Amateur Astronomy

Since starting graduate school, I have found myself devoting more and more of my free time to activities that are far more stimulating than those of the years prior. I spend very little time playing games and watching TV, and far more time painting, crafting or building random things, and just plain reading and researching.

My father visited for graduation, and during his visit we dusted off a Celestron Nexstar 6SE that I had purchased a few years back. Space, astronomy, and the science surrounding them has always been one of my primary interests, but for whatever reason it had fallen to the side over the past couple years. We setup the telescope, and looking at Jupiter through the eyepiece was seductive enough that it not only recaptured my interest in astronomy, but it escalated it to a new level. After weeks of research I found myself purchasing an Explore Scientific ED102 Refractor, and shipping the Celestron off to my father for his use.

Escherreal

Escherreal

At long last, here we have footage of one of my current projects. This is Escherreal, a game I have been working on for the past 8 weeks as the lead programmer with a group of 13 other individuals. This footage represents 6 weeks of work inside of the Havok Vision game engine. Escherreal is a 3D/2D platforming puzzler in which the main character Raffi is forced to navigate the impossible world of MC Escher. At his disposal, Raffi has two objects called the Mirror Marble, and the Infinispecs. The Infinispecs provide Raffi with the ability to dynamically shift the perspective of the world from 3D, to a 2D orthographic. In this 2D mode, the world behaves just as you would expect it to in 2D, and objects that happen to align appropriately are interactive as you would expect them to be. The Mirror Marble gives Raffi the ability to change the orientation of the world, to whichever axis fits his needs. We have put a lot of effort into this vertical slice of the game, and are proud to present our current progress.