Evaluation

As can be seen from my updated SWOT and Skills Audit, I have gained a lot from this module, mostly based around my main job role as designer and producer of the time-lapse segments of our showreel. On top of my newly established knowledge of time-lapse creation, i believe i have also exercised good communication between myself and my team, mostly through our facebook group, as well as far better time-management through the need to stick to a recording schedule for the time-lapse videos.


On the negative side, while i believe Wayne showed his expertise in photography through getting the camera set-up properly, i felt i could have made more of an effort to learn from him, especially as i feel this would have meant i was comfortable enough to go out and get the Sunset time-lapse i desired. I am also aware that my concentration didn't really improve much though it was certainly an improvement given my interest in the module and on top of this i feel my self-belief hasn't increased much either.

On the team side i felt that there was a certain communicative/participatory disparity between some of our team members, though they did help and play their part to some extent they were almost non-existent in terms of presence and general contribution. Despite this, the members of the team that were active and involved worked well together, and i feel the project lead, Patrick did a good job of keeping everyone up-to-date.

I was very pleased with the showreel overall, we've created something with a professional look, excellent soundtrack and enticing content, though admittedly as i have mentioned in a previous post i feel like some of the content isn't of a high enough standard. Also, the overall style of the video is rather erratic due to the lack of consistently themed title cards for each of the subject areas, though i understand this was due to some communication issues.

And here, for your viewing pleasure is that video:

Final SWOT and Skills Audit

Having finished the project, here is an updated SWOT analysis and Skills Audit:

Strengths:

- Problem Solving
- Idea Generation
- Research
- Supporting others
- Photography ^
- Time-Lapse Creation ^
- Communication ^
- Time-management ^

Weaknesses:

- Concentration
- Self-belief

Opportunities:

- Improve Communication by working in a team, discussing ideas, etc.
- Improve Time-management by focussing on meeting deadlines
- Gain new skills and abilities
- Gain confidence of own abilities

Threats:

- Team mates not getting work done
- Poor communication between team members
- Inability to obtain desired material
- Inability to obtain satisfying material

Skills Audit

Below you can see the areas in which i improved the most are based around my main body of work for this project, the time-lapses. I feel i have gained in confidence (self-belief) through my new abilities, and i made an effort to keep up communication throughout.

Skills	Evaluation: Project Start
Research	5
Problem Solving	4
Supporting Others	4
Idea Generation	4 (+1)
Communication	4 (+2)
Self-Belief	3 (+1)
Concentration	2
Time Management	3 (+2)
Photography	3 (+2)
Time-Lapse Creation	5 (+4)

Showreel Creation

Today was the day everything we worked on came together.

After adding the footage i had attained from my own work to the 'pool', Patrick and I worked together on making it into a coherent, enticing video of what you can achieve on this course.

Above you can see our showreel storyboard, admittedly it's a little 'bare-bones' in appearance but it conveys everything we need to know about the structure of our showreel. So using Apple's iMovie software, we began the process of choosing the content we included, as well as the timings. I found this multiple person approach to the video creation to be very enjoyable as it allowed for discussions and arguments to be made on every aspect, and i feel the final product benefited greatly from this.

The footage we had was obtained by Dean and Helen, a selection of their own work and that of students past an present, as well as opening and closing title cards from Wayne. There were initial concerns when we sat down to make it that we may struggle to reach our target of 2:30 (the agreed length of our showreel), but these proved unnecessary as we hit the desired time fairly easily in the end.

I should clarify the reason that hitting the time limit was a necessity for us. Patrick, being a wizard with sound and music software, had made a soundtrack for our showreel long before we started piecing everything together and it being such an excellent piece of music there was never any doubt that we would be basing the showreel around it.

Patricks Showreel Soundtrack 

So, that's what happened today. An enjoyable experience with the only problems being the lack of intermediate title cards for the different subject areas like "Art", "Animation", "Level Design", etc. Besides this i was very impressed with our final product and i was very proud to see all of my time-lapse work in the mix, though admittedly i felt some of the content was slightly unfitting or of too low a quality to be put in the showreel. Despite this, i believe we still have a great video on our hands, mostly thanks to Pat's fantastic music piece that just fits so well with the video, as well as Waynes high quality work with the title cards (though i wish there had been some made for the intermediate cards. I believe this was due to poor communication, however.)

