(PROJECT TERRA) The Birth of a World

Hello! My name is Mike Gratis Jr., and I am currently taking Rick Davidson’s “Finish It!” Course. Let me just say that it has changed my life for the better, and set me straight in my priorities. I do apologize ahead of time for anyone who has already seen any of this, as I have posted it in the “Finish It!” Q&A section, but I have decided (after completing Section 3 / Lecture 42 ‘Your MVP’) to finally post it here. I am really interested in what you guys have to say! Suggestions, comments, criticisms, ANYTHING! I like feedback, and I like to give feedback, so if you have something you’d like an opinion on, please feel free to ask me to take a look! Anyways, here goes!

Killing Distractions

Michael · a month ago

Well. I feel like I’m 50 pounds lighter, and I have cut some 'ropes that were holding me back. The emptiness will subside with time, and my productivity will be majorly apparent. Things I have done:

Uninstalled 4 games on steam that I had accumulated over 700 hours in …(don’t judge me)

-The Elder Scrolls Online
-Space Engineers
-Elite Dangerous
-EVE Online

Setup a ‘Double Browser’ system, using Chrome for ‘Entertainment’ and ‘Firefox’ for ‘work’ (even going so far as to create a new e-mail address so that none of my old stuff interferes with my logins)

Obviously (as requested) Killed all Computer Notifications (This part was actually quite liberating…TAKE THAT FACEBOOK!)

Made plans to head over to the Library near my house at LEAST three days a week so that I have a change of atmosphere (and a quieter work area)

This I have committed to doing for the next 30 days, starting as of 02/12/2019 at 10:51 AM EST (a Tuesday)

((I wasn’t sure if there was a discussion section here, so this is where it got posted. Apologies if this is the incorrect location, and if it is, I would appreciate the link to the area where it belongs, so that I may remedy the situation. Many Thanks!))

Switching to Flow

Michael · a month ago

Whenever I need to get ‘into the zone’, I will do one (or more) of the following:

-Exercise immediately prior to release endorphins and feel accomplished.
-Put on some kicking music, or some fantasy tracks, or some eerie horror vibes. Evil villain music…
-Wake up early and get to work (Consequently, get to bed earlier.)

The Promise.

Michael · a month ago

YES. I, Michael J. Gratis Jr. will, for the next 7 days, only promise to do something if I am 100% certain I will get it DONE!

(I got the chills there…)

WHAT - GAINING MOMENTUM

Michael · 24 days ago

For each day that I’ll be working over the next 7 days, these are the SINGLE most important tasks for me to finish (not “work on” but “finish”).

—Monday: Go through your ‘First Try’ sector map in ‘AstroSynthesis’ and find a suitable star system for your planet. (If there are too many, try finding one with a single star, and a planet in the habitable zone.)

—Tuesday: Make sure all of the information on the system correlates to correct scientific evidence. (Distances, Gravity, Atmosphere, Rotation, Axial Tilt, ect.)

—Wednesday: Recreate the system you chose from ‘AstroSynthesis’ in ‘Universe Sandbox’ (Transfer data as accurately as possible. It is unnecessary to go any further into detail than the base data on the star and the planets. No need to map terrain or put in moons or asteroids at this point.)

—Thursday: Troubleshoot any issues with the data or the transfer (if any). Finish up the system if you haven’t from Yesterday. If there are no issues, you can take a breather for the day (…if you want)

—Friday: Read up on Plate Tectonics in ‘The Planet Construction Kit’ and ‘World-Building’. Try to find (and watch) that video you saw on YouTube about plotting their movement and separation from a single landmass to multiple plates

—Saturday: Become comfortable with ‘Fractal Terrains’ and decide if you want to start making the terrain via the ‘single landmass into multiple plates’ OR begin with a generated fractal map, and work backwards in time (basically guessing, but having a little more control over) until you can bring them together into a single landmass. (NOTE: you do not have to start to make the actual map to complete this task.)

—Sunday: After making the decision on Saturday, come up with a base map to use for the creation process. (If starting from a single landmass, then make a base map for THAT. If starting from a generated map and working backwards, generate THAT base map. It would be a good idea to go so far as defining the plates, but no other detail is necessary at this point.)

