Works in Progress

#201

You know what, i like the design, its a bit sinister, and certainly unique . . . but i do have to wonder about the sword beholder’s hand, those bat-wing-spikes could be a hazard to him/her.

maybe they could turn out a little more.

#202

Well, I’ve made the first tentative steps towards producing some finished animation for my Briar Rose project. Here’s a measly 15 seconds worth:

www.hash.com/users/milos/entrance5.mov

This, in fact is my second totally re-animated attempt at this shot, the first was far too sedate.
I’m still in the process of deciding what type of lighting style to use. The volumetric and bloom effects were composited separately and don’t necessarily make perfect sense, but hey! it’s called artistic license.

Now, off to do some AM alpha OSX beta testing.

Stephen Millingen.

#203

I like the design as well. The blood channel thing is modelled realy nicely. I would prefer it if the specular on the metal was white or at least less yellow. And maybe it should be a little sharper. I think it needs to be reflective also.

#204

Stephen, that was really good!
I’m bummed that there wasn’t more to watch.
Character animation look good throughtout the whole clip. No jerky or awkward movements.
Mike Fitz

#205

Hey Pequod :wavey:

That thing is looking real sweet!!

I especially like the way that she finds her balance as she comes in and of course the way that her arm swings as she leans on the door is real good. Little touches like the timing of blinks and the way that she closes her eyes before sinking to the ground are done to perfection. Her arse is perfect too :wink:
The tree in the background looks like a little homage to the Tak advert by avalanche. Did you use lagged constraints? It looks real nice. How did you get the shadows lokig so good? Are they raytaced? Are you going for the 16 passes?
It is a nice touch to have her head go through that volumetric like that too. Golly gosh, you have realy thought of everything havn’t you!

I am in awe at this thing but I want to try and help you so I have looked it through about thirty times ith the finest combe that I could find and here are my thoughts:

The main thing for me is that the light on Briar doesn’t change when the door is shut. It looks just right when the moon is shining on her but I would expect it to change when the door is closed. This would also add some nice atmosphere change.

Perhaps you could use a negative light to make the area behind the door go darker as it opens. You could even experiment with doing it with a relationship if you are feeling nerdy.

I wouldn’t mind seeing that texture on her boots come back. It would fit with the highly textured brick-work that you seem to be settling for. I think that it looks good (allthough it is a lot of work I am sure).

At around the twenty fourth frame of second eight, her lovely thigh length boot moves a little too fast down her leg and catches the eye a bit.

At about the sixth frame after the twelve second mark there is a small jitter on her lovely thigh length boot.

It would maybe be better if, when she closes the door, her arm is straight (so that she is using the wieght of her body to close it rather than elbow grease). This would maybe add to the sense of exasperation and stuff but, oh, hang on… how would she end up leaning on the door? Maybe she slams it shut moving her body wieght sideways then stumbles, then flops forward onto the door… Oh, I don’t know.

This looks like front page material to me. You might want to put it on a non-AM part of the forum, I think that it would do well.

#206

:bowdown:
Stephen, looks great! She really comes alive! I love the eyes darting and her quick movements.

#207

Very very nice work. Great motions and lighting. I love that sliver of light shining thru the wall. Very fine attention to detail.

If I was to look for something, and believe me I had to look hard, i think when she closes the door, her hand should be closer to the side of the door with the knob. She should be fighting gravity and she seems to close it too easily based on her current hand position. I dunno worth a look. Just a nitpick.

Again fine work!!

#208

WOW!!
Stephen that clip is just stunning! I love the character, set, lighting and the animation is perfect. Was the hair animated by hand? I remembered a previous clip of Briar Rose you posted that I was very impressed with so I couldn`t wait to download this one, and I was in awe. With a soundtrack it will be fantastic.

Btw, do you use Mike Fitz` cogs system for the joints or smartskin?

Dale.

#209

Okay, some good advice here and nice words of encouragement, cheers.

John,
Lets see, I rendered at 16x multi-pass, but it still didn’t get rid of the texture shimmer. No lag constraints on the tree, although I considered it but felt it was quicker just to manually animate, especially as it’s fairly simple and not very visible.
The main light (moon) behind her is raytraced, so I could make sure the shadow on the floor was accurate. There are also two strong side lights which are casting z-buffered shadows.
You are right, the lighting on her doesn’t change significantly once the door is shut. I’ll have to reduce the intensity of those two side lights at that point. If the negative lights are now working in AM, that’s a handy use for them to darken the area behind the door.
She still has the same texture on her legs, it’s just been lost in this particular lighting setup. The brick wall is infact a very simple texture map, I’m not striving for realism. The lighting is moody so that is perhaps giving the scene a more sumptuous look than would be normal.
I’ve noticed the glitches on the thigh boots, not sure how to solve it yet.
Lastly, the foreshortening on the arm as she closes the door, gives the impression that her arm is bent, it isn’t. I might change the angle for that if it’s not readable.

Doug,
I would have liked her hand closer to the door handle, but it just hasn’t turn out that way, besides, I need her over to the left side of the door for the next shot :wink:

Dale,
The hair is hand animated but the laces dangling from her cap have dynamics applied to them. Unfortunately for this particular render, the dynamics decided not to play and only show the feeblest amount of movement.:banghead: Fortunately, it’s hardly noticeable.
By the time Mike’s cog system had appeared on the scene I had already rigged her with fan bones and smartskin. I shall definitely look into the possibilities of employing ‘cogs’ next time round though.