Footage Contribution

Having recorded the timelapses, my next undertaking was simply to gather some of my own work to the showreel.

The peak of my work this year was my animation work for Professional team brief, and the collaborative effort between myself, Tim Nguyen and Pat to create a racing game for the summer show,  so i decided to use them.

Jäga Rally (Racing Game)

Obtaining footage from Unity was a little tricky and somewhat frustrating, I was hoping there would be some way for me to create a camera in-game that i could fly around the track to get the various shots i desired. Sadly, there was nothing that would allow me to do this so i had to make use of the camera movement offered out-of-game and make do with that. The only problem i had with this is that i felt it was of slightly lower quality than if the game were actually running, and the dense grey fog that is automatically added and i could find no way of adjusting, making it difficult for long shots.

I used the popular desktop recording software Fraps to obtain the footage itself, a very simple program, you press a hotkey and it records your desktop until you press said hotkey again. I found it very easy to use but the results varied, i would sometimes get disastrous framerate issues and towards the end i found my videos were becoming artifacted and disjointed, as if the software was breaking. Thankfully at this point i had already obtained more than enough footage.

Team Brief Animation Work

Obtaining footage from Maya was a much easier affair given its built in 'playblast' function. Playblast allows you to quickly render an animation sequence directly from the viewport, so while admittedly this would be unsuitable for a 3D modelled scene where proper lighting would improve the look, with my flat 2D animations that look as good in viewport as they do when rendered, playblast was perfect. The videos i obtained were simply a select few of my favourite animations from those i had created on the Team Brief project.

Timelapse Progress

In this post i will be writing a summary of how each of our timelapse recordings went. To reiterate, the recordings we will be making are:

- Front of College (Sunrise)
- Front of College (Sunset)
- Classroom
- Sound booth

Front of College (Sunrise)

After finding we could get the equipment we needed, and given the bout of beautiful blue skies and sunshine at the time, Wayne and I immediately took out the equipment we needed and agreed to meet at roughly 4.30am the next morning (eek)

After very little sleep on my part, we did just that, and made our way to the front of the building where we intended to shoot our first timelapse. Something i noticed upon leaving my house was that the sky was much brighter than i had anticipated, though i was assured this wouldn't be a problem.

We agreed on setting the camera to take photographs at 30 second intervals and after finding a suitable spot we began. Given the time of day and our close proximity to a much lauded street for nights out, we encountered a few people who were just stumbling home. Thankfully given their intoxicated state and the agreeable nature that often comes with it, they didn't interfere with the shoot.

It was a fairly smooth run until we realised there was some overexposure in our setup, this was a very daunting prospect as it meant we would have to adjust the camera and this would be quite noticeable in the final result.

Despite this the footage appears to be useable, some adjustments were required in post-processing that saved it, and the footage would be squeezed into a few seconds of footage so it most likely wouldn't be too noticable. Either way neither of us really liked the idea of having to do it again!

Classroom 

The classroom timelapse was fairly straightforward, although instead of 30 second intervals we went for a much shorter 5 second interval between photographs. On top of this Wayne decided to try something new and create a blurred effect for any movement in the shot by lowering the shutter speed, this would give a nice effect commonly seen in timelapse videos.

Sound Booth

The soundbooth timelapse saw some clashing of ideas between myself and Wayne, in the setup process we argued over whether to have the lights on in the room in which the camera was placed, his argument was that having the lights off gave a nicer look to the scene, and in hindsight i agree, however we came to a compromise and had the lights switched on at the beginning when the sound booth was being set up. For this shoot we used a 3 second interval between photographs.

Front of College (Sunset)

It was decided eventually that the sunset timelapse was not a necessity as we could simply reverse the sunrise time-lapse. I was unhappy about this, but admittedly made no effort to take the initiative and get the footage myself.

Relevant - Teaching Assistant Experience and Brighton Develop Conference

On the 1st of May myself, and my coursemates Tim and Patrick acted as teaching assistants in the absence of Rob Naylor, the teacher for the lesson being run which was a general studies class on the use of ZBrush.

