Playable Character Animations Progress

Initial inspiration.

Once our group had pitched our final idea and art style guides to our Lecturers and got the approval for them, we could then begin the full production process of the vertical slice. First of all, we were all assigned beginning roles within our group. Due to my previous work on the main character design and development of the art guide, I took on the responsibility for developing the main character animations. I first began by determining  how I wanted each animation to look, I primarily wanted to not only make my animations appealing and portray a sense of personality but also make sure that the animations were appropriate for use in a game so I needed to ensure that all my animations where snappy and fit the speed of the actions of the players movement capabilities. For the movement of my character, I took inspiration from a few different games which I felt matched the movements I wanted for my character. My primary inspirations for my character’s animation came primarily from Cuphead as not only did its animations fit the rubber hose aesthetic I was going for but also the animations where specifically designed for a game environment so they where perfectly timed for player inputs while also possessing a large level of personality. Another point of reference I used specifically for the jump animation came from the original Rayman as I felt the jump from Cuphead was for too exaggerated for our character design and I wanted to get a jump that did not incorporate flips as it would seem out of place for a character that has alot of heavy equipment attached to them. So with these Initial forms of inspiration I then began Developing the keyframes for each of the essential animations required for my group’s vertical slice. However I don’t think I drew my poses correctly as after I had completed the keyframes and tested them I found that the movements were very noticeably off and I would have to fix this by adding several in-betweens but thankfully this seemed to correct the problems with the run cycle. After this we imported it into the game’s UnReal file and tested it on our playable character rig with great results. During this test however, it became apparent we needed an idle stance for the character. At first this could have been a simple still frame, but instead I wanted to give a bit more appeal to the idle stance of the character. So, taking more inspiration from Cuphead, I made it so that the character would bob up and down while idle to give it more live than just being a simple still image and I feel this makes the character far more expressive.

Development of initial Key-frames.

Once I was happy with my inspiration. I then began sketching out the initial keyframes for each of the animations. I ended up getting alot of advice from Richard Williams’ “Animator’s Survival Kit” as I have done since the previous semester, I primarily used it for the run as I found the survival kit extremely helpful in my past experiences but unlike before I divided to utilize the slightly more simple and quicker method of developing a run cycle where it only consists of 5  keyframes rather than 7 as I believed this would make the movement more snappy and thus felt it would be more appropriate for animating a playable character.   

Completed Animations

In the end, I came up with animations for the character while idle, running, climbing, sliding down ladders and a set of jump frames. All of the frames were easily imported into UnReal with its Flip book tool, after adjusting the timing of the frames we got a look at how the run cycle looked in-game. Overall Im satisfied with the and result of these animations and I feel I followed the art guides I developed for this character design. I do want to add more animations to this game project but for the sake of our time limit for the project, I have prioritized just the essential animations but if I do have time for adding more animations I will definitely want to give this character more movement and actions to make the character seem more alive and not just a blank slate.

Animation Discourse: Assignment 1 Progression and Evaluation

Initial reading and observations

During the first week of the assignment, our group made the decision that we would cover the article “Hanna-Barbera’s Cacophony: Sound Effects and the Production of Movement” (July 2021). After we made the decision we all went on and started reading the article and taking notes on all the points we felt were important. As we read the article, we all noticed a few things that were quite apparent with this article. The first noticeable aspect was that it was separated into 3 respective categories which made it much easier to pin-point what each team-member could discuss in the presentation, but the other and more critical aspect was that this article seemed to repeat itself on certain points numerous times in the different categories of the article to the point that it felt a bit too repetitive. We all collectively agreed that this could be one point we could make when being a bit more critical towards the article and the statement it was trying to make. Below you can find some of the notes I took to get all the important points of the article to which I could then start structuring my presentation slides.

Development of My Presentation Slides

Once we all got our notes, my group all came together and began discussing what categories we would discuss, I decided that I would discuss the category of building a library for two reasons. The first being that I found the idea of how sound-effect libraries are developed as well as the methods of adding sound-effects to animation quite interesting, the second factor was that the majority of my notes covered this category so I felt I had a sufficient body of information to write my slides around them. Once our group was satisfied and had a clear idea of what each of us would be discussing in the presentation, I then began developing my slides. The main points I detailed were the two most frequently used methods of adding sound-effects to early pipe-line animation which in this case were “Performance-based Synchronization” where a Foley artist would perform with the musicians and work to a set of inputs on behalf of the conductor to add sound effects to the soundtrack in real-time. This method allowed for much more fluent sound effects that were geared to fit an event or movement perfectly, This was Disney’s favored method of adding sound-effects and a perfect example that was detailed in the article was Disney’s 1941 film “The Reluctant Dragon”. The only drawback to this method is the fact that due to being played in real-time, the Foley artist had to time their sound effects perfectly to fit into the soundtrack which for certain sound effects could be immensely difficult to pull off due to the possible methodology required.

The second method that was used and the primary method used by Hanna Barbera in this case was using a library of sound effects. This method was brought on by technological innovations in technologies used in animation development. A Foley artist could develop a sound effect and record it and then repeat it over and over onto 1000 ft reels of Optical film (which would be replace by Hanna-Barbera with Magnetic Tape from the 1960s onward with their productions). With these reels, The film editor (Not to dissimilar to a video/audio editor in today’s terminology) could then cut the sound effects out of the reel and then cut them into the animation’s audio tract directly. This method allowed for sound effects to be used over and over again and for said sound effects to be kept consistent especially within episodic animation series. This also meant that sound effects could be recycled

and used for multiple productions at once which Hanna-Barbera used quite frequently to reduce the cost of developing whole new sound effects for every production they worked on. However, this is its main drawback as having the same sound effects recycled and used among several different productions at once and having them used to convey the majority of the off screen movement in Hanna-Barbera’s works meant that these sound effects could become rather stilted after time and also the constant recycling of sound effects across different productions was glaringly noticeable even to the public based on some criticisms highlighted in the article by Leonard Maltin and an unnamed child stating “Even a 10 year old could recognize (and tire of) the repetition in each show; the same canned music, the same gags, the same sound effects, and gimmicks, and the same characters, only in different guises’ (Matlin 1975).

When it comes to how Hanna-Barbera started their library. Once William Hanna and Joseph Barbera left MGM’s animation department in 1957 following it closure and establishing Hanna-barbera studios the same year, they took on MGM’s former film editor  Greg Watson who took some of the more complicated sound effects from MGM’s old library and then from this selection began producing a whole new library of sound effects for Hanna-Barbera’s animations. Some of MGM’s original sound effects can be especially heard in some of Hanna-Barbera’s earlier shows such as “The Ruff and Reddy Show”(1957-1962).

Conclusion

Overall this article observation did give me alot of insight into how Hanna-Barbera’s sound effects were incredibly significant to their animation productions and I felt the research for my group’s presentation was sufficient evidence to show my understanding of the category I decided to discuss. If I were to do a project like this again I may want to be less intense with my notes as I spent so much time writing them up that I was able to cover notes on all aspects of the article within the deadline to complete the assignment. I intend to improve this practice with future endeavors.

 

Bibliography

Sullivan, P. (2021). Hanna-Barbera’s Cacophony: Sound Effects and the Production of Movement. Animation, 16(1-2), pp.21–35. doi:https://doi.org/10.1177/17468477211025660.

The Reluctant Dragon. (1941). [Film/Movie] Hollywood LA USA: RKO Radio Pictures.

The Ruff and Reddy Show. (1957). [Animated TV Show] Manhattan New York USA: National Broadcasting Company (NBC) .

 

 

Assignment 1- art-style development: Playable character design development and reflection

This Post marks my summary of the entire development process of the playable character design for use in Group H’s vertical slide project.

