1. Course Introduction CSIS 5835: Graphics and Animation for Gaming

2. Game Development Workflow 3D animation software (Blender, etc.) Game engine software (Unity, etc.) Create game characters Implement game rules Import

3. Character Development Building mesh – Vertices, edges, faces in 3D Adding surface textures – Colors, patterns, images projected on mesh Rigging skeleton to mesh – Skeleton mapped to corresponding points on mesh Keyframe animation – Basic cycles for main actions (running, jumping, throwing, etc.) – Location of points/skeleton at points in time, automatic interpolation of locations at other times

4. Game Engine Creating world in which game is played – Terrain – Lighting – Cameras… Writing scripts for game – Implement rules of game – Control actions of characters in games – First person/Third person games

5. Underlying Math/Physics 3D projection and transformations Smoothing algorithms Projecting 2D images to 3D objects Physics of lighting/shadows Inverse kinematics Game physics Tradeoffs between accuracy and speed

6. Underlying Psychology Overall character design – Proportions, role in game, etc. Realistic motion – Running, walking, etc. Other cues – Speech, pose, expression, etc. Basic cinematography concepts – Lighting – Camera angles/motion

7. Software Tools Blender – Public domain 3D Graphics/animation package – www.blender.org www.blender.org Unity – Popular game engine (free version available) – Scripting in C#/JavaScript – www.unity3d.com www.unity3d.com

8. Limits of Course Will not be able to create realistic “human” character in this course – Takes work an skill learned from years of practice – Often takes team of animators weeks to create a few seconds of animation Goals of course: – Understanding of major steps of animation – Understanding of underlying principles – Practice with animation tools – Practice with game engine scripting

9. Assignments Simple projects (learning Blender): – Meshes for simple character – Adding textures/images to character/level – Rigging skeleton to character mesh and creating animation – Using characters in very simple first-person game – Using animated character in simple third-person game Final project : – Creating simple game of own design in Unity – Creating characters of own design in Blender for use in game Graduate student requirement: Short presentation on underlying math/physics of some animation concept