WK 9 - rendering techniques, cameras and lighting.

For my final lesson this week i learnt how to render out work, created in a suitable manner to gain the highest possible visual quality,  i learnt that there are three main points to consider when reaching this point of a task , these being the light set up ,the model surface, texture and finally the camera , which i learnt the next points how to create effective lighting and shadow rays which add realism to the objects. I learnt that there is generally a three light system , these being the main , fill and back light, through simple exercises shown i was able to ceate different shadows and pick up certain textures in an area set to do so, setting a frame to work with in an area, global illumination was used and mental rays to create reflections and other effects. This reference gives amore in depth reasoning behind the imaportance of setting a scene using good lighting techniques:
http://3dmodelblog.flatpyramid.com/labels/3d%20animation.html
This reference shows a clip were these techniques are used to create realistic lighting and rendering:

I used this reference as the landscape of paris shows a perfect example of the use of lighting and reflections

I found that these aspects of the tutorial were extremely useful to my own interests and relevant, as many professional practices use these techniques throughout there productions in windows , characters eyes and water etc. in which case it is a crucial factor to learn for future practices .
As regards to the success of my work for this, i found it was not successful as i had hoped as i would like to have the reflection on the floor more green and i could not do so after many attempts. I found it hard to navigate between all the different aspects when using illuminations and combining mental rays. Below is the example of work created in the tutorial:

To further develop my practices i would like to spend a great more deal of time using these effects as i can see how useful and effective they are in professional films shown . I want to learn those a lot more and also develop my knowledge in cameras areas were i would like to learn factors such as hand held camera effect and panning over objects and around them.
I plan to do this before my final soundscape project were i feel these effects would be effective and original in my own way if can possibly achieve this, or at least reach a standard were its basic. I hope to achieve this in the next week or two.

WK 8 -Creating joints and using paint weights.

For the tutorial this week i worked further on the hand that i created , and took this further into stages of animation were i created a relevant bone structure to allow it to perform like a usual hand,then learnt to combine the skeleton with the skin texture material. once i had completed this when rotating joints the mesh would collapse so i then learnt how to use paint weights in order to maintain the construction to nature performance without bad features appearing when animating.

This is my inital image of my joint structure on hand needs to be change so that bones appear symmetrical.
now i shall review this and make nessacary changes immediatly, below shows the outcome of my final bone structure.

This screen shot is an improved version of my hand were the joints appear how they should according to my reference of the hand ,it appears a lot more realistic than my previous attempt, in order to animate and use paint weights so the mesh does not distort. i have attached the joints to the skin so now when the hand moves and appears in texture it shall look like a fully functioning C.G.I hand.

i used the reference below of the anatomy of the hand to structure my joints , i fell this was an accurate source to work from.

Looking at other work done by professional individuals i felt that this was another great aspect to learn as its slightly similar to the leg exercise which i did not feel i enjoyed that much this excited me more as it was all my work , and could possibly be why i did not feel my self enjoying the leg task as much. i felt this was relevant in all aspects as again it introduced me to more elements of maya.
Below is my animated hand using paint weights , a few tests were done and i am overall quite happy with the tests undertaken however the footage could not load via blog spot or you you tube.
below is an image of animation in progress using paint weights to reshape any deformed mesh:

Here i found a useful reference were hands were used in  a realistic C.G.I format. This is the trailer for ratatoullie, were a member of staff offers starters to customers and hands and food are in the shot at the start before showing other visuals:

Personally i feel this task was at a basic standard compared to external references i would have liked to perform more tests and added paint weights more effectively i did however give it my best efforts.
Areas in which i would like to develop further are as mentioned aspects with more tests being performed and more effective use of the paint weights, i plan to address this as soon as possible as i would like to have completed it and be happy with the final product coming this far and actually getting tests uploaded.

WK 7-Adding texture to polygon hand.

This week i learnt how to texture the hand i had created from a previous tutorial , using texture mapping or projections , also how useful and necessary bump mapping is for visual effects, i worked in the UV texture editor were i had created sets of the top and bottom of my hand to then be placed in the editor to unfold and take a snapshot were it can then be put through photoshop to add color through a phong material after the two halfs being sewn back together neatly and apply to the polygon hand created in maya .  I  took a snapshot of the U.V editor to show the two halves of my image:

After taking a snapshot it can now be painted in photoshop,  and applied through a phong material.

here shows my final hand textured.

With reference to external work , i found this topic also a great interest of mine i was exciting to see the final product and comparing this with work such as sully in monsters inc i felt as though it was one a main interest in animation. With the source i used below it captures the effectiveness of sullys fur and also boos hands how they have been made and animated, this is useful as it relates to the importance of texturing.

I felt comparing my work to Pixars i  felt my hand was very good i want to touch up on illumination materials for elements such as nails ,also i would like to have liked to use bump mapping on the fingers and possibly over the knuckles however ran out of time in order to keep myself up to date . I would also benefit from adding in realistic textures for freckles and veins however as my first time texturing i felt my work was successful.
As mentioned above i would like to develop areas such as bump mapping and the use of other materials to expand my knowledge and make my hand more realistic again . I plan to address this issue next week if possible.

