Gannt Chart

Below is a Gantt chart, created to organise more efficiently what had to be completed in the set time frame. In red are the estimated completion times of each aspect and in grey is the actual time each section took to complete.

Completing the modelling took a week longer than expected which pushed other aspects behind schedule. However we believe that the extra time taken to complete the models was important in getting all models to look the best they could.

The animation stage also got pushed behind schedule due to the unexpected complexity of how some of the mechanisms moved. More time could have been spent on getting each mechanism to animate better but an extra week was the most the group could afford to allocate otherwise there would not have been enough time to create a professional looking video ready for the presentation.

Group Minutes 3rd December

Present:
Aaron Cracknell
Richard King
Stuart Norton
Tom Robinson

Progress:
With a week to go before the final presentation and hand in date, the group are nearly ready to begin rendering and start the post production. Today, group member Stuart recorded a narration to accompany the final animation and also provided his final environment scene finished. As a group we decided to go for a night time snow scene for our animation and this was added to the 3ds Max scene today.

With the steam pump now finished and fully animated the group today concentrated on cameras and lighting. With three separate cameras in the scene we can render a selection of different views for editing later. One camera provides a close up of the steam pump and rotates at different angles to see all areas of the pump. A second camera is static which gives a single view of the steam pump from a high angle. The final camera rotates around the building which holds the steam pump, the camera shows the environment and creates the atmosphere. This particular camera animation was made with the help of a eclipse shaped path constraint for a smooth animation around the environment.

Richard created an excellent model of a lamp to be used within the scene as a visible source of light. The scene is mostly lighted by a small number of omni lights to get the right amount of light in certain areas. A balance had to be established with the intensity to stop the omni lights clashing and making the scene far too bright. The group is on track to render out the required animations and hand them over to Tom Robinson's 'Final Cut' expertises where all three animations will be edited together along with Stuarts narration piece and a number of other audio files to create a realistic scene. Aaron Continued to finalise the animation and worked on finishing touches to the textures and modelling. Aaron and Richard began to place 3 cameras in different areas, and created the movie aspect. A short list of scenes that will be renederred at the end are shown below:

RENDERING

CAMERA 1
First section: Frames 1 - 613
Second section: Frames 760 - End

CAMERA 2
Frames 200 - 900

CAMERA 3
Frames 1 - 501

Meeting Minutes - 26th November

Present

Aaron Cracknell
Richard King
Stuart Norton
Tom Robinson

Progress

Today, the group reviewed the progress that has been made over the past week. Tom had been continuing with texturing his model and obtaining sound clips ready for the post production aspect. Richard and Aaron both completed their models with textures and began to create the animation of these sections. Stuart created an outhouse with textures and other objects, such as tools and crates/drums to add to the environment that will eventually be merged with the model itself. The group decided that all modelling aspects must be completed by tomorrow (Friday), so that animation can be completed by early next week. The rest of next week will then be used for post production purposes, primarily for the main camera work, and possibly to make a start on the lighting effects. The animation of the model now lasts for 30 seconds, and the group has decided to do approximately 20 - 30 seconds of narration before the model starts to move, where details of the model will be explained and background information provided. We decided to include a narration at the beginning as the main aim of the exercise is to educate people about the machine. Tom has been working on a story board for the main movie aspect, starting with the narration, then zooming into the outhouse where the machine will be placed. A switch will be activated on the machine, to then show it in full animation whilst the camera pans around it, zooming in on specific areas of the animation. This will then inform people about the machine, also showing how it works and the environment where it would have been located.
The two movies below show how our animation is currently looking. There are several glitches which Aaron and Richard are aware of and are currently working on, but this gives a general idea of how the machine will look at the end. The most noticeable aspects which need to be adhered to are the wheel, which is currently spinning too fast, and the 3rd arm back which collides with other moving parts:

The group concluded by looking at the coming week to see what needed to be completed by next Thursday. It was decided that Aaron and Richard would finalise the animation ready for post production. Tom would collate all of the sound patches to be used, and work would be started on the narration. Aaron and Richard would also amalgamate the outhouse with the model, and the group as a whole would start on the movie aspect, ensuring that the cameras work in the correct way. Stuart would also finalise the outhouse so that it looks as realistic as possible.

The story board for the movie aspect is shown below:

-End of meeting-

Meeting Minutes - 19th November

Present

Tom Robinson

Aaron Cracknell

Richard King

Stuart Norton

Progress

The group took part in an Interim Presentation today, to show the progress that has been made within the last month and leasing up to the few weeks until our Presentation to Terry Bradley, who is the voluntary trustee of the Museum of Power.

