Sketches and art work

This is the sketches and design work for my final major project. I drew a skeleton and a background and imported them into Adobe photoshop. Once I imported them into Adobe Photoshop I needed to draw them and refine the images so that they were more presentable to display.

The Design Process

In this post I will be explaining everything that I have done throughout my project.

Within my project, I used Adobe Director to create my game. I started by making squares that were needed in my game. I completed this process by creating a few square shapes in Adobe Photoshop. After making five blank squares with this software, I decided to add some colour. I chose five different colours that I thought were suitable for my project, and these were: yellow, red, blue, green, and orange. After I finished making the squares, I then imported them into Adobe Director. After I imported the images into Adobe Director, it was clear to see I needed to align the squares into the position that I wanted them to be in. After I did this I decided to do some research into finding randomising codes that were suitable for my task. Eventually, I found a randomising code and I went back to Adobe Director and edited the sprite frame to put the coding in. Adobe Director said the code was right and it had no spelling mistakes, but when I tested it the randomising did not work and the squares just played out in the same order every time, so it was not randomising in the way it should have been.

   Unfortunately, I had to remove the coding from the frames and look for another randomising code to use in my Director piece. I then searched for codings with more randomising functions. Luckily, I found some more coding to use and decided to try it in Adobe Director. The coding I used this time was correct and had no issues with the spelling or anything but when I tried playing it was not functioning properly, so again I had to remove all the coding from the frames to make them blank again. I then went back to research some more coding. After a few hours of researching yet more coding, I finally found a random code adequate for my work.

   I discovered when I was looking for the codes none of them explained that you needed to have markers on the frames to help the randomising function to work properly, so evidently this was the problem I had been facing. The code that I found was much simpler and a much shorter than the others ones that I have previously looked at. When I put this code into the frame, I decided to play it just to make sure it was working and it did because I put the markers on the frame correctly. I had to change the cursor when the cursor was over the top of the object, so I used a code, which I knew. The code was: (on MouseEnter me cursor 280 on MouseLeave me cursor 0 End). After I had typed the code into the frame I replayed it and tried it again. The cursor was changing when you went over the object, and it was still randomising every time you clicked the object.

  After doing some more research on adding sound to the object when it’s clicked, I decided that I needed a click or a bang sound effect to make the process more effective. I found a couple of sound effects that I liked and downloaded them from a site, which was free. I then imported the sound effects into Adobe Director and tested them out one by one, playing different ones until I had found the one most suitable. As a result of finding the most appropriate one, I then removed the ones that did not fit my requirements. In addition to this, I used the same sound effect continuously throughout my work and put it into every frame, so each object had the same sound effect every time they were clicked. I chose to test them all out a couple of time to make sure everything was working, therefore ensuring the effects were doing an efficent job. Eventually, I was happy with the way it was randomising when it was clicked and moved onto the next section of my project.

   My first initial idea was to have a whole song playing on loop in the background of my Director piece. I initially thought this was a good idea, but I then realised it would be too repetitive to just have one song playing in the background constantly. So I then developed my idea and thought about adding a couple of songs and remixing them instead. Eventually, I found some songs I believed were adequate for my project. The songs I chose included tracks such as: Rise Against - Give it all and  Ro Ransom - Cm Punk music. I downloaded five songs in total, from a website that allowed me to do such things.

   When all the songs had downloaded I needed to import them into a program. This program is known as GarageBand, which is a music editing system. The program can be used to add sound effects to sounds and even to create your music. Once the songs were imported I split the songs into separate sections so that I could add another songs to it to begin my process of creating my loop. I developed this by adding another song into the song I had created. After I did this I choose to fade the songs into each other because just putting two different song together did not sound effective and did not fit the vision I produced within my initial idea. 

   For me to fade the songs together, I had to grab sections of a song and change the volumes of them near the end before a new one began. Initially  I lowered the volume and then faded each song into another one. To make this process work, I also changed the volume of the following song, but I did not lower it I turned it back up so it would get louder. I did this to the rest of the songs by adding more songs that I chosen to use in my work and fading them all in the right places. To ensure the process was working, I replayed the song each time I added another section to decide whether or not my work sounded better. 

Once I finished editing the songs together, it was vital for me to export the songs into a MP3 format so it would work in Adobe Director. Once I had finished this task, I then added them to the Adobe Director software. When I had completed the importing stage, I attached my chosen songs into the frames I had created so they would play in the background. This added character to the moving squares with the sound effects on them. To conclude this process  I lowered the sound of the song so people trialing my product could hear my sound effects when the object is clicked with ease.

