First Act: wrap up of performance and set building

At the moment I am working on workshop environment. Almost everything is in the place for that environment.

 

A lot of atmosphere will come from texturing as modeling for this set is .. pretty basic. the workshop is crowded with little bits and bobs, nothing too major though still (and hopefully) enough of detail to keep the environment interesting for the eye to look at.

Essentially There are a round of... 15 different objects in the scene, but they are varied in the looks (scaling composition, staging ). Also, texturing will push this forward.

 

Started from the base, texturing the room. The very usefull tutorial I've got from Alan, tutorial of Gnomon workshops, had a set of tips how to enhance the looks only by painting colour, specular and bump texture passes.

Work is in progress. Here the scene has colour map only. Also the lighting is set up and in place . But it will be adjusted and animated in  each scene.

Also the last scene in first act was Ivan succeeding to overcome the first set of obstacles and he is about to find the new.





The video isn't the latest update. I changed the head shake animation and some other little details. But in all honesty I found animating the character  interact with the world especially ..complicated. This  took me two days to get  working. Gladly ( :D) in my entire animation this was the only bit where he had to lift, open locks etc. On the other hand,  soon he'll be swimming in the waters and diving in the air.. that also doesn't sound straight forward :D

First act shots were animated in the manner to appear that Bird is somewhat rushing. He is too enthused to explore the world  to become aware of himself. But through interaction with the world he  does explore himself (second act).

Letting it Loose and Inspection

Before I started animating the scenes I once again prepared the dope sheets/production sheets, as all the past animations, in particular trailer's project,  showed how they can really help to ,manage and improve the production of animation. The head is free from little bits of notes to remember, what in my case actually doesn't happen, I forget the little ideas :/
These are few examples:

Sheet 1/10

Sheet 3/10

 This is the little modeling I do when there isn't an opportunity to focus on some more serious tasks such as animating. These objects will crowed the workshop.

Also the basic representations of other mish-mash models are being prepared. I'm planing to render out a still image of these mish mash models staged in the workshop and  in basic white lambert shader and then paint in the colour and texture . This still image would then be connected with the actual 3d scene.

The still render will give me the precise perspective, shadowing and shapes to work with.

Shiball

The next in the pipeline is the scene of Ivan reacting to the window and running towards it.








I'm animating with the soundtrack uploaded to the timeline. And here also music suggested the sudden change of Ivan's body language where all of a sudden the bird forgets his confusions  and lets loose towards what he's attracted to.



the bird reaches the window and inspects the new. Again he is only assured he wants to reach outside, but has to come up with the way to overcome the first obsticle - shut window. He comes up with an idea after he sees the little lock.

These two videos were yesterday's and today's animating. I'm taking the time there. But these scenes are a great warm up before the much more complex animating still waiting ahead.

Week's progress



Developments on Animation's looks: ambient occlusion pass


Recently I spent time on blocking out the world and solving the looks of the animation. I decided to look what could be solved with parallax planes. So that I can plan out the production better,  what must be built and where I can save time.

These are the images of outside environment 'framed' using planes to suggest forests, sky, mountains.






I think these will still develop allot and the layering will be enhanced, because at the moment it does feel flat I think.

Also I'm slowly from time to time am modeling the sets, but my main focus and true work goes on to animating. After few test animations which helped to spot issues as as well as ( hopefully) better the animating,I think I have the first decent bit of animation. That is of Ivan waking up and exploring the world.




I find the tips and tricks website very useful, also thanks to Alan's and Phil's advice and suggested materials I'm beginning to find the animating easier.

Plan and the Block out of Ivan's World

Initially I started with rough plan of the world.

Then working in maya I made changes to scaling. Because now having story set and clear idea  it also became clear  how much of each environment is needed.

For pre-viz and animation purposes I figured to do initial environment modeling which will be developed through the entire project time simultaneously to other tasks. Again, I bothered myself enough to solve problems in concept art stage, so that when I'm building it serves as a reference.

Trees at the moment are only basic representations. To give an idea how many of them I need and what actually can be achieved with matt paintings.

As I mentioned before, I try to keep the translation from 2d to 3d as close as possible, however, particularly in Dream Island's case, there are lots of things that don't translate as successfully and fail to create the intended feel of the environment ... A Yellow sticker  there...

For now this is pretty much enough to inform animating, so apart from rigging problem there is no reason to wait with animating.

Model's Adaptation to the Story

Having the story set, it was time to go back to the Bird and make adjustments . Initial model looked more as a statue-figure. Relatively expressionless facial features, no "gadget" inside.


For the eye mechanizm idea was to keep what was  already built (ship wheel on top of the eye) and  add few layers on top.

I personally enjoy how the ship wheel detail is uncovered as the eye is moving around . It looks like the texture of iris or highlights.

(texturing still needs to be solved)

Lastly, the bird now has a lantern.

I think I'm in a very advantaged position,as the character was pretty much done during the summer. Now he is ready to be rigged.

