Monday, 8 May 2017
Internships
I have put a
lot of effort this year into finding internships over the summer because I feel
like second year is the best time to start looking for internships.
I emailed a
lot of places for internships including Rockstar Leeds and other rigging places
but I also wanted to find an internship relating to hand drawn animation because
I have decided to specialise in both areas, 3d modelling/rigging and hand drawn
animation.
For hand
drawn animation, internships are harder to find I think because it’s such a
specialised field but I immediately thought of Joanna Quinn’s studio, Beryl
productions in Cardiff.
Joanna
Quinn has been my favourite animator since I started practicing hand drawn
animation and after emailing her studio and making a quick cv and hand drawn
animation showreel, she offered me a week work experience doing drawing
exercising and hopefully in-betweens on her new film. I am extremely grateful
for this amazing opportunity and hopefully will gain lots of knowledge and
insight whilst on this work experience.
Sunday, 7 May 2017
Implementing zbrush into general workflow
I have started to learn zbrush as it's an import tool used heavily in the animation and film industry. I am trying to introduce zbrush to the pre production workflow. It really helps in pre production even if the project is ultimately 2d based because with zbrush you can quickly get a concept sculpt of characters and quickly get colours down on them.
For applied, after we had the characters designed, i added to the development of the designs by doing a very quick concept sculpt with dynamesh just to get a better idea for the forms and features of the character. I then used this as reference when animating.
This is a concept sculpt for another teams applied project, i wanted to sculpt this character as i thought it would be good practice as the pose is quite definitive.
I struggled for a while with getting the model with the colours into Maya but i finally managed it. However i need to learn more about the zbrush - Maya workflow because i think this will be very beneficial to me.
For applied, after we had the characters designed, i added to the development of the designs by doing a very quick concept sculpt with dynamesh just to get a better idea for the forms and features of the character. I then used this as reference when animating.
This is a concept sculpt for another teams applied project, i wanted to sculpt this character as i thought it would be good practice as the pose is quite definitive.
I struggled for a while with getting the model with the colours into Maya but i finally managed it. However i need to learn more about the zbrush - Maya workflow because i think this will be very beneficial to me.
Development of my 3d rigging skills
My love for rigging has developed greatly over the past year. I began
learning the discipline of rigging at the end of first year with the e4
ident project. I find rigging very logical and simple, when i say
simple i do not mean easy. I mean that if there is a mistake it is
because i have done something to break the logical structure of the rig.
This is one of the main things i love about rigging (among many). Any rig is possible essentially, its just the problem solving ability to make it work practically. This is also why programming is important to learn as a rigger because having a knowledge of programming opens up Maya and lets you fine tune any aspect of the program to make rigging easier and do things which would otherwise be impossible.
One important thing i have come to learn when learning programming alongside Maya is that Maya is just code visualized. The tools inside Maya are just functions. Realizing this made me implement the script editor more when using Maya, especially when rigging.
I made quite a few rigs this year, ranging from quick simple rigs to very complex rigs. I have been told not to get too far ahead of myself, as i have a very ambitious nature but this is the best way of learning, just jumping in and figuring every problem out until the project is finished.
Rigging has illuminated an aspect of myself which i had previously not given much though to, my problem solving ability. This is going to sound very pretentious but i believe i have developed my problem solving skills through rigging and real life problems and the development of these two different aspects of problem solving are intertwined, indifferent. By improving my rigging work i have improved at handling life and visa versa. This implies that the skills used for rigging are quite foundational and cross-disciplinary.
Starting with my first exploration of rigging from the end of first year. This rig was very basic, with simple FK controls and very basic blendshapes. Despite the rig being very basic it planted my feet into the fundamentals of rigging and wanted to learn as much as i could about it from that point on.
At the start of second year, i created rigs for the character and narrative module. I started exploring some more intermediate rigging techniques, such as IK chains, combining blend shapes for a full facial rig, and starting to use set driven keys for custom movements.
After character and narrative i spent alot of time learning about new rigging techniques and new parts of maya which i'd never touched before, such as the node editor and the script editor (which are now a big part of my workflow). I began playing around with rigging techniques on cubes, just to experiment and explore.
