James Battersby

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February 2010 Update

Posted: 26th February 2010

I thought I should post an article based on what I am currently involved in which individually don't amount to a separate article themselves. This will cover what I am currently studying, my climbing activities and anything else that springs to mind.

University: Management of Entertainment Software

This is quite an interesting module where we look at the typical Game Development Life Cycle (GDLC) including pre-production, production and post-production, understanding the various different roles in the gaming industry. We are currently looking at the pre-production stage and on Monday we are required to present a revised schedule for a case study of a struggling studio. I find it interesting because amongst my many dreamy ambitions in life is to set up a gaming studio of sorts but since I have no entrepreneurial experience this has been always been a major concern for me: where do I start and how does it work? Who knows, this may be the ammunition I need!

University: Special Techniques for Graphics and Animation

This has been a bit of peculiar module so far. We have been tasked to submit an application that covers any one of the following: static and interactive ray tracing, shadow mapping, motion hierarchy and flocking techniques. I have opted for the latter as this closely resembles a form of emergent behaviour, a small part of Artificial Intelligence (which I am interested in) and it also provides a good amount of research to be done. I'm not aware of anybody else on my course attempting this so I should hopefully provide something new!

University: Multiprocessing and Parallel Systems

Possibly one of the most confusing modules so far where we look at ways of optimizing applications by making use of multiple cores on any machine. So far we have covered the use OpenMP and Intel SSE and we have been given an assignment which looks at the way we can compare different techniques of parallelism, specifically the use of parallel sections and fors in OpenMP. Probably my least favourite module but given that almost all gaming platforms have multiple cores it is certainly not one to be ignored!

Dare To Be Digital

We were all sent an e-mail recently notifying us about the Dare To Be Digital competition being held by the University of Dundee where teams of gaming students get together to develop and "launch" a game over a 10 week period. This definitely looks like a lot of fun and a good change to gain some valuable experience. If it allows me to submit the final product (provided we're picked) for upcoming group module (Integrated Design) then I'd be more than keen to apply. Just need to get a team together to do it!

Climbing

I have finally learned to lead climb and I thoroughly enjoy it. It seems to have improved my technique dramatically (probably because I have to concentrate more). I've also spent a session at the climbing works which is an amazing bouldering (only) venue and I have even been on outdoor trip to Bamford which was enjoyable despite the cold weather (we were quite lucky in retrospect as it snowed heavily the following day). I am also enrolled on a 2 day course that will teach me how to set up ropes outside that should hopefully grant the freedom to climb anywhere (provided I have the equipment).

Birthday

It was my birthday a couple of days ago which I will be celebrating tomorrow (due to the fact I had a 9am lecture on the 25th). Thank you all for the well wishes and the presents I received, including the Band of Brothers Blu-ray boxset!

Returned from Les Arcs

Posted: 31st January 2010

I have now returned from Les Arcs, thankfully with only a strong cold which I seemed to have picked up from someone. Its certainly pleasant that my legs aren't aching likely they normally do after this kind of holiday, my technique must be improving. I apologise for not updating via Twitter but there were crossed wires between Barclays and Vodafone meaning that I couldn't top up my phone at all during my stay in France (well, I could have bought an international top-up card but I thought it wou'dn't be worth it). I have uploaded the best photos from the holiday (taken with my new Panasonic Lumix F515 (which is very good by the way)).

As for whats coming up next - I need to catch up on the lectures I missed from the last week, finish a report and will probably be going climbing at Stanage Edge next Sunday. Looking forward to it all!

Skiing

Posted: 20th January 2010

I will be skiing in the Alps (Les Arcs 1800) from Friday 22nd till Saturday 30th via a 16 hour coach journey. This is a well deserved (in my opinion) holiday courtesy of the Sheffield Hallam Ski & Snowboard Club. As such I will be out of contact but rest assured I will more than likely be taking a lot of photos. If possible I will keep you up to date via Twitter but no promises. See you soon!

Releases for 2010

Posted: 6th January 2010

As I am currently enrolled on a course which is primarily about building a portfolio for prospective employers in the gaming industry I thought I should list the projects that I either definitely will or intend to work on this year (some may have started last year). These projects will be assessed and/or will appear on this site in due course. So without further ado and in no particular order:

Assembly programming on the Gamecube (which translates onto the Wii, XBox360 and PS3) - completed
Fireworks using particle systems in DirectX - completed
The Adventures of Professor Photon: Lost in Time (Prototype) - completed
Moka - a Java version of the Steam client
Suduko (Java and/or C++)
3D Towers of Hanoi (Java and/or C++)
Draughts/Chess (Java and/or C++)
Multiplayer Pacman (Java and/or C++)
Space Invaders (Java and/or C++)
Lego Firestation (C++) - in progress
Robo Escape (Unity/Unreal Engine)
2D Platformer based on Simon's Cat (Java and/or C++)
1st Person Tetris 3D

This list will change because there are three more modules to go (each with either one or two assignments to do), another group project and then my individual research project (the last two I'm really looking forward to). The first four in the list are most likely to be done first partly because the first three have to be done very soon and the fourth because I think its a really good idea. I would like to add an AI problem in this list too but I need to think of a decent problem to tackle. Any suggestions would be most welcome.

Christmas Season

Posted: 19th December 2009

Its that time of year again and this year is quite different for me. I'm currently in the middle of my two week jury duty (which so far has been a total waste of time as I am yet to be picked) and university finished yesterday (although I have plenty of things to be getting on with).

Since my last post I have handed in two more assignments: one was to build a scene using Lego meshes (which I had to build myself) and the other was an optimization exercise using x86 assembly. Both were challenging yet interesting. There is a video presentation of the final version of the Lego assignment on Youtube and there is also a development stage version. I will be uploading screenshots of my work very soon. In the optimization assignment I was able to speed up the program considerably before I had even re-written the entire program in assembly but I did prove (using Newton's quotient) that the assembly version was more efficient for larger datasets as its rate of change was lower than that of the pure C++ version.

However just because university has officially finished teaching for this semester does not mean I am short of work. I have another graphics assignment to hand in (this time it is to construct a realistic fireworks display using a particle system) and also need to continue working on our game prototype. Both assignments are in for the 25th of January but I am currently concentrating on the prototype as I seem to be one with the Unreal Editor at the moment. I am slightly kicking myself for not checking out other engines (Unity in particular) as I have found Unreal rather frustrating (the fact that the Unreal Editor and the UDK are entirely different animals for a start). It'll be worth it though and I might upload some work in progress shots.

The future looks exciting: I am skiing in Les Arcs 1800 at the end of January, university starts again and I'm hoping to go to GDC Europe next year as a lot of our proposed projects are based upon what has been presented there. I'm also shortlisted to learn how to lead climb as I become more confident and hopefully I'll be able to go on a trip this time round (I had to cancel my trip to Snowden at the last moment when I realised I had miscalculated the deadline for the Lego assignment).

Merry Christmas and see you in the next decade!

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