Month: May 2023

Advanced and Experimental 3D computer Animation Techniques 1 Comprehensive Art project 2

Week 7 Filming

Individual Progress:

Firstly, I made some modifications to parts of the storyboard, making it clearer for us to understand the desired effects for each shot when shooting reference videos. Additionally, we divided the storyboard into three parts, assigning different shots to each of us for the key animation phase.

Next, the team members spent a day shooting live-action storyboards in the studio. We plan to use these reference materials for character animation, camera setup, and compositing in the animation. Jiaruo will play the robot, Lin will portray the male protagonist, and I will be in charge of filming and integrating the video clips. Since I am familiar with each shot in the storyboard as I created it, after consulting with Michael, we agreed that this division of roles is reasonable. The filming process went smoothly, and we spent half a day shooting. I then completed the editing in After Effects.

Furthermore, my third task was to integrate all the scenes together to ensure that the scene resources assigned to each team member are clear and consistent.

integrate all the scenes together in maya

Progress of Team Members:

Lin: Lin worked on adding details to the spaceship model this week. She created a control panel, and after researching references, we decided on a circular button in the center as the main firing mechanism. When pressed, the electronic screen emits a glowing effect.

Jiaruo: Jiaruo will continue working on character weighting this week.

Next Division of Tasks: We divided the storyboard into three parts:

Red section for Linsey
Green section for Jiaruo
Blue section for Tang

We will each work on animating our respective assigned shots. The estimated time for completing the animations is 2 weeks, with an additional week allocated for rendering and animation editing.

Integration:

On Sunday, May 28th, we will organize the documentation.
Our animation is scheduled to be completed in 2 weeks, leaving us with 18 days until June 14th. We plan to allocate 4 days for rendering and compositing, with Jiaruo and Tang handling the rendering, and Linsey in charge of sound effects. After completing our individual animations, we will transfer them to the school’s computers for compositing. Our plan is to finish rendering by the 12th.

Animation Camera Parameters:

Set the camera size to 1920×1080.
Use a focal length of 35.

Advanced and Experimental 3D computer Animation Techniques 1 Intro to Acting project 2

Week 16 – Stepped

During this week, I focused on the stepped stage, which is crucial for laying the foundation of the complete animation. In the Maya file, I organized the assets by creating separate folders for models and sound, labeled as “asset” and “sound” respectively. Then, I created a new scene and imported these files to begin the animation process. Prior to animating, I set up the camera position.

While working on the animation, I opened two windows in Maya. One window displayed the animation from the “persp” camera, allowing me to observe the motion, while the other window showed the fixed camera view (“camera1”) that I had set up. This setup made it easier for me to present and make adjustments to the animation in front of the camera.

Progress Made:

Organized assets and sound files in separate folders.
Set up camera positions for animation.
Created two windows in Maya: one for observing the animation and another for the fixed camera view.

Course Feedback:

During the feedback session, it was pointed out that there were significant issues with the hand movements in the animation. I hadn’t paid enough attention to the placement of the hands, forearms, and upper arms in a way that would face the audience. A guideline to keep in mind is to maximize the visibility of the limbs in front of the camera, avoiding situations where one part of the limb obstructs another.

Advanced and Experimental 3D computer Animation Techniques 1 Comprehensive Art project 2

Week 6 – Scene Design 3

Individual Progress:

Outdoor Scene 1 (Fantasy World):
1. Added displacement maps: To achieve a more realistic effect, I applied displacement maps to the tree leaves and trunks, creating a textured surface. The following image shows the nodes used for displacement maps.
2. Added cloud particle effects: Using the fluid particles in Maya’s FX menu, I selected the cloud effect and adjusted parameters such as density, resolution, and color. The cloud particles have built-in animation, which is advantageous for our scene as we don’t need to create additional animation specifically for the clouds. Adding this effect was intended to create a dreamy and ethereal atmosphere, aligning with our vision for the scene.
3. Added flower and grass models: Using brush strokes in Maya’s asset library, I painted flowers and grass and converted them into polygons using the Paint Effects to Polygon conversion. I also adjusted the roughness and reflectance in the material settings. The 2D concept depicted some flowers and grass in the enchanted world, so I added these elements to enhance the scene’s authenticity.
4. Obtained the A-image: I made some simple camera parameter adjustments. First, I enabled the display of object information to determine the camera’s position relative to the objects. Then, I set the focal length and range of focus in the Arnold settings. This allowed me to blur certain objects, such as leaves, to maintain overall visual harmony.
5. Added flower cluster decorations: Similar to the leaves, the flower clusters were created using planes. I obtained a stylized flower cluster material in Photoshop, consisting of a colored image and a black-and-white image. The colored image served as the base color for the planes, while the black-and-white image acted as an opacity mask, hiding the white parts of the colored image. The black-and-white mask was applied to the geometry’s opacity channel, resulting in the desired effect. We consider this a new technique for representing 3D scenes, inspired by the effect of hairpieces, and applied it to create stacked foliage.
6. Added lighting effects: Various lighting effects were added. Firstly, for the water reflections, Jiaruo created water effects, but encountered a problem where the water did not have an independent color after adding the base color. Therefore, we created a separate blue light for the water. Secondly, we added side lighting near the trees and atmospheric lighting for the entire scene. Lastly, to achieve the dream-like effect, we planned to add glowing orbs around the trees. However, we need to consider the impact on rendering speed, so we will only add the necessary lights from a resource-saving perspective.
7. Overall, we are satisfied with the results as they align with our expectations based on the 2D concept and create a dreamy atmosphere.

