Due to being busy for the past couple of weeks with other assignments, I wasn’t able to update my blogs with the current progress of my contribution to our group animation Hubris. Below is some the of stuff that I have helped with including pre-production sketches to final textures.
Pre-production sketches
Here are two room interpretations I did whilst we were still brainstorming the layout of our scene. The first one here was a depiction of our initial idea for our room layout, however, in the end up we decided to go for one that uses a 180 degree rule. Despite this, I really like how it turned out as it presents very well with the linework and colour choices, which have a great balance of contrasting with one another. Even though I like this drawing, I feel that if it were done in 3D it would most likely appear boring, not as exciting and playful in comparison to a room in which has the flexibility for various angles and viewpoints.
First room idea (discontinued)
Here is a drawing in which I did of all of the slime potions together which was done in order to visually brainstorm the positions of the bottles and props. By doing this, it helped out my team members roughly think about the table layout, the sizing of the room and also the angle at which the animation will be shot. This is a lot more different in comparison to the previous style I used, which was more muted, loose and organic looking. This is something I was experimenting with to predict what colours would look the best for the animation.
Final slime design concepts
Turn around versions
Here are the turn around versions for the characters above. We decided that we would scrap the plant and rock slime ideas due to the lack of time we have and also the complexity of these designs would prove to be very time consuming and a bit more difficult to rig and texture. In return, we would spend more time and effort getting the main slime models perfected, especially with the cat and devil slime tail rigs.
UV unwrapping progress
Below are a series of UV unwrapping in which I did for our groups’ models. After I organised their UV layouts, I took the updated fbx files over to Substance Painter to create their textures. Unexpectedly, I really enjoyed this process and found it really interesting how much of a difference it makes to have textures on a model. Moreover, there were a few issues I had come across during this activity, the main one being the eye UVs for the devil slime. For some reason, when rendered on Maya with the uploaded textures, the eyes would collide with the horns. I feel that the reason for this at the time was due to how the eyes and horns were in the one UV layer and this was solved by separating them and doing a project configuration on Substance. Ultimately, these outcomes came out really well and bring more personality to our characters.
Base slime UV
Main body unwrap
Eyes unwrap
Final textures applied
Post-explosionÂ
Cat slime UV
Tail unwrap
Main body unwrap
Ears and eyes unwrap
Finished textures applied
Devil slime UV
Eyes unwrap
Horns unwrap
Tail unwrap
Main body unwrap
finished textures applied
Reference videos
Here is a video I have watched recently to help me think more about how I colour my models. It mainly inspired me with the style I used for our slime textures, in terms of subtle details such as the gradient on the devil slime’s tail and simple patterns on the cat slime’s body. Moreover, this video has made me realise the endless opportunities and outcomes that can be created from using substance painter as a means to texture models.
In comparison, I also looked into another method of texturing models that utilises Photoshop to paint on the UV layers. Although the outcome of this turned out amazing, and I am more experienced with Photoshop than Substance. I feel that using this method would be difficult for me personally as I wouldn’t be able to have the viewport predicting these textures onto the model like substance painter. This would mean if I were to mess up or make mistakes, I would have to go back and forth between Maya and Photoshop to get the texturing perfected. In future, I think I will probably just stick to and continue practising with Substance Painter for my 3D work.
Practising the importance of shapesÂ
Below, I decided to revisit using shapes to convey character form and body language. With slime forms, this proves to be more difficult as there isn’t much to work with to emphasize emotion. Moreover, I tried to break some basic shapes down to see how they could be used as an armature for the slime base. These turned out rather well and taught me what shapes work well with the form of these characters. I feel as though my favourite two would be the triangle and semi-circle as these seem more natural and probably a lot more flexible in comparison to the circle and rectangle. This is due to how the rectangle is too flat and geometrical, and the circle is too round, almost like a ball. By doing this exercise, it has made me think more in-depth about how I will position and animate the slime to suggest expressions.