WK 6- Creating a polygon hand.

Today i learnt how to create a realistic hand using polygons , adjusting the uv components , extuding faces of polygons and was also introduced to new tools such as inserting polygon tools and offsetting polygon tools in order to create new edges, i found this exciting and really enjoyed doing it, by making very rough hand shapes using keys 1,2 and 3 i was able to soften the image have both mesh and block to visualize what was needed to be done next or what needed to be changed. This also was interesting as the exact techniques in order to create knuckles wrinkles and depth were demonstrated by using basic tools and slightly changing the U.V components .I used a reference for this hand to get the proportions correct, i used my own hand here and scanned in the image which i later imported into maya to get the correct ratios and created a duplicate of my hand in C.G.I.

This polygon hand has been converted to smooth mesh, the nails were created by using split polygon tool and the extrusion tool. below shows the more simplified approach to this task were a polygon was used and 3 insert offset edges were inserted which enabled me to extrude faces for the fingers.

This was extremely helpful and relevant with external sources proving this also. As this was a well spaced tutorial that allowed me to keep up with the demo and download all files with enough time ,and individual parts were thoroughly explained that left no room for confusion in any way.

This will be usefull for future projects as this covers all aspects that could be needed with a project if i was to use polygons as a basic structure, also the knowledge i learnt in itself has allowed me to explore my own way in which i could create the same task in a way i find easier. This practice could be helpfull when creating models and characters in a realistic form or that of fantasy. An external reference of this practice is in animations were characters are used in human form such as ratatoullie trailer by pixar:

Again with references to professional work i would like to consider my hand successful , through trial and error with the knuckles and fingernails which i had spent many hours mastering i was finally happy with my work being the first time i had created my own model, based on my hand , in this area i feel i could however develop further understanding of UV components in order to create cuticles or further markings of the hand which i could not achieve.

WK 5- lip syncing

This was a fun tutorial , experimenting with jason osipas mouth controls default grey, and creating my own mouth controls. With this i learnt how animators can use controls to control facial expressions , mouth movements , and other parts of the body, i learnt that blending shapes save a lot of time rather than creating lots of individual mouth shapes, and the basic movements being wide and narrow as one part, open closed.

facial movements by Jason Osipas book stop starring for lip syncing.

Here are screen shots of my own mouth controls created i the tutorial with the use of blend shapes:

unfortunantly i could not provide a clip of this as there were difficulties creating a clip and uploading to you tube.

Using these two techniques i am able to create full speech with  a character and sync it with audio.
In CGI films such as UP by disney pixar the use of blend shapes are used to provide consistent speech that flows beautifully were expressions are created off the back of the dialogue, the clip below was a good source in which i found how usefull this technique can be in a fully animated film.

In order to gain a more in depth knowledge, this tutorial covered all the basic principles that i had to think about. This was important to me as i felt that this is what i would need to learn and understand in order to bring more life into my characters  also drive the storytelling process forward. In previous tasks before the specialist unit i found i would tend to over animate my characters lip syncing . So this was extremely helpful and relevant to my area of interests. Below is my task fro lip syncing i used a downloaded rig off the internet called generi blue that came with controls, so from here i chose my own dialogue and then created my character singing to the lyrics.

With reference to professional work i felt for the level of knowledge i gained ,my work for this task was successful to the best of my ability ,  being both the mouth controls and my own task ,i am very pleased with the final outcome of both. I plan to look back at this task and tweak anything i feel can be improved further to my abilities. i want to address this as soon as i have free time to do so.
below is the professional reference i used to compare my lip syncing to:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVdlxwX6A7g

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3AAdkfiamU
 Both these clips are created by aardman animation 3d stop motion, i used these clips also as they show great facial expressions were talking or giving a shocked expression, they are extremely well made also beleivable as they were created based on real peoples movements and voices.

WK 4-FK, IK systems (leg)

This tutorial was interesting, i learnt a great deal on forward kinematics and Inverse kinematics as this was a task for the leg joints i learnt that the two points to consider when creating a leg was the joints and the F.K and I.K systems that would be used. I learnt about other tools in maya which could be helpfull  such as I,K handle tool , adding effectors , and how its a lot more easier to work in a lower proxy model with lower polygons. rigs were also created to allow movement in the leg.
I felt the importance of this was to create a realistic skeleton of the leg which can be used to animate later. also how the leg is constructed in joints by using pivots and how the foot needs many functions in order to tip toe balance on heels , run ,walk and dance using a three joint system.
As reference to external work i felt this could possibly be useful in the future however i did not feel as though i would like to concentrate on this aspect of animation in the future, it was great to understand further concepts in maya, just did not feel as though it was a strong point for myself.

I feel the task i completed was of a good standard the leg controls worked well with no errors also the foot element worked well, thee ball joint in the image is moved to the ankle as i was rigging at the time of the shot.
Here i do not feel as though i could develop much more in this area as i successfully completed the task, however i would be interested to know how to make leg/foot controls based on arrows to the side of my character so when animating the character could perform based on movements of the arrow controls set up .