Initial Planning and Inspiration

While Brainstorming Ideas for our game, we all settled on the idea of a game based around a submarine that has to collect gems and treasures for an organisation but the submarine constantly runs into mechanical and technical difficulties which you will need to resolve. When we where happy with the initial game idea, we then established That the art-style at first was going to be a cross between clean sci-fi and Saturday morning cartoons but this was later changed to purely Saturday morning cartoons as a result of lecturer’s suggestions. what aspects we will be working on and designing. For my work I was tasked with developing the design of the playable character. As a collective, we all agreed that the main source of inspiration for our Art-style had to come from the likes of “The Super Mario Super Show” (especially the “Star-wars” Inspired episode “Star-Koopa”) and some of the character and ship designs from Disney’s “Lilo and Stitch”. This was chosen as the main reference point due to the fact that these two works not only used a more sci-fi aesthetic than other animations like them, but they also still had a greatly stylized presentation which we felt would work perfectly with the general style of game we where going with which in this case was a slightly stylized and surreal but not to the point where it becomes too bizarre. From this basis we then began working on establishing our own art style for the project. Along with these first two references, I also found more references to use when designing the playable character. I first began observing the different ways saturday morning cartoon characters can be drawn  by taking various character sheets from shows by the likes of “Hanna-Barbera” and “DiC Enterprises” to get a feel for how the character’s proportions would be handled. Along with this research I also got some inspiration for the actual character design obviously from old fashioned scuba equipment but I also found some inspiration especially from the suit design from “2001: A Space Odyssey”  as I reasoned that both scuba and space gear are designed to do a similar task of acting as a barrier to a person as well as a way of supplying them with oxygen. It was with these sets of inspiration I then began to experiment.

   

 

First character design experiments

The first step I took when designing the playable character once I gathered my referencing and inspiration, was to sketch up some initial tests to get an idea of how the character’s silhouette would look. I came up with four initial sketches, each with different proportions and from there I chose the proportions I felt held the same aesthetic of our game which in this case was between the first and second sketch as although I wanted to create something with a more angular design, I still wanted to add some more flexibility in the arms and legs for more appealing animations later on. Once I was set on the proportions, I then began trying to refine the details and develop a design that wasn’t just unique but also appealing. I then began to experiment more with the helmet design, this is where my inspiration from “2001: A Space Odyssey” really shows as I felt that the helmet design fitted perfectly, of course I did try to make the design as “aquatic-esc” as possible by adding the collar beneath the helmet as well as a small torch on the right-hand side etc. The final outcome of my experimentation can be seen on the far right of the second set of drawings.

 

 

Finalized Character reference sheet and Art-Guide

Main Reference for the art guide format

After I me and my group agreed upon a final character design, I then began developing the final art guide for my character design. To gain an idea of how an art guide should be formatted, I used some art guides for “Molly McGee” from Disney’s “The Ghost and Molly McGee” which help me immensely.  One aspect I constantly kept an eye on while developing the Turnaround was making simple mistakes and finding ways to resolve them when drawing the character over and over again. By using this technique, I was able to develop an art guide that also documented how draw parts of the character where mistakes can easily be made along with also have a few principles of how the character would articulate and how some of its alternate expressions would look. This was by far the most interesting aspect of the entire development process for me as I found it interesting taking a character design from a final concept sketch and then observe how the character is drawn and develop a guide for other artists to be able to draw said character in a consistent manor. After I got the basic guides complete, I created a set of working colour pallets we could potentially choose for the character using a monochromatic, complementary or square tetradic colour pallet to choose from.

 

Conclusion

Overall, I felt I was able to complete this process to a good standard and I learnt how a character design and art guide should be designed to ensure that all artists in a team can draw a character consistently and the overall outcome of my research and design process fits my groups game plan very well. As stated before I feel the best aspect of this entire process was the development of the art guide itself as I found the entire process very interesting in how a character goes from a concept art piece to a fully functioning character design with boundaries that need to be followed by artists who are drawing said character. Although I’m satisfied with the outcome, I do have an aspect I wish to improve upon next time I’m tasked with doing something similar. That change is how I manage each stage of the development of the character, due to being used to have a lot more time to develop a character from the ground up, I found that my time-management was not that adequate and I found myself being caught up with the designing aspect of the development process for too long in my opinion which meant I wasn’t able to dedicate as much time to the finalization of the character design. I am aware that deadlines will be far tighter in the actual industry and this type of deadline may be normal, so I do want to keep this in mind and try and balance out the entire process and try and improve my time-management during a much tighter deadline to meet with the possible demands when working for a studio.

Animation Strategies: General Module Evaluation and Compilation.

This post will act as an overall conclusion of my work on the second coursework component of the Animation Strategies module and as a final evaluation of my progress during the entirety of this module.

What Was Done Right.

When it comes to what I think went well over the course of the entire module, I feel that my experimentation has went immensely well. By experimenting prior to developing the finalized animations for submission, it allowed me to gain a better understanding of how to approach animating each of the projects within this module as I would be able to improve upon any of the short-comings that may have been present within the initial practices. Another aspect that I think went well with the development of my coursework is keeping the shapes and silhouettes of my characters more consistent in the second coursework assignment. Following the feedback I received from my first coursework submission, one aspect that was quite distracting was how some parts of my characters would either become bigger or smaller for no reason during the progression of the animation. As a result of this feedback, in my second coursework I paid more attention to keeping the proportions of characters during the progression of frames more consistent and I felt that this attention to detail definitely paid off and my coursework 2 entries were much more consistent with the character proportions.

 

Where Improvements Can Be Made.

Despite my satisfaction with my progression through this module, there is definitely points that I wish to improve upon in future projects. T he biggest improvement I want to make in future projects is be more adequate at time management. Despite the result of my progress, I still think i was not good at managing my time with each aspect of this module especially with the second coursework component and I can’t help but feel that if extra time had been taken to experiment further, then perhaps the results could have been of a higher standard. Another aspect I want to get better at is having more consistent line art within 2D animations I develop in Harmony. My second entries suffer the most from inconsistent line-art which looking at it in retrospect I feel is a bit distracting especially in my finalized weight-lift animation which the head line art is noticeably finer than the body’s linear which does make the end product look slightly odd. These are aspects I intend to improve upon in future projects.

 

Overall Conclusion.

Overall, I found this module immensely helpful for learning core strategies when it comes to animating characters such as runs, walks, jumps etc. I can confidently say that I have gained a much better understanding of how to approach animating sequences that are essential skills to any animator within the industry. I only intend to improve further from my progression by taking on more complex experiments and animation sequences following this module to increase my ability to observe and bring characters to life through animation.

Coursework 1 Progression.

Coursework 2 Progression.

Lip-sync referencing.

Ghostbusters. (1984). [Film/Movie] Culver City, Ca United States: Columbia Pictures.

www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Full Television Commercial | GHOSTBUSTERS. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRee26pfVzU [Accessed 4 Jan. 2024].

Coursework 2: Lip-Sync Practice/ Final Submission/ Summary and Evaluation.

Initial Introduction and Practice.

The final sequence required for the Coursework 2 submission was a lip-sync sequence. This was easily the toughest process out of the 3 animations I had to develop for the submission, I did not have any past experience at animating lip-syncing and so I was going into this whole process with no prior knowledge. For the initial practices, I used a reference that was provided by the lecturer’s slides and also a pair of audio files to animate my initial lip-sync practices. I first started with the 3D animation practice and was able to develop it quite quickly, I also added a bit more animation to the rest of the character model to make the sequence look more organic. If I have any points I would to improve upon, it would be the pacing of the mouth movements, it stops far too early and it is immensely distracting. After this 3D animation practice, I then developed a 2D sequence using a provided character face and audio file. The animating process of this practice was quite time-consuming due to redrawing various moth shapes repetitively for each frame. But I was able to complete the 2D practice too and I was satisfied with the final result, the only aspect I believe that could be improved would be the pacing of the mouth movements on certain words or sounds as it feels like the mouth is moving too fast for the audio. Another aspect I would add to improve the sequence is a bit more facial animation such the face’s shape changing slightly on certain words and sounds to make it look more realistic. After completing these practices I then decided to create my final lip-sync sequence in 2d

 

Progression of Submission Lip-Sync sequence.

For my finalized submission, I decided to use an audio clip from the film (“Ghostbusters” (1984)) which in this case was an exert from the “in-universe” commercial for the Ghostbuster’s business as it was exactly ten seconds in length which was the requirement for the final submission. I was able to obtain the audio I needed from the official Ghostbusters YouTube channel in the video titled “Full Television Commercial | GHOSTBUSTERS” (2020), I recorded the audio exert I was after through Audacity and then began work on animation the framework of the three character I would be using. This was purely done to get an idea of each character’s body movements down first, I would then Animate the mouth movements in time with the body movement, this was the process I spent the most time on to make sure I got the pacing of the mouth movements to match up with the audio and once I got it to a stage where I felt it was in sync with the audio, I then drew the character designs using the framework as a basis while also adding in a few in-between frames to make the character movements look less choppy and more organic. Due to my initial complaints with my first 2D practice, I also made sure to add a bit more facial animation in the final version to make the sequence more realistic.

