Final evaluation . 

My Project Overview

What did i set out to create?

For my final project I set out to make a bus depot using real life depots for a reference to make my own this would cover a road around the outside of the depot fencing and a building as well

What was my chosen focus for this project ?

My chosen focus was environment art 

What tools and software did I use?

For software used I used Maya , unreal engine , photoshop , substance painter 3D and substance designer 3D 

Who was is intended Target Audience?

For my target audience mainly was art station as this was environment art 

What specific skills did i improve?

I learnt mostly a bit about photo shop as I have not really used photo shop in the past that much and then I spent a lot of my time using substance painter 3D learning how to add hight maps to textures I have made as well as substance designer to make textures to go into substance painter I also improved my skills in maya I latent how to use the sweeps mesh to make a mesh follow a curve as well learning a bit more about unreal engine as I wanted to add road making I discorved that you can make a decal and place it on the model and that it will take texture below the decal 

How did my skill level change over time?

At the start of the final major project my skills not improve as fast as I would had hoped they would of however to the end of the final mayor project they did start to see a big impermeant this can be see when it came to texturing the floor of the depot I was doing the texturing a long winded way that lead to unreal engine starting to run out of memory for the texter streaming pool Hower to the end of the of the final major project I found a better to do this leading to a faster way to layout some texters I wanted using decals the other part that I felt did not improve at the speed I wanted was my understanding of the maya when trying to make the fence I got stuck and spent a lot of time trying to get this to look just right however this also links into my research skills and that if I was better at asking the right questions into google I might of found about the sweeps mesh tool sooner and saved a lot of time 

How did i approach my work?

What stages did I go through? 

I approached by starting with initial idea’s I had 3 ideas the first idea I had was to make a bus (ALD E400 MMC) first bus spec (yes there is a difference in the interior) the second idea was to make a house inspired by up the last idea is a bus depot. next in my workflow I started to research bus depots mostly images to see how a bus depot is set out and how I work out the size once I think I have done sufficient research to make a pitch this was completed using pages (apples PowerPoint software) and I then displayed this to a small group of my pears this allowed me to collected their feedback and address any concerns that they might have. Then I started a bit more research this is to cover for the practical side so of the work then I moved onto the block out of the depot this covered the very core parts of the environment then after the I have done the block out I moved onto detailing the assets as well as working on making the textures while looking a weekly reviews of my work to see how well it is coming along this way I can see how much I have done against how much I have left to do and how likely it will be completed in time

What tools, methods and workflows did I use and were they effective and did they cause any problems? 

With methods in my workflow I would say I did not really have a set method this might of indirectly affected the speed of production I did try to use google sheets to track how far my progress had been coming along however this got over complicated by myself thus I think I need to find a better tools and ways to improve my workflow 

Did I follow any structure?

I have to be honest and admit I did not follow and structure I started to but this failed and I forgot about this as well I do think this is something I need to work on in any project I undertake as I plan to go to university in September (2026) and not having any structure or workflow is not going to help me at all 

How did I structure my project over the time I had to complete?

The plan for structuring my project over time was to list all the assets I wanted to make and list them order of priority using google sheets however this also did not last very long and I started over complecting this overall I would say that need to work on find a way to structure my project as over all I tend to start in a nice clear and easy to follow manner and the I start to slip into doing anything in any order this dose not help me or anyone else trying to follow what it is I am doing and I then end up going back over what I have done to try and clean it all up.

Did i meet my planned deadlines and milestones or did I not meet them?

Yes I did in the sense that I made the bus depot but no at the same time I wanted to work on the building with the inside modelled fully however due to time management I did not complete everything I wanted in time 

How did i manage my time effectively across the project?

At the start of the project my time management was good everything had a set time to complete by but as time when on I got stuck and wasted time working on this one thing when I should of put it to the side and worked on everything else can came back to it or looked a new way of doing it to keep things moving 

Did my planning resalt in changing my plans during production?

Yes my plan was to make the inside of the building fully but I changed that do only the front 30%

What caused these changes and why?

