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lebada
01-17-2008, 02:08 PM
Still in school and this is a project for the ages with me since i never attempted this before.

To complete it i need to do matte painting (never attempted), compositing (just started learning it now), highly realistic CG (never achieved nor tried fully) and a fully mechanical working "flying ship/place/heli" that goes into terrain mode as it lands.

The "story" is simple. A close fly by which is the first shot and the second shot is its lading (terrain vehicle transformation animation).

Teachers wanted to push my limits, i think this one does it. And so i shall begin. This is where im at with the first matte painting (or whatever i try to make of it):


http://img128.imageshack.us/img128/6061/valley1ti2.jpg

About the image: trying to get a lake in at the bottom(middle of image). Im THINKING of making the right side stone/cliff in 3D (onl y part of it) for some rocks to fall off as the ship flies by. (i want a close flight for the thrusters to emit the heat into the camera and make it shake a lil...bit cliche i know but adds to the effect)

I have 2 weeks to complete this, draw a few vehicle concepts and start modelling it slightly. (which is okay for the time frame...i work 40hrs a week and have another 20-40 hours for full time school so its crowded)

Please crits or advice on approaching certain parts of the project.
mindsample
01-17-2008, 03:42 PM
two main problems you are having at the moment is that first of all your matte painting shows obvious signs of blurriness where you painted (probably a photoshop stamp tool kind of problem) - that really distracts as the eye picks up on these kind of things very quickly and easily. Example: the grass-field in the middle and the rocks on the top right ...

Second you need to think about your "camera" and what kind of depth of field you would have in a shot like this.

The lens seems not too wide so your DOF can be pretty large but the rocks in the forground rhs IMO should be slightly out of focus, so should the spaceship once it passes the camera.
lebada
01-17-2008, 04:09 PM
i could cut some of the side rocks to be not as instrusive coming in from the side and just have half of the current rock formation showing.

the blurriness was me trying to see if i can establish a pattern for the sunlight coming in from behind and above the left mountain.

the onl thing ull see of the ship would be fast moving thrusters making a "j" close in to the camera from behind and then going off in the distace so most of it will be fast and blurry i would think. Especially if it emits the heat.
SpaXe
01-19-2008, 11:11 AM
Good positions of the elements so far. I'd like to see some lighting change.

Right now, the sky is almost white: a result of near over-exposure. Either that, or you're taking a picture directly at the sun, which is very close to this case.

That said, the foreground elements need to be darker and less saturated.
lebada
01-19-2008, 02:15 PM
Good positions of the elements so far. I'd like to see some lighting change.

Right now, the sky is almost white: a result of near over-exposure. Either that, or you're taking a picture directly at the sun, which is very close to this case.

That said, the foreground elements need to be darker and less saturated.

thanks. havent got to the sky as of yet. :thumbsup:
lebada
01-30-2008, 08:55 PM
few shots of the ship doing the fly by. the painting itself im doing the sky on atm so will update when thats done.

The ship is a planetary flyer so that can explain the wheels needed for the terrain but it'll be challenging to do a mechanism (one for the back, one for the front) to have the wheels pop out then also move into position with their shocks properly attached.

here's some previews.
http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/7540/frontyp7.jpg
http://img143.imageshack.us/img143/8327/front2lc4.jpg
http://img155.imageshack.us/img155/9310/backnc8.jpg
http://img143.imageshack.us/img143/6149/wheelzh8.jpg

As a side note, dont worry about the tires. i have treads made in 3ds max that i will replace these with on the chance im going to do some actual movemet (and mud splashing) some time way down the road.

If you have any reference pics for this kinda sci fi stuff please feel free to share. Thanks
lebada
03-05-2008, 07:15 PM
small update. fixed some small animation issues and started texturing (posted below). Still got a lil modelling i wanna do (which is mostly detailing or stuff that is gonna be left for last) but overall the shape is done. Hopefully 90% of texturing will be done by the end of the week.

http://img406.imageshack.us/img406/2686/48343331wy7.jpg

http://img513.imageshack.us/img513/4462/60044868yi5.jpg
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