Project 3 Final

I've gotten it working heaps better now with photos instead of clips. Also got the button's corners trimmed so it looks nicer. Still cant put it on openprocessing due to it imploding, (dont ask,) which may be due to the size of the applet. Or because it needs more memory to run. To be safe I crank it up to 1024MB, which allows it to work fine. I'll drop it in the R drive along with a couple screenshots.

 

Chilling - ScreenShot (Default)

 Booing - ScreenShots (Pop Crap)

 Moshing - ScreenShots (METAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

YES!!

With Tim's help, it runs a lot better, but now I think stop motion will look better. A little code rewrite and another photo session and it will be heaps better. Also gotta trim the corners of my buttons by converting to gif.

Mosh If/Else program problems...

I've been having a lot of trouble getting the .mov files to run smoothly on Processing. Otherwise, I've pretty much succeeded. However, if I cannot resolve this lag issue, I am considering converting my project to video and salvaging what I can. It does work, but barely, and it has just failed to be uploaded to openProcessing, or I would've posted a link.

I'll have a talk to the tutors and see what they recommend to do next.

200-300 Word description of Project 3

IF / ELSE Interpretation

Taking the idea of “headbanging” or “moshing” to symbolise a loop, I tried to see how Processing would interpret the conditions. It was clear that If and Else would work a lot better than While.

In pseudo code, I came up with the following:

If (musicIsPlaying and musicIsMetal) {

Then play video of moshing;

}

Else if (musicIsPlaying and musicIsNotMetal) {

Then play video of booing;

}

Else {

Then show photos, in a stop-motion like manner, of waiting;

}

Basically I wanted to show that when the code was run, Processing would check if there was music playing and if there was, then it would check to see if it was good music (anything heavy/metal). If it met both of those conditions, then it would play a video of a MetalHead moshing or headbanging. Keeping with my original idea of a loop, I went with the less traditional “windmilling”, or “circle” headbanging. However, if the music playing was crap, (pop music or anything similar,) then it would show a video of the same Metaller booing (or showing general displeasure).  By default, or when no music was playing, it would show a series of photos with the same Bogan waiting (arms crossed, tapping his foot).

I added 2 buttons, giving the user a little control. The first is a Play button which, once clicked, would become the stop button. Once playing, the second button (Skip), would randomly select a new track and play it, causing the program to check again if the music is metal or not and play the appropriate clip.

Once play was clicked, the code would keep running until the user clicked Stop or exit the program. The program would select a new sample when the previous one ends or when the user clicks Skip.

Storyboard Presentation

My board is too big to fit in the scanner, but the important stuff came through.

I had intended to do the light switch with motion detectors but I cannot think of a way to make it interesting. The only thought on that regard is to use the Xbox 360 Kinect and set up an LED display to recreate the motion it sees. In terms of time, I am unable to pull this off as far as I can tell. Instead I am going back to the moshing program. I hope to have a rough outline for Friday night so I can ask our tutors for their opinion. Stop-motion photos, short video segments; which would load the best without delay.

Either a small clip to be looped for each state (Mosh, Boo, Wait),

or multiple photos for each state.

Then over the weekend I should be able to get this code running for testing Monday onwards. I'm feeling like it'll need more user interaction, perhaps some buttons for controls rather than clicking with the mouse?

Project 3 - Further Idea Development

Based on blowing up a balloon, another idea could be:

If ( balloonDiameter < 20 ) {
balloonDiameter++;
}
Else {
balloon.pop();
}

or something like this?

If Else Description

If ( something is true ) then {
do this
}
otherwise if ( something else is true ) then {
do this instead
}
otherwise {
do this instead
}

This is my understanding of how If/Else works, or rather, how If / Else If / Else works.

The Littlest Robot uses a count system. ( Each time through the If/Else loop, the count is incremented (+1)).

By modifying the condition of the if statement, the whole 'story' is changed. Each change is dictated by the count or by 'how long the code has been running'. By changing the condition of when events occur, the story becomes changes, affecting the order of events and when they occur.

The Dungeon uses a user initiated If/Else system. By clicking certain 'buttons', the if/else triggers different events (or pages in this case,)  based on the previous events (or page). This is a very good example of If/Else.

Alice and Mad Hatter's Maze is very simlar to the dungeon. It uses mouseOver to highlight when clicking the mouse will trigger an event. Not as in depth or interesting, but still shows the basis of the If/Else.

Zombie in Wonderland . Very similar to the previous 2, but text based only. Very interesting though. The dungeon is based on this code.

Modifying either of the previous 3 codes just messes with the program. It just stops working or stops making sense.

Project 3 - Idea Development

If I go with:

while ( musicIsPlaying && music != shit) {
guy.mosh();
}

While music is playing and isn't shit, then the guy will mosh.
It seems this would work, but the while loop doesn't allow for the music to end. Everything else is locked while the while loop is being executed.
Maybe an If/Else would be more practical in this sense.

if ( musicIsPlaying && musicGenre == metal) {
guy.mosh();
}
else if (musicGenre != metal) {
guy.boo();
}
else {
guy.wait();
}

Still just a possibility at this stage.

