About Andrew Fanton

Andrew is a Master's degree student and a brilliant AI logic & pathfinding programmer. It's also safe to say he's better at World of Warcraft than any of us.

E-Mail: Andrew.Fanton [at] Gmail [dot] com

Don't Fall Into the Sarcasm!

8 August 2006. Tuesday. 4:14 pm.

After spending a couple of days absolutely baffled, I was able to solve the problems with the OSM Scene loader. It was such a painfully simple problem; I can't believe I didn't figure it out sooner.

Essentially, the materials weren't being applied to the meshes listed in the .osm file. It turns out that the method in which I created and initialized the OSMScene was being called by the ExampleApplication *before* any of the materials had actually been loaded. All I had to do was move a couple of lines of code in the ExampleApplication, make sure all of the files were in place, then presto! Instant scene loaded!

In other news, I discovered that Alex and Brendan didn't know I was capable of sarcasm. In all fairness, though, the type of sarcasm I displayed was rather uncharacteristic of me. Usually my sarcasm is blaringly obvious; today I was intentionally deceptive about it. It was amusing for all of ten seconds. Maybe I'll get a better reaction out of Sean...

Critique of Logo

4 August 2006. Friday. 4:28 pm.

First of all, this blog was originally a full critique Eric's logo concept. However, my collegues informed me that for many artists, a critique is a rather sensitive thing and not the most appropriate subject for a blog.

I'd like to apologize for not considering that. Though my personal art background is not extensive, I have been subject to critiques before. Personally, they were never a stressful affair for me. The feedback I received was generally positive and always constructive. I don't know what its like for someone to be harassed, humilated, or otherwise hurt by a critique, which is why I probably didn't even stop to think about the medium I was using to convey my critique.

Perhaps after Eric has had a chance to respond to our comments, I'll summarize my comments to him. For now, I guess, my adoring fans will have to cope with the fact that I have fallen from grace and have shamed myself.

Wes Gone Mad!!

2 August 2006. Wednesday. 1:10 pm.

While I was finishing up my lunch, Wes walked up to the lab door in front of me... and then started toss a pen at it! For a moment, I thought the poor boy had gone crazy as he repeatedly threw the broad side of the pen at the door. Then I realized he was just experimenting, trying to get a better idea of how basic physics work.

In other news, our engine is having some growing pains. Right now Sean is taking a look at it; our recent additions to the system are causing some cryptic compile errors.

So, the question is... who do I bug first?

Major Bump in the Road

26 July 2006. Wednesday. 5:44 pm.

Well, right now, I'm just kind of chilling after having a lengthy discussion with Sean regarding control. Basically, this is what our issue is: How do we tell the robots in the game what to do without connecting everything in the system to each other?

If we change the robot directly in response to input, how will the rest of the system be informed of the change? How do we tell the robot what it is to interact with without making the robot or the control scheme being too dependent upon world representation? How do we factor in the fact that things will be networked?

There's a lot of questions that are coming up, largely because we began building our prototype from the ground up without doing any top-down design. Though this is understandable since we didn't know what sort of packages we would be relying on, now that we've made all the major decisions, I think its time we finally bite the bullet and write up a draft of the entire system.

In the mean time, I joked with Wes about making our sound track be "Let's Get Physical!" Later in the conversation, Wes suggested a great idea for coming up with sound effects: we could just throw things at each other. (Anyone else see a pun there?) He seems to be doing alright; hopefully he'll have something soon for us to look at...

You are all my Pawns!

24 July 2006. Monday. 6:00 pm.

Frustrated with how Flash / C++ went and having not been needed by Sean, I decided to explore a different avenue of "skill development." I took a look at Autodesk's 3ds Max, the tool our artists are using to create our models.

I did a very basic tutorial in which I created a chess pawn. The program, though complex and multi-faceted, appears to be fairly intuitive. If my home computer performed better, I'd probably get a copy and learn to use it in my spare time. In the meantime, I hope I can get my hands into some form of art project; not that I don't mind coding, but it'd be great if I could express my creativity in a more tangible form. (Shame I don't have any musical composition skills. We will definitely need someone to do our sound track.)

Well, time to call it a day...

Flash & C++

24 July 2006. Monday. 4:57 pm.

My recent work has been to research if and how to integrate a Flash based interface with a C++ program. My research has lead to a series of dead-ends unfortunately... I do know now that it is possible to mix the two; in fact there are serveral approaches. However, using any of them effectively is beyond my capabilities...

First, there is GameSWF, which sounds like a good option. However, I have not been able to get it to compile properly, despite several seperate attempts.

There is also the approach detailed here: codeproject.com. I've gotten it to work, though it only will display bitmap symbols for some odd reason. The other drawback is that I don't have a clue how I am supposed to actually code the behavior.

It has been suggested that I post on various forums. Having searched several appropriate forums, however, I find the answer to the rather general question "How do I use Flash with C++" is the solutions I discussed above.

In the end, I really wonder if its worth the effort? I know Eric definitely has the skills with Flash needed to generate a GUI as do I. But do any of us have the knowledge and experience needed to hook it up with the rest of our system?

First Entry

21 July 2006. Friday. 1:40 pm.

I did it. I made my first professional blog entry... actually, it was just writing a profile for myself. Hopefully Eric will move it to the right place later. ;)

As tempting as it is to just sit here and type all day, I think I should get back to work, namely figuring out how to integrate a Flash GUI with a C++ program...

Profile

21 July 2006. Friday. 1:38 pm.

= Personal =
Gender: Male
Age: 24 (Born Oct. 15, 1981)
Hometown: Belmont, NY
Current Residence: Rochester, NY

= Education =
Bachelor in Computer Information Systems from Elmira College (2004)
Masters in Computer Science from Rochester Institute of Technology (Soon!)

= Work Experience =
Student Lab Consultant for Academic Computing at Elmira College (2000 - 2004)
Teaching Assistant for Information Technology Department (2004) and the Reality And Programming Together program of the Computer Science Department (2005)

= Hobbies =
Game design
Video games (RPGs, Platforming, Party Games)
Reading and writing Science Fiction and Fantasy novels
Drawing and other visual art forms
Studying religion, particularly Buddhism

= Life Philosophy =
- Honesty is the best policy... and the key to lasting happiness
- Know thyself and ye shall know all
- Comformity is the root of all evil
- To "think outside the box", you must not think of boxes at all
- Choas is a human invention
- Compassion is giving others what they need, not what they want

= What I Hope To Achieve at TribeMind =
- Make games that everyone can enjoy
- Create unique game systems that provide new experiences
- Challenge the current trend towards minimal innovation and conventional content
- Exploring and expressing my creative abilities
- Produce games in an environment that encourages individual expression and promotes equality amongst employees