Wendy's Animation Blog

Author: Wendy Wang Wang

Categories
Advanced and Experimental 3D computer Animation project 1

Week 1: Storyboard Ideas

This week, I explored three ideas using storyboards with different camera compositions or angles. I used the reference pictures from mainly Pinterest to structure each concept and relied on simple geometries to visualize each story.

idea 1: City Worm Girl

In this idea, the main character, ‘City Worm Girl,’ is inspired by my laziness during the Christmas holiday—how I behaved like a ‘worm’ to stay in bed sleeping or eating is similar to how the creature lives in real life. By thinking deeply, there are also three stages of a worm in its life cycle: caterpillar, pupa, and butterfly. Therefore, correspondingly I have added two other stages to my concept to reflect how the protagonist is pushed and growing up eventually to complete her journey and going to the next one.

I have looked at different worm pictures for this project and found that their colour palettes are mostly in high saturation. I also think the patterns of the worm could be an interesting direction to explore the making of 3D tiled textures:

By adding more storyboard shots to my story, I have considered the possible rules of third & golden ratio to make the view more harmonious:

Idea 2: Pocket Fantasy

In this idea, the daily item of a man becomes the main inspiration to be explored. In a date between a couple in part of London, the female feels curious about what is in the pocket of the male’s jacket, therefore she starts her journey in the pocket world. In this pocket world, she found cookies, apples and chocolates which seemed quite normal in people’s daily lives, but also, she was amazed by male underwear she rarely approached in her life and had fun chasing them. This story is entertaining, engaging and fun, and it concentrates more on small items in life that people can easily ignore.

Idea 3: Food Scam

The third idea ‘Food Scam’ is mainly inspired by the overpriced food in the central of London, it tries to visualize how would food destroy a relationship between two characters in a restaurant. In this story, I tend to make miss rabbit focus on eating and enjoying her meal, but avoid the payment eventually in the end, and make mister cat to undertake the risk of the pricy food. The concept of this story is inspired by ‘Romantic Scam’ where the female utilized the guy to achieve their goals in their life. Meanwhile, I hope this story could emphasize the deliciousness of the food through my animation and the action of the character.

Categories
Design for Animation, Narrative Structures and Film Language

Week12: Critical Report Presentation

After receiving feedback from the lecturer for my audio-visual presentation, here is my final version for submission with added moving images inside. I hope you enjoy watching it:

Categories
3D Computer Animation Fundamental animation

Week12: Animation Class Final Entry

After 12 weeks of learning fundamental animation in this unit, I noticed the enjoyable way of using reference videos and hand-drawn planning poses to block and polish them in Maya. Here is the polished work combination from this term:

In addition, here is my further development of the body mechanics animation over the Christmas holiday by following the last week’s feedback:

Overall, for this unit I organize my files by creating weekly ‘project’, therefore it could help me to find reference videos and play blasts easily:

I have used the website sync sketch to upload my weekly progression and then receive the feedback.

I have understood most of the 12 principles of animation and applied them into my work, and I am looking forward to learn more of them in the future:

I have been delivered the basic knowledge of ‘X,Y,Z’ in Maya, and it helped me to think through blocking an animation:

The setting of blocking (instead of polishing the spline) an animation:

I have trying to train myself to ‘keep thinking the invisible curve’ when I am adjusting key poses, or making plans of a rigged character in the animation:

I have touched the plug-in Animbot and its Mirror tool in the walk cycle animation and found them to be quite useful:

I understood the importance of weight shift, the leg tends to be straight when the same side of the hip receives more weight:

For the animation in Maya, I could also exaggerate key poses to make them follow the animation principles and make them visually look more powerful and convincing:

Categories
3D Computer Animation Fundamental immersion

Week12: UE5 Project Final Entry + Formative Presentation

In this post I I will be summarized my process of working on this funky project in mainly Maya and UE5:

The starting point of this project is a model I built from scratch from last year, inspired mainly by the concept art delivered by the company DNEG. As the design has been highly appreciated through review, therefore I decided to add a story behind it and make it more comprehensive:

Due to my knowledge of using UE5 and Maya, I started blocking the cyberpunk world of this robot directly from Maya and working on its following animation in the same scene. I added an additional dream scene in week 8, and baking alembic cash files with blend shapes from it to the unreal project. For the other model with either rigs or animation, I baked them in FBX files and then imported them into my UE5 file.

I used the advanced skeleton to build up the rigs of the main character, the tattoo robot. However, after completing most of the project, I have been given frequent reviews of adding facial rigs on top.

