Our class went back to the basics of rigging while Henry our lecturer had covid, we were covered by Michael for the morning session. He went back to the rigging we learnt from 1st year second semester when animating with 3D. Michael had uploaded the videos from last year and onto blackboard and shown how to add the rigs onto the bird model to make it wave. Since my main role in the group project is modelling and texturing this won’t be my responsibility within the game but I do like to try.

Meanwhile I finished my other models and make some fixes to the previous props along with their UV’s. 

These videos helped me out his week and the previous weeks.

4- 3D PLASTIC CHAIR _MAYA MODELLING – YouTube

Modeling a Coffee Mug in Maya – YouTube

Autodesk Maya 2018 – Headphones Speed Modeling – YouTube

Autodesk Maya Simple Key Modeling – YouTube

Model a hat in Maya part 1 (modeling) – YouTube

For the rest of the week I had went through the assignment 2 criteria and went into the other websites that Alec had put onto blackboard. I also went through different audio takes on the 11 second club that gives me plenty of choices of choosing a specific recording and animating it either 2D or 3D. I have a few options for the company and what audio I will choose for it.

This morning we had a presentation held by Jackie Smyth who visited our university to help us understand about placements, being a freelancer or running a business by being an entrepreneur.  It gave me ideas that I want to do in my placement year and when I leave and graduate my animation course at university. Afterwards our lecturers took each vertical slice group to see our progress and if there were any worries that we need of help for.

We then moved onto the explanation on our assignment 2 and picking that art style for an specific organisation that would meet the requirements if we were applying for them. We would have to choose one audio and pick either 2D or 3D animation for the assignment. 

We later went into our groups and made more progress on where everyone was at and to fix any problems that we had. I was able to finish my models that day and send them as FBX files to the rest of the group so they may be able to block out the environment. I then moved onto the texturing stage so I may present what I have done for the presentation fulfilling my part and role as modeller and texture artist. 

This week I have just finished modelling and texturing the hero props for the game. As well as choosing the colour palettes for the props using photoshop for everyone to use for texturing.

We continued with Zbrush for week 4. Henry showed us the shortcuts and ways to sculpt a character with maya. He did it with an elk where as us can do the same or choose an animal of our liking. It was very informative and much handy then blender in it’s way where we can sculpt the character from one shape or fill it up with shapes then bring into maya for the time being. My chose was a fox and here is what I’ve done from last week.

For our team project, modelling and texturing is happening.

For our morning session, Henry had went back to the character design principles and talked about the structures of characters/creatures and how to meet the requirements of the design. There was also the 9 tips on how to make a successful character; which are 

• Characters are composed of familiar elements
• The character must meet the requirements of the script
• The character must visually reflects a backstory
• The character must be coherent with the presented world
• The characters features an emblematic silhouette
• The character must be developed according to the initial approved design.
 • If the character is translated to a new medium then it must be updated but not changed
• A character must be produced in the appropriate quality for its role
• A character must have a convincing overall shape
• It must be impactful!

The anatomy of the skull was explained with the topography along with the head including eyes, the margins and the gender difference between them. Then moved onto the last which involved the facial expressions or simply the FACS (Facial Action Coding System) which displays the eyes, eyebrows and mouth.

We later went onto our zbrush’s and practiced with the structure of our models that we have downloaded from our blackboards. We had each chosen a face to mimic from it’s portrait 

In the afternoon for our presentations we had shown our updated versions of planning, gameplay, props, inspirations, mood boards and art styles, There had been some pros and cons for our presentation. For game designers have to agree on their narrative and animation people to finalize their art style and have a few animations done. 

Here is my following models and animation bit I did for an warm up.

For week 2 from creative industries we were introduced to Zbrush a digital sculpting tool that combines 3D and 2D modelling with texturing and painting. Henry had navigated his way through Zbrush show us the robes on the tools, shortcuts, demonstrations on models and setting controls. 

In some ways it is simply like Blender, but has more functions and tools for our projects which would benefit us for our final assignments at the end of semester 2. We had fun with it even though it’s new to my experience I would have to watch a lot of videos to get the gest of it for the upcoming weeks even during other assignments coming up soon, including working on animations for April.

Afterwards we had introduced our pitch presentations to the other two groups which involves an investigator under cover to solve a mystery within a telephone office and collect clues and listen over phone calls to connect the dots to find the murderer. We had shown off our work with game designers showing the levels and mechanics and the animation students displaying concept art of the characters and concept models of props with the theme of 1970’s with a chosen colour scheme and art style. However, we had to fix some stuff within the PowerPoint and do it again for the pre-production week. It’s simple enough to make amendments to the PowerPoint with everyone on board and with me making more models but didn’t have to texture them immediately but only show concept art for it. 

Also Ciara in our Group G set up the art style guidelines on her documents to show what’s there on what the environment will look like, the lighting, colours and characters. 

Our group name is Knives out (yes from the movie knives out since it’s a murder mystery trope were following for this project).

Starting our Semester 2, we were quickly introduced to our course Animation for the Creative  Industries. There our lecturers introduced us to our work for the 12 weeks, lessons we’ll learn, our assignments and finally what groups we’ll be in with the game designers to create our own game. For our assignments there are due April 28th and May 12th which involves the game and our individual animations whether it be 2D or 3D. 

So for our first week we back we immediately went to our groups, for me being in group G I met the following members of group G which included 11 other members including me making 12. 

For my main role in this group project is prop modelling and textures with minor  roles such as animation, visual effects and character sculpting/modelling.

Once we re-located into our groups we then went into our sub groups of 4 people so we would then come up with our 10 ideas with the main theme being Isolation and Connection and make it into one where we share amongst ourselves and turn it to three ideas. In my sub group I was joined up with Alex, Nicole and Dominik. We had interesting ideas involving family, friends, robots, war, animals, puzzles and Wi-Fi. For our sub group we narrowed it down to our first person perspective lighthouse with the goal on trying to keep the light lit.

Once our time was up we were all back into one big group again and heard each others main idea. The other two were a vampire trying to survive and become human within the end of the game and the other is the telephone idea where the person collects calls and tries to figure out the mystery. 

We quickly moved onto Miro and get our ideas. For being part of animation and artists here is the concept art and inspiration for each of our tasks.

Miro  

Overall it was a fun activity to be apart of and helped with giving us ideas on the game before our pitch presentation.