Ground Rules

Every member should attend the meeting

• If a member cannot attend due to whatever reason, he/she must inform the Project Manager beforehand.

• He/she shall make the effort to update himself/herself of whatever he/she has missed.

Members must attend their respective Project Development classes (according to their roles)

Meet with Supervisor once a week and update on progress

If there is any problem with one member, it shall be discussed immediately to avoid further misunderstandings

If having difficulty with the assigned task, do not hesitate to ask for help. It is a group project and the group is going to help each other out


These are just a few ground rules we set up for our group. If we agree on other things, we'll update this.

Looking into technology we can use

Asylum 626, the sequel to the game (Hotel626) we were all gushing about uses head tracking technology, which allows the users to control the action via webcam.

e.g. Chainsaw closet scene

                 Users can wave their hands to dodge the blade

                                            or in other parts, live video of players will appear on reflected surfaces.

Head-tracking technology

Conventionally, one of the challenges of sound reproduction using headphones is that the sound field moves with the rotation of the listener's head. VIP-1000 and MDR-DS8000 have Gyro Sensors attached to the headsets. They calculate the rotating angle of the head and based on the angle, make data adjustments to fix the sound fields using digital signal processing. In other words, real time adjustments of HRIR from the source to the ears are made as the head moves.

Therefore, even when the listener looks to his/her side wearing the headphone, the sound field will stay fixed, allowing him/her to enjoy close-to-live sound images with a realistic sound field. This can be explained from an acoustic physiological point of view as a phenomenon of sound stimulation reaching motor center in the head becoming closed loop. By switching on and off the head-tracking switch of the headphone indicated in the above diagram, it is clear that head movement largely affects the sound positioning

The principle of head-tracking technology

Human beings determine the distance and direction of the source of the sound through a kind of triangulation. However, when a person rotates his/her head, the brain gets confused unless these characteristics synchronically change with the head movements. As a result, the sound image tends to be fixed within the listener's head or in the original position. This is one of the reasons why the sound appears to originate inside the listener's head when using conventional headphones. Although it is technically possible to keep the sound image outside the listener's head by adjusting the patterns of reflected waves from the wall, the sound image tends to get fixed inside the head when the person is just listening to sound without a visual image. Head-tracking technology is a solution to this problem. By constantly tracking head movements, real time adjustments are provided for the characteristics of sound transmission from the source to the ears, thus, enabling constant and continuous accurate triangulation and resulting in a clear image of the fixed position in the front. Piezoelectric vibration gyros were adopted for tracking.

Whew! Presentation finito!

So, we had our presentation. It was nerve-wrecking. Thanks to the sensespinners for giving us sweets and this made some of us quite hyper.

When we were asked by our mates in the class how it went, we didn't know what to make of it. It was neither bad nor good. So that was kind of disappointing. Plus we thought we made it clear in our presentation that our project isn't a film. It was duly noted a couple of times, in fact. But, we do understand that perhaps we didn't explain it right or maybe the lecturers were just really tired after a long day of hearing everyone's ideas.

NEWS:

We got Fiachra as our supervisor!

Booth and components

The video

The narrative will be shot in first person point of view to make the user feel more immersed. Here's a short clip of what Claire filmed for her music video so you get the idea of the look and feel of our proposed project.

Audio in our presentation & Meeting with Pat

Here are our inspirations:

nightmare on elm street

nursery rhymes

the grudge

paranormal activity

nursery rhymes

1,2, freddy's coming for you
3,4, better lock your door
5,6, grab your crucifix
7,8, better stay up late
9,10, never sleep again

Late last night and the night before,
         Tommyknockers, Tommyknockers,
                knocking at the door.
I want to go out, don't know if I can,
         'cause I'm so afraid
           of the Tommyknocker man.

• surround sound is key for our project
• use of the three types of sound:
  concrete
  musical
  voice
• the use of very low notes and high notes

• sound mapping

Brief Storyline

YOU are asked to house-sit for your aunt and uncle.


Suddenly, weird sounds and an unexplained visit from a young girl lead to the unraveling of a terrifying experience.



you will be given a chance to survive based on your decisions throughout the night...



Of course, this is still interactive and we'll be incorporating technologies such as the eye-toy, code device and others. Suggestions?

Presentation next week!

We just had our mock presentations and glad we got to practice. Now all we need is to make our presentation in Flash and finalize the research that we want to put in.

Mood Board

Here is a photo of our mood board. Basically to show what we want the users to feel.

Limbo Game

“Boy uncertain of his sister’s faith enters limbo” is the tag line of the absolutely beautiful game currently in development by Playdead, an independent game studio based in Copenhagen, Denmark.

The game takes on a journey of a boy that transverses through the ‘horrible world’ challenged by obstacles which gradually more difficult and more hostile (see video interview at the bottom with Mads Wibroe, the producer). Somewhat influenced by film noir, the game is a solitary, dark, black, silhouette filled journey filled with soft depth blur to describe mood. No text, no music, in “Limbo” you are in the game, alone, in the dark.

The Playdead game studio was founded by Arnt Jensen and Dino Patti in 2006. Limbo is Playdead’s first production and its first game to be published.
Limbo won Excellence In Visual Art and Technical Excellence award at the IGF earlier year. You can read the full interview with the PlayDead’s CEO Dino Patti on IFC.com.

You can find more information on the game by visiting limbogame.org." -http://www.creativeapplications.net/games/limbo-games/

Spooktacular

Here's a video of our journey in Spooktacular event in Kells.

F.e.a.r.

First Encounter Assault Recon is a horror themed first person shooter game. F.E.A.R. is a fictional special forces team which is called to deal with a supernatural event. The user is playing as the Point Man who possesses superhuman reflexes and the task is to uncover the secrets of the paranormal that is in the form of a little girl named "Alma".

The Good:

• FEAR elevates gun battles to a cinematic level  
• Creepy and atmospheric  
• Visually amazing--you will smell the smoke  
• Sounds incredible  
• Wild and fast-paced multiplayer. 

The Bad:

• The game is a system hog  
• Some environments and enemies recycled a bit too much  
• Some loose ends in the plot don't tie up as well as they could.

 http://www.gamespot.com/pc/action/fear/review.html?om_act=convert&om_clk=gssummary&tag=summary%3Bread-review&page=3

This game has the similar look and feel that we want for our project. We will not be using graphics but we'll be using real life footage and hopefully we will achieve the same acceptance this game received back when it first came out.

Here is a short clip from the game: