Thursday 29 April 2010

Shot 1...probs

im messing around between shots...you know how it is...and heres how it stands

i know we had to make the pot a certain size so macho could fit in it...but now to get the lil guy to actually be able to reach to water the plant he'd have to have a rock set up like this....

personally...think this looks ridiculous and not sure what to do about it....suggestions? i think he would need a setup so he could get to his flower but is this too much?
answers on a postcard please

Wednesday 28 April 2010

Adam

All i gave you yesterday was the lighting tests. I've uploaded thye final animation of shot4 into the Adrive along with the textures so you can incorportae it into the scene and do some render tests.

Tuesday 27 April 2010

26th April - 3rd May Work

Matt

finish up animation of shot 4 (mid to end Tuesday)
Your next few shots...
Shot 24
Shot 22

*****plese email me any texture stuff you did not finish so i can pass on to Andrew. What happened to the forks textures? I will be mailing my stuff off later today*****

Adam

Tuesday - collect lit and textured environment with Matt's imported animation and test the render layers with this.
Post render results - breakdown of each layer and then final composite of all no later than Thursday 28th April.

Tom the Stocker Wright

Shot 26 - Heros Reaction shot. See email with link to shot list and Animatic for reference.

JB

Sort out the texturing and dynamics of the dust/clouds used for shot 32. These will need to work for shot 35 too.

Tom R

Tuesday - review of shot 23. Please send playblast Tues eve/Weds morn for update.

Emma

Shot 11 animation.

Clym

Animate shot 31

Sarah

Finish up the button issue
Finish up L Gnome Facial Control Panel
Scale Characters
Copies on the adrives
Notifications and info to animators
Animation: Shot 18

Macho's Playing Up

Some weird and annoying computer wizardy that Maya loves to throw at us, just to watch us squirm.

It might just be in my comp but the first time i try to open Macho's file his body has dissapeared. All you need to do is reopen the file and it will have sorted itself out.

This doesnt seem to have any effect on anything, its just a pain in the bum.

Lemme know if this causes any problems.

1st attempt at my 1st shot

My current progress with my first ever shot for gnomes. You can't see the eyebrows well but they are moving. And i deliberately put more time at the beginning than necessary just so you can see the beinning and end better. Comments for improvement please cause this needs a bit of work...

Characters Available for Animation!

Hey Guys!

All three characters are now available for download and ready to animate. Please email me

s.verrall@rave.ac.uk

for details of how to download etc.

happy animating!

Sunday 25 April 2010

Hero Gnome: A look at Clyms Interface

Monday 26th April

To all,

please be in tomorow at 10:30 for updates, session with Dalli what have you. Meeting will be short sharp and sweet and then were away on working on our own bits and pieces once more.

Matt
please bring in the final textured environment tomorrow and any props that are textured as well as ones not finished as were gonna pass them over to Alexander to complete so you and I can focus SOLEY on animation. I have finished my props so he just needs to play with the bump mapping.

Adam
Once Alexander has imported the lights accordingly then your able to start transfering over your render layer tests to the real thing. PLEASE GET Z DEPTH WORKING COS THAT WOUL BE SUPER DEE DOOPER. Ask Alex Hulse why the Shadow Layer is being a complete pain in the butt so we can either cut it or sort it ready for rendering.

Cheers guys, see you then

Sarah

Saturday 24 April 2010

an animation issue...

seriously...so i been playing with the Hero model which does NOT look any good in normal not smooth preview setting (no offense Yaniv its not a dig at your modelling) but my machine can not cope playing back animation with this character on smooth preview.

This means...i can NOT animate him on my machine as his normal face (without smooth preview) is completely unreadable. Im hoping you can playback animation on the college computers or matt or the other guys who are going to animate with this lil guy your machines have more ram than me to be able to do this otherwise we are screwed.

