Mr Umran Ali
School of Arts, Media and Creative Technologies
Current positions
Senior Lecturer
Biography
Dr Umran Ali is a senior lecturer at the School of Arts & Media at the University of Salford. Having led a video games design programme for a number of years, he has developed an international reputation as a consultant in the conceptualisation, design & validation in a range of both further & higher (UG & PGT) programmes. He has also acted as and external examiner and expert for several HEI’s both nationally and internationally.
He maintains a deep interest in the meaning, impact, and design of natural spaces, in video games, exploring virtual natural environment design through teaching and research. He has written extensively on video games design & production, and his research focuses on natural environment and landscape design in video games, and how landscape architecture, geology and geography can further evolve natural environment design in video games.
His interdisciplinary research has taken video games design to organisations such as the Landscape Institute & Chartered Institute of Ecology and environmental management. He is an active design practitioner, having recently designed the Virtual Amazon (2019) project using a games engine to create an immersive and interactive Amazon rainforest as a democratic global environmental engagement space for young adults.
Games Design
Narrative & Storytelling
Virtual & Immersive Reality
Artificial Intelligence
Generative A.I
Game prototyping & development
Qualifications
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PhD
2009 - 2016 -
Higher Education Research & Practice
2007 - 2008 -
Creative Technology
2004 - 2005 -
Computer & Video Games
2001 - 2004
Publications
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An Architectural Approach To Level Design
Ali, U. (2018). An Architectural Approach To Level Design. The computer games journal, 7(1), 39-41. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40869-017-0050-7