Learning Experience
During character animation I felt I learnt two new techniques to help me when using max studios and animating models. The first thing I learnt was how to use particles effectively. I used this when creating the characters Jetpack animation, which i feel looked realistic.
The second thing I learnt was how to use the CatBox. The CatBox was a new and quick way of animating when compared to Key Framming. The ability to create postures and then set weighting to make animations was a big time saver, and a lot more effective. This system was also beneficial as animating the bones without the skin allowed me to animate the character to have the correct movement.
I learnt more about how to look at characters in films and games and interpret there motives through there actions, for example a character who looks down a lot, moves slowly and has very slow movements can be seen to be shy. Where as a fast moving, pointy nosed character can be seen as a more evil and scary character.
The last thing I felt I learnt was how to give a character a personality. My character started as an evil man and grew into a more defined character as he is now. I feel I gave him a strong personality, being evil and a gadget lover, with a sense of intelligence and insanity.
Final thoughts on the Animation
I felt that the animation itself went well and gave the character a good atmosphere to project himself. I found myself laughing at the character in several parts, and could see how crazy I had made him. I felt that the character could have been more detailed with a mouth, but due to the Morpher issue it was impossible to do so.
Problems that Occurred
The major problem I had was that the animation grew to a length that was longer than I had anticipated, as well as having issues with the Morpher modifier. These problems were difficult to overcome, however I feel that the characters eyes and hand movements expressed the characters attitude and expressions well enough to replace the missing mouth animation.
What I would Change
If I was to animate the character again I would make sure all of the body parts where created separately, so that I could use the Morpher modifier along with the skin modifier. This would make animating easier and allow me to make more detailed character expressions.
I would also try to add more detail to the characters surrounding and lighting, as these were a low quality and made the animation look unrealistic.
In summery, I have enjoyed this module. I feel I have learnt a lot from it and have enjoyed my time working on my character. Bob will forever be remembered as my first character, and my favourite evil character.
Friday, 4 May 2012
Scene 8 and Rendering
Scene 8
In this scene the character stands up after having the Jetpack fly off without him, only to have it fly behind him later. This animation was used by KeyFraming and the CatBox animator again. This scene also featured the partical system again to create the Jetpack's flames.
After this was completed I put all of the scenes into Adobe Premire Pro and created the animation useing simple black and white fades. While doing this I found that my animation grew by around 15 seconds, but looked better then I believed it would. This was also the time to add the sound effects to the animation. These included the characters evil laugh, along with the jetpacks flamethrower sound effects.
All of the sounds used in the animation were used from SoundDogs.com and were free to use.
Character Understanding
This scene shows a shot of the Jetpack fling behind the character, and him rolling his eyes. This was to show that the character has given up with the gadget, and will move onto a new one.
In this scene the character stands up after having the Jetpack fly off without him, only to have it fly behind him later. This animation was used by KeyFraming and the CatBox animator again. This scene also featured the partical system again to create the Jetpack's flames.
After this was completed I put all of the scenes into Adobe Premire Pro and created the animation useing simple black and white fades. While doing this I found that my animation grew by around 15 seconds, but looked better then I believed it would. This was also the time to add the sound effects to the animation. These included the characters evil laugh, along with the jetpacks flamethrower sound effects.
All of the sounds used in the animation were used from SoundDogs.com and were free to use.
Character Understanding
This scene shows a shot of the Jetpack fling behind the character, and him rolling his eyes. This was to show that the character has given up with the gadget, and will move onto a new one.
Scene 7
Scene 7
This scene was made using keyFrames and the CatBox animator again. The main things that happen in this scene is the Jetpack takes off without the character, as well as the facial animations.
Character Understanding
I enjoyed doing this scene as I find the expression on the character amusing. The character shows signs of insanity and disbelief as his Jetpack takes of, leaving him behind. I feel that making his eye twitch gives him a sense of craziness and danger.
This scene was made using keyFrames and the CatBox animator again. The main things that happen in this scene is the Jetpack takes off without the character, as well as the facial animations.
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| Jetpack leaving the character |
Character Understanding
I enjoyed doing this scene as I find the expression on the character amusing. The character shows signs of insanity and disbelief as his Jetpack takes of, leaving him behind. I feel that making his eye twitch gives him a sense of craziness and danger.
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| Characters Eye Twitch |
Scene 6
Scene 6
The Jetpack fire was created using the "Partical SuperSpray" tool in Max Studios. The fire is created using a group of particles of which another group are created every frame and then giving force using the velocity tool. This gave a realist looking fire, and gave the animation a more realistic impression.
Character Understanding
This scene shows only the Jetpacks attributes, but leads on to show several different emotions from the character, including anger, fear and sadness.
The Jetpack fire was created using the "Partical SuperSpray" tool in Max Studios. The fire is created using a group of particles of which another group are created every frame and then giving force using the velocity tool. This gave a realist looking fire, and gave the animation a more realistic impression.
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| Character Jetpack starting |
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| Character Jetpack at full power |
Character Understanding
This scene shows only the Jetpacks attributes, but leads on to show several different emotions from the character, including anger, fear and sadness.
Scene 3 - 5
Scene 3 - 5
The animation for the eyes was created by Key Framing the scenes and then changing the properties. The button press was created by using the CatBox animation system, and Key Framming the button to shrink once pressed.
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| Character eyes after animating |
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| Character pushes down the Jetpack button |
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| Button before being pushed |
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| Button after being pushed |
Character Understanding
In the follow scenes the character shows more of a personality by making several facial expressions, as well as showing signs of being impatient and unimpressed. The characters eyes roll around his head to give the viewer the sense that hes annoyed when his gadget doesn't starts. The irratick mash of the Jetpack button then shows how impatient the character can be.
Scene 2
Scene 2
Scene two involved 3 cameras and a few different animations, mixed together through the CatBox system. The CatBox system works by creating animations and then saving them to layers. You can then increase the weighting on each individual layer to make the character play out that movement. If you want a mixed of the two animations you can simply blend the two layers together, by turning the weight up on both and create a complex animation in a short period of time. A notable way of telling the different layers apart is by the colour they give to each layer.
The cameras are used all at different times during the animation, to save time and space creating a seperate max file for each scene.
Character Understanding
In this scene the character is pulling the straps on his Jetpack, and then in the next scene, continues to press the button on his Jetpack. The animation is quick and gives the impression the character is in a rush to try his gadget.
Scene two involved 3 cameras and a few different animations, mixed together through the CatBox system. The CatBox system works by creating animations and then saving them to layers. You can then increase the weighting on each individual layer to make the character play out that movement. If you want a mixed of the two animations you can simply blend the two layers together, by turning the weight up on both and create a complex animation in a short period of time. A notable way of telling the different layers apart is by the colour they give to each layer.
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| Character with layer 1 animation |
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| Character with layer 2 animation |
Character Understanding
In this scene the character is pulling the straps on his Jetpack, and then in the next scene, continues to press the button on his Jetpack. The animation is quick and gives the impression the character is in a rush to try his gadget.
Scene 1
Scene 1
The scene for the animation is built of 4 - 5 texture planes and a light source orbiting from above. Depending on camera angles and lighting effects, the planes can be easily manoeuvred to suit the camera. The character is centred in the middle of the scene, with all of his gadget gear on. The first scene begins by having the light source turn on, and the camera quick zoom towards his face.
This scene was created using two main aspects, which are re-used throughout the animation. The first being key framing, a system of setting key frames in which an objects properties change. This was used for the light source and can be very effective, but at the same time very difficult to use. The system relies on the users locking every property before it is changed, and if forgot to do so can cause major problems.
The second system that was used for the characters animation, in which the CatBox animation system was used. This will be explained in more detail in a later post.
Character Understanding
In this scene the character is suppose to appear scary and omnipotent. The character welcomes the character as if he had planed for it to be there.
The scene for the animation is built of 4 - 5 texture planes and a light source orbiting from above. Depending on camera angles and lighting effects, the planes can be easily manoeuvred to suit the camera. The character is centred in the middle of the scene, with all of his gadget gear on. The first scene begins by having the light source turn on, and the camera quick zoom towards his face.
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| Scene set-up |
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| Darkness before the light is turned on |
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| The characters default posture |
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| The character bringing his arms up to meet his face |
The second system that was used for the characters animation, in which the CatBox animation system was used. This will be explained in more detail in a later post.
Character Understanding
In this scene the character is suppose to appear scary and omnipotent. The character welcomes the character as if he had planed for it to be there.
Morpher
Using the Morpher tool would have been useful during the animation process, as this allows for easy facial animations, as well as other numerous things.
The way it works is by using a an object and a clone of said object. The clone can then be manipulated into any shape, however vertex's cannot be created or deleted (The Morpher only works when the objects vertex numbers are unchanged). The process can be repeated for as many clones as the user needs, as to create more shapes for the object to transform into.