 

 

Evaluation and Conclusion.

Overall, I feel that I was able to create a lip-sync sequence very well and I’m immensely satisfied with the end result. I’m especially pleased with how I animated the mouth movements to be in sync with the audio I was using and the use of facial animation to add to the movement of the overall character animation which made it feel more fluent overall. Despite my satisfaction with the final animation, I still have some points I think that could be improved upon in retrospect. By far, the main aspect I would improve would be the facial animation on the second character. This is because while looking at it now in retrospect, I feel its a bit too stiff and could perhaps benefit from having more changes in the facial shapes during certain words and sounds especially during the point where he lifts his head upwards as it is far less noticeable and the facial movements are very stiff which I will try to avoid in future projects like this. In any case, after completing this animation I can confidently say that I am more aware of how I should animate lip-sync animations. Especially following this project, I am able to also determine what I should and should not do while developing any lip-syncing animations in any future projects.

 

Bibliography.

Ghostbusters. (1984). [Film/Movie] Culver City, Ca United States: Columbia Pictures.

https://www.google.com/search?q=lip+sync+animation+reference+front&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwiQxJPR3MSDAxVkmicCHRSaBy8Q2-cCegQIABAA&oq=lip+sync+animation+reference+front&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQAzoECCMQJzoGCAAQBxAeOgYIABAIEB46BAgAEB46BggAEAUQHlDnCFjREGCoFWgAcAB4AIABUogB7gOSAQE3mAEAoAEBqgELZ3dzLXdpei1pbWfAAQE&sclient=img&ei=UCmXZZDcD-S0nsEPlLSe-AI&bih=961&biw=1903&hl=en#imgrc=TYa27co71hHmQM

www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Full Television Commercial | GHOSTBUSTERS. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRee26pfVzU [Accessed 4 Jan. 2024].

 

Coursework 2: Run and Jump Progression, Summary and Evaluation

Initial Jump Practices

One of the first animation practices I created during this assignment was actually a basic jump to show a basic shift of mass quickly from one point to another. for this practice, I referred once again to Richard Williams’ “Animator’s Survival Kit” (Page 213) (Faber and Faber 2001).  Using the survival kit as a basis, I was able to create a set of keyframes and then I was able to animate these Key-frames within Harmony. Along with animating the keyframes, I also added some early anticipation poses as well as slowed down the starting poses to create a more organic jump that looked more realistic. I felt that this first Practice went well but if I were to do it again I would perhaps try to make some of the leg movements less choppy while the character is airborne or how the foot that has a delayed fall seems to fall a bit too slowly. In any case, this exercise was helpful for me when understanding how to animate a character executing a basic jump. I also had some experimenting at animating a 3D jump between key poses through the weekly lectures just to get some more experience with developing the exact same sequences through different means of animation. Although, I felt that it came out looking quite impressive, I decided quite quickly that I wanted to do the final submission animation in 2D.

 

 

 

Development of Final Run-and-Jump

After I completed the first jump exercise, I began to establish what I would do for my final submission animation. The main idea I came up with was a simple run and jump over a large box. I would eventually find out that as it turns out I couldn’t find a point of reference that perfectly reflected the action I initially envisioned. To compromise, I decided to find a point of reference that came close to the poses I required and then interprete the loose ends of the my sequence. The main Reference I used for getting a loose idea of the required poses were two YouTube videos by the users “Adam Turnbull” and “Amar Nawaz” known as “Animation sequence test – Run / Jump / Turn / Stop” (2016) and “Character Animation| Jumping Over| Task 06| Maya” (2021) Respectively. By using both of these videos, I was able to grasp a close idea of the type of poses I would require to animate my final run and jump animation. After getting my key poses transferred I then began experimenting with animation smearing with the sword as I thought due to the sword constantly moving back and forth rather quickly and felt that using smeared frames could emphasize the speed. However, when put into practice I found that it didn’t really work and it felt slightly tacky due to the constant moving and the sword not staying stationary for long enough which all came together to make it not look right. So, in the end I decided to scrap the smeared frames and just kept the sword’s frames static. After making any necessary adjustments to the pacing of some frames so the entire sequence felt fluent enough for finishing off the final character frames.

