Principles of Mobile Site Design

Great resource and inside on successful mobile design by Google & AnswerLab

Click here

Using Maya Expressions to Create Auto-Swim Fish Rig

Here are some useful Maya Tutorials to learn how to create an auto-swim rig for a fishing using Maya Expressions

Maya/Rigging: Creating an auto-swim fish rig using expressions, Part 1 from zeth willie on Vimeo

Maya/Rigging: Creating an auto-swim fish rig using expressions, Part 2 from zeth willie on Vimeo.

Game User Research

If you ever thought wondered about how to conduct a play-test group for your game, Here is a helpful slide show that tells you in the best and simplest form.

An Introduction to Games User Research Methods from Ben Lewis-Evans

Other resources in more detail:

1) Best Practices: Five Tips for Better Playtesting
2) Finding Out What They Think: A Rough Primer To User Research, Part 1
3) Finding Out What They Think: A Rough Primer To User Research, Part 2

Setting up Unity to Export Android apk

OK so today I spent hours trying to figure out why my unity 3D project wouldn’t build. I found several different solutions for anyone who might have these same problems in the future.

1. Make sure that your android SDK version is 21 or older. For some reason any updates above 21 cause problems with unity. If you need to revert to 21, you can download it by clicking the following link:
2. Make sure that you copy the abd.exe file from the platform tools folder and put it in the tools folder. Here is a great tutorial video that explain the process perfectly.
3. Install JDK 32 bit

Here are some great resources.

Setting up basic email for your App Inventor App

So I have been going crazy the past week or two with trying to figure out how to setup the ability to send a emails from your phone. Well I found the perfect solution to my problem. There is a basic email template available if you visit Pura Vida Apps website. Try it out ,its awesome! I used the “Tony’s email starter template”. Thanks Pura Vida! Here is the website link: http://puravidaapps.com/sendmail.php

I made my own simplified version If you want to take a look. I kept the send an email option, i removed the attaching a file with your camera (doesn’t really work), I added a cancel button to return the user back to the main menu, and I added the ability to make a phone call right from the app (to a predefined phone #).

Screen Shot of App Inventor set up

Screen Shot in App Inventor’s Blocks Editor

 

Plug-In to convert unity 3D projects into Ecilpse format

I thought this was a pretty cool way to make android apps into an eclipse

Tutorial Link:
http://blog.appjigger.com/tutorial-passing-screen-offset-values-from-live-wallpaper-to-unity3d-with-unity2eclipse/
Unity2Ecilpse Asset:
http://u3d.as/content/appjigger-studios/unity2eclipse/3jT

Animator Creator Demo App

This is my  Prototype Draft of Animator Creator App. Still a work in progress. Still need to figure out how to implement SQLite Databases and where projects created by the user would be saved.

Animator Creator Android App Concept Design

This is pretty much a layout of an Android App idea that evolved from it originally being an android component It looks like there is going to be at least 16 java class and 11 XML files (for graphical layout). Both versions are kind of similar the only difference is determining the look of the Animator Creator Interface -> how it functions might change. Follow the arrows starting from “Welcome to Animator Creator” class

version # 2

Conference Paper/Final Project

Download Conference Paper here

View Video Presentation here

Download final project files here

Project Assignment #4

ecore diagram final

Junit Test

JUnit test of ACUI

Android APIs I wanted to implement in the ecore model where several widgets in the android.widgets* package for the user interface and media player. The user can preview different animations from the Animation Library prior to inserting it into their Animator Creator Project and when they want to view the final product.

Here are a few widgets I was thinking of using for playing media:

android.widget.VideoView

android.widget.MediaController

android.net.Uri

NOTE: The Android API’s are not implemented in my model because when adding the API’s I kept receiving errors in project and would not let me run a JUnit test so I took the path of least resistance and just stuck which emf/ecore/regular java code. This model is very theoretical.

Since I was not successful at implementing these API’s with emf, i created a simple Android App to demonstrate my ideas and how i envision how the interface would look like for the most part.

So we start off at the Start Menu. You can create a new project, upload a previous project, or quit the application. In order to access data, i would need to set up a database using android.ContentProvider. That is something I would implement in the future. anyways it goes straight to the Animator Creator User Interface. In the UI the user can edit and add animations, play their creation, save it, or quit the application. Alot of Functionality needs to be implemented but its just a simple framework.

Main Menu and Animator Creator User Interface

When the user clicks the edit button it asks the user if they are sure they would like to add an animation to their project. If they select yes, it then takes then to the Animation Library where they can search animations based on type.

Animator Creator UI Edit Button going to Animation Library Class

In the UI, if they user presses play. Again it asks the user if they are sure they want to view it. then a video player plays q single video with the audio. (For some reason the play has issues in the emulator does work to great).

Play Btn to Video Player

click here to download Project Assignment 4