#CSCI 4229 Semester Project

Semester Project for Willem Schreuder's CSCI 4229 Computer Graphics Class

By Eric Horacek and Devon Tivona

##Overview

Meet Bug. He is a little robot who has been dropped in the middle of a very dark and spooky forest. He is attracted to fire, so tap anywhere on the ground to make a spark and he will chase after it. He also doesn't like bumping his head into trees, so he navigates around them to avoid damaging his circuits.

##Dependencies & Setup

This is an Xcode Project, so it must be compiled on a system running Mac OSX with an install of Xcode that has an iOS SDK of 5.0 or greater. This project uses the Cocos3D plugin for the Cocos2D framework, both of which are included in the project. These frameworks are thin wrappers around OpenGL ES 2.0 that allow us to write graphics code in Objective-C, automatically load models from .POD files, and establish dependence hierarchies between graphics objects.

This project uses CocoaPods to manage its dependencies. You must have the pod ruby gem installed to properly install and build this project's dependencies. To set up this project, run $ pod install in the root directory of this repo. See cocoapods.org for more information on this process.

##Building & Running

After you set up the project using the pod ruby gem, open the CSCI4229.xcworkspace in Xcode, and then build and run the CSCI4229 target using Command-R.

##Navigation Paradigm

To navigate the avatar around the 3D world, simply tap on the ground where you want him to go. A particle system will appear where the user taps, and then the avatar will travel to that location. Moreover, the program uses the A* Shortest Path algorithm to prevent the avatar from running into various objects around the scene when he is navigating the select location.

##Cameras

There are two ways to view the world in this technology demo. The default camera is a third-person camera that follows the avatar around as he moves. A drag gesture while in this view will rotate the camera round the avatar, so that you can see the entire world. When in this camera mode, you can use a pinch gesture to zoom in and out on the camera.

If you zoom in far enough, the camera will switch to a first-person mode, allowing you to see the world from the avatar's perspective. When you are in this camera perspective, a drag gesture will allow you to look around the world. To return to third person mode, use a pinch gesture.

When in third-person mode, you may also tap the avatar to enter first-person mode.

##Performance

Because this project and Cocos3D graphics library are meant to run on-device, this project will run slowly and will be somewhat hard to operate in the iPhone/iPad Simulator. You must run it on an iPhone or iPad for it to reach ~60 FPS. Additionally, the movement controls require input from multiple fingers simultaneously to explore the 3D world, which is nearly impossible on the iPhone Simulator.

##Screenshots