 

 

 

Summary and Conclusion

Overall, I feel that this animation came out quite well and I feel I was able to achieve the type of run and jump I set out to initially develop despite the short-comings of having to use loose referencing and interpretation. Regardless of my satisfaction with this piece, it does have room for improvement. Primarily in its pacing as I feel it is still too slow when the character makes contact with the floor and runs of camera, while also being slightly too fast during the jump itself. But overall Im satisfied with the end product and I do intend to improve upon these short comings in future practices and sequences.

 

 

Bibliography

Williams, R. (2001). The animator’s survival kit. London: Faber And Faber.

‌www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Animation sequence test – Run / Jump / Turn / Stop. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLbgoAy-wUU [Accessed 1 Dec. 2023].

‌www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Character Animation| Jumping Over| Task 06| Maya. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjqierFmHLk [Accessed 1 Dec. 2023].

Coursework 2: Body and weight mechanics practice and Final Outcome- Weightlifting

 

Initial Research and Practice.

For the first week of the second coursework component of the animation strategies module, we began by developing an animation of a character lifting a weight. For this I primarily turned to YouTube for referencing and found my best referencing through  YouTube user Clarence0’s  video titled “340kg / 750lbs Deadlift @100kg” (2016). Using this video, I was able to get a good understanding of the stages that a person takes when lifting a heavy object and was able to establish a set of keyframes to begin work on my first prototypical weightlifting sequence.

Like my past practices and experiments, I sketched out the key frames traditionally to get a feel for positioning and composition and then began to work on the actual animation on Harmony. I was able to come up with my first working prototype relatively quickly and I felt that my key framing emulated the general stages of a weight-lift quite well. However, there were a few aspects I felt could be improved upon. The first and perhaps the most noticeable improvement, is the pacing of the sequence. Looking at the speed of this first attempt, it is too fast and makes the barbells appear lighter than they should be. The other point I noticed was the way the barbells flexing was approached using perspective. When the sequence beings the two weights are cylindrical but my use of perspective unintentionally deformed the shape of the weights as the sequence progresses, resulting in the weights appearing more cone-shaped by the end of the sequence. With the results of this first practice, I felt more confident about what I needed to adjust to refine my weight-lifting sequence.

Final Submission development.

After the outcome of my first weight-lift exercise. I felt I was ready to being development of my finalized weight-lift. This time around I started with my usual process of sketching and transferring the keyframes into harmony and then I began to work on the sequence from the ground up. While trying to interpret the in-between frames, I further analysed “340kg / 750lbs Deadlift @100kg” (Clarence0 2016). This time, I payed closer attention to the slow progression of applying pressure at the upper and lower torso to allow for the gradual lifting of the barbell to emphasis its immense weight. I also wanted to put more emphasis in the anticipation stage of the weight-lift with having the character make sure his foot placement is perfect before committing the lift. With these new observations I was able to begin developing the sequence while also keeping the aspects I was happy with in my last attempt including the barbell flexing due to weight and the weights cracking the surface upon hitting the ground again. Overall the development of this sequence went quite well but I found even after using my new observations, it still felt like the sequence was happening too quickly and I was alerted to this by my lecture’s observations of my animation. This problem was easily fixed by adding more frames and in-betweens during each of the stages of the weight-lift and the progression from initial sketches to the final result can be seen below.

.

Conclusion

Overall, I am satisfied with the end result of my finalized weight-lift animation and I feel that I have improved my ability to observe how characters would carry out lifting heavy objects and the sequence that revolves around making a weight-lift look believable. I do intend to improve my observations of this sequence and improve on animating weight-lifts as I feel that there can be some improvements made such as adding more in-between frames to create a more smoother assent when a character is lifting a heavy object.

 

Bibliography

www.youtube.com. (n.d.). 340kg / 750lbs Deadlift @100kg. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdTc2Gv52uI [Accessed 4 Dec. 2024].

Character creation: Complete Portfolio

First Design Reference and Sketches

Example 4

First Concept Sketches

 

 

 

 

Final Reference Script

Character design Script Fletcher

 

First Finalized Character design

Further Character concept design Changes

Fletcher Character Script (Updated)

 

 

 

Character Block-out and Sculpting

 

 

Retopology and Prop Modelling

 

 

UV Unwrapping and Multi-Resolution Installation

 

 

Rigging and Posing the Character

 

Developing an Alpha-Texture

Texturing and Baking Normal Maps     

Development of the Environment and Importing the Character and Props

 

Post-Production PhotoShop LUT Editing and Final Screenshots

 

 

 

Character Creation: Module summary and reflection

This post marks the end of my work on the Character Creation module and will be a summary of my progress and overall self-evaluation of how I felt I performed in this project.

