Finished

Heres my final animation of the snake actually in the film, there were a few problems but we chose not to move the body but just the head.

Final Shots

Here are a few render shots from the final film to show the rig of the explorer in full working order; i am so happy that the rig allowed for a dive roll and rope swings; i feel that it didnt hold us back in anyway, which was my fear. I had rigged before but nothing as complex as what i have managed to create for this film. The film looks fantastic too and the animation really demonstrates the rig. I feel it worked out so well although there have been problems theres been nothing i cant fix with them pretty quickly and with no effect to the current animation so overall i am extremely happy.

Animating the snake

So i knew i had to do some animation for my file even though it really isnt my thing at all, however it had to be done. I had previously done a small amount of animation with the tortoise just a short walk cyccyle as a test, unfortunately the tortoise got dropped. Anyway we had a snake already rigged but not texture, therefore i needed to texture it then animate it for a scene in the film. The texturing went well but the UV'ing for it whoever had done it wasent great, but its so small thats its hard to tell anyway. I originally animted it moving along the floor and rearing up. Unfortunately when i imported it into the environment and tried to scale it down it messed up and corrupted. Therefore i had to unbind it and re-rig it to size. It took some time but i managed to get it done and animted in the scene. Heres the test animation for the original movement.

Nearly there!

So close to finishing now! Anyway it was getting to the point where work is starting to get thin on the ground as we had started rendering and just finishing bits off at this point however the kitchen still needed to be textured for when the cooker had blown up. Therefore everything had to be blackened. So i took the original textures i had created and layered up a charred/burnt texture over the top to give the desired effect we were after. Here are a few screenies to show how it went, i am particually pleased with the effect to show how the ash has settled! As the camera only sees a certain amount of the kitchen in the shot ive only needed to texture about half of it for the specific camera.

Lighting

Now that we have began rendering the house interior needed to be lit; having already modelled and textured the kitchen i now had to light it. I have also been given the texturing for the hallway and have taken up what Rob had previously started. Obviously i am not a lighter but i am pleased with the outcomes i have been able to achieve. Initially i was aiming for a light orangery/yellow to the scene as i imagined it to be very early hours of the morning where the sun had just began to rise; however Jonno wanted it so that it was clear it was the middle of the night as opposed to early morning. I therefore changed the lighting to be more of a moonlight feel. I am happy with both the kitchen and the hallway and feel that the light coming from outside through the windows gives that extra touch to the scene. Although my primary area of modelling and rigging is over i feel i have been able to offer help with both the texturing and lighting for the project.

Texturing

So for the past few week or so ive been working on texturing the kitchen ready for the film; having modelled and uv'ed the kitchen it only made sense for me to texture it also. Jonno wanted quite a modern feel to the kitchen so textures were kept quite clean and nothing too fancy to fit with the style of the house. I found it quite a challenge as it is not really my specialism but i am filling in as required to get the film finished. Im very happy now with how it has turned out and can show a small environment from modelling through to texturing. Although it still looks a little plain here once the walls and floor have been textured and the scene has been lit im sure it will look great. So my next task is to finish those off and then move onto the next part, which Jonno will assign me to.

Tweaking the sleeping guy rig

Rob found a few problems with some of the blend shapes for the sleeping guy; when the eyes blinked on one side it moved the eyelid on the opposite side. When both blinked at the same time it messed up. Unfortuntely as we are all aware once a blend shape has been created the only way to fix it is either to delete the cause of the problem or to unbind the skin and re-model the blend shape and re-weight, which would have taken way too much time to fix. I came up with a solution of moving the verts on the blendshape model so that they would not move on the actual rigged character. Agaian in took quite a while but crisis averted and the problem has been solved.

Heres the UV map for the grandfarther clock, which Ben modelled, took quite a while as it was quite intricate and alot of small pieces, which took time to map correctly.

