Saturday 19 April 2014

Week 8 - 9 Naming Colaborated Parts and extra componenets


In this video it shows the Google SketchUp file that i worked on for a few days. i put together my half of the church and Alans half into one and i went through the whole church and turned the extra left over pieces of the church into a component. I also went through the whole church again and renamed the 70 components then made sure they were all correct as there were many errors.

Problems

  • The colours of some layers were similar and i had trouble finding the componenets for that layer so i could name them correctly.
  • Parts of the church might have been put on the wrong layer before we received the sketchUp file (see post below)
  • Some layers would not turn into components  and i had to explode the group and find every little peices that was scattered around and turn it into a component.

week 7 - Potential campaign problem found


As i was working on google sketchup i realized there might be a mistake that the sketchup file has. The problem is that on the 5C layer it only shows the component that the image below reveals but when i press on the 5e layer a part of the 5c campaign is shown (look at second image below). I will have to ask Jon or my tutor if this is an issue that needs to be fixed.



Friday 18 April 2014

Critical Reflection - Communication

This week (week 6) we learned the importance of communication in group work.

Team One -
Yaoyu, Lauren, Bassel, Anthony, Benjamin, Xiadong.
Project - The Creation of Gothic Architecture.

This team was very well presented and their delivery with their speech was superb. They were very vocal and clear with what they said. They defined what communication was and its importance when working in teams. I disagree to some extent when they said that speeches that are  "written are better as they are prepared beforehand". I feel like if someone is passionate about the topic they are talking about and they know what they want to say, then they will communicate much better to the audience as they would make more eye contact and engage with the audience. However having points on a card would be much better then reading from the cards. This will allow for eye contact with the audience and room for engagement.

The team gave examples of different types of communications from verbal to non verbal. I learned the terms Asynchronous and synchronous and found it interesting when the group compared different advantages and disadvantages of both terms. I agree with the team when they mentioned that synchronous communication can have a disadvantage when getting asked questions while asynchronous communication gives you time to think and respond.

The overall video presentation was very interesting and informative. The video was very well made and it was a comedy to watch yet the team still got their facts across and stayed on topic the whole way. The only thing the team lacked was telling their peers how they communicate and what is the best and worst type of communication for different projects.


Team Two - Martha, Anthony, Kerre, Darren, Daniel
Project - The Bus Stop of the Future

This team by far had the best presentation in my opinion. They covered everything the last team covered and more. This team went very into depth about the communication theme. I agree with them that effective communication can prevent problems and vital information as any error can be very costly with time meaning there could be issues with meeting deadlines and stress will kick in. I like how they noted down different methods of communication they mentioned such as talking, video, chat, phone etc. It made me think about the presentation that my team was gonna give and how to be effective with communicating what we researched.

They break down on how they communicate together in order to work together and share information with eachother which they mentioned was through facebook. I can relate to how they communicate as we communicate through facebook nearly 95% of the time.I created a group and invited everyone in my team and it has proved to be very efficient as some of our team members including myself had trouble understanding what to do. It is nice to know that there will be a reply pretty quickly to help you with your work. Facebook has helped us immensely when it has come to sharing problems and finding answers. I also like how the team broke down the most efficient way to communicate is to call someone to email the person you want to contact or if it is urgent then you should contact by phone.

Overall the presentation and delivery by the group was great. They covered all topics and made me think about how i could communicate better with my presentation and the different approaches i can go about when contacting people. I also learned the importance of different communication methods and which ones to use for what case.


Team Three - Marina, Andrew
Project - The Last Suprematist Sculpture

This teams presentation was entertaining and interesting. I liked the idea of using Marina's voice over while showing different images on the screen. I however think it would have been better if there was more information while Marina's voice was playing in the background of the presentation. The information was very well laid out and they mentioned everything the previous grouped mentioned except for the fact the other group explained how to communicate effectively. The only thing that i would improve on is the depth of information that the group went into.

