This Month’s Overview
This month was an interesting one in the terms of progress. On one hand, I finally got though many of the hurdles holding me back, such as organic modal and lighting, then I got behind again with elements such as rigging and weight painting. My work is starting to come together and as some things keep me from moving forward at a good pace I feel a drop quality that will alter the final project. Thankfully not to a huge extent, the final result will still be good, but I know with better anticipation of issues the final result could have been better.
Scene Setup
Models Insert
As this month marked the completion of both the Density’s and Blaster Woman’s model including weight painting, they were now ready to enter the scene for animation. I would also be adding in the rest of the assets such as the PC Station, crates, boxes, containers, etc.
The non-characters models will go in first as they will give me the idea of how the rooms are laid out. This is important so I know where each character can move without running into a wall or the scene having to be re-planned if the animation flow becomes uneven. When adding in the assets, I did not know I could insert the Maya file directly, instead of having to insert the fbx file. I spent more time adding the textures back in than I would have if I did it the other way. At least I have a back up of all textures and fbx files incase the model breaks due to a random bug on Maya’s end.
With the extra assets in, my environments started top look more complete. The warehouse’s ground floor, for example, now stores cargo as it is intended to in the story. I did run into some texture issues with the two containers where both of the images would not load correctly. I had to re-import the models and render out the textures again in order to function properly. With the textures that would not work after that I just used a default colour texture from Maya.
I took into consideration after a interview with my tutor Mike, that my layout for the complete environment files were a mess. This was due to large file size through build up history and the amount of separated meshes. It was also unclear which layer held which model. I used the Group options to collect models in the outliner (under the names of Background, Non-moving assets, etc.) and the layers were all remade and colour coded for easy identification. Finally I would freeze all models X,Y and Z values and delete all history to clear up my file size.
The same would be done with my characters’ models, but inserting the Maya file so I don’t have to retexture the models and the rigs are not lost. While they made into the animation without any significant errors of transition, the models were spilt from their own layers, but it was not hard to fix that problem. I would also colour code the layers like the assets, highlighting which layer contained the rig, bones and mesh and to whom it belongs. More images of this set up can be seen throughout the blog.
Lighting
With all the models coming together to form the complete environment it was time to start adding in lighting. I did run into an issue where new lights stopped working, but that was due to a light cap that was easily turned off when the option was found.
The Skybox was added but I will be looking for a better quality JPEG (or equivalent) as the one I got off the internet is very low resolution.
Character’s Creation
Attractor’s Model
For the longest time, Attractor only had progress on his backpack and guns as I kept running into issues on the organic side in sculpting his mask, shoulder pads, boots, etc. This was due to my lack of 3D organic modeling (especially with Maya). Thankfully, two of my tutors (Henry and Mike), were able to teach me how to modal organic elements within Maya, eliminating the need to switch between the programs Maya and Blender. I was then able to build the full model at great speed, untie the body with the backpack gear and texture them in Substance Painter. The only elements missing is the piping, but they are added during the rigging process. I am happy with the overall result but as I would soon learn my problems with this character are far from over.
Update (April 10th): Due to unfound errors with the lighting and texture loading, Attractor has to change to In-built Maya coloured materials. This lost some of the texture elements, like roughness and improved colour but they still can carry out their job and will not have to have files loaded back on to them.
Blaster Woman’s Hair
As with Attractor above, the lesson on organic modeling has helped me to finish off the hair for Blaster Woman. There is not much to say here except for two key points: Firstly is the hair is shorter than the concept art, but I’m ok with this as the style still works. Secondly, the hair might not be able to have a rig completed due to time constraints (for both Mike and me) but I was told by my tutor that it does not matter too much and should not adversely affect my grade that much. I’m glad the model is done and ready for rigging.
Rigging and Weight Painting
This process took so much time, led to me falling behind and even then, I felt I was getting nowhere fast. So many Issues arose, from the lack of my knowledge (such as how a human body works in term of weight painting) to Maya not working correctly (like Maya’s auto rig completely breaking down with how figures work). I even felt for a time that my work would ether not be complete or it would look rushed and awful. After trying to help me out, Mike made me a offer. Because I was working on my own (with the exception of sound), Mike was going to do the Rigging and Weight Painting for me. Normally I would not accept as it such a big favor to ask and I feel uncomfortable loading work on to someone else that I should be doing, but I was not doing well and I was already behind thanks to this task. So I excepted. Mike has already completed both Density and Blaster Woman, with Attractor being worked on for next week. Not everything will be prefect (such as Blaster Woman no longer bring able to open her jaw) but it will put my project back on track and start me animating next month.
Test Shots and Test Animation
Before I started my animation and waiting for the completed weight painting to come back, I did some quick test renders to see what my project would look like. While they are not prefect, such as the lighting (the bloom is strong but the characters are very muted), it help boost my moral to see my work finally coming together. Additionally, with the lighting, it helps identify what elements could use some refinement, which is useful feedback for next months work.
Test Animation
For Next Month
At this point the animation process has to begin next month as I am further behind time than what I would like. As Mike is now helping with the weight painting and rigging all models should be animation ready by the start of the 2nd week next month. I should do some more test shot and some test animations to get a understanding of how each rigs work before the proper animation begins. I should also adjust the lighting as well to try and find the right balance for each scene, but it will change down the light again once the animation is complete. If I have any spare time, I should work on the opening and closing credits.