MONASH UNIVERSITY
SCHOOL OF COMPUTER SCIENCE AND SOFTWARE ENGINEERING
HONOURS YEAR

FIT4012 : Procedural modelling, animation
& artificial life in computer graphics

Assignment Notes


Title :

The Lost City of Atlantis

Date Due: Refer to main page
Weight: 100% of your final mark for this unit
Submission: CD-ROM

 

Specifications:

The lost city of Atlantis was a creation of Plato that appeared in his texts Critias and the Timaeus... or did it really exist? It is your mission to reveal the rich architecture of Atlantis. Swimming amongst the buildings of Atlantis are countless schools of fish, mermaids (and mermen), sirens, maybe even Neptune himself! Perhaps the Scylla and Charybdis have ventured here on holidays from Sicily.

From an etching by Athanasius Kircher c. 1666.
Statue of Plato, Museo Capitalini, Roma.

Use generative procedures based on the principles discussed in the lecture notes and in reading elsewhere to create a city of Atlantis. Your architecture must be generative. Perhaps Atlantis has crumbling and collapsed arches and towers, great palaces and humble cottages. Perhaps it houses an advanced, thriving submarine civilisation with modern architecture and new technology. It is up to you and your skills as a software author to generate its rich detail. Populate your city with schooling creatures that swim amongst the city's architecture.

Additional (optional) ideas: Perhaps particle systems could be employed to generate rising bubbles. Maybe procedural textures could be used to generate marble or brick surfaces, steel or shiny glass. Perhaps plant modelling techniques could be used to generate seaweed. Your vision of Atlantis will to some extent determine the most suitable modelling techniques.

All your code should be written in C or C++ and should run under a UNIX (or derivative) operating system. The models should be visualised in OpenGL. Either a camera path through your city can be pre-programmed by you, the camera can follow a generative path through the enviornment (e.g. it might follow a fish as it swims), or the camera can be under the control of a human user. Any of these possibilities is acceptable.

If you wish to get into the Hall-of-Fame here is something that might assist. Visualize your animated model by rendering a still image specified by a model file exported from your software. Use a stand-alone free/share-ware renderer such as POV-Ray to produce the rendering. It is worth scanning the POV-Ray gallery and Hall-of-Fame for ideas on how to use the modelling primitives the software can handle to generate landscapes containing buildings, creatures, light sources etc. This rendering can be made after the project deadline if you desire as it will not be assessed.

Choose the features of Atlantis that most interest you and model them as appropriate. You will need to research modelling techniques, especially those on generative architecure. This will involve reading papers and books, not just the WWW and the lecture notes. Prepare a bibliography document detailing the references you have consulted in the course of your research. Write a paragraph describing the contents of each reference you have consulted. The paragraph should be specific about what the reference contained that was of value (or not) for your assignment.

Marking breakdown:

Stationary features: buildings and plants. [45]
Animated features: schooling fish and other creatures. [45]
Bibliography: only published books, conference and journal papers count for marks. [10]
Bonus: the best images and extra features may receive some bonus marks.
Don't overdo it, your total mark is capped at 100.
<=10
 

Submission Details:

The assignment is due at the time specified on the main page.

Submit all of the files specified below on a CD-ROM clearly labelled with your name and ID number. Submissions will be accepted at the General Office in building 63 only.

You will need to include the following in your submission:

Documentation is important. Marks are allocated within each section for the research you have done. Documentation submitted should include:

Each file of your source code must contain the follwing at the top:

 /* 
  * This software is the original work of <Your Full Name>. ID: <Your ID> 
  * This software is submitted in partial fulfillment of the 
  * requirements for the degree of <Your Degree>, 
  * Monash University
  */ 

You are encouraged to consult reference material as widely as possible, but remember the code you write MUST be your own work. Make sure you think about, and understand, the processes involved rather than blindly copying the work of others.

Please be realistic about what you can achieve given the time constraints. Students invariably spend far too much time on this assignment. As much fun as it is, any time above 50 hours would be better spent on other activities. (e.g. fishing in the Monash pond)

Late assignments will incur mark penalties according to the Fibonacci sequence multiplied by a lecturer-determined scaling factor (e.g. 0.5, 1 or 100). An assignment that is one day late will receive a one mark penalty multiplied by the scaling factor. Assignments two days late will receive a 2 mark penalty, three days late, 3 marks, each multiplied by the factor. The sequence is [1],1,2,3,5,8,13,21... (times the factor). This applies for all days including public holidays and weekends so please submit your assignments punctually!


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