My next rig was for COP. I wanted to make a stable but advanced facial rig and i would say i have achieved this. This rig exposed me to various problems and in turn solutions, which added a lot of snow to my rigging snowball of knowledge. I solved problems such as adding squash and stretch to my rig, constraining joints to a surface. The amount of problems i had on this rig was ridiculous, but I'm grateful because it means i have learnt a lot more.
I intend to improve my rigging skills constantly over the summer and over third year and build a massive snowman (really good rig) as evidence of my increasing snowball of rigging knowledge.
This is one of the main things i love about rigging (among many). Any rig is possible essentially, its just the problem solving ability to make it work practically. This is also why programming is important to learn as a rigger because having a knowledge of programming opens up Maya and lets you fine tune any aspect of the program to make rigging easier and do things which would otherwise be impossible.
One important thing i have come to learn when learning programming alongside Maya is that Maya is just code visualized. The tools inside Maya are just functions. Realizing this made me implement the script editor more when using Maya, especially when rigging.
I made quite a few rigs this year, ranging from quick simple rigs to very complex rigs. I have been told not to get too far ahead of myself, as i have a very ambitious nature but this is the best way of learning, just jumping in and figuring every problem out until the project is finished.
Rigging has illuminated an aspect of myself which i had previously not given much though to, my problem solving ability. This is going to sound very pretentious but i believe i have developed my problem solving skills through rigging and real life problems and the development of these two different aspects of problem solving are intertwined, indifferent. By improving my rigging work i have improved at handling life and visa versa. This implies that the skills used for rigging are quite foundational and cross-disciplinary.
Starting with my first exploration of rigging from the end of first year. This rig was very basic, with simple FK controls and very basic blendshapes. Despite the rig being very basic it planted my feet into the fundamentals of rigging and wanted to learn as much as i could about it from that point on.
At the start of second year, i created rigs for the character and narrative module. I started exploring some more intermediate rigging techniques, such as IK chains, combining blend shapes for a full facial rig, and starting to use set driven keys for custom movements.
After character and narrative i spent alot of time learning about new rigging techniques and new parts of maya which i'd never touched before, such as the node editor and the script editor (which are now a big part of my workflow). I began playing around with rigging techniques on cubes, just to experiment and explore.
My next rig was for COP. I wanted to make a stable but advanced facial rig and i would say i have achieved this. This rig exposed me to various problems and in turn solutions, which added a lot of snow to my rigging snowball of knowledge. I solved problems such as adding squash and stretch to my rig, constraining joints to a surface. The amount of problems i had on this rig was ridiculous, but I'm grateful because it means i have learnt a lot more.
I intend to improve my rigging skills constantly over the summer and over third year and build a massive snowman (really good rig) as evidence of my increasing snowball of rigging knowledge.
development of my 3d modelling skills
As well as rigging i am very interesting in 3d modelling. This area is highly linked to rigging with topology being the main area in which the two disciplines are reliant.
I have been practicing my 3d modelling over the past year and i have realized that with each model i make i can see improvements on the last one. This has encouraged me to keep modelling and get as much practice as i can.
What i love about 3d modelling is that it is like traditional sculpting but with the added complexity of topology, now this might sound like a limiting factor but i argue that it expands the art form of sculpture to a new level where deformation of the sculpture is the main goal. This gives the sculpture a greater and more sought for purpose.
This post is to show the development of my 3d modelling skills throughout the past year.
I'll start with the end of last year, i created a 3d model for the e4 ident brief and created a pretty poor model to rig and animate. The model was mainly poor due to its topology. The polygon density was all over the place, causing creases in unwanted areas and just being quite messy. Despite the crude model i learnt a lot because i devoted a lot of my time to studying maya.
My next models were for the first major project in second year, character and narrative, I modeled a shaman and a girl. The improvement from first year was drastic. I took on board a healthy workflow of researching (tutorials and articles) and practice. This helped me to rapidly build up my knowledge of 3d modelling. I also learnt more about topology, i realized it was very important and i payed it a lot more attention. Notice my model's structure now accurately depicts the structure of the human body, especially the face.
