The University of Utah
At the University of Utah, I study Computer Science with an Emphasis in Entertainment Arts and Engineering. It prioritizes programming, but also delves students into digital arts, focusing on Animation in Video Games and Film.
I always loved video games as a young man; however, as I have aged into my adult life, I have strayed my time away from games. My true passion is to work in animation for film. I am inspired by the magnificent works and creations of successful production companies such as Pixar Studios, Disney Animation, Dreamworks Entertainment, and Industrial Light & Magic. Video Game companies I aspire to work for are Rockstar Games, Electronic Arts, or Activision.
The University of Utah has made quite a name for itself in the Computer Science (CompSci) field. The U played a key role in the creation of what is known today as the Internet. Ed Catmull, a successful Alum from the CompSci department at the U, is one of the co-founders of Pixar Studios.
I always loved video games as a young man; however, as I have aged into my adult life, I have strayed my time away from games. My true passion is to work in animation for film. I am inspired by the magnificent works and creations of successful production companies such as Pixar Studios, Disney Animation, Dreamworks Entertainment, and Industrial Light & Magic. Video Game companies I aspire to work for are Rockstar Games, Electronic Arts, or Activision.
The University of Utah has made quite a name for itself in the Computer Science (CompSci) field. The U played a key role in the creation of what is known today as the Internet. Ed Catmull, a successful Alum from the CompSci department at the U, is one of the co-founders of Pixar Studios.
Fall 2010
I only took two courses in my introductory semester at the university. However, I concurrently attended my final semester at the community college.
Spring 2011
As of Spring 2011, I was officially a university student. I dived right into my major and balanced my workload with a mix of technical courses and courses leaning more toward the artistic side.
CS 1410 - Object-Oriented ProgrammingThis course is a big test for computer science students. This is the course responsible for the major's high drop out rating. This class was difficult at times, but the instructor was some sort of mad computer scientist/genius. I really admired my professor, Peter Jensen. We did a lot of fun projects in this course and we learned a lot as programmers. We focused on the programming language Java.
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CS 3660 - Interactive MachinimaSay what? Machina-huh? ...Machinima is a way of making small movies with the use of a video game engine. It's actually used all the time in the video game industry. Say there's a small segment of story you need to tell without the players involvement. Rather than paying up the wazoo for massively powerful animation and rendering software (like AutoDesk's Maya) and recreating the characters and the environment in a whole new realm, just use what you've already got built within your video game engine. Just about every game uses machinima these days, especially RPGs (Role-Playing Games).
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PRT 3430 - The Global Citizen
This was a general studies course. I chose this course, mostly because more relevant courses were unavailable to me and my difficult schedule and late registration, but I love humanities and anthropology and if were to not go into something technical or artsy, it would be anthropology. This online course taught students a wide variety of subjects in global tourism. We covered tourist behavior in certain regions, various global conflicts, safe and wise travel, various forms of tourism, and various impacts of tourism.
Summer 2011
Summer enrollment was a must for me in 2011. Without it, I wouldn't have been able to claim my major and would have put myself out a year of progress toward my degree. I took two 4 credit courses, which is basically a full workload in the condensed schedule of the summer semester.
CS 2420 - Introduction to Algorithms and Data StructuresThis was an important step in the technical direction of computer science. We continued to use Java programming and designed 8 different data structures in about 10 weeks. We learned how to implement and utilize java's built-in data structures as well as build our own. We covered arrays, matrices, ArrayLists, LinkedLists, Binary Search Trees, Heaps, Chained Heaps, Hash Tables, and a few others. Looking back, I learned a lot about data organization from this course, and will more than likely use this stuff in the future.
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Film 3500 - Film Production IThis course was project based. Students worked on their own in writing their own stories, gathering a crew, hiring actors, film scheduling, location spotting, filming, directing, and editing. It was a major workload for each individual student. We learned a lot in this crash course of filmmaking. I came out with two decent films, too.
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