In the UE5, I have imported my baked animation into the sequence and added all materials on top of each model. Furthermore, I have learnt how to build fire Niagara in week 7 and added that to the sequence as well:

For the lighting, I added all of them inside UE5, and keyed a few of them through the animation sequence:

I have also added the colour grading of the scene through the camera, to make the scene reaching what I expected more:

In the end, After I had rendered all my animation I used the software Premiere Pro to work on its editing and sound design. I used the website ‘story blocks’ recommended by technicians in the digital space and selected a matching soundtrack to the narrative:

I added the dream-like effect on top in the matching dream scene by mainly adjusting the level of exposure and contrast of colours:

I received my final feedback from lecturers, peers and industrial people from Siggraph to make sure I can create better idea based upon the progression of this feedback.

Overall, I really enjoy this project, I have learnt a lot of new knowledge from the weekly workshop and also it allows me to work on an experimental figure in its story. In the future, I want to create more robotic characters and add what I have learnt from this project to their model, rigs and animation.

And in the end, here is my recorded formative presentation for the design proposal of this project, I hope you enjoy watching it:

Categories
3D Computer Animation Fundamental animation

Week11: Body Mechanics Polishing

This week I have concentrated on adjusting some key poses from my blocking of the body mechanics animation.

The screenshots below point out the direction of the weight shift at the beginning of the animation:

Overall, the movement of the animating rig should follow like a bouncing ball with an invisible curve, and it should always carry on moving forward by relating back to the reference video.

Also, by exaggerating the movement of each key pose, it’s easier to see the upper body of the rig is behaving similar to the pendulum animation, where the hip is mainly dragging the upper part to complete this jump.

After the highest point of the jump, I keep the hip in the middle to keep the animation simple and keep the dummy has a stable landing on the ground.

I was trying to play the timing of key frames to build up a pendulum feeling of the rig’s upper body:

When the body quickly landing the ground, I stretched the length of it by following the bouncing ball:

When the body fully reached the ground, I squashed its middle length by following the bouncing ball:

Here is my polishing animation from this week with its side view:

Here is my polishing animation from this week with its three-quarter view:

Categories
3D Computer Animation Fundamental immersion

Week11: Project Progression before submission

This week I have made some final changes to my work and let the lecturer checked them before my submission, here is my final render:

I have changed the font of the film to make sure they are much easier for audiences to read and feel the vibe of my creation:

And I start working on the submitting video to make sure I edit all the work from this unit together:

Categories
Design for Animation, Narrative Structures and Film Language

Week 11: Audio-visual presentation progression

This week I have focused on shortening my presentation by improving its draft version, I will be bring this work to the class and asking for the final feedback:

Here are a few of my hand-written scripts showing how I deal with the rehearsal:

Here are my files and recording software through making this presentation:

Here is the editing interface:

After the feedback session I added more moving images to my presentation, and here are the main footages I used:

Here is the example of the change I made during editing process:

Categories
3D Computer Animation Fundamental animation

Week10: Body Mechanics Blocking

Due to the direct drawing of tracing on reference was not allowed, I have updated my sketch for the body mechanic animation:

This week we have been focused on how to build up an animation structure by using geos and parent constraints with the body rig:

After we have had a rough structure, we build up different selection sets to adjust keys of the rig body:

Beside my hand-drawn reference, I have also used the video reference to adjust key poses in this animation blocking:

Here is my outcome for this week’s jump:

Categories
3D Computer Animation Fundamental immersion

Week 10: Project Progression

In this week, I have concentrated on adjusting my projects with the feedback I have received.

First, by following the lecturer’s advice, I have made the opening title longer for audiences to read:

In the dream scene, inspired by the dream scene in Rango (2019), I have added bigger scale of Goblin models on the background of my project:

Due to my robot’s lack of any facial rig, therefore its ambition and desire for money in its dream become signs of unreal ‘$’ to deliver to the audiences (a rendered clip below to show the semiotic):

In the workspace, I have removed the shots that were pointed out as crossing the 180-degree rule and added more that were inspired by Toy Story 2 (1999):

In the end, The film shows the interaction between the fixer and Woody, mine shows the close-up of the robotic face after and following up its distance to the mannequin:

Before the tattoo process begins, I have added a shot of the robot moving to the dummy from the latter’s perspective to show their interaction more straightforwardly.

My rendered version of this week’s progression:

Categories
Design for Animation, Narrative Structures and Film Language

Week 10: Essay Class Cancelled + Presentation Preparation

This week, the class has been cancelled therefore I am concentrating on preparing the audio-visual presentation for the submission:

Here is a draft version of my audio-visual presentation, I will be more dedicated to shorten the presentation and maybe adding more video clips inside: