Textures Research

Created another moodboard for textures.

Some of these may be taken into consideration when adding textures to certain aspects of my ride.

Research into my Animation project.

I wanted to gain some more inspiration for my project by looking at existing haunted house rides. This will allow me to identify key elements that I could include in my ride in order for it to be successful.

This video of the Haunted Mansion in Disney land is a good example of a good haunted house attraction. What I found particularly useful is the comment the user had left when they added their video. It read:

"This came out pretty good. The shot looking back at the empty hallway is there because it's one of my favorite sections of the Haunted Mansion, and, it was eerie to see it so very empty on a super-crowded Summer day."

Maybe I could incorporate this into my ride?

Had a look at another video, this is a ghost train at Pleasure Beach, Blackpool:



I particularly liked this because it gave me a good view of the track itself, and the fast dip the carts go down could be used as part of a 'scare scene'. Also it showed quite a few props that I could take into account.

I also came across this video an NTU student has done:



I really liked the theme and thought the overall idea worked well. I liked the fire and fog effects they used and it looked really realistic. Also the music/sounds fitted well and added to the jungle atmosphere. The key points I need to keep in mind here are that I need to make sure my sounds and music fit with my theme.

Interactive Media 500 word rational

Before I started designing my portfolio, I took the time to research other existing online portfolios to gain inspiration for my own. This is shown on one of my blog posts, found at this post. I then went on to create a series of wire frames that helped me to explore different designs that could work, possible colour schemes and what would needed to be improved. I created quick mock ups on Photoshop to allow me to visually see what my final layout design could look like. I wanted to follow the ‘less is more’ concept so that my website is legible, easy to follow, but is still eye catching and aesthetically pleasing. Links to show this are:

Post 1 (initial wire frames. Idea for gallery thumbnails was inspired by the top design)

Post 2 (Using a different colour scheme)

Post 3 (Decided on a colour scheme, but still need to play about with the layout)

Post 4 (Layout completed, slogan finalised and designed myself a logo)

I decided on 4 solid pages that I wanted to include. These were:

• Home Page

• About Page

• Work Page

• Contact Page

On the work page, I wanted to incorporate some form of gallery to allow users to interact with my site and look at the work that they wanted to. My ‘gallery’ consists of thumbnails of my work so that people can visually see what that piece of work involved. These thumbnails also lead to a web page dedicated to that one piece of work so that people can see what I did in each project. I also included a gallery of my own photos that I have taken which users can interact with by physically going through the gallery themselves. I have also incorporated a Facebook badge on my contact page. This allows users to be directed to my Facebook page and so, interaction is continued even outside the website. This is also the case with my Twitter widget which is also found on my contact page. To allow people to quickly access my blog, I have included an image that acts as a link. On rollover, the image changes colour to show users that it is a link. This allows them to easily find links that are incorporated in my website and make navigation a lot more simple for them. At the end of the day, I don’t want people getting frustrated over trying to find links!

I believe that it is very important people have as much access to my different sites as possible. Whether it be social networking sites, or others such as my blog. This means that people can easily get in touch with me if they require my help, want to send feedback, or maybe even get in touch about possible employment!

Overall, I am incredibly happy with my final outcome. I have never done work with HTML or CSS coding and to say it was my second project in Interactive Media, I think I have really excelled myself! In order to produce the final design, I have had to look at a lot of tutorials on the web and videos in order to find out how to do certain things. For example, I wanted to know how to add the twitter widget and Facebook badge. Obviously we have not been through this in lessons so I took my time to find out how to do it. I am glad I did this as it increased the interactivity in my site and people could very easily get hold of me if needed. Creating rapid prototypes of my final design on Photoshop really helped me to come up with a final design in a short space of time. The advantage of this was that I then had more time to actually add the content of my website, and was able to perfect it with the time left.

Researching haunted house rides..

I watched Scooby Doo not long ago, and only just remembered there is a scene where they go investigate a shut down haunted house ride. I can't find a video to show the whole thing, but I have found a couple that shows the entrance of the ride, and the inside of the entrance.

This shows the inside of the ride.

This shows the putside of the ride.

Moodboard for Animation

Hopefully this moodboard will give me a solid idea of what I want my theme to be.

Several updates in one.

Can't actually believe how motivated I am this term! The slight disappointment of getting a C for my DP1 has really made me focus. But yet again, I worked my arse of last term and deserved better than a C. Oh well. 

Went to see Paul tonight. Not exactly the best film I've seen, but it was pretty good! Funny in most parts and Paul is a well thought out character. I love Simon Pegg and Nick Frost as a duo :D

I'm currently trying to get my Portfolio finished ready for submission. I'm just really hoping I've done enough to impress the NTU Multimedia staff and get the grades I really do deserve. Don't even know what I did so wrong to get a pissy C. I'm guessing it was just my presentation, but I did explain everything thoroughly :/ Arghhh!

Today's Animation session was quite productive. I've thought about certain aspects of my haunted ride, and managed to plan out my track. I wanted my ride to be on 2 levels to maximise the space I had to use and to ensure my ride was a long enough duration. I will post some pictures when I get round to sorting it out. Need to finish my Portfolio ready for Monday!

Completed contact page

Just a sneeky peek at what my contact page looks like. Enjoy :)

First animation seminar.. Not too bad!

Okay so, yesterday I started my next project which is Animation.

Brief:

Design, build and animate an amusement park, terror, haunted castle/house ride to fit into the Waverley Theatre with 2-3 scare scenes.

Doesn't sound too bad! 

So we started with some basics... learning how to use some new tools.

1) Using shapes, to create new shapes, by joining the shapes together. That make sense?

I used a series or rectangles and circles to show this and made a little car shape :D

2) Using the "Lathe" tool. Drawing a line then pressing the lathe tool creates a 3D shape. Lathes are used to create 3D shapes by a laser following the line you create, and it carves the shape into wood, metal, etc.

Taking these points into account, it will help me to create some different and new shapes that may come in useful for certain props in my animation.

I then went on to start creating the track shape, cart and animating the cart.

 

This shows the creating of my track. I used a simple shape to make the track so that it didn't over complicate the track shape.

 This is my practice cart so that I can get used to creating one and making it animate along the track path.

 This shows that I have managed to animate the cart along the track path ( which took quite a while as I didn't know where all the buttons were :( )

Here I had added a few props, a crooked fence outside adds the old effect to the haunted ride. I want to find a way of using some form of lighting to make the candles outside the front door look realistic.

Here I have animated a sliding door for the exit of the ride back to the start (which I am quite proud of :D)

Start animation on Tuesday

I am so fucked.

I don't mean to brag, but I am a fucking genius.

Spent 2 hours on my online portfolio, and seeing as I didn't go to the seminar this morning, I've had to work out how to add a facebook and twitter widget to my portfolio by myself. AND I'VE DONE IT!

I am so bloody pleased. :D

I would like to add that my portfolio is now coming together quite nicely :)

Hurrahhh!

Portfolio layout update.

After spending 3 hours trying to perfect my layout for my portfolio, I think I have finally cracked it!

And to make it even better, Shaun said he liked my design :D Yay!

Layout for Digital Me project - My online portfolio!

I missed todays seminar with Giselle because I am rather ill :( Anywayz, Been working on my portfolio in my spare time to try and get ahead. This is what I've got so far!

I've used simple colours so that the text stands out, and I wanted to incorporate some form of personal slogan. It isn't the best, but I quite like it :) Any thoughts on this layout?