe in California Assembly in China”) into real and positive “Made in China”. In other words, according to Chinese Premier, the power of
creativity and startups will be encouraged in the following years. With the productivity and consumption of China, this is certainly going to form a huge market and vibrant environment for creators and designers. Meanwhile, the communication between best design origins and China’s market will be much more frequent. In this promising field, I define my future position in short term as qualified UX designer/ product manager, double as communicator with European and American background; I would love to be employee in ad agencies, innovative startups or well-known companies. In long term, countless exciting things could be achieved once I gear myself up with the skill set of creative technologies, design, management and communication. Like most people, I am a big fan of Internet. Big data forms an intangible layer which covers the earth up, processing innumerable transmissions each day. To my understanding, the best two advantages of Internet are easy information exchange and auto data processing; thanks to this, human communication is better evolved and became much more convenient than ever. In my view, Internet technology is definitely one of the main reasons which initiated current creative waves, everything in our world will be redefined after enabling by the Internet, most objects that we are so familiar with is or will be transformed into smart devices with multiple functions integrated. It is a trend that companies are making experiments to integrate relevant new function(s) into their products seamlessly, starting from an ordinary product and add new technology features or, the other way round, begin with a new technology and looking for possible applications on existing objects. No matter how innovations will be carried out, relevant functions and outstanding interaction are key points when a new product is ready to come out of the lab, there we found the importance of experience design.
Q5
The Book that I recommend
The Old Man and the Sea is always my number one selection from all the books that I read. In addition to its remarkable popularity, two of the highest honorable awards in literature confirm the success of this novel written by Ernest Hemingway. Even though reading is losing its popularity nowadays, I think the plot of The Old Man and the Sea must be still well known, especially in America. This novel is based on a true story while the author was living in Cuba, this must be one of the reasons which make this fiction dramatically touching. Santiago’s (the main character) story is simple but legendary, it reveals the most important things in life that we should admire and strive for: dignity, persistence and faith. As a lonely aging fisher, Santiago is faithfully holding on his own mission, sailing and fishing, even he is considered extremely unlucky
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by others. The old man respected the giant marlin that he caught because of its unyielding dignity, also found a reflection of himself from it. During the fierce fight with sharks, Santiago was fearlessly protecting his marlin, the easiest solution, giving his capture up, never appeared in his mind; at that moment, the marlin is no longer a fish who would bring benefit and feed others, but a symbol of dignity, a firm attitude to setbacks in a man’s fate. I think life is after all an one-man show with a first-person perspective long take, personal mission is the final meaning of a person’s life. Basic values are so easy to be absorbed, but very hard to be implemented persistently. This book is definitely a “must read”, even though I guess most people have read it, I still want to choose this one to suggest.
E
very man’s life ends the same way. It is only the details of how he lived and how he died that distinguish one man from another. Ernst Hemingway
A Failure
Q6
I learned from it
M
y most unforgettable personal failure was my National College Entrance Exam (NCEE) in China which plays the same role as SAT in the U.S.A. but totally different. Frankly, I did not succeed in my Chinese SAT, my expectation based on so many simulation tests was totally failed. It was still possible for me to be admitted by so called “first class” universities, but I was clearly informed myself that only the very best schools in China are attractive, a university which is lack of educational resource and potential opportunities is definitely not a wise option. That younger me did feel tremendous depression and helplessness after had found out my scores. Paying a precious year to double my last year for a 3-day-exam seems to be the easiest way out, but I was not will to replay a year, doing the same old things but spending real time, I believed there were better possibilities. So shortly, I cheered myself up and started searching on the Internet for alternative possibilities. Finally, I found an admission program for Chinese high school students offered by a group of French universities, it considered China’s NCEE score as a factor, but their independent tests and interview were main standards. I was attracted by mechanical engineering under graduated program of University of Paris Sud (my university for the first two years of my undergraduate program before I got my transfer to Pierre and Marie Curie University) and succeeded in their evaluation. Then I flew to Paris alone with 40-kilo-weight luggages (about 88 lbs), began my life independently in a totally different environment using an unfamiliar language. After 5 years, I received my diploma, traveled to many famous European countries, met friends from different countries, handled French well and gained abundant experience. “God doesn’t close one door without opening another.” This is my constant attitude to failures. However, it is also a brilliant idea to run faster and arrive the destination before the door was closed.
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People who never cared about the Chinese educational system (which is certainly not necessary to be known by many) may ask why I care about that much when I did not succeed my exam, why there was not other options? Against very limited educational resource, China has a huge number of high school examinees due to its incredible great population, how to fairly distribute resource to young Chinese citizens is a serious problem. Our government chose to make thing, that is to make NCEE the unique standard for university admission and incline to some universities to elevate their qualities and international reputation. Students in China work so hard during heavily loaded 12 years after kindergarten, NCEE is the only chance for most students to better initialize their future. As the rate
of admission for National Key Universities’ in my province is planned and fixed to around 9%, which means really strict, I had school mates who doubled, or even tripled the most stressful last year for retry, some others will choose a more famous college regardless of their preferable majors. Luckily, Chinese government is getting closer to its decision of reform our out of date educational system. I hope a better functional one will come out soon, make profit to millions of young examinees in each year. Many reports could be found on the Internet about the painful parts of China’s educational system, an extreme example of Hengshui High School will shock one’s recognition on education.
Q7
A Tweet
Q8
Job Placement
T
hankfully, I found abundant resource on VCU Brandcenter’s website about job placement of graduates, especially on the Alumni sub-page. So I checked out each portfolio site of Experience Design (XD) alumni, their works and resumes gave me a vivid illustration about what a student will become after this graduate program. I personally found out that most frequent titles for graduates of this track are UX Designer, Creative Technologist, as answered in the FAQs, main employers are advertising agencies. Alumni Salary Survey gave me more specific and elaborate data; besides its key point, job satisfaction research responded to one of my concerns; luckily, most XD graduates show appreciation about their jobs. However, for international students, they might have the advantage of being more international but the weakness of being less familiar with domestic culture and business in the U.S.A., these students’ goals are probably not exactly the same with their American colleagues. So I interviewed my friends Qin and Jiapeng about their career expectations, they both expressed the wish to become firstly UX designer during their OPT, then try to capture opportunities in Sino-American business related to creative design after their professional experience matured.
Thank You I am looking forward to add MORE interesting content into my story ! I think Brancdcenter could be the next great place for my future chapters ! Thank you again and have a NICE day !
@stivdo Find Me on
Probably soon on
Created By Xia Du March 2015 @ Beijing, China