Despite apprehension as to our ability to help in this situation we all found it to be a very gratifying experience. I personally felt surprised by how much i remembered of the program, not having used it for roughly two months.

After a tentative start we sank into our roles and eventually decided it was best to combine our knowledge and attempt to solve problems together, this meant we had a greater chance of being able to successfully solve the issues we were presented with, whilst also learning something new from eachother.

I found the experience to be wholly enjoyable and offered a great boost to my self confidence, i would happily do it again.

Brighton Develop Conference

On top of this i felt it was worth noting that i have signed up as a volunteer for the Brighton Develop Conference after the opportunity was recently given to us. There's no guarantee that I will get a place as their are a limited number of spaces and the pool is not being limited to our college alone. I would be ecstatic if i landed a place as the BDC will no doubt offer excellent opportunities to learn as well as meet talented and well-known indivduals who already work in the industry.

[UPDATE] - Time-Lapses are go.

Hallelujah!

Though we have yet to settle on an exact structure for our showreel, it has been decided that we will be using time-lapse footage.

After having clarified this i went with Wayne to see if the equipment tis available o us, the answer came back surprisingly quickly: Yes.

They have everything we needed bar the one piece that i was expecting more than anything else not to be there, the dolly and motor. Or, more specifically, the motor, apparently there are dollys that can be used (with special permission) but no motors for those delectable panning shots i was hoping to get. Still, i came away very happy that we will be able to get the time-lapse footage we need.

Despite lacking a proper plan for our showreel we still decided on a few time-lapses we wished to include:

- Sunrise/Sunset over college on a clear/very sunny day
- Footage of classroom filling in the morning
- Over-the-shoulder footage of a student working on something (undecided as of yet)

I am both very excited and dreading the prospect of creating these time-lapses, though the dread stems only from the 'Sunrise' footage which will require a very early start for myself and Wayne!

Market Research - Showreels

We were asked to do some market research into other showreels for courses similar to ours, so the first thing i did was go to YouTube and search for "Game Design Course Showreel", below is the first video that popped up as a result:

Swansea Institute Games Design Showreel 2007

This showreel focusses  solely on gameplay footage, something we should definitely avoid, not least because the majority of the work that we can showcase isn't in game! I found it to be a tad confusing at times and the video looks quite dated but then again it is from 2007, on top of this i felt the music didn't really fit with the video.

So, with the belief that a more recent showreel might be slightly better, I added "2012" to the search, which lead me to the videos i have summarised below:

Student Showreel 2012 - Wakefield College

This video demonstrated a distinct style, featuring the logo you see above which appears in the bottom corner of all the footage as a watermark, a nice touch. It immediately starts playing The Prodigy's 'Invaders Must Die' which is a good choice as it has a nice build up. The footage reflects this buildup before performing several satisfying video jumps in time with the music. The first part of the video consists of level fly-throughs that are all filmed very well in-game using some sort of path-based 'dolly' system i am unfamiliar with. It gives a very professional look to everything.

After this section, and again in fitting with the music the video switches to showcasing particular areas such as artwork and 3D renders using a mixture of stills and videos, the switch comes just as the music reaches a break which i find to be a particularly nice touch.

Overall it adheres to the notion that showreels must present the best/most impressive work at the start of a video.

BA Game Art - Show Reel 2012 - St Helens College

This video is more of a showcase of work than the last video, it's simply a slideshow of images appearing under various titles such as Environment, Vehichles, Character, etc. There are no moving images, perhaps this was deliberate so that the still artwork didn't stand out by comparison as it did in the Wakefield College showreel. The music wasn't really tied to what was happening on screen but provided a constant soundtrack that complemented the video overall.

I feel like this video is not something we should be aiming for, i would like our showreel to be exciting whilst also showing some great work.

 

University of Bolton - Games Showreel 2012

This showreel is far shorter than the other video's i've watched, in some cases this may be a better timeframe to use as it presents a more manageable chunk of video for the viewer to digest. The videos style seems very professional but much like the last video i find it rather... subdued. It's layout and theme are great, and the actual footage they are showcasing is fantastic, but the weak soundtrack that is again completely disconnected from the footage doesn't really draw you in as much as i think it should.


