Week 31 Journal

Date: 25/04/08


This will be the final entry of my blog.


This week I have been helping the team achieve the final team milestone presentation to a high standard. To do this I have been practicing my section as well as providing feedback on other teams members sections.

On Wednesday the team practiced the presentation in front of Claire and Amanda. The feedback from this good with Amanda expressing that presentation was delivered in a professional manner and because of this nothing had to be changed. I also spoke with Claire about my individual report. I will be writing about my interests in mise en scene and how it is applied in video games and how the researched knowledge helped push the project forward.

On Thursday the team delivered the presentation to the supervisory team. This was the final milestone and it was important to deliver a clear presentation as we were showcasing our results. I feel that I delivered my section well, as did the rest of the team.

Finally next week, the team will check the final team report one more time and then print it before handing it in. I will also complete the first draft of my individual report.

Week 30 Journal

Week 30

Date: 20/04/08

Over the weekend of 12th & 13th April, I read through the final team document and highlighted any discrepancies that I felt needed changing. I raised these points on Wednesday to the team and the necessary changes were discussed and amended.

On Wednesday I discussed my ideas for my individual report to Claire. Claire pointed out a few areas that I may wish to concentrate on. I took these points on board and started out planning out the sections of my report.

On Thursday I help construct the final points of the presentation. I was then assigned my section that I would discuss during the presentation.

Over the next week I will be continuing with my individual report, and helping the team deliver the final milestone to a high standard.

Week 29 Journal

Date: 11/04/08

This week the team received feedback on the final team report, and I amended my sections on the advice given. Later on in the week, I helped go through each section to make sure that all amendments were made and the document was up to a high standard.

My focus for the next week will be the individual journal, after learning what is needed in this report I will now go ahead and plan out the different sections.

Week 28 Journal

Week 28 Journal

Date: 04/04/08

Over the last three weeks I have been concentrating on completing the sections that I was assigned to writing in the final team report. The meeting before Easter was very helpful, allowing me to understand how my section could be improved, and these changes were implemented into my Evaluation Approach section. Changes included a flow chart for the testing procedure and the feedback from this proved that it was a lot easier to understand rather then writing the procedure out. I was also assigned with writing the conclusion. When this was written it was decided that it needed a little bit more added to it, as it was not quite right. So due to this I worked with Nick to write a new conclusion.

While the final team write up was taking place I also took the role of assistant editor. This allowed me to check on the sections the team were writing to make sure that the document stayed within the set style of writing. I also suggested some new sections that should be implemented so the document covered all aspects of the project.

With this draft now completed and being checked by Amanda and Claire, this has allowed me to start concentrating on the individual report.

DUE TO THE EASTER BREAK THE NEXT BLOG WILL BE PUBLISHED ON THE 4th APRIL 2008

Week 25 Journal

Week 25

14/03/08

This week has once again concentrated on the statistical analysis of our results. On Tuesday a meeting with Steve Manning was held. I found this to be a very useful meeting as Steve went into more detail as to why we should use the statistical methods that we have chosen. This meeting helped me gain a greater understanding of statistical analysis.

On Wednesday I showed the new structure of the final team document to Amanda and Claire. They seemed happier with the new structure and this now allowed the team to go away and plan their own sections. In the afternoon I assisted the team with making the graphs of our results, to show the supervisors on Thursday. Once we had all the graphs together I made sure that I understood what each one was showing.

Thursday’s Supervisors meeting went well with us showing the graphs and explaining to the supervisors what they all meant and how our conclusions from them can be back up from our statistical analysis. The supervisors gave us all feedback on the graphs, and some interesting questions were raised, such as can SAM be used to measure other emotional responses when playing games.

On Thursday I assisted the team by helping Nick and Phill plan out their sections for the final team report, which is to be written over the Easter break.

I feel that this week has been quite successful as the statistical analysis has shown that most of our data is significant, and with the meeting with Steve Manning it allowed me to see that the data was correct and now the team can go and write about our data in the final team report.

Week 24 Journal

Week 24

07/03/08

The beginning of the week started with me looking through the final team report with Nick, concerns were raised that we felt the document is not written in the correct style but we decided to wait till Wednesday to get feedback from Claire Brierley and Amanda Dewhurst on our first draft.

On Tuesday we continued with testing, after testing around six participants, a team meeting took place to decide that testing should stop to concentrate on the analysis of results, as we knew that analysis of the results would be a hard task using statistical analysis.