Week 2/10 : Defining Animation in Detail

This week I took some time to revisit and define the character better. In our discussions with Alan, we agreed that bird's model needs to be revisited to make adjustments for animation. Add more expressive body parts ( eyelids, eyebrows, jaw etc.) . as well as the story asks to add other details, such as a lantern in between his hips and chest, a lock and so on.

And the next follows experiments with his jaw :

Then we go underneath the surface. I've gathered Ivan's character profile. This was a note made during this weeks tutorial with Alan. To have a clear map of personality (then go and analyse the animation itself, what is being done atm) which would then drive the animation.

Here you'll find a brief description, main characteristics progression and body language.

As written in my previous posts, story is taking it's better and more defined shape. The idea here  was to present other mish-mash models. They would be presented in the opening sequence, at Ivan's 'birth place'. Suggesting this is a workshop where models like Ivan are made.

My only note is.... maybe these models shouldn't be fully built, but only half way there. Suggesting this is now Ivan's time.
But there you go, a sheet of mish-mash model thumbnails,  meet Buckaloon, Shiball and Spyrer.

As supposed to be done in preproduction, I merged myself with concepts of the animation's world.
Here is the outer environment concept start:

But I somehow didn't feel for this drawing... There were (are) problems. SO I went back to my original drawing, pixie which I'm using as an artwork-inspiration for the environments . The work also defined the colour pallet of use. It was surprising to discover the true tonality and colours withing this work, event to me, the author

So at the moment, I'm drawing a new concept of the shore. It will build on this composition:

Currently I'm solving Ivan's performance issues, and looking in to ways to enshure the animation will be in its fullest potential.
As well as I'm thinking of ways to merge 2d and 3d techniques to make the animation an experience of illustration brought to life.

Suggesting Ivan's Goals: Revisited Animatic

As previously discussed it was unclear what is the true goal and a driving point for the bird: is it to forfill his nature and become a true bird which can fly, or is it to keep on exploring new things as well as getting to discover more about yourself ? All of those things are true, but one more thing plays an important role: the Island's likenes to Ivan and the suggestion it is his true place to stay and  is his true home.

To convey this idea the Island and more particularly the nesting-box, is brought more as the main focus point.

Narrative Project: The Last Week

Last week of studio experience just past away and here is the last update on activitys done throughout the time.

The week was busy with getting the last animations ( the ones which involved toymaker's character) done.
There were quite a few of them :
toymaker in production line scenes

The scene of Toymaker meeting  his creation :

When Animation was completed , I've concentrated on postproduction, that is compositting and editting.
Main changes done in after effects were to achieve a certain look and feel , whether it meant to add noise, increase exposure, animate glow. All the scenes had their colours tweaked, most of the time ading 4 colour gradient to add some variety in other wise quit simple looking scenes ( such as marching army shadow on field etc.)

Heavy editting is what our project relied uppon from the very beginning, and that is where I found myself for .. 3 days. Weird enough, towards the end of editting each time  I'd have a headache, what isn't usual to me at all , so perhaps  these subliminal shots and  speedy sequences really do effect somehow :D

Here is a taster of the final product, a teaser trailer :




Appart from that it was time to wrap the project up, so here are the designs of DVD cover and DVD disc:

Ant the actual painting suggests the story of film itself. The toy which was created to bring happynes and joy and  was an inactive shell, got invaded by alien content and became  lost and  threatening monster.

There will be one last post, an overview of the project and the trailer itself :)

Studio Project Progress

 The latest achievement is to have scientist textured and ready to be copied for different scenes.

I did bare in mind which parts needed most of attention as they are seen the most of time or in a close up in our trailer. For example, majority of time we see scientist's chest and neck.

So the first scene with toymaker performing was 'there is a plan' scene. Where he is in a military base and analyses  ways to shut down alien toy.

Just a note, textures were created by Bob, cup by Earl. I've gathered those elemnts and created lighting, other details to create an atmospheric setting.

Aside to that I've finished the quit demanding scene of meteor's impact on dumpster and its content. I chose to animate each and every element in the waist disposal. The result is here as follows:




Since we are pretty much in postproduction stage I 've started preparing for ideas our group had in mind .
I took another, more in-depth look in our  referencing trailer of Super 8 . It was unbelievable to see what makers have "hidden" in them..


For example, the research showed the 1min 30 sec long trailer had 6 sequences of subliminal cuts. That is usually between 4 to 6 different and very abstract images per frame. This as I found adds to confusion also stresses out  and creates impact.
Similarly I thought to try and use this cinematic technique in our trailer in its post production. So these are  the following  images I've created  for subliminal cuts, one of which is alien's eye itself.

Soon more to come. Watch this space.

First Glimpses at Ivan

Today I layed all the textures and set up base materials and really got the chance for the first time to see how Ivan, the bird made out of various unused model parts, looks.
I am happy that the outcome is so much like the concept drawing. Again I got to realise how a good resolution of design in the  stage of preproduction  saves time/energy/sanity throughout all other stages.

There's still some tweaking left to do, for example to add bump and specular maps. Maya..  also started complicating things.. I think the problems are caused by the load of textures.

The Making of SLime Mold Life Cycle