Andrew did his part very well. He engaged with the audience and made eye contact and explained all the dot points in his power point pretty well. I like the idea how he mentioned that in his group there is only two people so they agreed on the roles each person takes. They agreed for one person to be the driver who does the work and the other a navigator who observes, provides guidlines, feedback and recomendations for improvement. They mentioned these roles switch in order to get feedback.

Their final video was made in Powtoons and seemed like an intresting program. I liked how they incorporated all their information into that final video and found it great as they used something no one else did in the class. I have added powtoons to the list of presentations programs i would want to use in the future.

Overall their presentation was very simple and straight to the point. They went into enough detail to get their information across although the group before them did a much better job. Their presentation on the other hand out did the other 2 groups and was a job well done.



Critical Reflection - Planning

During week 5 we were shown presentations by 2 groups on the theme of planning.

Team One - Bethany, Maria, Daisy, Iqra, Yen, Mathew.
Project - Aerial Ropeway in a World Heritage Environment

In terms of content, what i got out of the presentation was informative and interesting as there were various planning strategies that the group had demonstrated. I did not know much about gant charts at first as i have never personally used one myself, but the group showed their example of their gant chart for their project and it seems very useful, especially in large teams.

I have learned the importance of planning and gant charts and how they are useful when working with milestones and key dates as the team mentioned "it keeps everyone on the same page". The team also informed us that by planning ahead and having everyone know what they are doing, it creates a healthy working circle and it "maximises work efficieny"  resulting in teamwork being more fluent. I agree that gant charts are helpful with the planning process that it offers to each team member and teams themselves . I think it is a good way of creating objectives and deadlines for group members in order for teams to move on to the next stage of their project and planning in general is very crucial in order to execute any mission. Their video was interesting, i like how they turned a broad topic into something simple and related it back to their project.

The video was interesting in a comedic way and it grabbed peoples attention, however it would of been nice if the team had given us more examples of planning and maybe act out a planning sequence instead of showing their Katoomba trip.

Team two - Jason, George, Ruo, Michael, Kangyi
Project - Bus Stop Of The Future

This team was similar to the first team but i found their presentation much more well presented and much more informative. They gave us alot more planning strategies and ideas by showing us various planning tools and team activities that could be utilized. I like how the team mostly focused on how they used planning in their project and the steps past and future steps they took and will take in order for them to execute their objectives. I agree with their idea of figuring out who is best at what and then assigning them their roles in order to get the best result in their project.

The teams video was engaging as it felt like it was an interview and the person presenting was looking right into the camera. It was very informative and summed up pretty much everything they presented in front of the class. Most of the people who presented did well although some didn't and i would have them improve on their delivery when presenting, despite that, everything was well presented and i learned alot from this group.

Tuesday 15 April 2014

Back Brief







Week 6 update - Unity Collision resolved and playing with lighting


This is a video of me testing and placing the Church into Unity and trying to play with different settings that Stephen taught us in order for there to be collision between church and person. I also started to play with lighting in order to make the church look more appealing and to also reveal different parts of the church in order to give it more depth.

Week 6 update- Naming and grouping components


This is a video of me renaming components as there was some errors in the naming, so i rechecked all campaigns so there would be no errors.

Tuesday 8 April 2014

Week 4-5 update






This following week i have been working on separating and grouping all the components within the church. It wasn't to bad but there were some little things that proved to be frustrating. I had trouble at times grouping objects such arches that were not connected to anything so i had to keep finding parts that were relevant to that component. I also started working on naming the components that my group members provided me with. I had to for example name components for bases, roofs, columns as "CSES_2a_BAS". By next week i will have to have all the components named and ready for our next step.

Tuesday 1 April 2014

Week 3-4 class update

Before

After

Today while observing the SketchUp Church model and cleaning it up, i realized there was potential unity problems that could occur when exporting. The ceiling from the inside of the church had many faces that turned green when using the PlayUp check normals tool. In order to fix this me and Alan reversed the faces of all the green areas of the ceiling.

Problem :
  • Too many green normals that could cause problems in unity as the objects could potentially not be visible.
Solution :
  • Reverse the face of each of the green faces.