On Wednesday a first draft of the final team report was given to Claire Brierley and Amanda Dewhurst, they then gave feedback and confirmed what I had already suspected, that it was written in the wrong style. They gave advice on each section, and for my own section (Evaluation approach) they advised that a flow chart of the testing procedure would look better then a paragraph of writing. I now have a better understanding of what is now needed in the document; one problem was referencing what the team member, but that is no longer needed. So rewriting my section should be a lot easier. From this meeting I went a formed a new structure for the final team document be written in. This will be shown in next Wednesday’s lesson.

On Wednesday afternoon, the team started the analysis of the testing results. This allowed me to start looking at the different method of statistical analysis that Phill had already started looking at.

On Thursday a meeting took place with Dr. John Charlton. This meeting proved very useful as it allowed him to explain the tests that we should use to analyse our test results. He suggested that we use the Wilcoxon signed ranks test to measure the Pleasure-Arousal-Dominance values and the paired T-test to measure the average heart rates. He showed the team how to do these tests in SPSS.

Early indications are showing some good results, and these will be concentrated on next week, before the break for Easter.

Week 23 Journal

Week 23

01/03/08

This week has been split into two different parts. The first part was writing the Final Team Report. The first thing I did was complete a second draft of my section for the team report. I worked on the parts that had been highlighted by the editor (Nick) and rewrote them, so that they stayed within the style of the document. Later on in the week, I worked with Nick to amend the Implementation section. As my role of secondary editor I read through this section first before it went to Nick. After reading through the first draft, I came up with some of my own ideas and discussed these with Nick. These ideas were then incorporated into the document. Nick and I then went through the whole document to get it ready to hand into Claire Brierley and Amanda Dewhurst as a first draft.

The second part of the week was spent testing the artefact. During this time I tested many participants as well as helping the team to find students to take part.

Next week, I will continue to help Nick get the final team report ready to hand in, and continue to help the team with testing the level artefact.

Week 22 Journal

Week 22

22/02/08

During this week I have been writing my section for the final team report and helping the team with the start of the testing phase.

During the weekend of the 16th and 17th of February I started to write my section of the final team report. It was decided that I will write the Evaluation Approach. The first thing that I had to decide was the content of this section. I already knew that the section would need to include our testing method; I also decided that a section on our control methods and the control group testing should also be included as these were quite important to our final testing method. I also asked Phill to write a small section on the prediction of our results, as I felt that this should also go into the Evaluation Approach section. Later on in the week the team got some feedback on the sections from Claire Brierley and Amanda Dewhurst and from this I will change my section appropriately, although what I had had written was in the right style, a few changes were needed.

This week also saw the start of the testing phase. Throughout this I have taken on two different roles. The first of these was making sure that enough Pre – Test Questionnaires, SAM forms and heart rate monitoring sheets were available to the team for testing. I also made sure that after each test, the forms were filled in correctly as this would make for easier data analysis. The final role that I took was testing participants. While doing this I made sure that the control measures that the team had outlined in the design document were adhered to, this was to ensure a fair and equal test was being conducted.

Over the next week, I will complete my final team report section and continue to help the team in testing more participants.

Week 21 Journal

Week 21

15/02/08

The main focus of this week has been delivering Milestone 3 to the supervisors. As I wasn’t taking part in the presentation, I took the role of working on the documents, so the rest of the team could concentrate on working on delivering the Milestone presentation to the highest possible standard.

The document that I worked on first was the final team report. I started to plan this document so it was ready to work on. Along with this I moved the literature survey into the final team report. The literature survey needed to be slightly amended before it went into final team document. I placed in the SAM write up which I had written during week 9, so the literature survey was up to date with changes made to the project since the literature survey was first written. The final team document was now ready for the team to start writing. It was also decided that when we started writing the final team report I would help Nick with the editing role for this document. This would work by me reading all the work that the team do to make sure that it has everything that the section needs and any mistakes can be removed before it is placed into the document.

I also worked on the design document during the week. The first thing that I did was to place in the prototype lighting system document. It had been decided that the pictures within this document would be placed within the design document appendix. After fixing some minor problems that occurred with moving the prototype lighting system document into the design document, the design document was nearing completion. The other changes that were made I made with Nick, these were minor changes to the SAM form and the heart rate monitoring sheet. These changes came about due to the control group testing phase last week.

During the week, Nick and James were practicing on delivering the presentation, during this time I would give them my thoughts on how the presentation could be improved ready for Thursday’s presentation.

I have also started to plan my individual report; I made sure that I had all the academic journals and books that I found useful to get through this project, so when I start writing the document I have all the resources to help me write it.

Finally at the end of this week, Nick and I discussed writing the final team report. We discussed who should write each section and handed out tasks for the weekend.

With Milestone 3 now complete, I will now be helping the team with the testing phase of milestone 4 along with writing and editing the final team report.