After I had completed all the above, I needed to make five pressure pads. For me to make five pressure pads I needed: cardboard, foam, foil, wire, and glue. To begin the process, I needed to cut out a several square shapes from cardboard. Once this was complete, I cut small pieces of foil and stuck them to the cardboard square. After this was done, I cut out a pieces of foam which were bigger than my foil shapes. The reason I did this was because I wanted to use the foam as an insulator. I then decided to cut square shapes out of the foam. By doing this to the foam I formed a connection between the pieces as the wire was then able to touch the foil when pressure was applied. To add to this, I had to strip some wire back so the metal inside was showing, this then helped with the next part project as I had to stick the wire to the foil inside the home made pressure pads. I then stuck wire to each part of the foil, that was attached to the two separate pieces of cardboard. When this was complete, it was clear for me to see, the foam had to be stuck down over the foil. Once this had been done, I stuck the two pieces of cardboard together with glue.Then I covered them with masking tape, so it would be easier to paint. I continued my design process by spray painting each pressure pad with the colour that I wanted it to be. I repeated this process four times so that I would have the number of pressure pads I wanted to use in my work. The colours that I chose were: orange, green, pink, yellow and blue. After the painting stage had been completed, I covered them in cling film for extra protection when people stood on them whilst trying my idea. 


The next stage in my design process was to get the pressure pads to work with my Adobe Director piece. To make this work I needed to change the coding that I already had to different coding. I wanted to change the code from ( on mouseEnter me to on keyDown ), in order for the coding to work with the pressure pads.

I soon found additional problems with my Adobe Director piece, so I had to change the images I had picked because I only had coloured squares on a white background. I decided to change it completely. This was a risk because it was close to the deadline, however I decided to have a black background with a skeleton on on drinking a green liquid as I believed it was an effective idea. After I had created this new idea, I put it into Adobe Director to set as my background. Once this was done I saved my work, naming it "stuub2". This was the template starter for my game. After I saved it I closed the software I had used down, and then opened a new Director piece. I added the same background as the "stubb2" had, so I could begin to piece all my work together. When this was done, I added a new picture that would show up when the number button was pressed. 

I decided to make a skeleton figurine in Adobe Photoshop to use within my work. Once I had made the skeleton I changed it to the colour of it to green, and saved it as a PNG so it would work with Adobe Director. After saving the first one, I did the same for the rest of the skeleton. However as I saved each skeleton, I changed their colouring each time, renaming them which appropriate names. Once I had done all the skeletons, I imported them into Adobe Director.

I then opened a new Director piece and also added the same background as the "stubb2" had to it. Once this was done, I then imported the particular image that I wanted. For example if I had wanted to use the green skeleton as my first key, then this would be the first item I would have chosen to import. I then put the image into the right place for where I wanted it be and then set a script to it. This script was: (on keyDown, if the key pressed= "1" then go to the movie "stubb2"). After the script was put into place I checked if it had any errors or spelling mistakes. As it had no spelling mistakes or errors, I evidently saved it and named  according to the colours it held. For example, if I was doing the green skeleton first, I saved it and called it 'green skeleton'. After this had been completed, I made a folder so that I could save everything to do with my Adobe Director piece in it.

After making the folder, it was vital for me to make a new Director piece to make a new control key in. This was so I could add the same background into it again and also put in a different colour skeleton. I repeated the process by starting new Director pieces and changing the colour of the skeleton and naming them as their colours. I did this five times so that I had 5 different keys to work with. I also changed the script with each one to make it work with each key. I decided to try it once again with the pressure pads and it all worked properly and in align with each other. This was good because I could then easily step on different colour pressure pads, and the right coloured skeleton would appear.

When I began setting up my final major project, I had to set up my stall and have what I wanted to go where I needed it to be placed. So I had a stand in the centre of my stall and I placed the Mac that I was using on to stand. Once the Mac was put in place, I had to figure out where I was going to have the pressure pads on the floor. When I had the pressure pads in the right place, I taped them down to floor because they will be more suitable and more safe and by doing this this they wouldn't move around when people stand on them.

When this was completed,  it was time to test everything out before the show began. Whilst I was testing it out, I had to change some of the coding because some of the letters/numbers that I had linked with the pressure pads did not work. And so, I had to change the coding of the pressure pads in Adobe Director to the working keys. Once I had changed it to the right coding I re-tested everything and found out everything was in working order ready for my event.