The main thing i noticed in all of these videos is that none of them show the actual premises in which their respective courses take place. I can either take this as a sign that any such footage is unnecessary, or that i have an opportunity to do something original on my hands! My instinct tells me its most likely the former reason but i would certainly still like to try and make it work with the time-lapses if i can, my assumption is that it would need to be worked into the theme of the video. 

Research - Time-Lapse Video Creation

Having been assigned our job roles last week, with one of mine being Cinematographer, I decided to spend some time looking into the area of time-lapse videos as i coined the idea of including a few in our showreel, just to break it up.

Some idea's for time-lapse segments we've had are:

- An outside shot of the front of the College over the course of a sunny day

- Video of the main Design for Games classroom T1.2 over the course of either a single lecture, or throughout a day

- Video of a student at a computer, creating something: a 3D model, a PhotoShop image, a ZBrush sculpture, game coding, anything which show's an interesting part of the game creation process

There are plenty more interesting shot's we could get of the college though of course we don't want to include too much that deviates from the main aspect of showing off great work from the course.

So, after having these idea's i had a look into how time-lapse videos are created. The most prominent method is to use a dSLR camera, this is due to their higher output quality and greater level of control as opposed to more basic cameras available.

On top of this you need an interval timer, unless the camera has an interval function built in. An interval timer is just what it sounds like, a device that will automatically take photographs at regular intervals defined by you. Apparently it is also possible to have the camera connected to a laptop or other device that is running interval timing software.

These two items are supposedly all you need. It's how a time-lapse video is created, you obtain a series of images taken at regular intervals over a period of time, after which you can use a variety of digital software packages to combine the sequence into a 24-30 Frame-Per-Second video, put a fitting music track over the top and BAM, you have yourself a time-lapse video.

However there are some other item's that will be required if you want to create something good or at the very least, steady:

- A Tripod
     An obvious inclusion, but the tripod will allow for a steady stationary shot. Care must be taken to  make sure the camera isn't knocked or moved during the capturing stage so it's recommended to keep a close eye on the camer during this time.

- Multiple Batteries
     Some time-lapse shots take a long time to create, and the camera will be running for the duration so it is advised that you bring multiple batteries that can be swapped out between shots. Wayne, who i will be working with to create these time-lapses, pointed out that it may also be possible to obtain an AC adapter for the camera, this will mean no battery changes but is most likely only feasible for the indoor shots.

- Multiple/Large Memory Cards
     If the images that are being captured are of a high resolution, memory is of course going to be an issue. Time-lapse video's require hundreds and sometimes thousands of images to be captured, so we may well need to carry multiple cards, though if we can obtain a memory card with a particularly high capacity, we should be ok, even for the longest time-lapse.

- Planning
     I believe we will be discussing whether time-lapse shots will even be needed during next weeks session, but if we do we will need to do some pre-planning before getting the shots. It's advised that you take some test shots to make sure you get an angle you're happy with. You can also do some simple math to work out the interval timing, number of shots, and the final duration of your time-lapse segment, this can all be very useful to know in advance.

As mentioned earlier, once you have all the images you need, it's just a case of using digital software to assemble them into a video. I'm assuming this will be the easiest part, at least for me, i am unfamiliar with fancy photography, but using PhotoShop to create a video? Simple!

As an addition i would like to say that when envisaging the indoor time-lapse of T1.2, i see it panning from left to right. I have looked into the creation of moving time-lapses and whilst they require extra equipment like dollys, extra tripods, and motors, i still think its doable in the time we have.

But despite all this there is one potential problem: We are limited to whatever equipment is available to us. It is entirely possible that we may not have access to the equipment we need to make these time-lapse video's, at least not for a long duration. I have a feeling the equipment we would need for a moving shot is even less likely to be available.

However, we will find out soon enough, tomorrow i plan to go and find out how much of this stuff is available to us as it is important to know what we can achieve before we start planning the showreel.

