FA Technology Gathering Opening Extra Credit

This was the first of the three extra credit assignments I went to. When we ( we being Jenni, Travis, and my cousin) first arrived, there didn't seem to be anything going on. We showed up on time, but no one seemed ready, or it seemed somewhat empty. We went downstairs so my cousin could use the bathroom, which ended up taking like 30 minutes; it was ridiculous. Turns out he was playing Monopoly on his phone, while on the john. We went back up after the extended break, and things looked a little more lively, but there still were only a few exhibits. As a bonus, there was a giant projected screen, half behind make-shift curtains displaying boobs, and a naked guy doing jumping jacks; it was hilarious. Sadly after a while, they pulled the curtains closed and as far as I'm concerned, didn't reopen them. The first exhibit we went to, was a game this gentleman had made with a moral message about the preservation of the Rainforest. The game itself was, surprisingly, pretty decent. Like a pretty nice flash game off a kill-some-time website. You played a little man with some face paint and spears. You'd run a linear path horizontally (think Mario with a spear projectile) and throw spears at bad guys. The game was short at 3 levels, and took all of 10 minutes to complete. There were a few different projectiles, and a Rainforest message at the end of each level. It was a pretty impressive project. My favorite thing I saw at this gathering, was a alternate take on the Myers-Briggs test; this thing was impressive. You took a seat, and without any further instructions were told to "click things". Every page would usually have a few options such as a bird sitting on a wire by itself, and a group of birds sitting on a wire (see where this is going?) After you got to the end of the path of clicked objects, you were awarded your test result telling you your personality type. It would calculate your personality based on what you clicked, such as an extrovert for clicking the multiple birds on the wire, or an introvert for the single bird. The thing that surprised me about this test, was its accuracy. My friend Travis had taken the traditional form of this test only two weeks prior to this and scored exactly the same results. I also scored something similar to what I had received when I took the test in high school. The fact that no instructions were needed, and the results were that accurate was truly impressive; unless you are my cousin Scott, who just clicked the first thing that highlighted under his cursor, then your results weren't too accurate.

Machinima Extra Credit

As the second extra credit assignment, Roger, and the majority of our class went to the machinima showings at the end of our last class day. I knew what machinima was, but had never actually seen any, or bothered looking it up online. From what I understand, all of the projects shown when we went were made using the Half Life 2 engine. The thing that I thought was odd, is that some of them clearly took a long time to make, then had terrible audio/audio editing; I don't get it. You would think that if someone where to put this much time into a project like this, they use a mic better than the one they found in the bargain bin at Wal-mart. One project in particular, had it's audio so varying, that at times it would hurt my ears and sound distorted coming out, and at other times, would be nearly inaudible because the mic couldn't handle it. Audio issues aside, some of these were quite neat. One video in particular, Villains Anonymous, I found especially funny and creative. It was about help group meeting for villains, which ranged from Darth Vader, to an enemy from id software's Doom. One part in particular, where a linguistically superior demon tells his story, was hilarious. He tries to do some shopping at a grocery store, and despite using great manors, and, in his head, sounding like a perfect gentleman, all anyone can hear is his screeching and yelling; he can't understand why everyone is so afraid of him. Another machinima that I enjoyed, not because it was funny, but because I thought it was well done and entertaining, was one based upon Edger Allen Poe's The Tell-tale Heart. I liked the way in which the poem was depicted, and the narration was superior to a lot of the other works. It was an interesting way to hear the poem, and gave visual entertainment along-side it. I had seen this done many times with The Raven, but not this one. This overall was a fun experience, and gave me a better understanding of what machinima is, and what it takes to create it. The interesting thing with this type of movie, is that the acting seems nearly as important as in a live action movie. When there was sloppy voice acting, it took me away from the movie, just as much as when there is sloppy acting in a regular film. Something else I noticed while watching these, is that the more serious ones didn't seem to work as well as the comedic ones. This could be the same reason as with live action movies, where it's harder to make a drama than a horror movie, or it could be that this genre of film just doesn't work as well with drama, I'm guessing it's the first. Anime, and CG seem to work just fine with drama.

Second Life Extra Credit

The Second Life extra credit assignment turned out to essentially be a "how to" for Second Life. For the first hour and a half, the people who put together the seminar explained how to use second life, and how to create an account - it was awful. Luckily for me, I could use the internet for this part. The majority of the people there were 50 years old women, who would mutter under their breathe things like "well this just isn't working right." I was actually surprised to see the demographic, I was expecting people more my aged, and men; I think however, that the group of people that were there, were there as an activity for some other group. The final half an hour was spent listening to a lecture from a lady from a remote place, talking about the possibilities of Second Life...Such as giving a speech from a remote place. Somewhere in the middle of this, Roger exhibited our games to the class, and of course, our game wasn't working properly. A few people from the other groups were there in-game, and the person who was supposed to be there in-game for our group, Team Knight Rider, wasn't there. Roger gave me as an example of someone that could answer questions for our group however, so I stood by our building for the remainder of the time - no one asked any questions. Compared to the other two extra credit assignments, this one was pretty damn boring, but at least Roger knew this, because afterwards he apologized to Jenni, and myself; after I receive the extra point from this, apology accepted ;) I suppose if nothing else, I got to see the in-game voice chat working, and got to browse the internet while receiving extra credit.

Hmm

Seems there was a new fruit found in Austria.

Rough draft.

I've found my tree, and edited out the original fruit. I played with a blown glass pear as a piece of fruit to add, but am not sure if it's what I want. I'll figure something else out later.

P.S. it's not letting me add an image, I'll add one later when the site gets fixed.

Step three

Claus LaComme, is an aging farmer, who years ago inherited his father's farm upon his passing. He decided to stick with his family's roots and maintain the farm as not only a means of financial support, but as a way, that he felt, to stay close to his late father. His wife periodically complained about the appearance of the yard claiming that there wasn't enough "greens" as she called them, which lead to his planting of the tree.

Step two

A man in the country-side of Austria grows a new fruit that has scientists stumped. The man claims to have grown the tree from a sapling, and one day noticed something blossoming on one of its branches. A few weeks later, the blossom grew into a large unfamiliar fruit. After not being able to identify the fruit, he contacted local news papers to spread the word about his mysterious new finding.