What caused this change in my planning it was the use of time management I did a sort review on how well I was doing and I found that I was behind and other sections of the my project needed more work or had yet to be started this was a sad desion I had to make as I wanted to do the inside 

How did my planning and production decisions impact my final outcome?

I found that the decisions I made in the project had a big impact on this project more so than my last project form last year I feel that I should of used the layout form last year and the work flow to help me with this project the overall impact lead the final outcome not being the best I was able to achieve 

What challenges did i face? 

I faced a challenge with in maya trying to get a fence to follow the bend in the road I made and this took me some thing to find a way that worked for me

The Technical, Creative and Time management?

How did i solve them?

With this technical challenge I spent over a week looking online to see if anyone else has done what I was trying to do after some time I came across sweep mesh this allowed me to get the fence the follow the same curve as the road

What did those solutions change or impact in the project?

This overall wasted a fair amount of time and lead to other parts of my project that I wanted to do being delayed 

Did i need to adapt your approach when something did not work and how?

Yes I need to do more research to help me adapt and find a new approach to my project  

How did my idea change over time?

Over time like my last final major project I kept to my idea with little to no changes 

Did I need to scale anything up or down in my projects overall scope?

Yes I had to scale down the level of detail that went into making the main building 

What had a direct influenced my decisions to do this ?

This was mainly due to how long it took me to make the fencing around the perimeter of the depot this used up a lot development time

What did I learn about?

I learnt about new ways to texture and detail assets In unreal engine by making use of the decals option within unreal engine 5.6.1 as well using maya sweeps mesh 

How do I find that I work best?

I find that I work best by modelling and reasserting as I go however this can lead to me forgetting to document this research that I have done 

My creativity?

With creativity I found that I was able to be more creative however also having more time might have been of help

My time management?

However my time management could have been management in a more efinent way 

What worked well for me and what didn’t work well for me ?

Most of what I did worked fairly well for me somethings did not work so well such as in the modelling side I found that trying to make the mesh follow a cruvr was harder then I believed it was going to be on the other hand the rest of the depot modelling this worked fairly well with a only minor adjustments being needed 

If I was to restart?

What would i change?

If I was to restart the FMP(final mayor project ) I would look to work to a real depot to scale over making my own depot based of real life depots this would allow me have a set plan with set sections to made in a set order  

What would I keep the same if I was to resart?

I would keep most of the research the same however as I found a lot of technical drawing of the bus deports that would play in hand if was to make there depot .I would still use maya and unreal engine photoshop and substance painter 3D I would look to use a dynamic scope starting what is needed the most and incising the scope of the project as more is completed and with my planning I would plan without using a dynamic scope my planning would cover everything I wanted to do within my project 

What had the biggest impact on my final outcome?

I have found that time has had the biggest effect on my project over all time lead to parts of the scope being dropped however time is was not the only factor  the way I approached this projected was not well planned out this might of improved the overall time wasted 

What decisions improved or limited my project?

I found that looking back the main decision that limited my project was that I spent more time than I should of on one section of my project instead of finding a different way or rethinking it overall this is something I need to work on going 

My conclusion and action plan

In conclusion there is a lot I needed to improve on the main area’s are scope this is something that needs to have a better plan and my overall planning (lack of planning) planning is something I have never really been to good at and this is a skill that will befit me not just in my educational study’s at college but also when I go to univeity and in any job where planning is needed I do like the idea of a dynamic scope this is where I work out what is needed and what I would like to add and then base this over time spent again time left over for each section of my project and then for the overall project I also think I need to make sure I make use of project tracking software. Actions for any next project make use of better planning research time management look at how a game studio would build there environments and see how I can apply this to my project look into find a better way of researching in a way that allows me to keep a informed actions within the project over working out what might work as well as having a section for documenting research for software that I am using as well I will conclude that I felt that I did better with my FMP last year than this year and I would have worked with my feedback form last year the final renders I have taken look really god and I am happy with the outcome I just think I could and should have done better 

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