Outdoor Scene 2 (Real World):
1. Added planet texture, lighting effects, and star models: In the story’s conclusion, the protagonist chases after a green planet. To capture the mystery and longing associated with the distant planet, I added a green planet texture and applied mesh light effects. Additionally, I incorporated star models into the scene.
2. Camera focus adjustment: Similar to the previous scene, I adjusted the camera’s focal length to achieve the desired visual effect.
3. Rendered three images: I rendered three images, one with stars in the sky, one without stars, and different textures for the moon. After discussing with the team, we leaned towards the night sky without stars and a moon texture that exudes a hazy atmosphere.

Progress of Other Team Members:

Yuhan Lin: This week, Lin completed the integration and import of scene resources in Maya. They added self-illumination and lighting, and the overall presentation looks nices.

Jiaruo Zhang: Jiaruo worked on character weighting this week, which will take about two to three weeks to complete.

Next Steps:

Finalize the Storyboard:
- Team members will act out character animations for the storyboard, including determining camera angles, character movements, expressions, and dialogue or action language.
- Consider the relationship between the two characters in the animation: supervisor and supervised, friendly brothers, strict parental figure, etc.
- Through discussions with Michael, we realized that the storyboard lacks some specific details for further exploration, making it difficult to proceed to the animation stage. To achieve better consensus within the team, we have decided to act out the animation ourselves to clarify how the animation should be.

Integrate Scene Resources:
- Organize scene resources, categorizing them into two scenes and character files.
- Set up lighting within the scenes.

Advanced and Experimental 3D computer Animation Techniques 1 Intro to Acting project 2

Week 15 Intro to acting

The following five weeks will be into the acting part, making a close-up shot above the chest. I will mainly focus on 3-7 second animations of dialogue and facial expressions.
First, into the preparations.

The process of preparation:

1.First, I find a dialogue. Then I only listen to the voice to distinguish the speaker’s emotion instead of watching the original animation plot because this will affect the emotion of the character I analyze.
I found a Lego animation dialogue from the website:
Dialogue audio:

The dialogue lines are: “Oh wow. That was a great, inspiring legend, that you made up.”

2.After listening to the dialogue, analyze what the character is thinking and what kind of emotion it is when he says this; and then use a pen to record some emotional and psychological content of the character that I guess.

3.After speculating on the character’s psychology, I began to imagine the character’s actions when he said the words. Of course, this is also related to the fourth point. This character will have some connection with his voice and his appearance; I may give him some personality so that the content of the dialogue and the model are more cohesive.
thumbnail version1:

4.Find a rigged model.
Model from: https://discover.therookies.co/rigs/
Model picture:

5.Divide the dialogue into different beats; for example, there is a turning point in the dialogue, from low to high mood, passive to aggressive statements, etc. Therefore, I can divide this dialogue into two to three parts and further analyze what action to take through emotions.

From the dialogue I selected, the character first uses an exaggerated and praiseful tone to praise something and then turns into a very indifferent tone. This makes me feel that the first half is a mockery of the character, a false, exaggerated praise so that the latter said indifferently： oh, you made up all this!

6.After completing the above work, you can perform in front of the camera. It is challenging to integrate into this role and think about it. I may speculate on what was said in this dialogue again. This makes it easier for me to imagine the emotions and states of the characters.

I guess the content of the previous sentence of this dialogue:

A: I come from a brave place! I am a princess of a country! My father and king fought an evil dragon alone! So you believe me, I also have such strength!

B: Wow that’s awesome, what does that sound like, oh that’s all made up, idiot. Who would believe this useless content?

Notes of the dialogue emotion: Hypocritical praise, insincere, disapproval, contempt. Frown, scorn, anger, frustration.