Project 3 - Coding Exhibition

At this stage I'm going to go with Loops. Possibly a while loop. But maybe more of an If/Else.

Processing Description of While:

Controls a sequence of repetitions. The while structure executes a series of statements continuously while the expression is true. The expression must be updated during the repetitions or the program will never "break out" of while.

This function can be dangerous because the code inside the while() loop will not finish until the expression inside while() becomes true. It will lock out all other code from running (mouse events will not be updated, etc.) So be careful because this can lock up your code (and sometimes even the Processing environment itself) if used incorrectly.


Processing Description of If:

Allows the program to make a decision about which code to execute. If the test evaluates to true, the statements enclosed within the block are executed and if the test evaluates to false the statements are not executed.

Processing Description of Else:

Extends the if() structure allowing the program to choose between two or more block of code. It specifies a block of code to execute when the expression in if() is false.

Processing Description of For:
 
Controls a sequence of repetitions. A for structure has three parts: init, test, and update. Each part must be separated by a semi-colon ";". The loop continues until the test evaluates to false. When a for structure is executed, the following sequence of events occurs:
1. The init statement is executed
2. The test is evaluated to be true or false
3. If the test is true, jump to step 4. If the test is False, jump to step 6
4. Execute the statements within the block
5. Execute the update statement and jump to step 2
6. Exit the loop.

The only idea I have at this stage is moshing (headbanging) being a metaphor for a loop of some sort.

Final Musical Gluttony

I nearly got the single tone version to ascend and descend to match the colours but it was fairly boring anyway.

But I did get it to do what I wanted originally, which is add notes and play sequentially each time food is eaten. The more food = the longer the tune.

Here is the link

Reflecting on how this relates to transformation, the only transformation is the snakes length and the colour shifts. So not as transforming as I'd have liked but at least there is some.

Further Musical Gluttony Development

After some help from Tim, I managed to get the worm to eat/play the food/note and take on the color of the food/note.

I am now working on building a sequence of notes that the worm will hold the color of the last played note, until returning to white, after each food.

The main thing left to do is to change the length of the note as it takes too long to play the tune at this point.

Musical Gluttony Development

I've inverted the color scheme and set food to colors indicating the note that will be added to the tune. Having trouble getting the audio to play chronologically, which is affecting me writing the color flash of the worm's body as it will relate to the audio code.

Although not working properly, I've posted it on openProcessing here.

I am hoping I can email this through to Angela as I'm working over the weekend and I think the Uni doors will be shut by the time I can get there after. It seems I'll need all the time I can get to get this to a point where I'm partially happy with it.

Review of Gluttony

Points to reconsider are as follows:

Hurts to look at - try different color schemes (no flashing food)
Too gamelike - food should only spawn once the old food is eaten (and once the music stops?)
My noises are too cartoony - eliminate them and try to, instead, make the snake flash the color of the food and play a tone associated to the color.
As the snake grows, the tune will get longer (incorporating more notes).

Interim Final of Gluttony

 

Link to openProcessing sketch

I tried a few ways to get visual feedback from the eat and explosion, but to no avail. I'll continue trying over the break. Also tried adding an image of grass to the background, but my sounds started getting null pointer exceptions. I'll have to play around with it a bit more. I've settled with a blue background for now.

Project 2 Development

I've continued developing my code. Adding the fluid nature of the worm (rather than the blocky one I had when he got large), I've done a little experimenting with colour of the food. I got sound working for eating, moving and the explosion (when he eats too much and resets). Left click spawns a meal. Holding right click keeps spawning meals. I still need to work on the graphics (the worm, the food, the background etc.) and also for when he eats the food (perhaps a closing pair of jaws over the whole screen for a sec) and the explosion (something similar to the jaws but with smoke).

One final thing I want to add (maybe,) is, having the food run away slightly (to make it a little bit entertaining). Also need some sort of music file activate when worm is close to exploding (to build tension but also let user know something will happen soon).

Worm 1, Worm 2, Worm 3, Worm 4

Links to openProcessing.

Project 2 Development

Finally making headway! Tim helped a bunch. Figured out my massive strokewidth was the reason fill wasn't visible. Also now understand how to remove the 'food' I was trying to get eaten. Now i'm back on track and should be able to get this done in time. :)

Here's a screenshot of how it's coming along.
Not too bad considering I only started this one on Wednesday 13th.

Major Trouble!

