Visionaries
There are no comments for this page [ Add Comment ]Saturday, April 28, 2007
By Jordan Muhlestein
Standard-Examiner staff
Student project gives glimpse into Ogden's future
See Standard.NET videos for the virtual tour
OGDEN -- People curious about how The Junction will look once construction is finished are getting a sneak peek, thanks to the senior project of four Weber State University students.
The students spent more than a year, including thousands of hours on computers, to build a three-dimensional virtual model of completed development of the former site of the Ogden City Mall.
The result is a glimpse of how the buildings, such as the Salomon Center, Megaplex 13 theaters and the Treehouse Children's Museum, will look in reference to the rest of downtown.
Christy Butler, 24, of Ogden, was the team leader, with Geoff Hale, 21, of South Ogden, as scheduler, Chester Bailey, 27, of Ogden, as data manager, and Sean Christensen, 26, of West Haven, as treasurer.
The students, all majoring in design graphics technology, approached the city with the idea in spring 2006, said Josh Jones, Ogden geographic information systems project manager.
He said city employees had been working on a similar project, but the students' work was far superior.
"The level of technical ability and professional work is impressive," Jones said. "This is such a neat way to partnership with the city and the students."
He said the information is on the city's Web site, www.ogdencity.com, to allow people to visualize Ogden's future.
The students contacted the architects who designed the buildings for the site, and obtained plans and drawings for each available building, Butler said.
They then designed the buildings using several computer programs.
While the end result is impressive, the project was not without its challenges.
Bailey said developers of some of the land at the site do not have final plans, so the students had to draw possible concepts based on the planned use and the available area.
"We had to change some textures as builders made alterations to their original plans," he said. "Luckily, we could go to the site and see what colors and materials were being used on some of the buildings."
The students also had to wait each time their computers analyzed their data.
"We would set it to render and let it run overnight, then come back in the morning," Christensen said. There was always the worry that the system would crash and some of the data would be lost, he said.
The project's budget was $500, said Christensen, and the students were able to finish with $160 left over, thanks in part to receiving discounted printing costs.
Text 