So for the past couple of weeks ive been brought in to UV parts of the environment and the assets/contents for them. Having already modelled the kitchen i was then assigned to UV it also. I had to learn how to UV properly first so Rob gave me a quick run through on the basics and the rest just came with practice and my own mistakes and learning through them. Im glad i now have learned how to UV as it will prove usefull when texturing my own characters when i graduate. Here are a few screen shots to show the completed kitchen ready for texturing. Ive also uv'ed a few objects around the house such as the grandfarther clock and other assets within the house. The plan is now to begin texturing so all is coming together nicely now.

The Mouse

Ok so at the start of the film to bring a bit more life to the appartment we decided to have a mouse running under some of the clutter and units in the lounge. Also to bring a bit of life to the shot too. Ben Griffon modelled the mouse and very well i might add, low polly and a nice clean mesh. We decided not to smooth it but just smooth the normals out as you will be seeing it in the distance anyway. Its weighted really nicely and im really happy with the outcome. Jonno uv'd it ready for texturing too so its ready to hand over to Ben for animation.

A peculiar week

So the first week back has been rather unsettled ive felt, having given the rig back to Asa i accepted doing a rig for Jess Soderstrom as i figured i had a spare week before Jonno wanted me back on Aztec Escape. I began work on the pigeon for Jess first thing on monday with the intention to start weighting by tuesday. Asa contacted me saying that instead of Ik handles for the arms could i parent constrain them, so i was working on 2 rigs, things got a bit hectic and Jess decided that the rig id done for the pigeon didnt quite work well enough so she decided to re-rig. Proberbly my fault for not having the time to be able to put in towards it; in hindsight i didnt really have enough time to do it. There was a few problems with the rig for Asa but finally they have all been ironed out. Jonno has asked me to rig a mouse for our film next week so im hopefully getting the model off Ben tonight so can make a start first thing monday morning. It will be interesting as ive not done a four legged animal yet except the tortoise, which unfortunately has now been scrapped as Jonno felt its involvement in the film was a bit odd. The rig wont be too complex for the mouse though as its only in the film very briefly.

Although the week didnt go quite to plan i felt i learnt alot and also learnt a few new future techniques for rigging, all experience which is a positive.

Asset Modelling

Jonno asked me to make a few assets for the film just to bring more liefe to the appartment really, basic objects such as a sky box, dvd rack, beer and coke bottles.etc Heres a screen grab of the ones ive modelled for the film.





Having handed Sophie back over to Asa jessica sanderstrom approached me with some rigging for her film, ive agreed to take one of the models, which is a pigeon. Ive given myself a week to get it done in so that i can then get back onto my film. There was a shortage of work on my film so i thought id do the work for Jessica while i had a bit of time spare. Ben has also finished modelling the mouse for the film and has asked for it to be rigged so Jonno will be checking it over first but i think i will be given that to work on next week.

Finally Sophie is Finished!

So after a few technical hiccups over the holidays ive finally finished rigging sophie for Asa!The model was quite nicely done so it was easy to weight and it turned out very well in the end, its not quite as complex as the rigs for my own film but it works well still. As always the chest was perhaps the most pain staking part of the weighting process as it took me a good few hours to sort it out properly. Anyway heres a few screen grabs.

Easter Break

Ok so now were in the easter break and ive returned home for a few weeks so am incontact with Ron and Jonno through phone and e-mail. Rob touched up the snake that jen had modelled for the opening sequence for me to rig and weight; i managed to get it done in just a day or two as it wasent too complex. Here are a few shots of it.











Having rigged the snake Jonno has now assigned me to modelling props for the lounge area, small objects but necassary to add character to the film.

Finally finished the Dissertation!

Finally, its over; it sucked so much life and time from the group in terms of working on the film this term; but alas its done now :) I feel that production on the film ground to a halt and no progress was made in the film for the term really, however were now ready to animate and finishing off modelling im sure will be done soon. Jonno has been most helpfull since we finished the Dissertation ans has taken on his role as Director very well with organisation very well.