Links:

How to Make a Time-Lapse Video: The Ultimate Guide

Creating a Time-Lapse Video in PhotoShop

Moving Time-Lapse Photography Tutorial

SWOT Analysis and Skills Audit

After deciding our job roles we were asked to perform individual SWOT analyses. Here is mine:

SWOT analysis!!!:

Strengths:

- Problem Solving
- Idea Generation
- Research
- Supporting others

Weaknesses:

- Communication
- Time-management
- Concentration
- Self-belief
- Photography
- Time-Lapse Creation

Opportunities:

- Improve Communication by working in a team, discussing ideas, etc.
- Improve Time-management by focussing on meeting deadlines
- Gain new skills and abilities
- Gain confidence of own abilities

Threats:

- Team mates not getting work done
- Poor communication between team members
- Inability to obtain desired material
- Inability to obtain satisfying material

Skills Audit

The purpose of the Skills audit is to take the strengths and weaknesses mentioned in the SWOT analysis and give a more accurate reading of how big of a strength or weakness each of these areas are. The numbers are on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being the highest competency and 1 being the lowest.

Skills	Evaluation: Project Start
Research	5
Problem Solving	4
Supporting Others	4
Idea Generation	3
Communication	2
Self-Belief	2
Concentration	2
Time Management	1
Photography	1
Time-Lapse Creation	1

Research - Desired Job Roles

Today we began by looking into job roles as they're essential to progressing onto the planning and eventual production stage smoothly. We agreed that it'd be good for us all to go away and look into the roles we most wanted to take. Here are mine:

Director

As i understand it right now our showreel may require some filming so i would like to be a director for these parts. A directors job is exactly what it says on the tin: they pick and choose what will be happening in the scene they are trying to create, how it will be filmed, timing, everything.

Producer

I would also like to be the producer for the scene i am directing. Producers can perform a number of roles such as managing fund-raising, budgeting and hiring, but in my example i am looking at the role of producer in a purely production sense.


These are the two roles i managed to look into in the time given, after this we regrouped and decided as a team who would be doing what. I was very happy with my positions:

Researcher 
     Everyone is a researcher because we will all be looking into how showreels are made, seeing examples, learning from them and pooling our impressions to generate ideas.

Lead Camera Operator
     I have discussed the idea of including filmed segments for our showreel and it was agreed that I, working with Wayne, could create these filmed segments

Cinematographer
     This basically relates back to the previous job role, but differs in that the title refers to the one who chooses the best shot to use when filming.

Director
     Together with Dean, i will be deciding how our showreel will go, choosing the sequence of everything within, and the overall theme, we felt it was best to have more than one person working in this role so all idea's could be scrutinised before being given the go ahead.

Below you can see the entire finalised job roles for our group:

Members and Job roles

Patrick Sweeting: Researcher, Film Editor, Composer, Production Manager

Dean Stone: Researcher, Asset Collection, Story boarding, Director

Wayne Ramsay: Researcher, Broadcast designer, Assistant Camera Operator

Matt Thomas: Researcher, Lead Camera Operator, Cinematographer. Director

Helen Folland: Researcher, Asset Creation, Director of Photography

C'est Commence

Today we began our second Work Based Learning module. Last year, in our first WBL module, we were taught some useful skills for working professionally. This year we are to put those skills to use. We will be working in groups to create a promotional show reel for our course, during which we will be expected to demonstrate a professional attitude towards the project, right down to attending all lectures on time, as you would be expected to in a job role. If our work is deemed worthy the College will take our work and use it for real marketing purposes.

After being introduced to the brief for the module, we were asked to form groups of 4 people with whom we will be working for the duration. This was relatively easy and i feel the group i am in will work very well together, a fact demonstrated by our immediate jump into some preliminary research.

We started by looking at some well known game trailers to see how they were presented, focussing on the different shots, the content and the music, the reason behind this was that we were thinking of going for a video game style trailer for our show reel. After this we moved on to looking at some show reels, concluding that the fundamentals of a show reel are high quality content, good flow, and a well matched soundtrack. Whether we can adapt this to a video game trailer style remains to be seen, i'm a tad skeptical as i feel this may stray to far from the show reel formula, but at the same time i would love it if we could as we all have some great ideas.