I plan to gain further knowledge by researching into books for basics in leg rigging, although i would  not like to pursue this task further i am interested in the possibilities when it also comes to creating my own characters to develop this idea.

WK 3-Swinging arm

At first we learnt to correct any errors or adjust controls made in the previous task. The second part of the tutorial was the swinging arm, here i learnt about pivots and how parenting objects was critical in order for different parts of the body to move,point constraints were briefly discussed in the demonstration, however i personally could not make sense of my limbs in the outliner as i had parented them in the wrong structure of the hierachy, i reconstructed these items and ensured they fell correctly and later set keyframes in order for the arm to swing i used the references below to ensure i made correct changes to the short animation.
The first reference i used was a page from Richard williams animators survival kit were the key framing of the hands are shown.

This was usefull to locate the keyframing positionswhen the arm swings.
The second image was from a book called bone anatomy which i found on this website:

This image made the anatomy of the arm clear to allow fluid realistic movement in my characters arm.Also when considering joints referance gives a clear idea were pivots should be placed .

This was important as i could correct any previous mistakes, and with reference to professional work also the pivoting and parenting was interesting to me as they apply to many objects and characters shown in many animations were legs arms and any other pivoted objects are used, this tutorial also helped me builds up knowledge of the software and its capabilities.
For this task i felt i had created a swinging arm well as it seemed straight forward however i felt as though the arm was too floppy as it swung forward which let the overall piece down as shown below:

As for my extended task of researching into my own object with pivots i chose to do a locomotive steam train wheel area were two wheels would power the movement of the wheels based on pivots and parenting practices. I found that there were certain elements which seemed to advanced where expressions were more likely to be used, my first attempt of this worked well however compared to professional practices the wheels moved far too quickly , on my second attempt the wheels did not stay parallel.

Here i could see that i needed to develop and spend more time in this area as in a lot of aspects of animation these techniques are used daily, in order to gain further understanding i had a tutorial to show my work and correct errors made, well doing the tutorial i understood new ways to create a more effective steam train using relationship editor, expression editors and pivots and parenting which was extremely useful, which i can now apply to my own work in the future.

Wk 2 Bouncing ball

This tutorial allowed me to gain a more in depth understanding of the values in which one must consider to give a realistic interpretation of a bouncing ball, this was usefull and the basic principles of animation were put into practice, i learnt how important the graph editor and the outliner are in this line of work also how its alot easier to name all new properties in order to keep work in order, the outliner and graph editor proved to be crucial in this task in order to create purky bounces and to create a  ball control for the stretch and squash parts of this task. I learnt basic rigging aspects to apply to my ball control , also the use of different tangents and how they worked was helpful and i believe that all aspects will be used in future practices.

With reference to professional work such as the Pixar short, - for the birds i feel these practices learnt are extremely useful to my own interests , in this short you can see how rigging and basic principles of animation has been adapted to it when the birds are squashed together and fling up the controls give a realistic interpretation of the birds being flung into the air also how they land, with this in mind i would like to able to create such effects within my animation were possible in the future. Here on this link you can see how professional practices have been accomplished using these principles in CGI: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PP8C2xSsngo
As reference to this pixar short, i would qualify my work as successful, i feel my rigging went well and when i understood how interactive creation can effect my work, i created more military controls in order to gain more precise squash and squeeze factors in the bounce of the ball , also taking into consideration what type of ball was being bounced ,the weight  and movement. when looking into research and references i also found a video by kiel Friggins ,called monstera deliciosa, he was showing his french film at Annecy in 2009 , here i found although 2d animation was used to create the piece, the bubbles in the introduction scene and  change shape- squash and squeeze as his character runs through the forest and i found this to be a very good reference to how important the simple principles are and how effective they can be , a clip of his work is shown below:

The main area i did identify that i can develop further was the rotation of the ball when rolling at the end and gradually stopping also ensuring the ball bounces and rolls in time to give a realistic look.
i plan to address this towards the end of this week to the best of my ability.
Creating a rig from scratch was challenging and after making errors and correcting them in order for the rig to fully function was an achievement in itself and gave me confidence and enthusiasm to contiue doing CGI as my specialist option as i addressed this factor as i was creating the project i do not feel as though i need to go back and address any aspects of the rig.

Wk 1- taster

First week, we had a taster with the basics of C.G.I animation, here i learnt the way in which simple polygon shapes  can be merged together , the different elements of a single objects that can be used to distort an object and to change size and shapes . a general understanding of tools and there performance were introduced via presentation which gave me a clear understanding what can be accomplished when time and effort is put into practice.
This was important to me, as i had originally planned to do stop motion, however seeing this presentation excited me and i felt that by taking C.G.I as my specialist option i could learn a great deal and have fun with this as its always been my favourite type of animation.
In the future this subject could be helpfull as it may take me into many areas of the C.G.I industry, from games and special effects to cartoons character modeling or a general specialist topic such as rigging or lip syncing using controls and expressions.
My objections for this week is to research into my specialist option, i am also going to look into relevant software that will help me in this topic.