3 Day Cinematic Challenge! ICE, Chris Bischoff - DIGIC on a shoestring budget!

#1

OK guys - inspired by this thread:

http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=2&t=1211500&page=1&pp=20

I’m going to have an awfully full weekend!

I listed a whole lot of things that are pretty much impossible to do on a tight time budget:

Full character animation (facial and cloth simulation included)
Crowd scenes
A fight scene
Animals
Rain
and Snow…

So of course Ill be trying to add in all of these.

Following the the incredible work of DIGIC on Assassins Creed - we will be following a single man hunting ‘something’ through the snowy streets of Victorian England.

My schedule works like this:

Day 1 - ALL modeling. Characters (Including rigging), environments, props.
Day 2 - Cameras, Lighting and animation - and hopefully rendering!
Day 3 - Compositing and Editing.

Now to make matters worse I have a pretty packed Saturday…but I’m still going to be going at this whole hog!

In regards to the modeling, I really want to focus on composition and camera moves - so will be using as many premade assets as possible. I have a pretty extensive library of DAZ characters, so will be relying on those for pretty much all character modeling.

Environments will be a mixture of modeling, and integration of any older models I can find.

Textures - the one and only CGTextures.com

I do want to have some BIG establishing shots - but those will have to wait until the end of the day. I will probably do those mostly in After Effects with photos on 3D layers…I have an idea - no idea if it will work!

Ill also be recording timelapses of my working - I’m sure some people may find them useful!

#2

Two words: Good luck!

Another two words: Great Scott! :smiley:

#3

Oh! I know!
Why don’t you just add …

  • Overview of a city where buildings randomly explodes while the streets are getting flooded with water after several huge breaking waves

… to that list.
Just you know… to make it feature complete.

#4

Dont tempt me… :smiley:

#5

What, no fluid simulations?

#6

I really wanna do one shot where the character runs over a puddle and it splashes…but I think Ill do it in post. Still…I havent broken out FUME in a while…

#7

Maybe you can do it with Phoenix or Houdini,
I hear this is an excellent exercise to learn programs which you never use.

ps.
5 hours inn, and all words, not a single image to show for,
I’m loosing faith here man!

#8

Alas…Im at work. Gotta pay them bills! At lunch Ill try to start something…

#9

Bills be important! Them and girlfriends.

Here’s a narrator to keep your spirit up link

#10

Lunch time work!

#11

Haha, this is insane! Please do not explode in the process. :eek:

 For the puddle splash: If it's a Close Up, maybe you can film it (with a phone or DLSR) outdoors with a boot wrapped up in blue/green cloth or cleaning rag... then composite the shoe of your character in. If you're choosing an angle from the side, you can maybe get away with only a rendered still from the shoe and animate it in AE with the puppet tool and heavy motion blur.

With your skill level this could be done in 1 - 1.5 hours or faster.
If you have the matching victorian footwear at home, then it’s only a couple of minutes. :smiley:

So maybe something like this: Character steps on rendered puddle in CG, but before reaching it -> cut to the filmed CU… splash -> next shot

#12

Already, very impressive. :slight_smile:

#13

Im going to be using a camera to actually get the shots I want, and then extract that data and turn it into a 3D camera. If I have a spare moment Ill try the boot idea!

Alternatively I have the full Action Essentials set - Im sure that with some 2D tracking data I can make it look pretty convincing.

#14

Environment. Most of the models are from Daz - all cut up and pretty much jammed together!

No GI in the scene. Render time is 1:30 at 720p.

#15

Yup, no premise at all, looks terrible!

Do you have a storyboard yet, or a plan for the edit?

#16

I have a written story, and a selection of beats I know I need to hit.

Im creating the environment and then Im going to stage the shots inside the environment…kinda of a ‘Jackie Chan’ way of doing it - but tight deadlines force you to work with what you have!

#17

That’s cool, I hadn’t thought about doing it that way.

I’m going to solve things in a different way myself so it will definitely be interesting to see this pan out.

Hope you post enough screengrab update painover render concept whatever on the way.

#18

my main character (Jack) is rigged and running! Some really dodgy stuff happening with the weights on the face, so Ill have to sort that out.

#19

Whoa your entry is coming along well!

#20

Is it mocap?