7.Under my repeated camera performance and action changes, I tried better to express the emotions and transitions in different beats until I felt pretty good (it’s best to ask classmates and friends for opinions). I’m not happy with the acting footage so far (despite my efforts many times) because it doesn’t look exaggerated enough; I can review my performance later and exaggerate the character.
Video:

8.Next, start to draw the thumbnails. Of course, this step and the lens performance are complementary. Before the performance, I conceived a plan and drew the thumbnails’ first version. Then after taking lots of performances, I chose my final version and repainted my thumbnails, so a sketch plan is essential to help us expand our thinking.
Thumbnail version2:

9.My preparations is done, I get thumbnails, a reference record (for my performance), a rigged model (for animation), and a dialogue audio. Next week, I will work on the next part of animation blocking after getting feedback on the preparation work.

Advanced and Experimental 3D computer Animation Techniques 1 Advanced Body Mechanics project 2

Week 13: Spline

When transitioning from blocking to spline, the animation may not look great initially. First, One reason is that there may be missing information between frames, and the in-between frames are auto-generated by the computer. I need to fill in these gaps with information. On the other hand, there may also be too much information, and I need to gradually clean up the excess to make the animation smoother.

It’s important to note that the cleaning process has a specific order, as outlined in the course materials. If this order is not followed, the animation may not change as expected and could even become a disaster.

Progress for this week:

Feedback: This week, I divided the animation into two parts. The first half required my primary focus, while the second half involved the monster hand grabbing the person and suspending them in the air. I will be using special effects to attach the hand to the phone in the second half. Therefore, my main focus was on modifying the first half. Although there has been some improvement in the motion compared to last week, I still need to pay attention to motion delays and arc movements, which are recurring topics. I need to focus on the arc movements of the hands, head, as well as hips and gradually refine my animation to the polished version.

Advanced and Experimental 3D computer Animation Techniques 1 Comprehensive Art project 2

Week5 Scene Design 2

Individual Progress:

Outdoor Scene:

Added smoke effects: To depict the desolate and abandoned atmosphere of the outdoor scene, as per the 2D concept, I added smoke effects. It was my first attempt at creating smoke effects using the FX menu. I adjusted several parameters, including density (smoke concentration), resolution (smoke size), and color (smoke color) to achieve the desired effect.
Removed some elements: Upon reconsideration, I decided to remove certain dilapidated house assets (sourced from Sketchfab) from the previous version. They didn’t align with the deserted setting, and their removal resulted in a more streamlined composition.
Camera focus adjustment: To fine-tune the visual composition and direct the focus to specific areas, I adjusted the camera’s focal length. By opening the object information display and modifying the Arnold focal length parameter to 25, I achieved the desired effect.
Overall, the effect is pleasing, but it deviates from the original concept. The background shifted from daytime to nighttime due to changes in the story narrative.

Outdoor Scene 2:

Created the ground model in ZBrush and painted the textures in Substance Painter. Jiaruo then applied water effects in Maya’s VFX, combining the trees, leaves, ground, and water source. The next step will be to further refine the scene based on the 2D concept.

Group Progress:

Lin: This week, Lin addressed the texture mapping issues in the scene. As mentioned before, the UVs were all mapped within the 1,1 quadrant, resulting in low resolution when applying textures to the models. After discussions, we decided to switch to UDIM UV or separate UV mapping for specific parts, ensuring they are within the same quadrant. Eventually, the scene reached a satisfactory state with added decorative details on the doors and launchers.

Jiaruo: Jiaruo completed the character skeleton binding.

Overall, the progress is significant, and although we encountered some issues, timely communication and mutual assistance among team members helped resolve them.

Next Steps: The next week will focus on finalizing the scene, with each team member striving to complete their respective tasks, including modeling, texturing, special effects, and lighting (Linsey and Tang). Jiaruo will continue with weight painting based on the bound skeleton models.

Advanced and Experimental 3D computer Animation Techniques 1 Advanced Body Mechanics project 2

Week14 Summary

Final version:

As shown above, this is the final version of the Browse Phone.

Browse Phone is an animation completed in five weeks. Its production is roughly divided into several stages: 1. Source of inspiration 2. (Plan action) draw thumbnails 3. Shoot references for my performance 4. Modify and improve thumbnails 5. Blocking animation 6. Blocking plus 7. Spline 8 . Polish

This project allowed me to understand the production process of a10-second animation from beginning to end. Here it only refers to the animation process and does not focus on modeling. I chose online character models to complete this animation.

Understanding the complete animation process is most significant to me in this project, not only the stages mentioned above but also some details in each stage. I listed a few points that I paid attention to.

