Class Review 3/30

Since Last review:

Animatic: We have an updated animatic, with some new camera angles, some cut shots after hearing critique on last review, updated the textures for most of the environment. Also we added a new story element to make the story more appealing.

Kelsey: I completed the mouse texture and have placed it into the scenes.  However, the UVs have become broken somewhere between references, so I'm currently looking on a solution.  I also realized there was an inconsistency with the snake bump map, so I re-assigned an edited version.  I also worked on layout, and completed layout for Shots 1-6 and 8-10.  I also completed the animation for the 3D animatic and started final animation on the mouse in shots 1-3.

Jorge: I completed the mouse rig after realizing there was a few bugs when the animators began to animate.  I also began working on a lighting scheme for our environment using a three-point lighting set up and a environmental fog box.  Finally, composited the 3d animatic and am currently in the process of developing a lighting key.

Lukas: i began working on the animation of the first few shots. It is taking me longer than I thought, so we have reworked the schedule so that the animation will be done by next week, and then I will have less days to work on the audio. With my limited animating experience,   I am working on making the model move in a life-like manner, without any static movements.

Christian: Textures have been finalized and released. I was supposed to have started Lighting on the characters Monday, but after testing the lighting on some of the textures, I've been making small tweaks and reworking some of the textures so that they aren't as patchy or dark in some areas. As a result, I've make a slight change in schedule to start the character lighting by the end of this week so I can have it done by the beginning of next week. After my finishing touches on tweaking the textures, lighting will be my new focus.

Class Review 3/21

For this review, we will show progress on our rigs, textures, and an updated animatic.

Animatic

Original animatic:

Revised animatic:

We received critic over our original story line about the believably of the character's actions.  This new animatic is one which addressed those issues and created a more interesting story.


Rig Updates

Snake Rig: by Lukas

Our snake rig was designed with the intent of being able to move the body in a snake-like form. The joints were strategically placed so that they could slither and coil. The jaw and tongue are also able to work in according to the snake's anatomy. A blendshape was added so that when the snake jaw is closed, the model's teeth do not poke through the bottom lip. This was made into a control for easy use of the animator.

Mouse Rig: by Jorge Macias

The mouse rig is nearly complete, however there is a problem I encountered near my final steps. The finger joints on the right hand of the mouse seem to be deforming the mesh. Each time I attempt to add influence or bind the joints to the already established joints, the mesh breaks, as shown above. The rest of the rig, however, is complete.  

Textures

Snake Texture: by Kelsey

I was inspired by ball python morphs and chose to use a red, orange, and black color palette.  These colors combined are more menacing and also aesthetically interesting.  I also applied a shallow bump map and specular map to imply scales.  

Problems:  Currently, for some unknown reason, the snake will not render in mental ray.  These renders are using Maya Hardware 2.0, and doesn't show the texture to its fullest.

Mouse Texture: by Kelsey

The mouse texture's UVs are currently in the process of being unwrapped, and will hopefully be completed soon.

Asset Textures: by Christian

Within the duration of these passed few weeks, I was assigned about 9 or so asset textures to work on. Since the last review when I had been testing brushes and strokes, I have since implemented specific brushes used in Photoshop, here are a few of those textures:

Climbing Branch 1
A main asset in our animation, the UV snapshot below illustrates the process in texturing each asset. A reference image was used to capture the fine indentations and woody surface of a branch.

Climbing Branch 2

One of the main assets in our animation, a reference image was used to mimic the fine details of a wood surface.

Ground Texture:

Used with a variety of brushes to make a very organic and gritty feel.

Heat Rock:

Another big asset, I'd like to display s typical problem many may run into when texturing.

Below, you can see that the given UV Snapshot becomes jumbled and not uniform, resulting in an obsolete snapshot. After troubleshooting, the problem can be fixed by copying the UV map by selecting the shell. After doing so, the UVs can be re-unwrapped and will fit back into place.