New project- Kind of

Asa has asked me if it is possible for me to rig and weight her main character being a small girl. I have agreed to do so but stated it wud be almost 2 weeks before i can commence work on it as my main project comes first along with my Dissertation. I feel it will give me more experience and more work for my showreel. She was also very desperate as half her team had disappeared. Ive also been approached by a few other people to rig for them, seems nobody knows hot to do it really. Id like to accept all of them but i really just dont have the time.

Rigging the Explorer!

Finally ive got my hands on the explorer, Jonno took his time but the model is really nice to work with as its very clean and well modelled, which makes my job alot easier. Anyway as i had experience from the sleeping guy i felt more confident with the explorer although its a more complex model, which makes it slightly trickier with weighting. Anyway although the weighting was a real pain at times im happy with the outcome and am able to hand over the model to Dan now to animate. Again ive created a full rig and all the blend shapes.etc

Rigging!

Finally i get to work on my main area of the production pipeline! Along with Modelling; Rigging is my favourite area. Ive been given the Sleeping Guy model by Rob and have managed to Rig it pretty well i feel, it deforms nicely and is quite a nice rig, proberbly the best ive created. Ive added an ik/fk blend too and facial controlls for Dan to work with. Anyway without further adew heres the Rig for the sleeping guy model. I also created the face using clusters, which gives alot more acurate deformation and alot more defined facial expressions. Clusters are the way to go!

Dissertation

It really is the bane of my life! not worked on the film for two whole weeks now! how crazy is that! Hopefully i will be able to carry on as of monday but am STILL waiting on the two models for me to rig and weight. I cant do anything until i get them, which is very annoying but i guess it allows me to do my dissertation. Its still fraustrating all the same as im restricted yet again and really need the models. The film has fallen well behind and id due o even further; i think a few members intend to spend yet another week on the dissertation as opposed to the film.

Term 2

Having started the new term Jonno has assigned me with the task of modelling the kitchen; he gave me two weeks to have it finished completely; i have managed to do it with two days to spare and am very happy with how it has turned out. I feel that the modelling in it is very strong as the geometry is very clean as i have tried to keep it to quads as opposed to triangles; this helps for texturing. Here are a few screenies of the finished piece:

I am very pleased with the tortoise and ultimately my first rigged character; however it did cause me plenty of headaches when trying to weight it. I found that because of its short stuby legs it deformed quicker than any other creature, which obviously has longer thinner legs, this made it hard to weight and i can only imagine how much better it will be to weight something with much longer legs. Anyway heres a quick test animation just to see if the rig works ok, or at least enough for what we want it to do.

Here are the images of the tortoise once i figured out how to wrap deform a model; this allows me to rig and weight a low polly model and then sub divide it into a high polly model before simply wrap deforming the high polly mesh around the low polly allowing the high polly mesh to be effected by the weighting.

During the Christmas break i have been working heavily on modelling and rigging the small pet tortoise for the film. Although not a main character we felt it added comedic appeal and we plan to have it appear more than what was initially shown in the animatic. Here is a blocked out version of it, rigged and weighted. I am quite pleased with this as it was a good oppertunity to familiarise myself with rigging and weighting and a good building block towards rigging the main characters. It has taken me a while to do but i had to learn all the principles for weighting, which took me quite a while.

I am however quite unhappy with the lack of direction from the Director over this period and although i was given the work to do the tortoise i felt that there could have been alot more guidance; i was not given a clear model sheet as i had to source one myself, which i felt was poor. To add to that difficulty the tortoise approved by the director was then decided inappropriate as the neck came out the shell and not under it. This was decided after i had modelled and rigged the chosen design. This meant i had to remodel it and rig it to fit the new design. I also feel that the group could have done more work; i understand it was a busy period over christmas for everyone as i was working 30 hours a week plus any family visits.etc but yet i still managed to model and rig a character; i feel that other group members did not put in the same commitment over this period. When we finished the term Jonno wanted all characters modelled and half the environments started; we ended up with 1 character being modelled and rigged that being mine....