I seem to be unable to pull coordinates from objects on an ArrayList.
Also - Too many problems encountered with my puddles. With time as restricted as it is I'll have to try a different concept, so...
Putting the puddle code on hold, I've had a go at my other concept (the Gluttonous Worm). I seem to be having the same problem with this one too! Sitting here at the extra tutorial, I'm hoping there is time for help from the tutors, but the room is awful full and only 2 tutors, so I'm probably wishing with false hope, but I'll wait. If i dont get help, I'll have to make a completely new code and it will unfortunately be a lot simpler. :(

Puddles Development

Going from just one class to multiple has made things more interesting.
I've tried having a seperate class for the character (stickguy at this time).
I'm going with arrow key controls for now, just till I get it running better.

Then I started trying to get the puddles to generate randomly when executed, but stay like that until the program ended. Had a bit of trouble, but nearly got there. Ran into the problem of trying to detect when my character's feet touched the puddles.

I experimented with a lot of the ideas I mentioned previously, but the easiest way I found was generating 10 circles close together, looking sort've like puddles. I ended up with a class for the parts within each puddle as well as a class for the puddle itself, on top of the stickGuy and the main class.

 

 I got to this point (for some reason my guy stopped spawning in the centre of the screen), and then had the problem of nothing clearing the screen when  my char moved (making the blur in the pic to the right).

Finally I tried restarting to try it a different way (using a square with a shadow as my char).

It felt like I was going backwards. I changed the movement to click where you wanted to go.

It was supposed to slowly 'walk' there, or if held and released, 'jump' (height based on click length) there instead. This got tricky and I ran out of time. It was supposed to make wading noises going through puddles or a splash based on the height of the jump upon impact.

Project 2 Development

Going with the puddle idea, I've been thinkin of several ways to explore this.
1 - Just having puddles that splash as the character goes through them (either by directional arrows or by following the mouse)
2 - Having rain that comes and resets the position and size of the puddles
3 - Being able to jump. The higher the jump, the bigger/louder the splash and visual splash. Either by space bar held down and released or the same with mouse click.

I'm thinkin that having the character 'jump' would be the best for interaction. After re-reading the brief, I realise now that it has to be mouse click orientated, so a click will make the character walk/wade to the click position. If the click is held, then released, the character will jump to said position with height relative to the length of the hold.
For this to be more effective, i think i will need to use a shadow, as my character may disappear off the screen. :)

The next problem is the puddles themselves. I want them to be rounded like a real puddle, but this may be something to work out later. Also need animations for the splash and ripples of some sort for visual reference to wading through them.

perhaps using a combination of  Lava lamp, Metaballs and Blob out for the puddles.
and for the characters motion: Ball physics ? for the collisions (sounds): Collision Detection, Bomb drop and Pong.

Project 2 Ideas

 

I'm thinking about more going for the Gluttony Worm, but more likely the Rain or the Puddles.

Audio Interactive Inspiration

I've found a bunch of cool things on OpenProcessing which I hope to use to build my own application off of.
Gravity swarm - This is an awesome idea, no audio, but maybe I could work on using the base idea and incorporating sound.
Interactive roots - I like the organic nature of this, combined with the interaction, yet again, no audio though.
NeuralNet noises  - This is very interesting and I like the interaction visually even if it's quite basic.
GravitySound  - This uses sound in an interesting way but limited in interaction.
Warp Lick - Back to soundless but the interaction used in this sketch could have very interesting audio options.
Very Creepy!  - I'm not sure what to say about this one, it has sound, but is very very strange.
TANK WAR  - True Interaction! A game involving audio and visual. Highly interaction although the controls seem odd.

From last year's work Gallery (num25), I really like the simplistic nature of this, and a really clear visual to audio connection.

Reflection

*
The use of random numbers and variables helped me achieve that which would've been impossible otherwise.

Also learning PDF exporting is invaluable, enlarging via vectors will come in handy in the future I'm sure.

And finally, Beziers and Vertexs played just as much part in making my fire and nature images as randoms and variables. I've worked out that they can be tricky to use!

*
I want to keep on top of my workload better than I have, starting earlier so I dont end up under pressure.

I will start by scheduling my time to make sure i dont end up rushing things right before the due date.

5 5 9 1 3 2 2 0 4 8

Older Wallpaper Developments

Left - Earlier Fire.   Right - Nature: right when I started to get what I was looking for.

All the rest of my developments are in the PDF format so i cant add them to my blog.

I do however have plenty of them :)

Final Wallpapers

I'm not sure how to put the PDF files on here, but my previous developments are fairly accurate to the finals.

Wallpaper Developments

Fire - Lightning - Nature - Water

They've changed a lot from the sketches, but are starting to look more like a set now

Photo of Final Sketches

Bad quality as it's off my phone but I forgot to scan it before submission. :)

Wallpaper Sketches

These are the concepts for my 4 wallpapers. At the time I was unaware they were meant to be related.

Link to my Open Processing portfolio

This is the link to my Open Processing portfolio:
http://www.openprocessing.org/portal/?userID=10012

Me Again

This is me.                                        Yes, yes, I'm very funny looking. :)