# Week 11 — Tuesday, November 3 ### Project 2 Review · Project 3 kickoff · Portfolio gap revisited --- ## Focus Present the technique demonstration. Then reread your Week 3 portfolio gap statement and turn it into a project brief. --- ## Due today — before 9:00 AM **Project 2 — Final Render (10 points)** 1. The finished demo piece, exported to submission standards 2. Technique visibility breakdown — node graph, debug view, turntable, or before/after 3. Process documentation 4. Written reflection, 500–750 words --- ## Bring to class - Everything loaded and ready before 9:00 - **Your Week 3 portfolio review and gap statement** — reread it before class - Your online portfolio, open --- ## In class **Formal Project 2 reviews.** Both students present, both attend both reviews. Written instructor critique in addition to verbal notes. Present the demo piece, then the tutorial, then take questions. Expect to be asked to explain the technique verbally — which is exactly the interview question you have spent five weeks preparing for without necessarily realizing it. **Project 3 kickoff.** The assignment: an original piece that fills a gap in your portfolio, or demonstrates a skill a real job posting requires that your portfolio does not currently show. **Gap statement revisited.** We reread what you wrote in Week 3 and test it against what has happened since: - Is the gap you identified still the right gap? - Did Projects 1 and 2 partly close it? - Did they reveal a different gap you did not see in September? - Which pieces from this semester belong in the portfolio, and which do not? **Job posting review**, if you saved one. Which named requirement does your portfolio not currently demonstrate? **Scope conversation.** Five weeks, one of which is finals week. This is where scope gets set correctly or the project runs into trouble. --- ## Before next week 1. **Write the gap statement for Project 3.** Specific: not "I need environment work" but "every environment I have is stylized and my target studios do grounded realism, so I need one grounded realistic environment in Unreal with performance evidence." 2. **15–20 thumbnails or explorations.** More than the previous projects asked for — this is the one where concept exploration actually matters. 3. **Build the reference board.** 4. **Draft the technical and capture plans.** 5. **Thumbnails due next Tuesday.** --- ## Note — the gap is the brief Project 3 is graded substantially on the argument, not just the artifact. A technically strong piece that does not connect to a real gap scores lower than a modest piece that closes a gap precisely. So do the analysis before the concept. Open your portfolio, ask what job it currently qualifies you for, ask what job you want, and name the difference. That difference is your brief. Starting from an idea and reverse-engineering a justification is transparent, and it usually produces a fourth piece of the kind you already had three of.