Assessment 2 Submission. Using industry standard programming language to build tools for animation and game production pipeline

Project Brief and Marking Sheet

DUE DATE: as specified in the course outline.

TOTAL MARKS : 34 marks (worth 45% of the total assessment)

Learning outcomes covered

Brief - In Summary 

Select a CGI editing application or applications, for example Maya, with  Unreal Engine, or Fusion with Unreal Engine, or Unreal Engine on its own. Write mini-tool sets in those, that create and enhance artworks for animation and game production pipeline in that technology.

Through this process you will gain an understanding of to investigate and compare different programming languages used for animation, visual effects and real time applications. Understand how to select and use a number of different scripting languages to achieve the desired effect and tools. Develop your skills at creating custom tools to facilities  production scenario.

Choose a project that you are going to make manipulate. Confirm this with your tutor. This project requires considerable discussion with your tutor to confirm and identify the work you are going to do. Make sure that you have taken time to have discussions with you tutor about the artwork you undertake

What to do

Write script to help with your production pipeline to create each of the mini tool sets 1 to 2 as described below. Each script is to ease a sequence of operations for your on-going overall project portfolios. In this way you will create a more efficient production pipeline.

Mini tool set One – manipulation objects already in the artwork (17 marks)

These scripts are to move through the current artwork that is being edited, to adjust objects in the artwork in your selected editing technology.

You are to write one script  that traverses the object hierarchy to manipulate a feature of an object or objects in your artwork. (15 marks)

This script is to :

1. Select an object or set of objects from your object hierarchy. 3 marks
2. Adjust a feature of that object or the selected set of objects  3 marks
3. Move an object or set of object to a different place in the hierarchy 3 marks

For each of the above the following rubric is to be used.

Two marks are awarded for integrating the work into an existing work flow, as follows. 2 marks.

Marking of your script will be check for technique as follows:

• Coding practices (6 marks)
  • Comments. These are required for developing your practice as a technical developer in CGI. Coding “Comments” are human readable  clear descriptions of the code that you have scripted. You must write comments that describe each step in your scripted recipes.  (2 marks)

One mark is awarded for an occasional comment, for example one at the top of your scripts and one in the middle. 2 marks will be awarded if the comments tell the complete story (in brief), i.e. describe what happens step by step in your recipes.

• Indentation, (gui markup, and code ). This is essential in Python, it will not work without it, if you have a Mel script then you must make sure you have used  indentation to identify each block of code. For example, blocks of code that belongs to If, While , For and Procedures. (2 marks)

Up to 2 marks are deducted in total when the script you write does not use appropriate indentation. The tutor will indicate when you have not managed to meet this requirement, including when this requirement has not been more than twice.

• Naming conventions. Make sure you use consistent and meaningful names for all parts of your script, the variable names, the procedure names, the script names (2 marks)

Up to 2 marks will be deducted in total when the script you write does not use appropriate names. The tutor will indicate when you have not managed to meet this requirement, including when this requirement has not been more than twice.

Mini tool set Two – procedural or interactive artwork (17 marks)

This script is to implement procedural generation or interaction of within an artwork. For example: generate a whole work of are based on a set of 3D features.

You are to required to create one script that are  :

1. Generates a complete artwork.  (3 marks)
2. runs and implements the generation of one form of 3D feature (or interaction) or equivalent as discussed with your tutor.  (3 marks)
3. runs and implements the generation of 3D feature(or interaction) that is different from the one implemented for requirement 2 or equivalent as discussed with your tutor. (3 marks)

For each of the above the following rubric is to be used.

Two marks are awarded for integrating the work into an existing work flow, as follows. 2 marks.

Marking of your script will be check for technique as follows:

• Coding practices (6 marks)
  • Comments. These are required for developing your practice as a technical developer in CGI. Coding “Comments” are human readable  clear descriptions of the code that you have scripted. You must write comments that describe each step in your scripted recipes.  2 marks

One mark will be awarded for an occasional comment, for example one at the top of your scripts and one in the middle. 2 marks will be awarded if the comments tell the complete story (in brief), i.e. describe what happens step by step in your recipes.

• Indentation, (gui markup, and code ). This is essential in Python, it will not work without it. If you have a Mel script then you must make sure you have used  indentation to identify each block of code. For example, blocks of code that belongs to If, While , For and Procedures. (2 marks)

Up to 2 marks are deducted in total when the script you write does not use appropriate indentation. The tutor will indicate when you have not managed to meet this requirement, including when this requirement has not been more than twice.

• Naming conventions. Make sure you use consistent and meaningful names for all parts of your script, the variable names, the procedure names, the script names. (2 marks)

Up to two marks will be deducted in total when the script you write does not use appropriate names. The tutor will indicate when you have not managed to meet this requirement, including when this requirement has not been more than twice