Added my major project blog post to the list of blog posts

_posts/2018-04-11-sonagraphic.md

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+---
+layout: post
+title: Sonagraphic
+date: 2018-04-11
+categories:
+    - Major-Project
+description: Proof-of-concept game demo that uses audio analysis to affect gameplay. Learned how to use Unreal, in particular its visual coding "Blueprints", as well as basic concepts of audiovisualization.
+image: https://imgur.com/9geUqRp
+image-sm: https://imgur.com/ApFXb5t
+author: Nicholas Mercadante
+author-image: https://avatars3.githubusercontent.com/u/25127906?s=460&v=4
+author-bio: 2nd Year Game Design & Development Student at the Rochester Institute of Technology
+author-email: nvm6501@rit.edu
+author-social:
+    github: https://github.com/dantayy
+    linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicholas-mercadante/
+---
+
+#Summary
+Sonagraphic is proof of concept for a twin-stick shooter that utilizes audio analysis to affect gameplay 
+based on the music being played.  I did a lot of research for this project over winter break, 
+then spent a couple hours each week on average working on it from the end of winter break until submission.
+During that time I learned a lot about visual coding with Unreal 4's blueprint system, 
+as well as the fundamentals of audio visualization, specifically what to look at in an audio file to extract a beat.  
+The current build analyzes a manually input wav file as it's played for beats and allows the player to fire 
+a special beam that deals instantaneous damage to all enemies in its path if they hit the special fire button on those beats.  
+Consecutive beats hit on time widen the beam, and misses jam the special fire temporarily.  
+My main issue ended up being the platform I was working on; time would've been better spent 
+had I realized how nonexistant documentation is on implementing external C++ plugins into an Unreal project.  
+If I were to do this again, I'd probably do it in Unity.  There's a well documented audio analysis tool available 
+on their storefront that was used to develop AudioShield (which was my original inspiration for this project).  
+Especially now that I have a better understanding of what's going on behind the scenes to grab beats from a song, 
+I can focus more of my efforts on making the gameplay fun and adding features like song importing.
+The project currently can be viewed and cloned [here](https://github.com/dantayy/Sonagraphic).