1.During the preparation stage, it is a important part to consider the camera perspective that the animation will show. This is because we need to consider the camera angle, the displayed action of the filming reference, the displayed angle of the 2D draft, and the angle established in the Maya scene. The characters in this shot often face the camera from a three-quarter angle of view, and the opening of the hands and feet must also be paid attention to. They cannot be blocked or crossed and should be shown entirely.
2.Blocking is also a crucial part; it can help complete the prototype of an animation. Just like George’s metaphor, the animation is like the rudimentary part of the sculpture that is pinched out during the sculpture’s first step. Indeed, the outline part is the foundation for the entire animation.
3.Besides of the blocking, spline, and polish parts, the order of actions of the model is significant. It must be modified first from the crotch, then the waist, shoulders, head, hands, legs, and finally to the fingers or toes. The crotch and waist tend to affect the extremities, and if not modified in sequence, the animation will turn into a nightmare.
4.As a tip for animation, part of the body delay is very important in animation production. The movement of every part of the body does not necessarily occur at the same time. This idea also comes from the 12 rules of animation that follow through and overlapping action and secondary cation. For example, when the shoulder moves to the left, the head is slightly delayed for a short time and then follows the shoulder to move past, making the movement more attractive.

Reflection: In this project, I gradually got familiar with some basic knowledge about and how to represent this knowledge in animation; Squash and stretching, anticipation, overlapping, and positions of keyframes and intermediate frames were more accurate than before. However, I also had some challenges, such as being-unfamilar with arcs, fast and slow, time control, etc. Although I paid close attention to them, I needed help to use them fully. Especially in the polish stage, I pursued smooth curves and let the animation become over polished. Also, because I could not grasp the time control well, the second half of the project shows a relatively quick transition(like a lack of some frames). The advice provided by George and this project helped me a lot and made me improve my shortcomings. I willl focus on my insufficient knowledge and practice more to make better animations.

Advanced and Experimental 3D computer Animation Techniques 1 Comprehensive Art project 2

Week4 Scenes Modeling

Individual Progress: This week, I started modeling the main outdoor scene, which is a large sand pit. I first sculpted its basic shape in ZBrush and then created a high-resolution model with added terrain textures. I then imported them into Substance Painter to bake the textures, transferring the details from the high-resolution model to the low-resolution model. This approach helps reduce the polygon count and prevents lag when importing the model back into Maya. The following images show the materials created in Substance Painter and the placement of the models in Maya. The remaining models are sourced from Sketchfab, while the rocks and ground were created by me.

Group Progress:

Lin completed the second version of the indoor scene materials, but after discussions, there were still some areas where the materials were not satisfactory. Lin will make further modifications in Substance Painter for the third version.

Jiaruo completed the modeling and texturing of the trees. Using SpeedTree software, Jiaruo created the tree models and used Photoshop to create the tree leaves. She prepared a colored base color texture and a black and white texture, which were applied to the color and opacity channels, respectively, to achieve the leaf effect.

Next Tasks:

Tang will further refine the texturing of the outdoor scene and import the textures into Maya for composition.
Lin will make the third round of modifications to the indoor scene and address the UV expansion issues to improve the texture resolution.
Jiaruo will proceed with character skeleton binding.

Advanced and Experimental 3D computer Animation Techniques 1 Advanced Body Mechanics project 2

WEEK12 Blocking plus

This week, I will begin blocking plus on the animation. Here are some notes I recorded before starting:

Moving hold: In animation, there are moments when a character appears to be still in a particular pose. However, to bring the character to life, it’s important to incorporate subtle movements such as breathing or slight shifts in position, like slight forward-backward or up-down movements.
Copied pairs: This technique is similar to the concept of a moving hold. When you want to maintain a specific action for a certain duration, you can copy the original keyframe and paste it in the desired positions where you want it to continue.
Arcs: Most actions in animation follow curved paths, such as head movements, arm waving, and leg walking. It’s important to start paying attention to this during the breakdown phase. Focusing on whether the actions are moving along curved paths will make your animation look more professional.
Overshoot: When a motion comes to a stop, certain parts of the animation do not stop immediately with the main body but continue moving slightly in the original direction, creating an overlap or follow-through action.
Settle: After the motion loses all its kinetic energy, the action settles back into its original state.

（link： https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JELQ5-v2fa4）

These notes will help guide me in creating more engaging and realistic animations by adding subtle movements, understanding the concept of arcs, incorporating overshoot, and allowing actions to settle naturally.

Progress for this week:

Class feedback:

The main focus this of week is still on the issue of delayed body movements. For example, whether the head, shoulders, waist, and hips are moving at the same time. If they are, the subordinate parts should move slightly slower than the leading parts. Additionally, attention should be given to whether the hand and foot movements follow an arc, such as sliding the hand downward or gradually lifting the foot off the ground. It’s important to ensure that these movements follow a curved motion path. I will continue to make adjustments based on the feedback received.

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