Thanks William and Mike :slight_smile:

Stephen Millingen.

#210

Stephen, I love it!!
She’s so emotional and the whole scene is very magical.
I’m in aw.

#211

pequod: Wow! I love it. It’s so encouraging to see stuff like this made in A:M:thumbsup:. Give us more!

#212

Hey Stephen,

Verynice. Very, very nice - there is a charm in this piece that is lacking in so many other CG animations - I found myself wondering what she’s running from - who or what is after her… I really like the fact that you’ve chosen to stylize the “look” of the lighting - so my only suggestion in that regard would be to perhaps experiment with different light colors (slight) for internal and external lights to add a little separation… perhaps…

Here are a few nitpicks - the kinds of things you would hear from other Avalanchers if we were all sitting around watching this:

Did you intend to animate the spotlight on the door, or did you pull a “Bunker”? (a “Bunker”, named for Jeff Bunker, is what we call it when you unintentinally animate something in a scene. Of course, now with the new “A” button, you can do a reverse Bunker and THINK you were animating a bunch of stuff - and find out that you weren’t setting any keyframes at all… but I digress…)

The door opening seems to precede what would be her impact - like it opens too soon - or it opens too quickly given her impact. You might try keeping it closed for another frame or two OR you might have her travel further into the room from that initial impact - there just seems to be a little of an imbalance there to me (my opinion, of course).

Upon that initial entry, it might give a little more life to have her feet slide a little - she’s coming in pretty fast, and the floors are wooden - so one might expect a little sliding - and it would work well with the initial imbalance of the character.

I love that little off-balance action and the quick look around, BTW…

When she coils up to jump over to the wall, the anticipation is good - but she “twins” through that spin - you might try putting her right arm in a more “protective” pose - anticipating the impact - and bring up her left knee in flight (coil her up, and then uncoil her on impact). Also, the impact on the wall could use a little more secondary motion - she looks a little “floaty” right now - needs a bit more recovery from the impact (close the eyes and grimace for an instant before going to the “wary” expression).

When she leaps over to the close the door, have that leading foot slide a little. You have a little sliding as she slams the door, and that adds SO much to her sense of weight - I think that adding a little slipping around would really help (IMO of course).

I love the fact that you have her breathing!! BRAVO! and that final little “sigh” before she slides to the ground is great! Maybe add a little more bounce on impact - that cute little booty HAS to have more spring than it’s currently exhibiting - not to mention other “soft bodies” - but I do understand that you are “stylizing” :wink:

In regards to the “creeping boots” phenomenon, well, there’s always muscle animation when all else fails…

Of course, these are all just nits. I really like this character, I love the moodiness and the stylization of the set and the lighting, and I think you’ve pulled off some excellent (and difficult) animation here. Whatever you decide to do, I, like many others here, would like to see more (no pressure, no pressure - LOL!)

JoeW

PS - I showed it to Jeff Bunker and he was impressed - which he almost never admits…

#213

Hookflash– great looking sword. Maybe a leather wrap look would work on the handle.

Pequod– Phenomenal work and really inspiring. Nice bit with the barrel too.

#214

Thanks Cosmic, Hookflash and GizmoMKI,

Thanks also Joe for taking the time to critique my piece. Being a one man band I rely on this sort of feedback or nitpicks.

The spot light on the door is infact a crude animated mask I added when compositing the clip in Commotion. I felt the corners weren’t dark enough and liked that fairy-tale retro look it gave. At the beginning the mask does retreat to the edges quicker than the camera moves in, which probably contributes to the ‘Bunker’ effect.

I did initially try to get her sliding into the shot, I just couldn’t make it look right especially from the front view.

You’ve spotted my deliberate attempt to keep Briar in the air longer as she bursts into the room, by opening the door earlier. Oh well, back to the drawing board. If I extend the length of her jump, she’ll just get too big in the frame. Perhaps some niffty camera work is called for here.

I like the idea of her coiling up slightly as she spins in the air, that should really add some extra dynamism. Her impact against the wall, I have found difficult to make plausible, I’ll try your suggestions.

When she leaps over to the close the door, have that leading foot slide a little.

Oh no! not more sliding :wink:

Stephen.

#215

#216

Wegg,

You keeping this in AM? Or is destined for Messiah land? Cool concept drawing.

#217

Looks cool Wegg! Glad to see you using am again, I’ll be joining you soon. My upgrade should be here today :slight_smile:

George

#218

Originally posted by Roger Eberhart
[B]Wegg,

You keeping this in AM? Or is destined for Messiah land? Cool concept drawing. [/B]

It’ll be in Messiah before it ever gets animated.

One my guys sketched it. . . so I can’t really take credit for it. . .

#219

Nice use of splines! Nice work. But why didnt you use LW? Or Wings3d?? I thought those two apps were what you guys were using now? Great work!!

#220

I really like AM’s modeler for organic work. I could probably have also worked in wings but. . . Then I wouldn’t be able to relate to you guys as much. :wink:

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