Evaluation on my Final major project

In my evaluation about my final major project I have kept an eye on everything that I have done throughout this project.  I found the research in this project quite enjoyable because I got to find out dance machines work and also how they were made and also how they were put together. When I was researching this it inspired me to make my own version of  the game as my final major project. I also enjoyed researching other peoples Final major projects and finding out what inspired them and how they came up with there ideas and how they processed them into making there final major projects.
 I also liked doing the whole of the project because it was different to the other projects that we have done in college because we had to present it to the public at the riverfront. Some disadvantages of doing this project was checking if the coding was working and also if I had the right coding to make it work. For example I coded my Adobe Director game one day and the next day the coding decided not to work at all, this meant that I had to re code it to make it all work again.  Even though I was happy with the look of my Adobe Director game, I think that I could of spent more time making and designing the visuals. I could of spent more time designing the skeleton artwork and the background to go with it.
I spent most of time trying to code and find the right coding that would work with Adobe Director. The pressure pads that I made myself were good and was all functioning well on the night of the show. Another Disadvantage was doing the research for the coding, I found this not as interesting as the dance machine research because it the coding was mostly all the same so it was like researching the same coding most of the time.
I feel like i spent more of time researching how to do coding and dance machine research that I didn't leave enough time for the actual physical side of the project which was making the game for the show. I spent some of the time making the pressure pads but I could of spent more time making them because i rushed making them, if I didn't spend more time researching and more time making pressure pad they would of turned out better even though I was happy with the outcome of the pressure pads that I made. I also spent more time on the research side of things that I didn't leave enough time making everything as good as I wanted it to be. As I know for next time I know that I will need to spend just as much tie making the game as of the research side of things.
The first night of the show went really well and my game and pressure pads were all working well. I though my stall and the outcome of my game was good. When people asked me what they had to do for my game, I just said said on the coloured pressure pads and find out what will happen. When they stood on my pressure pads they saw that a skeleton would appear on the screen linking with the same colour pressure pad. After they finished testing all of the coloured pressure pads they thought it was a good idea. They also asked me how I made it and what program and how they could make it themselves. I explained how they could make there own pressure pads and what programme and coding they would need. I had a few kids like my game more that other people because they thought it was cool that they stood on my pressure pad something would appear on the screen. The first night of the show was the main one because loads of people turned up to the event to try what we made and to see what we did. The other nights of the shows wasn't as good as the first night because about ten people turned up throughout the remaining days of the show. So we spent most of the time then waiting for people to turn, and when people did turn up we had to get ready quickly and to set up again.
Overall I thought I did really well with this project because I put a lot of effort into the project itself. Even though I had some glitches in the project I would do it all over again making sure that I spent  more time making the game, even though I had a working game to present for the show and as for the show I though it was good to do because it gave you experience for future events and shows. It also shows what you have to go through in the working world to get your product/project out to the public.

Step by step first try

This is the first step of the game where it starts off with a yellow square, you need to click the yellow squares to move on to the next one and it is all randomised so you don't know what colour square you will be getting next.

Then you move on to the another square after it has finished randomising then you click on the square again 

to move to a next one.

As before you move onto another square, so you need to click on the square to get to the next on.

As before you move onto another square, so you need to click on the square to get to the next on.

Once you land on the blue square you cannot continue the game because it stops you from moving on to the next square, but you'll never know when you will land on the blue square because it is all randomised.

Final look at FMP step by step screenshots

             This is first page that you will see of the Adobe Director piece. You will have to use the pressure pads to get the new skeleton to appear.

This is another page with a different coloured Skeleton.

This is one of the pages you will appear when you stand on the Orange pressure pad.

This would appear after you hit the green pressure pad.

This would also appear once the pink pressure pad is hit.

 This will appear when you hit the blue coloured pressure pads.

You will see this when the yellow pressure pad is hit.

This would be in full screen mode on the night of the show, so you wouldn't see the rest of the background you'll just see the main page with the skeletons on.

Coding and Lingo Research

Adobe Director uses codes to help the program work and do certain functions but it is mainly called Lingo.

Lingo was created basically as a syntax verbose which was made to be designed to mimic spoken language. 

To get a frame to go somewhere or even a new frame you would use the lingo code, ( go to the frame)

The use of using lingo in Adobe Director works in three different parts, these parts are called Behavior, Movie and Parent.