(This was the point at which the group had reached by the end of this weeks meeting/group-work)

It is visible that the effort and concentration the group has put into maintaining an accurate scale has paid off - there were only minor adjustments needed in terms of scaling and re-positioning the left-hand section (due to the sheer amount of fittings and attachments that needed to be positioned and rotated in the correct places, making up the complete object)

Role Continuation up till Next Weeks Meeting

Tom Robinson: Researching,Generating and Applying textures to the left-hand section (this will only need minor animation that doesn't impact on the progression of the central section of the model), so this can be achieved seperate. Also, further collection of suitable sounds; as part of Post Production role. 

Aaron Cracknell: Progression and potential Completion of animation of own 'side' of central section with relevant textures applied. Linking the outhouse to the main model with textures ready for movie creation.

Richard King: Similar to Aaron's role, but animation on containing singular orbital-arm and other connecting rods. Textures applied to the wheel and orbital arm.

Stuart Norton: Progression of Environment; made up of 'outhouse' with minor furnishings inside and general era-contextual items within the surrounding environment. 

Other Items

There was the thought that both Aaron and Richard, as their sections were going to take a fair while to animate fully and Tom shall be busy applying the series of textures/maps onto the left-hand section, they should use any spare time to apply their own textures to the section they have finished animating which, we all agreed, was not as varied or irregular as the selection to be applied onto Tom's section...

With only three weeks left of the semester, the group ideally intends to be completed by the week ending 6th December, so that the few days of the subsequent week can be used as preparation for the Presentation on the Thursday of that week.

-End Of Meeting-

Meeting Minutes - 12th November

Present
 Richard King

Aaron Cracknell

Tom Robinson

Stuart Norton

Progress

Although the group planned to bring together all modeling aspects ready to begin animation, unfortunately this did not come to fruition. This was primarily because the modeling has taken longer than we expected. As such, we decided to bring together all of our models so far, to see how things look at present. The image below shows our current progress:

As you can see from the image above the modeling process is nearly complete, however some parts are yet to be completely finished. Over the past week each member of the group has been pursuing each section they have been assigned.

Aaron Cracknell: Finished modeling the bass unit of the model and some parts of the middle area that will later be animated. Some textures and colours applied.

Richard King:Experimenting with textures, specular and bump mapping on the wheel object. Finished modeling the small metal pots which are attached to the steam pump in numerous places.

Stuart Norton:Finished modeling the right side of the steam pump.

Tom Robinson: Nearly completed the left side of the steam pump, including all pipes, dials and levers. Small section left to finish modeling.

 The group decided that as we couldn't complete all aspects of the modeling by this week, due to the complicated shapes needing more time to model properly with detail.As well as trying to finish off the rest of the modeling, we experimented with textures on some of the objects.
Texturing and hopefully some animation will be started next Thursday in the tutorial, by then we hope to have completed modeling all the objects and bringing them all together into one file so we can attach everything together and begin texturing, applying bump and specular maps.

-End Of Meeting-

Meeting Minutes - 5th November

Present

Aaron Cracknell
Tom Robinson
Richard King
Stuart Norton

Progress

Today, we showed our progress so far, we disscussed and criticised each others work to warn about any problem areas that might show and congatulated each other on a job well done. It was good to see everyone working to the best of their abilities. We joined everyones work up into one file to keep it to scale and to see what it looked like compared to our pictures and it looks like everyone is on the right track. Deadlines are being met and everybody is happy to continue at this pace. The images below show our work so far:

Tom's Valve
Richard's Wheel
Stuart's Air cylinders
Aaron's Base Unit

SWOT Analysis

A ‘SWOT’ analysis for our project consisted of assessing the group’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. This is an important aspect of the project because it is helpful to understand which group members are better and worse in the different areas of the project. So by using the SWOT analysis as a reference it was a straight forward step to assign responsibilities to members that were best suited to them personally.

Strengths:

Aaron Cracknell: Modeling, UVW Mapping, Applying Textures, Animation, Rendering.

Richard King: Modeling, UVW Mapping, Applying Textures, Animation, Rendering.

Stuart Norton:Modeling, Animation, Cameras, Rendering.
Tom Robinson: Modeling, Cameras, Researching Textures, Post Production (Audio/Narrative).

Weaknesses:
Aaron Cracknell: Audio and texturing.

Richard King: Post Production (Audio/Narrative).

Stuart Norton:Textures & Mapping, Post Production.

Tom Robinson: Creating key frames and designing animation within 3ds Max.

Opportunities:
Aaron Cracknell: Gaining more knowledge of 3ds Max.

Richard King: Bump and Specular Mapping.

Stuart Norton: Improve my weaknesses within 3ds Max.

Tom Robinson: Animation.

Threats:
Aaron Cracknell: Lack of experience with 3ds Max.

Richard King: Lighting and Cameras.

Stuart Norton: Fluidity of Animation, Detailed Modeling.
Tom Robinson: Detailed Animation.