I need to blow up a cow.... How?

[swardson]

pack if full of dynamite and let-r-rip :) hehe jk

while I dont have experience blowing up livestock, this is what I would do.

I would have a 1 frame switch from the rigged cow to a different model that is dyunamically setup to explode.

Break up the model as appropriate for the breaking parts.

Build in some soft body goop for all the innards that stretches between parts and flys out etc.

buld in some blobby particles for the blood and guts thats more liquidy.

build in some particle instanced pieces for larger pieces of meat and bones.

possibly some hard body dynamics for some bones (might be going a bit far).


anyways... thats what I would do... have fun (make sure you add the, no actual cows were harmed in the making of this fim, disclaimer) :)

-Brad

[mimo8]

I like musicrakers advices alot.
as an explosion only lasts some frames, I would avoid too complicated dynamic setups and fix it frame by frame ... also a lot can be done in video-composition

if you want it really disgusting you could have some frames, showing the cows toren appart face/skull flying by or dropping in the grass in front of the camera.

but in general keep it simple to not get too dodgy


.... I looked at your page and like your produktion alot
looks like loads of fun

[Night Hawk]

try using "extract faces" for the cow and some fields and maybe rigidbodies.

[yeoj]

the one-frame switch also works for me. always two sets of models, one intact and the other broken into pieces with some added mesh just to make the effect more detailed... :)

[ehoch]

theoretically speaking, good explosion animations will have two parts:
1. Anticipating Action Explosion
2. The Main Explosion

A few brief frames of rapid expansion then contraction signals the audience that an explosion is coming and makes it appear more energetic. Also, this tends to be true to life where a little spark sets off a massive blast, or a faint charge travels from the ground up to incite a lightning bolt. But since "true to life" and "looks good on screen" are completely different things, just animate the sequence so that it reads "explosion from within" very clearly to the audience.

[jdonnelly]

I'd agree with all these posts thus far. Also along with epoch's suggestion of anticipation is a must. Also in case you didn't know, if you didn't want to deal with blendshapes for the anticipation part YOU CAN ANIMATE VERTICES!... can make some effects much easier by doing that.

[kungfuelmosan]

check out FER REAL animation labs 'Blast Code' for explosion stuf it looks sweet! (maya plugin) although im unsure if it could 'incinerate a beauvine' lol

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