Employer: The Creative Assembly

Project: »Stormrise«

Tasks: The Videogame »Stormrise« is developed by the company »The Creative Assembly«. At the final stage of the project I get engaged as a QA to test the game and assure the quality. The game has to run stable. All missions must be playable with rising difficulty. The game is tested on X-BOX 360, Playstation 3 and Windows Vista.

Tasks:
• Test the game for bugs
• writing clear error reports in the handsoft database
• verify errors on request
• follow test plans and specific tests
• report balancing and graphical issues
• discuss errors with the team

My Part: Besides this task my main task is to test the localisation of the game. As a native German speaker I test the German version of the game. Reporting all typos and checking the sentences for the right grammar and the sence.

References: Kevin Wright, William Hamilton

Links: The Creative Assembly Stormrise
Stormrise official Community

download movie (12.2 MB)

Client: Sand Goanna

Project: Designing and building a “simple” web page that looks “professional” with a changing Flash Header. The content must be editable by the client.

Solution: Based on the „CMS” Wordpress I designed a theme with all the requests of the client and some more features.

My Part: Concept, Layout, Design of the Theme, Modifying some PHP and JavaScript code

References: Boyd Sparrow,

Link: www.sandgoanna.com.au

Client: Köln International School of Design (KISD)

Project: The school shootings happened in Erfurt (2002) and Emsdetten (2006) and many other places. People ask for the reason. Some politicians and media say that computer games are the cause. The politicians want to forbid these shooting games.

Solution: In my diploma thesis I created a social ad presenting a variety of problems that together can lead to school shootings. The focus of the media and the politicians should be spread from one possible reason to the whole variety of problems.

My Part: Idea, research, concept, lyrics, typography and layout of the documentation, storyboard, graphic, 3D models, rigging, textures, 3D animation, rendering, editing, composting, presentation.

References: Prof. Björn Bartholdy, Prof. Heiner Jacob

Downloads: German Documentation (8.0 MB)

Links:zehn-kleine-spielfiguren.de

download movie (12.7 MB)

Client: Electronic Arts Sports (notional)

Project: This Ad, made by »Köln international School of Design« students, was particular created for the Porsche International Student Advertising Film AWARD known as »DAVID«.

Solution: A potential advertisement for the video game »FIFA 06« from EA Sports. The Ad was also presented to Electronic Arts in Cologne.

My Part: Compositing, Camera (Making of)

References: Prof. Björn Bartholdy

download movie (3.7 MB)

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Client: Köln International School of Design (KISD)

Project: What did Cologne look like 2000 years ago? Answers to this question are being provided by a 3D reconstruction of Roman Cologne.

Solution: The unique research project Visualization of Roman Cologne has succeeded for the first time in producing, in real time, a model of the city at a certain point in time that is fully navigable in its entirety. It is now possible to stroll through the whole of Roman Cologne, to see the buildings in their actual urban context and to walk around them.

My task is to construct the terrain model. This would be the “building site” for the model of the ancient city. It was a great surprise to see from the present-day topographical model that one can still clearly make out the ancient city extents, i.e. the flood-safe plain on which the Romans founded the original city. All the known historical topographical variations were eliminated from the current model. Additionally, the topography was adjusted to the available findings. Where there was no available data, it was interpolated.

Feedback: Press reviews in German

My Part: Terrain model (3D), part of the presentation

References: Dipl. Des. Michael Eichhorn

Links: www.colonia3d.de www.wdr.de/studio/koeln/lokalzeit

Client: Baden-Württemberg Film Academy

Project: At the »Institut of Animation«, part of the »Filmakademie Baden-Wuerttemberg« is a »Artificial Actors« (2003-2006) Research and Development project. A team of Artist and Programmers develop new ways to enhance facial animation. In this team I work as a 3D-Artist and get the task to create hair for the 3D-Character »Selina«.

Solution: Setting up the hair with »Joe Alters Shave and a Haircut« for »Autodesk Maya«.

My Part: Hair, Animation

References: Volker Helzle

download movie (3.2 MB)

Client: Self Initiated

Project: Building a virtual 3D-Version of me.

Solution: Using high resolution data from a 3D Scanner as reference and the animation tools from the »Artificial Actors« research project of the Institute of Animation I build a 3D Model of my head in Maya. The model has a rigg and animation controls.

My Part: Idea, 3D-Model

References: Volker Helzle

Project Status: unfinished | Work in Progress

download movie (7.3 MB)

Client: Köln International School of Design (KISD)

Project: Building a 3D-Model of a object as per-visualization.