Behavior are the frame scripts which are joined to the sprite or even inserted into a frame, they are mainly used to control the sprites movement and also its properties. The behaviours of frames can be used to make a pause or even create a delay within a frame. By using Behaviors it makes the program more easy to use. Behavior in frames can also control and even interact with other sprites which makes it an true object.

Movie in Adobe Director are scripts which are not joined with sprites so they become an instantiated object, they are also available throughout the whole program, but they are useful to hold initialising global variables.

Parents these are scripts and they are used to give birth and create instances of an object. Objects can also control and be in command of a sprite and media imports without being joined to a sprite. Parent scripts can also create new and also destroys a object whenever it wants too, by doing this it frees them from the control of the Behavior.

Research on dance machines

Research for my game will be about dance style games. These games can be found in the cinema and other places like bowling arenas. These games work similar to mine because you have to put pressure on the right pressure pads. It tells you on the screen which pressure pad you'll have to push down, for example if you have to hit the left arrow on the screen you'll have to hit down the left pressure pad.

Dance dance revolution is a dance music video style game. It was produced in Japan by a company called Konami and it was soon released around America and Europe in the 1999's. It was the first game of it of its kind and it was a huge hit around arcades and cinemas. To play this game you had to stomp on the right pressure pad matching the one on the screen, this game become really popular because after you have finished playing the game you could add your score to the leader boards and you could beat your friends score.

Game play for this game involved the person choosing the song that they wanted to listen too, when you hit the rights arrows you would get a score, hit the arrows at the right time you would get a better score, for example if you hit it perfectly you would get a bigger score. Some of the games were also available in two players mode, in this you could either play against the player or play with the other play. In  play against the other you both dance to the same song but have a separate scoring systems so whoever has the highest overall score at the end of the song wins the game. In play with mode you both dance to the song but the score adds  to combine and overall score at the end. 

As the game progressed the game play/mode became harder starting with basic difficulty then going up to manic level then all the way up to expert level which is the most difficult mode to play.

http://www.tek-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=1283160

Link to to a website for coding

http://www.deansdirectortutorials.com/Lingo/tempoLingo.htm 


On this website you can find coding for Adobe Director which helps you make a button that creates a a delay for example. This site also offers tips for different coding which you can use, and it also has a step by step and information on how to use the code and where to place the coding in Adobe Director.

Final Major Project Proposal

For my final major project I 'am going to do like a dance style reaction game.  This will have the person playing it testing reactions and other things. Some of the pressure pads that you hit will activate music and different colour squares on the screen. For this i will have a black out tent of some kind to black it all out so its dark.

For this I am going to buy an old play station dance mat and take it apart and reprogram  it and make it do what i want it to do. I will also design my own graphics and pictures that will be stuck on tot he pressure pads.

I will also being doing a countdown counting down from 5 all the way down to 1, and once this has counted down the game would start. 

I am having coloured skeletons  a screen which is linked to the pressure pads and you have to stomp down on the  right coloured pressure pad.  I am also adding sound effects so when the player hits the skeleton off the screen using the pressure pads and by adding sounds to that, they would know they they hit it. Another thing that I'm going going to do is add a type of scoring system, each one of the skeleton would give you 10 points if you hit it off the screen. On the other side of the screen I will code into Adobe Director a timer which will countdown from a certain time, this allows each person an allotted amount of time to play the game. The timer will beep when it reaches down to zero.

I' am also going  to research how to make pressure pads from scratch. There are many videos and tutorials that I can use and help me make my own pressure pads. An advantage to making my own pressure pad is that I can have the shape and style of pressure pads that I want. I can also make them how big or small depending on the size that I want them to be. Another option is to buy an old play station or computer  dance mat, and then I would have to re programme the dance mat so it would be compatible to work with the programme which I needed it to work with which was Adobe Director. If I did manage to re programme the dance mat I would have to change the design because it already has one on it. So I would have to put my own design over the top of the dance mat so it would go with my game. 

Here is a link on how to make a pressure pad and it also shows you with pictures how to make it.

http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Pressure-Pad

For when I do the show I am going to have my game on full screen on the Mac and have the pressure pads all around the computer on the floor, so it would be easier for people to play my game. Once the pressure pads are around the computer on the floor I plan to hide the wires and tape them down so people cant trip over them and also they would be hidden out of site I also plan to have music playing in the background so it would feel more like a dancing game.