It was extremely exciting modelling Brenda's character, the girl, as her character was very stylized. I loved the challenge of converting something very stylized into 3d as I'm sure there are a million ways of doing it. I also impressed myself, because modelling the coat was a challenge with topology as a constraint but i managed to solve all the problems i was faced with and was left with a mesh that deformed fairly well.
As well as the characters i also modeled the props for our short animation, i found this as an exercise for really hammering in the fundamentals of 3d modelling.
This is a model from a character i quickly designed abit after character and narrative, relating to a story idea i jotted down. I wanted to try a more stylized character and here i got more experimental with my use of topology, trying different ways of wrapping the edge flow around the model and finding out new better ways of deforming areas. For example in this model i have quite noticeably exaggerated the topology around the eyes to form an expansive 'super-hero mask' around the eye area.
I started this next model some time after the previous one, just as a side project. This mesh is alot more organic than my other models. The polygon density is more relevant, there are a high amount of polygons in the areas of the face and hands. This is because these areas will be deforming the most and will be subject to more acute deformations, therefore an increased polygon density is required.
An area i spent along time on was the shoulders, i worked out how the shoulders move and studied more about the anatomy of the deltoids and surrounding muscles.
This next model was for my COP practical. I felt the topology was clean and deformed well but maybe the polygon density could have been more relevant. I also should have experimented with different ways of modelling the hair because although this way worked fairly well it's not the most reliable or believable way.
My love for 3d modelling has developed over the course of the past year and i believe it will continue, as will my knowledge for this area.
I have been practicing my 3d modelling over the past year and i have realized that with each model i make i can see improvements on the last one. This has encouraged me to keep modelling and get as much practice as i can.
What i love about 3d modelling is that it is like traditional sculpting but with the added complexity of topology, now this might sound like a limiting factor but i argue that it expands the art form of sculpture to a new level where deformation of the sculpture is the main goal. This gives the sculpture a greater and more sought for purpose.
This post is to show the development of my 3d modelling skills throughout the past year.
I'll start with the end of last year, i created a 3d model for the e4 ident brief and created a pretty poor model to rig and animate. The model was mainly poor due to its topology. The polygon density was all over the place, causing creases in unwanted areas and just being quite messy. Despite the crude model i learnt a lot because i devoted a lot of my time to studying maya.
My next models were for the first major project in second year, character and narrative, I modeled a shaman and a girl. The improvement from first year was drastic. I took on board a healthy workflow of researching (tutorials and articles) and practice. This helped me to rapidly build up my knowledge of 3d modelling. I also learnt more about topology, i realized it was very important and i payed it a lot more attention. Notice my model's structure now accurately depicts the structure of the human body, especially the face.
It was extremely exciting modelling Brenda's character, the girl, as her character was very stylized. I loved the challenge of converting something very stylized into 3d as I'm sure there are a million ways of doing it. I also impressed myself, because modelling the coat was a challenge with topology as a constraint but i managed to solve all the problems i was faced with and was left with a mesh that deformed fairly well.
As well as the characters i also modeled the props for our short animation, i found this as an exercise for really hammering in the fundamentals of 3d modelling.
This is a model from a character i quickly designed abit after character and narrative, relating to a story idea i jotted down. I wanted to try a more stylized character and here i got more experimental with my use of topology, trying different ways of wrapping the edge flow around the model and finding out new better ways of deforming areas. For example in this model i have quite noticeably exaggerated the topology around the eyes to form an expansive 'super-hero mask' around the eye area.
I started this next model some time after the previous one, just as a side project. This mesh is alot more organic than my other models. The polygon density is more relevant, there are a high amount of polygons in the areas of the face and hands. This is because these areas will be deforming the most and will be subject to more acute deformations, therefore an increased polygon density is required.
An area i spent along time on was the shoulders, i worked out how the shoulders move and studied more about the anatomy of the deltoids and surrounding muscles.
This next model was for my COP practical. I felt the topology was clean and deformed well but maybe the polygon density could have been more relevant. I also should have experimented with different ways of modelling the hair because although this way worked fairly well it's not the most reliable or believable way.
My love for 3d modelling has developed over the course of the past year and i believe it will continue, as will my knowledge for this area.
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