Initial design Processes.

 

During the first few weeks, I mostly focused on finding a character idea. At first I was purely following a script that had been developed for the module’s curriculum as a simple prompt. But after I finished the first design sketches, I felt like I was missing an opportunity to develop a character from the ground up and go through the entire process from initial scripting to a finished character with a context. This is how the development of Fletcher began.

 

Further Initial Character Development.

 

I started by developing a basic script to get an idea of what my character would look like and what properties They possess. After this, I then began to gather inspiration that related to the script. In this case, archer uniforms, tactical bows and glass-tipped arrows etc. with all the reference images I gathered I then developed a Finalized character design sheet traditionally for use in the 3D modelling process. After I finished the traditional concept sheet I also wanted to create a digitized version of it but before I did this, I sort of thought about my character more in terms of their design. Before this, the majority of the characters I created were male and I felt it was a bit repetitive, so I entertained the Idea of making this character a female instead which I further redesigned my character design in the finalized digital version of the concept art. Along with this redesign, I also made some changes to the script to match the redesigns I had done to my character.

 

 

 

 

Character Model Block-out, Sculpting and Retopology.

 

Once I got the concept art down, I began the modelling process. First, I began by blocking my character based on a simple sketch I developed in Krita to get the basic proportions in Blender. After I got the basic shape, I slowly began sculpting and building up my character model over the course of around 2 to 3 weeks and eventually I completed the first initial sculpt. I was then able to begin retopologising the mesh which I felt went quite well and I was able to complete it to a better schedule than my last 3d character model attempt in my previous year. The one main obstacle I faced at this point was how I would create the hair, after finding a helpful tutorial on YouTube by the user “Blender Secrets” known as “Blender Secrets – Easy Anime Hair”, I was able to create my character’s hair easily and after I finished this I then modelled the bow and arrow. At this point I was slightly time-cautious and felt that modelling the short sword and buckler shield that I created in the concept art wouldn’t be necessary for my finalized shots of my character and decided to cut them out of the final model. Afterwards, I moved onto the next stage.

 

Baking Normal maps and texturing.

 

The next stage consists of sculpting more intricate details onto my retopologised character through use of Blender’s Multi-Resolution modifier which allowed me to subdivide the retopologised mesh to sculpt more details over its surface. Simultaneously, I also Unwrapped the character mesh and adjusted the UV map to export it as an FBX file so I could then start texturing the character model in Substance Painter. Along with creating a FBX for the retopolgised model in its low-poly form, I also created an FBX of the high-poly version made through the multi-resolution to give the character model more surface detail. This was done so that I could use high-poly FBX to bake the details of the high-poly mesh into the normal maps of the low-poly mesh so it would have more detail while not requiring a massive volume of geometry. This process was probably the most difficult part of this entire design and development process as I still didn’t really understand how Normal maps worked at first, but after I asked my tutor about how they worked, I finally gained a better understanding of what their purpose was and how I could use them to add more detailed textures onto low-poly meshes. After baking the normal maps, the texturing process was carried out extremely quickly and I  was then able to export out the texture maps for the character model, bow and arrow easily.

 

 

 

 

Character Rigging.

 

The next stage of development was rigging the character and posing it for use in Unreal engine. This was a pretty quick process as all I needed to do was develop a simple humanoid rig which in principle should have been a quick and easy task. But at first, I was having trouble with mirroring bones due to positioning of bone origins which it took me a bit of experimenting and adjustments to get the result I was after. But after this, I was able to create the armature and parent it to the character model. After getting my character into a pose I was happy with, I exported a third FBX of the low-poly mesh in its posed state to which I could then import it into Unreal engine.

 

 

 

Introduction to Unreal and putting together the Final Shots.

 

At first, I was quite unsure of how Unreal Engine worked and how to use it. So, I needed to take a closer look at the tutorials created by my tutors to get an idea of the software’s properties. But luckily, after watching through them step by step, I was able to get to grips with using Unreal relatively quickly. So, I began by first sculpting and developing my landscape and once I got it to a stage I was happy with, I then added trees, rocks and vegetation using files that had been provided through some of the class tutorials. Overall this process was quite interesting and I enjoyed using Unreal to develop the environment.

