Overview

The final project presentation is your opportunity to showcase all the work that you’ve put into your final project over the past few weeks. Note that one half of your project grade (10% of your course grade) is based on the final presentation, and one quarter of your project grade (5% of your course grade) is based on the associated final project report. The remaining quarter of your project grade (5% of your course grade) has already been decided based on your milestone report.

This document serves as a reference and guide for preparing and delivering your final presentation and report to maximize your success.

Logistics

Final project presentations will take place Thursday, August 11th, in Bishop Auditorium, from 1-7pm. Non-SCPD students are required to attend the presentations for the entire duration; the only exception is for students who have finals on Friday, August 12th, who may depart early from the presentations (these students are advised to present as early as possible).

We will soon be distributing a sign-up sheet with timeslots for presentations. One member of your group should register your team’s presentation on the sign-up sheet. Please note that all groups will have the same amount of presentation time, regardless of group size; be sure to divide your presentation fairly between group members.

Project presentations will be graded live by the teaching staff. Each staff member will score your presentation, and your final presentation score will be the mean of the judges’ scores. Roughly speaking, the judges will grade on the amount of work done, the project’s technical depth, the aesthetics of the results, and the overall execution of the project.

Final project reports are due via email to the course staff by Friday, August 12th, at 11:59pm.

Warning: we cannot accept late presentations or late report submissions (they will receive a score of 0). It is your responsibility to submit your work on time.

Warning: If you have a non-standard video connector on your computer (for example, a MacBook), please bring an adapter cable! The room will likely have VGA and HDMI, but it is up to you to make sure you can present with the room’s projector equipment.

Presentation Guidelines

Final project presentations should be no more than 4 minutes. Presentations that exceed this time limit will be stopped mercilessly at 4 minutes - time yourself and practice if necessary to avoid getting cut off! After your presentation, one minute will be reserved for Q&A. Both the judges and your peers may ask questions during this time. During the Q&A session, the next group of presenters should connect their laptop to the projector and get ready to present. Due to the large number of final projects, we must make the transition process between groups as efficient as possible.

A good general outline for the final project presentation is:

Title slide
Problem statement
Mention your sources if e.g. you’re implementing a research paper
How your project is related to graphics / the class
Description of algorithm / other technical things you did to create your project (e.g. if you hand-modeled some things in Maya)
You could include some intermediate result pictures, e.g. a screenshot of your scene setup in Maya
Final results
Challenges encountered
Any extra things tried
Final results (if not done earlier)

This outline is not a required format; please organize your slides in the way that makes the most sense for your particular project. For example, if your presentation is an interactive demo, then you might want to allocate more time to–for instance–flying through your virtual world in the demo and displaying all the interesting features you developed. Per the aforementioned grading criteria, structure your presentation so you best showcase the amount of work you did and the technical depth and aesthetic appeal of your work and results.

SCPD Students

SCPD students have two options for presenting their final projects:

They may present on campus like non-SCPD students.
They may present a pre-made video by submitting a YouTube link (videos must be not more than 4 minutes). This will not involve live Q&A, so extra care is encouraged to cover all details. Note: YouTube links must be emailed to the course staff by August 10th at 11:59pm!

In either case, SCPD students still must sign-up for a timeslot in the Google spreadsheet (even if just submitting a pre-recorded video for us to play!). However, the pre-recorded presentation videos may be played in a different order interspersed among other presentations.

Also, SCPD students who have other commitments (e.g. meetings at work) are allowed to leave after their presentation is completed.

Report Guidelines

Final project reports should cover the same general topics as the final project presentation, but in more depth. The report affords an opportunity to showcase additional results, challenges, algorithms tried, etc. that were not covered in the presentation.

In addition, final reports must contain a detailed description of the division of labor (who did what) for the project. If we feel that a division of labor was very uneven, we may grade group members differently according to their contributions.

Final reports should also cite all sources for algorithms, code, models, and any other resource or idea that was not original to one of the group members. Failure to cite all sources is a violation of the Honor Code. We will prosecute all Honor Code cases related to the final project - you have been warned! Any reasonable format may be used for citing your sources.

There are two ways to submit your final report: either as a typeset document (PDF) or as a website. A website may be easier to showcase your work if, for example, you need to include videos of your interactive output, or if your final project is web-based. If submitting as a typset document, we kindly request that you submit your final project report as a PDF file. While we may accept other formats, PDF will be the easiest for us to grade. If submitting as a web page or website, please just email us a link by the submission deadline. Make sure your website stays live until final course grades are released.

Finally, to reiterate: the final project report is a written document like a research paper, not a slide deck (though your final presentation slides and final report will probably overlap a great deal). With that in mind, please use proper English syntax and grammar, including using complete sentences.

Questions?

For questions related to the final project presentation or report, please post on Piazza.