Assignment 3: Animated short Blog

Intro:

For our last assignment in Animated narratives we where split up into groups of five and where given the task to create an animated short between 15-30 seconds, based on the theme adventure. During the idea process we quickly decided on the idea of a ghost within an abandoned house. One of our early ideas was for the ghost to be getting ready for a date, and once he met his date they were sucked up by a ghost buster like machine. We then settled on the idea of the ghost going into the kitchen, where he finds a fridge and floats through it. He would then emerge from the fridge with a sandwich floating inside him, it would then fall to the ground. The short would end with a tear drop from the ghosts eye.

 

Research/References:

In our team I was given the task to model and texture the hallway, as well as animating the first shot of the short. As soon as I was assigned the hallway I already knew what I wanted it to look like. My favourite game is ‘The Last Of Us’, and the main menu shows a window within an abandoned house with overgrown vegetation. This is where I took my inspiration from for my hallway model. I then done a quick concept art of the hallway to get an idea of how it would look and the colours I could use.

 

Production:

So I began by creating a basic hallway with a window and a doorway leading into the kitchen. I then went back into it and added more like the skirting board, shelf & supports, window sill and wooden planks. I then added curtains by using a plane and a ncloth simulation. I pivoted the plane to a support so it wouldn’t fall, I then made the support smaller so that it would push the plane together to create to wrinkle effect. Lastly I paused the simulation and duplicated to make an object. To add more detail I removed parts of the curtains to make them look ripped. Early in the year we had already created a vase and table for the development of our modelling skills. So I decided I could use these assets within the hallway. Next i wanted to add the vine coming through the window of the hallway. To help me do this i used the following video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKvOPklNCOY. Firstly I created a path for the vine to be created upon. I then created an ivy mesh and used the attribute editor to tweak it to my liking. I then applied the mesh to the path. I did have a problem where the mesh wasn’t showing up in the render but this is because I had forgotten to convert it to polygons. Once I had finished modelling the hallway I then moved onto UV mapping. Now UV mapping is something I struggle with but I think I’ve improved a lot since my last assignment. Using YouTube tutorials I was able to create clean and straight UVs. I still think I can do better, but I have definitely improved. After I had finished UV mapping, I then moved onto the textures. I exported the scene as an FXB file and imported it into substance painter. To achieve to look I wanted, I downloaded and imported custom materials From ‘Substance Share’, such as; ‘Peeled paint wood’, Broken old brick wall’, ‘Mossy pine’ and ‘old painted wood’. There are separate textures for the table as I already had textures done for the table when I previously modelled and rendered it. Once The hallway was modelled and textured, it was time to start my part of the animation. Another member of my group was modelling and rigging the ghost, so I got the model off her and imported it into my scene. This is where I found a problem. For my shot there was no change in expression of the ghost but, the model has its mouth open by default and there was no control for this. This was easy to fix though. I done this by unfreezing the transformations on the model, then using the face select tool to close the mouth of the ghost. I then added keyframes to the ghost and camera so they would move smoothly together. I tried to replicate a typical cartoony ghost, that would float up and down while moving. I spent some time trying to get the timing right. To me its smooth enough but could be better. Once the animation was finished, another member of my group gave us the backdrop and lighting setup so that it would be consistent throughout. When I imported the lights, They were slightly off because of the scale of my model. So I made some slight tweaks to match mine. The scene was then complete and all I had left to do was render the animation.

 

 

Outcome:

Below is my final render of my section for ‘Midnight Snack Adventure’.

And This is the final ‘Midnight Snack Adventure’ render.

 

Conclusion & Reflection Throughout the year:

I really enjoyed this assignment as it combines different aspects of 3D work, such as modelling, and animating. I feel like this is the big assignment that we’ve been building up to, so it was fun working in a group and to finally create our own 3D short. I particularly enjoyed modelling and texturing the hallway. This has made me want to develop my skills, focusing more on environments. Overall I have really enjoyed my first year in animation, and because of that this year has flew by. Previously I was studying cyber security but decided to change course as I wasn’t enjoying it. I am very glad I made that decision. This year has taught me the basics of 2D and 3D animation. This was my first experience with any form of animation, so it was a bit daunting trying to learn all of the new software and techniques. But I think my work is pretty on track for a beginner. My favourite section of the year was definitely 3D animation, and this is where my interest lies and I cant wait to develop my skills further. I also enjoyed the problem solving aspect of each assignment, through the use of forums, videos and exploring the software. This gave me a sense of accomplishment, and I think this will be a good skill to have in the future. In general I think my work is to a decent standard, but I could try a lot harder to improve the quality. I had a few personal matters along with COVID which really impacted my motivation. But I can wait to see what’s in store next year.

Assignment 2-Animation Studies-Blog

Planning/ Research

For this assignment we were tasked to create two 3D animations. One had to be a study in the weight of motion and body mechanics. The other was a study of emotion / personality of a character. We were given the choice between two rigs, The Monty rig or the Ultimate walker rig. I chose the Ultimate walker. After doing some research and looking at references, I started making animatics so I could get a rough idea of what my animations would look like. Below are the animatics

Animatic for Animation 1- Emotion

The idea is that walker would look suspiciously behind him as if he had heard a noise, He would then turn back around in a resting pose. A box would then fall beside him, startling him. He would lift his leg to and use his foot to cover his head. He would then slowly move his foot so he can see the box, place his foot down then slide up to the box. He slowly moves his foot towards the box and hesitantly pushes it. He stops to see any reaction. Another box then falls on his head and knocks him out.

 

Animatic for Animation 2- Weight

I wanted to keep the weight animation short so I could focus on getting the timing and positioning right to be able to effectively show to weight of Walker. So my idea was walker would throw his leg forward causing him to slip on to his back. He would then use one of his feet to push him so that his feet would be pointing to the sky. He would then push both his feet out and use the momentum to lift up and land back onto his feet. I used the following YouTube video as reference for the ‘Kick up’.

 

Development

I first started with animating the weight task and then the emotion task, as I thought expressing emotion would be harder and as this is my first time 3D animating, starting with the weight would give me more practice. Both of the animations were pretty straight forward to animate. I had some problems with the timing of the keyframes, were they were either too fast or too slow in certain areas which hurt the flow of the animation. With time and manipulation i was able to smooth out most of the timing issues to a satisfying degree. The final animations are below which have been rendered with the Arnold engine.

Animation 1-Weight

Animation 2- Emotion

Conclusion

Overall I really enjoyed working on the 3D animations as I prefer it over the 2D style. I definitely see some areas which need improvement. I feel the animations still have a little bit of a floaty feel to them, which gives the impression that they don’t carry any weight. I also found it a bit hard to convey emotion with a character made up of only a ball and legs; with no face. However I enjoyed the challenge. I think I done an alright job with the rig we were given to convey emotion but looking back I believe I could have used specific movements and used timing more effectively to better express emotion. I can also see some clipping in both of the animations. But I think with time more practice I will be able to Implement more weight in my animations and overall improvement my 3D animating skills.