So I’m coordinating an off-season animation competition. It starts now and runs to August 18th. Similar to previous years in the FIRST competition, you are allowed to do whatever you want to until August 18th, when you have to have sent me a CD with the animation on it. Unlike FIRST, you can use whatever codec you want to encode your CD. However, if I don’t have the codec, I won’t be able to watch your animation, so if you think that I might
not have the codec, you should either include the codec on the CD or provide instructions on how to get the codec. After getting the CDs, a group of judges will watch each animation and send back comments to the team that made it on what was done well and what could be improved. Depending on how much free time I have, there may also be prizes, either for best overall animation or for best in each of the three areas that FIRST looks at(creativity, content, technical). With permission, the animations will be put up somewhere on the web, for all to see and marvel at.
So, you ask, what is this animation supposed to be about? Well, because this is effectively training for FIRST, it’s going to be a 30 second commercial. And because you are all robotics people, it’s going to be a commercial for robots. The kind of robot that you advertise is left to you, and may or may not be possible using current technology. Household robot, c3po-ish robot, killer death robot of DOOM, whatever. So that’s it. Make up a robot, make a 30 second commercial for it. Sounds simple, right?
But this is training, so we are actually going to help. Firstly, you can always email me at Eagle “DOT” Kessler “AT” gmail “DOT” com and ask for help about anything (ideas, tech issues, scripts, storyboards, whatever). I check my email compulsively, so I will probably respond within a few hours. Secondly, the GRTv Quality Control Team (danielab “AT” gmail “DOT” com and erica “DOT” mccay “AT” gmail “DOT” com) has kindly volunteered to provide the same high-quality Quality Control service that they provide for GRTv, which means that you can send them frames of animation and they will send you back long lists of everything that needs to be fixed, ranging from (to pull some examples from last year) “The cards are going through stuff” to “The kitchen would look better in light blue rather than white” to “There should be actual stuff on the keyboard keys”. If they start getting really nit picky, you are doing well. I have found that it helps the animation look much better to go through and follow their suggestions, even the really nit picky ones.
So that I have an idea of how many teams are doing this, please email me telling me that you are entering an animation. Please tell other teams in your area about this, because we want as many teams as possible to be involved.
So, in summery, you have until August 18th to mail me a CD with a 30 second commercial for a robot on it. You can email me for help with anything, the GRTv Quality Control staff is standing by to critique your animations, and you should send me email if you want to participate.
Please mail CDs to
Eagle Kessler
769 Los Robles Ave
Palo Alto, CA, 94306
Good Luck!
Eagle Kessler
GRTv Team Leader, 2003-2004