Day 32

The presentations went well! Now on for the big task tomorrow! Tali Ho! (Definitely need to remember a water bottle ha ha.)

Day 31

Today was spent mainly going over our presentations and proof reading them for tomorrow. The Hawaiian party was fun though! However I didnt have that much time to stay and party because I had to get back to my project.

Day 30

Sando was sick again today and didnt get a chance to look at the mars cloud system we had tampered with. Although we did get some more accomplished today. I texted Sando and he walked me through some steps on how to use "driven keys" in order to mark different changes in the star's life. For example: at this point of the star's life it will be this color and this size. That was definitely helpful and I was able to understand it. But I did run into a small problem: when I tried to key the star's color parameters, nothing happened. Sooo, i'm obviously doing something wrong there ha ha. I continued working on my space shuttle and gosh, it is lookin fine! (If I do say so myself lol.) Presentation is almost complete.

Day 29

Sando was sick today and we weren't able to get that much accomplished on our star simulation. Amy and I instead worked on creating earth and mars using the normal maps that Sando had left us with. Now we have a great looking copy of earth as well as a cloud system to enhance its looks. Mars is a work in progress, we were unable to get the cloud textures to come out as we intended. As the day progressed I began working on a space shuttle for our "Dynamic Universe" because I found that I was useless in trying to figure out what was wrong with mars. Sando is going to have to look at it when he gets back. I also continued working on my presentation, but for some reason its a lot easier to work on it at home. I get more accomplished at home anyway. Maybe because i'm less distracted by friends lol.

Day 28

Today I had the chance to watch some presentations of the undergraduates in their preparation for friday. Sando told Amy and I that we dont actually have to go up to present with him tomorrow. He said that we really wouldnt be doing any talking since its his project. Honestly I'm not really sure what he's going to be presenting because he hasnt even started his presentation! It worked out nicely because I have an appointment tomorrow and I wasnt sure how that would fit in with the time budget here, or if I would need to reschedule. It was nice to be able to watch the undergrads practice their presentations and take notes as 'what not to do' when I give mine next friday. Lol. It kind of alleviated some pressure as well, watching them made me realize I'm not the only one nervous about presenting. (Watching them stumble a couple times was nice to see, not to be mean or anything ha ha. But I didnt want to be the only one potentailly stumbling a couple times. Not to say I wont try to perfect it!)

Day 27

Today we headed off to our last field trip :'( Oh the joys of riding in a limo bus. Those days are all but gone now. But it was fun while it lasted! We visited the Eastman Kodak House and learned about the early methods of photography that incorporated the use of metals and glass to preserve an image. This kind of photography is called daguerreotype and over time, the daguerreotype can tarnish from exposure of the elements, therefore they are becoming all the more sparse and have accumulated much value. We had the chance to see the effects that a small bug had on a daguerreotype after it had died within its casing, and its body moisture caused a tarnishing around that area of the image. After that we freely explored a small room of early cameras, and we were even lucky enough to see the very camera that took the "Flag Raising at Iwa Jima" photograph! (I think I butchered that name ha ha.) Anyways, it was all very cool and definitely worth while to visit.

Day 26

After moving into our new computer lab, we were able to run Maya 2011 with more efficiency and get a lot more done today. The computers in this lab have quad processors, I think. Dont quote me on it ha ha. We noticed that as we expanded our red giant star, the shader that we applied for it completely went wack. It made our star look totally different and we then realized that we had to change our surface shader node to fit the size of the star. After some trial and error (actually we had to remake the shader quite a few times) we finally found an accurate star texture. I also worked more on my presentation, and to be honest I'm getting kind of nervous lol.. I hope it goes well.