What I have learnt over the last few days...
smooth preview IS NOT what its cracked up to be. Without continual checking in normal mode you have no idea where those vertices are actually going because its averaging out to make the model appear smooth. This causes issues with painting weights as a lot of the geometry if unchecked is already crushed/has overlapping vertices and therefore its difficult to get rid of problematic wrinkles and creases. Its a case of going back to the model (non smooth preview) and sorting out the weights. Yes yes...smooth preview is a blessing by not adding extra geometry lines BUT your entire modeling experience should not depend on it. For something as intricate as painting weights, crushing in the fingers will give the skinner a nightmare.

i am happy? i am sad? i am ambiguous gnome?!

Friday 23 April 2010

Adam...again

Wheres the work you said you would post on your blog Wednesday 21st April...

and the same work you said would post up last night Thursday 22nd

the same work you were set from the 7th April

3 weeks...one test of render layers...????

Thursday 22 April 2010

Adam...

where are the render layers tests you've done? We havent seen any results yet since you started after the render meeting with Alex Hulse 7th April.
you were supposed to post these up yesterday evening (weds 21st)
We also have not had your work Dan Dalli told you to finish on the 6th April including:

-rigging the washing line
-sky dome creation

Wednesday 21 April 2010

JB...

i need your email address so i can send you feedback on the dynamics shot/keep basic contact.

Thursday 15 April 2010

Thursday 15th April

Hey Guys

I'll be in college from 1 onwards...

Sarah

This weeks objectives...

bit late posting this but we're all aware and underway with these jobs...

adam

render layer passes tests using render farm
research into lighting

matt

texturing creation for the scene

sarah

last teething issues on the rigs sort out
painting weights and GUI setup

yaniv

finish blends
pass onto sarah to forward to Clym

clym

facial control setup for Hero Gnome
bind rig and skin weights for Hero

tom

shot 23, review of this monday 19th

Thursday 8 April 2010

Will the Animator of Shot 32...

please post a playblast of their work by 12 (the lunchtime version of 12) 9th April. O and your tractor is currently parked on top of a pig....john deere tractor on top of a pig.

cheers

Sarah

Wednesday 7 April 2010

More Stats...

How many shots each of the characters appear in:

Macho = 22 shots
Hero = 16 shots
Lady = 11 shots including her death and broken state...most of hers is sitting down too.


Render Layers Meeting

with Alex Hulse Wednesday 14th April at 11am in BA Animation

Sound Meeting Notes

Hey Guys

just taken a look at the animatic with the sound and it is looking or rather sounding rather gooooood indeed. Really can start to see it taking shape now which is excellent.

No more sound meetings organized, myself and Pip discussed what's the best option for now overlaying the sound to the final animation and we decided it was best to give Pip copies of playblasts (Quicktime) for her to integrate into the timeline and time accordingly. I've said potentially next week we could start handing over stuff (shot 4 Matt) but more likely than that week after.

Its all sounding/looking great guys so lets keep up the awesome work :)

Sarah

Tuesday 6 April 2010

Week Objectives: Tuesday 6th-Monday 12th

Matt

animate shot 32, i need to see the majority of this animation for Friday, your not needed in college so ani mani mate like the wind.
Please provide feedback on the 2nd years work, I've already mailed Tom but would like your input as to what shots we can now give him to do.

Adam

im waiting to hear back from Alex about the rendering but for now its next Tuesday so be ready and preped
washing line - it needs to be rigged so the clothes can simply swing back/forth (not the line itself, the clothes)
lighting experiment - textures through simple scene set up, run through the render farm with simple light set up to see how the timings are looking for non HD but still widescreen.

Sarah

rigs
blendshapes - Lady
weight
sort it out


Yaniv

blendshapes - Hero Gnome
UV map the fishing rod

Dimensions

Right, firstly we're running at Pal 25 frames, timeline and rendering.

Out of Maya you want to be rendering at 1025 - 576.

And in After Effects you want to have a project setting of 720 - 576.
If i remember rightly Dan said that AE would recognise the ratio as widescreen and would automatically update itself. Either way its not something we immediately have to worry about, and we'll get him to confirm stuff before we make a start compositing.

Monday 5 April 2010

Tuesday 6th April

In from 11am onwards