When written as user stories, over the next 7 days I will be completing the following:

—Monday: A person will finally be able to visually see and pick out the star (from a sector of space with 219 systems) where our world will exist, and our story will begin.

—Tuesday: Mike will have all of the stellar data and technical information to begin setting up a mock model of the star system.

—Wednesday: A person will finally be able to see the star, orbits, planets, and asteroid belt in a graphical way. It gives a more defined view of ‘place’.

—Thursday: Completed fly-through video of the solar system with music to showcase how the star system is set up. Going for a WOW! Factor. (Somewhat achieved)

—Friday: Mike will research and take notes on plate tectonics and continental drift to prepare for the creation of a terrain map for the habitable planet.

—Saturday: Mike will have a firm understanding of plate tectonics and continental drift (enough to make a feasible blueprint of the planet crust, and what plates need to go where. (Basically a continuation of Friday, as this will require quite a bit of planning and knowledge) ((MAKE SURE YOU ARE NOT SPENDING TO MUCH TIME ON IT! Progress needs to be made.))

—Sunday: Mike will chart a base map of the plates that exist on the planetary surface and whether they are continental or oceanic.

PROJECT TERRA

Michael · 8 days ago

Okay, so I know it has been a while since I posted here, but a lot of life has been going on (moving, working, and so on and what not) I have finally had time to sit down and post to you guys about the things I have accomplished on my Project. I now have an Accountability Buddy, and we have a schedule set up, and are making commitments and consequences regularly. I am happy to say that I have not had to paint my fingernails hot pink yet, and I plan on never having to do that. I really dislike that consequence, and in no way want to see it come to fruition. On that note, here are some of the things I have accomplished so far, and I have gained the momentum to consistently carry on with it. Thank you for this course, Rick. I am into Section 4 now, and will definitely keep you posted as things progress!

A Few Shots of my work on the Plate Tectonics of the Planet in Preparation for the Terrain Map Features

2/16/19 3:24 PM EST

Okay, so I kind of threw this together, but this took a LOT of time to complete, so I thought the little bit of epic music was worth it for me. It might not look like much to you guys, but this is a hand crafted sector of space which I kind of labored over. It contains 219 star systems, 5604 celestial bodies (including the 331 stars, 3468 terrestrial planets, 320 moons, 205 belts, 343 rings 313 gas giants and 624 asteroids) and is the base for the setting I will be creating for the story (and eventually the short animated film) I will be writing. WOOT! Displayed are most of the 219 systems, only some of which are labeled due to the light-years of distance between the camera and the stars. This is really just the bare bones. I will eventually localize on a single system, and flesh that out piece by piece (star, planetary maps, moon maps, and asteroids). Next post should be a rundown of the system, and the focal planet for the story. Then the process of creating the plate tectonics, the climates, the seasons, and the weather and constellations. After that will come a closer look at the planet itself, as it will begin at the start of the story. Just a tiny step on an incredible journey.

(Best if watched full screen, and even then it is a little grainy because of the sheer amount of information that had to be rendered.)

2/21/19 8:02PM EST

I’ve been busy. Finally got a majority of the basic Star System Modeled and transferred between two separate programs I used. AstroSynthesis for the 219 Star Systems and numerous other celestial bodies. Then for the Nallae Star System (where I am placing the planet I will be focusing on) I used The Universe Sandbox (older version) Then transferred the data , piece by piece, MANUALLY (because all the import methods I tried failed). I had to do a few conversions for differences between the programs (As in, AstroSynth uses radius to measure the size of a planet, and Universe Sandbox uses circumference. And then there was the whole ‘ratio compared to Earth’ calculations I had to do to get a basic measurement. Oh the joy…) After that, I had trouble trying to get a completed movie file out of Universe Sandbox for this clip here, so I ended up rendering a metric big ton of PNG images and then importing them all into Blender’s (YAY!) Video Editor. Got a little practice there as well, which is good. After searching the web for a nice CC0 track to put it to, this was the result. I hope you enjoy it. I enjoyed making it.

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