Is animating in VR the future (The amazing work of Goro Fujita)

#1

Hi guys,
I strongly recommend to follow what Goro has been doing in VR.

He is helping the VR toolsets mature and he is doing amazing work, VERY FAST (as in hours).
You can see a lot of his VR work here: (animated Quill/ rendered in Redshift)
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbTQ4StJhp1RDisqUTuJSZg

Here is a quote from an recent interview:
"What’s your perception of the future of art and VR for the movie and game industry?

GF : I believe that with VR we finally found the medium that is made for creating objects, characters, worlds in 3D space. Regardless if you are working on a VR production or a traditional 3D pipeline there is no faster method than creating assets in VR

In VR you are not constrained to a 2D surface (tablet or computer monitor) anymore. You can manipulate, paint and sculpt in all axis at one time which was not possible before. Everything you create can be then exported to other 3D applications and can benefit all kinds of departments down the production pipeline from previsualization to final asset creation. Creating in VR can significantly cut down production time and budget for any entertainment production.

more of the amazing interview here:

#2

I believe animators at Disney are also working in VR to develop better ways of working. I’m not against it, not one bit. But the old man in me likes the way things work now. But I also like progression in art and methods of creating it. So i’m all for it.

#3

OK, so does this mean that all 3D softwares are obsolete??!!!

#4

Maybe…

I feel like we are a the verge of another quantum leap in the animation workflows.
A big selling point of the new VR workflows is their amazing speed and how they steal a lot of ideas from sketching.
I mean look at this…


It is still primitive, but it is improving fast.

#5

Where can it be seen how the animation process occurs?
Indeed there’s a demand in affordable mocap for artists.
Still I doubt a traditional animation will go away. Rather it will complement the new one.
But freeform animation is an amazing prospect for any aspiring artist. Imagine if you can create your animations in a week of learning without any prior knowledge. It should really foster creativity. Because studying animation is a long process, which turns off or halts many artists.

#6

agreed. but the thing is that the animations toolsets I have been seeing in VR are more akin to stop motion animation.
Here is a project Disney has been working on for a while

#7

I would think it will take its place, like the cinema, radio, books. None has become completely obsolete, but the ratio of consumption has changed.
Is there a market for this technology? Definitely. I think it’s the same paradigm changer, as was Zbrush for modeling.
Will it make less jobs, or payment for animators less? Possibly. But you can’t stop the progress.
I foresee more content created much faster, and of a lower quality.

#8

been following him for a while now, absolutely in love with that look.

as soon as they manage to also let you create less painterly styles, proper topology, rigs, keyframe interpolation animation and whatnot this might get huge. good for all the people with constant back pain like me :smiley:

i have no worries at all that it has an impact on the amount or payment of jobs for animators. it’s not like all of a sudden everyone can animate just because they put on some VR goggles. it’s just another way of doing things, and as we all know, as soon as things get easier and faster to make, the demand usually goes up as well.

for now it’s not for me, since i suck at painting, even in VR. but i’m following the tech with interest, pretty sure we’ll see loads of exciting stuff.

#9

Putting on vr googles and flapping around won’t make instant animators. It is like saying that picking up wacom tablet instead of a plane pen will make you better illustratir. That is so wrong and incirrect in so many ways. As for ysing vr for animation… haven’t personaly tried it yet but i cant see how waving around and walking is more pleasant and not making you really tired soon comparred to sitting and animating with tablet. Also eye strain on vr set can’t be that good for hours and hiurs of working.

#10

I am always in favor of tools that make the creative process
less labor intensive.

#11

I’d have to think the vertigo vomit factor has to be a thing for some folks.
Hard to be ‘productively nauseous’…

#12

VR is middleware, like what the pager was to the smartphone. Its useful at the moment, some will adopt, will have its niche uses. Once hologram / goggleless displays are available to the general public (already being developed) , VR goggles /AR will just be old news, which may be sooner than you think. Of course if you have a use for it in the meantime, and it gives some advantage, may as well use it while its relevant, and profitable, but I do not see it being long term.