University of Oregon - Department of Architecture - ARCH 424/524 Cheng - Advanced Design Development Media

Session Seventeen

Heightening expressive communication

Mar 4, 1997


Objectives: To understand some techniques for computer mediated communication

I. Check-in/Help on VDS

A. Hypernews PLACES

B. Chat rooms

See Tip of the week

C. Desktop Video-Conferencing

D. Internet Phone
Download and try the demo for 14 days free or get it from the Course Disks' Shareware folder.

II. Posting 3D Files

Two objectives: browsing (VRML) vs. working (original file format or DXF) For joint work from a common model,
  1. Figure out what common file formats you share with your partners.
    UBC mostly Mac FormZ
    HKU mostly IBM-PC AutoCAD, 3DStudio, access to Mac FormZ, SGI Wavefront
  2. Choose the file translation which loses the least information (test w/ available tools)
  3. Post your file to your Website via Fetch
  4. Link in the URL of the file, or its directory

If more than one person works on the model simultaneously, conflicts about direction will need to be resolved.

III. Designing with Photoshop Image Processing II

A. Paths

B. Layers

Each layer has multiple color channels, so Photoshop format (PSP) files are very large.

IV. Using Photoshop Layers to create a 2D Animated GIF

  1. Get a copy of GIFBuilder from the Course Disks --> HOME --> NYC --> Shareware
  2. Plan the story line, aquire images to be combined.
  3. Open image files to be used, create a new layer for each file to be overlayed & paste them onto the layers.
  4. Use the ability to move layer elements and change transparency to create frames of the animation.

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edited Mar 3, 1997 by nywcheng