Solution: A 3D-Model of the Airbus A400M transport plane, which is not finished yet.

My Part: 3D-Model, rendering, composting, presentation.

References: Michael Eichhorn

Downloads:German Documentation (1 MB)

Client: KISD – »Köln -> Koblenz« Project

Project: Creating a DVD Menu.

Solution: The »Köln -> Koblenz« Project was all about working with audio visual media while traveling. Three groups, equipped with notebooks and cameras, travel from Köln to Koblenz and back. They have the task to Produce a short Video while they are on tour. One group travels by Car another one by Train and one by boat. The result were heaps of little short Clips.

I made one of these Clips and the DVD including the Menu. A little touristic Plastic TV became some kind of mascot for this Project. Based on this Plastic TV I create a DVD Menu.

The Project was presented at the »Orgatec«Fair in 2004.

My Part: Camera, editing, Web page, DVD Menu, 3D-Model

References: Prof. Björn Bartholdy

Link: groups.kisd.de/koelnkoblenz

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Client: M. Night Shyamalan (notional)

Project: Redesign of the original title sequence from the movie »Signs« written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan.

Solution: The font and style used by the marketing campaign for the movie is animated to the Music. Pictures of crop circles in the background introduce the viewer to the theme of the movie. The crop circles are discovered and analyzed by humans and appear more and more often…

My Part: Idea, Concept, Editing, Layout, Composition

References: Prof. Björn Bartholdy

Downloads: German Documentation (3.5 MB)

download movie (10.3 MB)

download movie

Client: Sony (notional)

Project: The small robotic dog from Sony, the »AIBO« (Artificial Intelligence BOt), is used as a mascot of the Sony Corporation in print and TV advertisement for other Sony products. The AIBO itself has bad sales figures in Germany. Sony seeks for new marketing concepts to advertise the AIBO itself. Sony emphasizes that the Bot must be advert as a friend of human.

Solution: The concept is to advert AIBO with TV-Sponsoring clips. The AIBO ads are fitting to the theme of the feature film to merge the ad better to the TV Program. A 8 sec. long clip announces the movie, which is presented by Sony and AIBO. After a commercial break the AIBO wishes furthermore good entertainment and completing the AIBO recalls who presented the feature film.

Feedback: Sony showed interest and presented the Ads on the »IFA« 2003 in Berlin. The Ads were also shown on the »FMX« »Eyes And Ears Junior Showcase« in Stuttgart

My Part: Idea, 3D-models, rigging, Mocap data, textures, 3D-animation, rendering, editing, composting, presentation.

References: Prof. Björn Bartholdy, Stefan Terlinden

Downloads:German Documentation (1.0 MB)

download movie (15.2 MB)

Client: Sony (notional) / KISD

Project: Building and Animating a 3D-Alien for the AIBO Project within a few days.

Solution: Using a free 3D Model as a reference for the Alien. Building a Alien head and mounting it to the Model. Building a Animation Rig with Character Studio. Using Motion Capture Animation data to animate the Aliens. All done in 3DS Max.

My Part: Idea, 3D-Model, Rig, Texture

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download movie (4.6 MB)

download movie (0.6 MB)

Client: mARTin Bierschenk

Project: Design a personal brand »be your own brand«.

Solution: Create a personal brand based on

• competencies (What the person stands for),
• on standards (What the person is committed to) and
• style (How the person represent to others)

In this process I also created the Logo »mARTin^®«, the claim »ART in motion« and a 3D Animation for the Logo, the core values and the claim and a font type.

My Part: Idea, Concept, Core Values, Brand Definition, Logo, Claim, 3D-Animation

References: Prof. Dr. Brigitte Wolf

Downloads:

English presentation (0.1MB)German Documentation (0.5MB)

download movie (3.9 MB)

Client: DLR (notional)

Project: Building a useful 3D-Web application, using the Shockwave-Player.

Solution: Creation of a product presentation and 3D Game for a fictive future vehicle Based on the page of the DLR (German Aerospace Center). Modeling and Game done with 3DS Max and Director.

Group: Michael Malitz, Martin Bierschenk, Sahin Demir

My Part: Idea, 3D-Model, Shokwave implementation, Havok-Physik-Engine

References: Richard Jungkunz, Michael Eichhorn

Link: Project Page

Downloads: German Documentation (0.5 MB)