Revision as of 23:33, 13 November 2015

Final Project

The final homework assignment can be done in teams of up to three people, or individually. Each team will need to implement an interactive software application which uses some of the advanced rendering effects or modeling techniques we discussed in class. We will evaluate your project based on technical and creative merits.

The final project has to be presented to the entire class during our final exam slot from 8-11am on Thursday, December 10th in room CSE 1202, the conference room on the first floor of the computer science building. It will be graded by the instructor, the TAs and the tutors. Late submissions will not be permitted. You are welcome to bring guests to the presentation.

Grading

Your final project score consists of three parts:

• Blog (10 points)
• Presentation (90 points)
• Extra Credit (10 points)

Blog (10 Points)

You need to create a blog to report on the progress you're making on your project. You need to make at least three blog entries to get the full score. The first is due on Tuesday, November 24th at 11:59pm, the second is due on Tuesday, December 1st at 11:59pm, the third is due on Tuesday, December 8th at 11:59pm. During the final week you need to upload a short video of your application to your blog. It is due by Thursday December 10th at 8am.

The first blog entry needs to contain (at least) the following information:

• The name of your project.
• The names of your team members.
• A short description of the theme of your project.
• The technical features you are implementing.
• What you are planning on spending your creative efforts on.

In week 2 you need to write about the progress you made, and mention any changes you have made to the team, project title, or implementation plans. You also need to upload at least one screen shot of the state of your application to the blog.

In week 3 you need to give another update like in week 2.

The video should be a 1 minute long (+/- 5 seconds) screen grab of your project. You don't need to use any editing software, but you need to use software to capture your screen to a video file. You should use screen recording software, such as the Open Broadcaster Software, which is available free of charge for Windows and Mac. On a Mac you can use QuickTime, which is available free of charge as well. There does not need to be an audio track, but you are welcome to talk over the video. Embed the video in your blog, or link to it from there.

You are free to create the blog on any web based blog site, such as Blogger or WordPress. You should use the same blog each time and just add blog entries. If you need to move to a different blog server, please move your entire blog over (copy-paste if necessary) and let us know its new URL.

The points are distributed like this:

• Blog entry #1: 2 points
• Blog entry #2: 3 points
• Blog entry #3: 3 points
• Video: 2 points

Presentation (90 Points)

80% of the score for the presentation are for the technical features, 20% for the creative quality of your demonstration. The grading will be based solely on your presentation! What you don't show us won't score points. Each team will have one minute per team member for the presentation.

To obtain the full score for the technical quality, each team must implement three skill points worth of technical features per team member. For example, a team of two must cover 2x3=6 skill points.

Your score for creativity is going to be determined by averaging the instructor's, the TA and the tutors' subjective scores. We will look for a cohesive theme and story, but also things such as visually pleasing geometry, tasteful textures, a thoughtful choice of colors and materials, smart placement of camera and lights, effective user interaction, and fluid rendering.

Here is the list of technical features you can choose from:

Easy: (1 skill point)

• Per-pixel illumination of texture-mapped polygons
• Toon shading
• Environment mapping
• Bump mapping
• Glow or halo effect
• Particle effect

Medium: (2 skill points)

• Collision detection with tight bounding boxes
• Procedurally modeled city
• Procedurally modeled buildings
• Procedurally generated terrain
• Procedurally generated plants with L-systems
• Water effect with waves, reflection and refraction

Hard: (3 skill points)

• Shadow mapping
• Shadow volumes
• Shape grammar for buildings or objects
• Displacement mapping
• Screen space post-processed lights
• Screen space ambient occlusion (SSAO)
• Screen space directional occlusion (SSDO) with color bounce
• Collision detection with arbitrary geometry

For a full score, each of these technical features must fulfill the more detailed requirements listed at the bottom of this page.

Additional technical features may be approved by the course staff upon request.

Presentation Day

For the presentation, you need to bring a laptop or other computer with a VGA output (make sure you bring an adapter if necessary). If nobody on your team can bring a computer to the presentation and you can't borrow one from anyone, you can use the instructor's Windows laptop, but you will need to test out your application at least one day before the presentation (even if it is not the final version), ideally in the instructor's office hour on a Tuesday. The presentation should be done by two people: while one person speaks to the audience, the other one operates the computer. It is expected that all team member attend the final presentation.

Your application needs to run in full screen mode, with the graphics window maximized. It is not acceptable to run your application in a small window like you did in the other homework projects, because the judges have to grade you based on what they see on the projector screen.

Implementation

If you want to have debugging support from the TAs and tutors, you need to implement this project in C++ using OpenGL and GLUT, just like the other homework projects. Otherwise, you are free to use a language of your choice, you can even write an app for a smart phone or tablet as long as you can send the image to the projector through its VGA input for the presentation.

Third party programming libraries are generally not acceptable, unless cleared by the instructor. Exceptions are typically granted for libraries to load images and 3D models, libraries to support input devices, or support for audio. Pre-approved libraries are:

• GLee to manage OpenGL extensions
• SOIL to load a variety of image formats
• SDL as a more versatile replacement of GLUT
• OpenAL for audio support
• Any XML parser, such as MiniXML or PugiXML
• The math library GLm, as well as the enhanced version of it
• FreeGLUT, a modern GLUT replacement
• GLFW: similar to GLUT but slightly different approach with more control for the programmer
• Physics engines (such as the Bullet Engine), as long as they are not used to obtain points for technical features.

Extra Credit: Bounty Points (10 Points)

In order to motivate you to choose the implementation of some of the hardest algorithms, you can receive up to 10 extra points for a flawless implementation of one of the following algorithms, as well as adequate visual debugging aids. Note that some of these are not directly or sufficiently covered in class, so you will need to research them yourself.

For a full score of 10 points, teams of N people must implement N of these algorithms! In other words, each of the algorithms below gains the team 10/N extra credit points.

• Screen space post-processed lights
• Screen space ambient occlusion (SSAO)
• Screen space directional occlusion (SSDO) with color bounce
• Collision detection with arbitrary geometry

Any other effect (even from the regular effects lists) can also be eligible for bounty points, but requires permission by a course staff member.

Tips

• If you use Sketchup to create obj models: Sketchup writes quads whereas our obj reader expects triangles. You can convert the Sketchup file to one with triangles using Blender, a free 3D modeling tool. Then you put the object into edit mode and select Mesh->Faces->Convert Quads to Triangles.
• MeshLab is another excellent and free tool for 3D file format conversion.
• Trimble 3D Warehouse and Turbosquid are great resources for ready-made 3D models you can export to OBJ files with the above described technique.