Week 20 Journal

Week 20

08/02/08

During this week I have taken on many roles to make sure that everything ran smoothly, as it was an important week for the team as we would be starting control group testing.

It was decided that I would assist Nick with setting up the arrangements for the control group testing. The first task that I carried out was to make sure that the heart monitor was ordered and would arrive this week. After speaking to Brian Morris, the heart monitor was ordered and it arrived ready for control group testing.

On Tuesday I spoke with Phill about the SAM method, as I wanted to make sure I fully understood it before I went into control group testing. After this discussion, I purposed to the team that we should look into writing a prediction section to show what we believe should happen in our final testing phase. I believe that this will show the supervisors and examiners that we fully understand the SAM method and we understand our results from the testing phase.

During Tuesday I worked with Nick on the presentation, I suggested a few ideas that I felt would help with the presentation and we worked on these during Tuesday afternoon.

On Thursday the team carried out the control group testing. I took the role of making sure that all the paperwork was in order. I made sure that the participant filled out the pre test questionnaire before they started to play through the artefact. Once they had played the first artefact I handed them the first SAM form and asked them to fill it in, in their own time. I did this once again after the second test had taken place. I also made sure that all the relevant data was all kept together so when it come to data analysis it could be done without confusion.

This control group testing proved to be very valuable to the team as it showed us where problems lay and we can now sort them out before the main testing begins. There were a few minor issues concerning the level, which I started to fix on Thursday afternoon.

Next week I will be helping the team prepare for the milestone presentation. I will also be setting out the layout for the final report document. Finally I will also look at the literature survey as this may need altering to fit into our final document report.

Week 19 Journal

Week 19

01/02/08

During this week I have been concentrating on completing tasks set out by the milestone manager, to make sure that the level artefact is completed and ready for control group testing next week.

The week started with me working with James on placing lighting throughout the level artefact, as well as placing lights I also helped with the placing of light glows (env_glow).

After a team meeting in which the team agreed with the lighting throughout the level, I then took the map and started to place in light objects. I concentrated on using four different props to represent the lights. The first of these is a light bulb. I used this twice throughout the level, once in the first room where the player starts and again in the final room where the level ends. The second light prop that I used was the florescent light prop. These are extensively used throughout the level in the corridors, the stairways and in the main reception areas. For the light that is being emitted from the cubicles I placed in lamp props. The last lighting prop that I used is a texture. I tried to use one of the textures supplied by the toolset, but unfortunately this was self illuminating and didn’t fit into the level. I discussed this problem with the milestone manager (Nick) and it was decided that he would make his own texture and pass it to me when ready. Once I had this texture I added it in to the two office areas on the top floor and in the two office spaces on the floor below. I then went on to adjust the light map maps throughout the level. I adjusted the light maps in the areas that the player will see and will be walking.

With the level near completion the team would complete many playthroughs to sort out any minor problems. I would help fix some of these minor issues with the help of the team.

The last thing that I did this week was to format the lighting document that James has been writing. I did this so it would fit into the design document.

During the next week I will be helping the team conduct the control group test, and also with the preparation of the milestone presentation.

Week 18 Journal

Week 18

25/01/08

Over the last few weeks, the artefact has been under construction by the team. While Phil was building the level geometry and Nick was creating some textures to include in the level I wrote a short document on fear as this is what our level is based on. This document helped the team understand what it takes to elicit the emotion of fear and so when it comes to inputting the fear elements into our level we have a better level of understanding of what it takes to elicit fear.

Once the basic level geometry and the level had been textured the level was passed to me and I began to add props into the level, I had to browse through all the models that the toolset had to offer and decide which models would be best suited for the theme of our level and then placed these into the level appropriately. Also while doing this I also started to add decals to the level. These were placed to show off the wear and tear of the level. I also made the level linier; this is to ensure that the player doesn’t get lost while playing the game. This was done by blocking corridors, with numerous props and adding player clips so the player cannot get past the props. The main task here was to block the front of the reception, and the placing of some props was not really going to do the job effectivly. After a few ideas were proposed by the team, it was decided that a I should create a crash scene where a lorry had crashed through the front of the reception. Once i had done this i passed it to phil who gave me his impressions and how it could be improved.

While the level was with other team members, I started to look into a prototype lighting system with James. This was so when it came to lighting the level we would have a system that had already been devised and would help the team place the lighting effectively. Also, while the level was with other team member I would go through the level and write down a list of any problems that I felt were affecting the level. I would then discuss these problems at the team meetings and a plan to resolve them would be put in place.

Over the next week I will be helping the team get the level complete and ready for testing.