The Morpher tool would have been used on the face of my character, however the skin modifier prevented this. The skin modifier pulls vertex towards bones, and using the Morpher effects this process. Therefore all of the facial animations had to be done by Key-Frames, and made itdifficult to work with.
The problem also made it impossible to animate other aspects of the model, such as his ears, nose or mouth. This was for the same reason as before, and made it difficult to put the characters expressions across. However I feel that the characters expressions still worked well, and i improvised to create a still, believable character.
It should be noted that morpher can be used in any cercemstance, however as I was using CatBox for the character, only the head would have benifited from using morpher.
Below however is a quick tutorial on how to use the Morpher modifier to show I can compentently use it.
The way it works is by using a an object and a clone of said object. The clone can then be manipulated into any shape, however vertex's cannot be created or deleted (The Morpher only works when the objects vertex numbers are unchanged). The process can be repeated for as many clones as the user needs, as to create more shapes for the object to transform into.
The Morpher tool would have been used on the face of my character, however the skin modifier prevented this. The skin modifier pulls vertex towards bones, and using the Morpher effects this process. Therefore all of the facial animations had to be done by Key-Frames, and made itdifficult to work with.
The problem also made it impossible to animate other aspects of the model, such as his ears, nose or mouth. This was for the same reason as before, and made it difficult to put the characters expressions across. However I feel that the characters expressions still worked well, and i improvised to create a still, believable character.
It should be noted that morpher can be used in any cercemstance, however as I was using CatBox for the character, only the head would have benifited from using morpher.
Below however is a quick tutorial on how to use the Morpher modifier to show I can compentently use it.
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| Create an object that you want to Morph |
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| Create a clone of that object |
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| Minipulate the clone, without adding or subtracting any vertex |
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| Select the primary object and choose the Morpher modifier |
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| Choose "Pick object from scene" in the modifier panel and select the clone |
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| Now adjuse the percentage options in the modifier to bring the object to the desired state (50% Morphed) |
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| Now you can create more clones and mix the morphs together using the percentages in the modifier panel (100% Morphed) |
The Story I picked
After looking at both of my stories and deciding that both would most likely end up being longer then planned, I decided to make scene 1 my full animation. This gave me more time to create the animation and add more expressions to the cahracter.
Tuesday, 1 May 2012
Story Development
There are two storys for the character, one being half a minute long and the other being a whole minute. The storyboards and scene scripts for each are shown below.
Character
Animation - Story 1 SID:
0918959
1.
Black
Room
2.
Lights
turn on and illuminate character
3.
Character
smiles and cracks knuckles
4.
QUICK
CUT Close up of Jetpack straps
5.
QUICK
CUT Close up of button
6.
Character
presses button
7.
Loud
noise and then silence
8.
Character
looks puzzled/surprised
9.
Character
looks crazy
10. Masses the button
11. Close up of button
12. Jetpack noise starts
13. Jetpack exhausts fire
14. Character looks happy/smug
15. Jetpack fly’s off without character
16. Blank expression from character
17. Character sighs
18. Jetpack fly’s behind character
19. Cut to black
20. END
Scene 1 Script
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| Scene 1 Page 1 |
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| Scene 1 Page 2 |
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| Scene 1 Page 3 |
Character
Animation - Story 2 SID: 0918959
1.
Lights
turn on and show door and letter box
2.
Camera
pans down door
3.
Package
is posted and wakes sleeping character
4.
Character
is surprised
5.
Character
smiles
6.
Character
jumps to his feet
7.
Camera
follows character running to side
8.
Character
stops and look at camera
9.
Smiles
10. Evil laugh
11. Close up of button press
12. Nothing happens
13. Character slowly moves his eyes to
look at button
14. Button is mashed again
15. Angry face
16. Sad face
17. Quickly smiles when the button makes a noise
18. Smile changes to a stunned face
19. Camera zooms out
20. Bomb appears behind character
21. Unsurprised face
22. White light
23. Shows character with a black burnt
face
Scene 2 Script
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| Scene 2 Page 1 |
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| Scene 2 Page 2 |
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| Scene 2 Page 3 |
Character To Date
The character has now been designed, coloured and rigged in Max Studios. The character has been designed in the image of the planned documents with minor alterations, most noticeably the chin is now a lot more defined. The character has also been designed with some equipment as designed below. The characters emotions and reactions play heavily on his necessity to have gadgets and gizmos.
Now that the character has been fully designed, the next step is to think about his scene in more detail, and design the story, cut by but.
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