 

Afterwards, I imported my character model and props into Unreal along with connecting the textures and normal maps to all models with no problems. I was then able to position the character within the environment to my liking and added some basic lighting to add a focus point to the character as well as add some more dynamic shadows thanks to the forestry within my environment. With this process completed, the final stage could then begin.

 

 

 

Final character Screenshots and Post-Processing.

 

I first started this stage by taking a high-resolution screenshot of the character and environment and then I brought said screenshot into PhotoShop and got my hands on a basic blank LUT sheet. I already had used PhotoShop quite regularly in the past so I already had a basic idea of some of the tools that it had to offer and so I was able to adjust various parts of the screenshot with no issues. Once I was satisfied with the final edits I had made to the screenshot, I then copied all the modification layers of the edited screenshot and pasted them onto the blank LUT to copy the light adjustments I had made. I was then able to get the modified LUT and hook it up to the Unreal file which would then transfer the same adjustments made in Photoshop into the Unreal file itself. I then was able to take the finalized screenshots of my character model Which ultimately marks the end of the development process of my character model.

 

 

 

 

General Evaluation

 

Overall I felt that the development of my character model was done quite well. I would say the parts of the process I felt went the best, would have to be designing the character’s concept art and also the retopology of my character. This is mostly because I remember I had quite a bit of trouble with retopology during my first 3d character model from last year and I felt I handled it much better in this module as I mapped out the retopology in a much more organised and logical way and it overall felt a bit more professionally put together this time around. As for designing the character, I have always enjoyed designing characters, so this process was done quite easily for me. My first initial design did need some adjustments in the case of its colour pallet as it was clashing slightly in some places but aside from this slight issue, it was an easy and quite enjoyable process of this character’s development, another aspect I enjoyed quite a bit was using Unreal as I found the landscape building feature to be quite satisfying to use and some of the tools and properties Unreal has to offer were quite interesting to experiment with. I do intend to do further experimentation with Unreal in the future to refine my practices with the software.

 

Despite being satisfied with the final outcome of this project, I do have some points that I think could have been done better looking back on the entire progression of this project. Probably the first aspect that comes to mind is that I felt I could have tried to create a more unique environment for my character, looking at it now in retrospect I feel I could perhaps have made an environment that had a bit more variety in its terrain or even a few more tree and rock varieties to improve the visuals of the environment my character is set in. The next aspect that I felt could have been done better would be the modelling of my characters arrow. Originally, I wanted the arrow to have a glass tip with a green serum inside of it, but I did not do this in the end and instead went for a more basic green serum-infused arrow tip which I feel is lost potential in the final model as this was far more basic compared to my original vision for this character’s props.

 

Overall I Felt I learned a lot from this module and I was able to expand my abilities in working with 3D modelling and development software. After being introduced to Unreal Engine and gaining a better understanding of how to create models, normal maps, textures etc. I do want to experiment more with 3d animation in general to widen my skill-set and make my abilities in both 2d and 3d far more versatile so I can be more flexible for what roles I could play within an animation Pipeline within an industry setting.

 

Media Referenced (Bibliography)

www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Blender Secrets – Easy Anime Hair. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iqQziLphGE.

Unreal engine final rendering and post-production adjustments.

After I was able to import my character model and textures into Unreal and then position them in the environment in a way that felt right, I was able to start creating the final rendered images of my character model within the environment. Using Unreal Engine’s high resolution screenshot feature I was able to get several screenshots of my character within the environment then I got a basic blank LUT, which I then brought both the LUT and screenshots and bring them into Photoshop to edit the screenshot’s lighting through the use of Photoshop and then translate the adjustments to Unreal using the edited LUT. After this, I was able to create the fully edited finalized screenshots of my character with the updated lighting and colour adjustments. Overall I was very satisfied with the outcome of this process and I didn’t really find it as difficult as other parts of this entire design process as I have work with Photoshop quite a bit in the past and already was aware of a lot of its tools and properties, so editing the final screenshot LUT was pretty easy to do. After I completed this part of the process, that officially concluded the design and envelopment of my character for this module.