This assignment was considerably easier compared to the one done previously on the modelling of the city. Here more emphasis was placed on coming up with the storyline and animation than on the actual modelling of the legoman and floursack. However, there was a lot of work to be done before the actual animation could began. These include the rigging of the floursack, the modelling of the set, as well as texturing the legoman and floursack.
However, once all these are done, the actual animation turns out to be very easy once I came up with the storyline. I do run into a few problems but after consulting with my friends, it was easily solved through the help of the graph editor and hypergraph. There was only a problem which I have been unable to solve. When i tried rendering in .AVI mode, the render ran but return complete after only 1 frame has been completed. This turns out to be a frustrating problem as I was very close to the deadline. Eventually I decided to do a playblast file instead. The result turns out to be decent at least.
I felt that after going through this subject, I learnt alot, not only in the subject but also from the tutor. Although he may be blunt and his words may be abit mean, I think that what he said does have some merit to it. I will forever remeber the lessons I learnt from this subject for the rest of my life.
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Yeu Wing's IN3D Journal 2
Finally done with IN3D assignment 2. Time has a habit of speeding up when deadlines draw closer. Stress and panic builds up, and I find myself without sleep yet again for an assignment submission. Yet, I found the assignment interesting and educational. It was a tough assignment to do, animation. Many things hindered my progress (and some out of my control), but I managed to complete it in the end.
Firstly, the problems I encountered. Animating a realistic floursack was very difficult, and to reproduce human actions in the floursack was a daunting task. I had to watch many videos of soccer players plying their trade to get the movement right, and even then, it STILL doesn't look right.
The second problem encountered was the render tool (or my computer?). My computer refused to render the scene properly no matter how many times I tried. I checked and rechecked the settings with fellow classmates and found myself stumped as to why my computer refused to render. I had to use a friend's computer in the end, and I managed to render what I wanted.
Now, the things that I have learnt in IN3D. Animating look easy, but it certainly isn't. It is incredibly difficult to animate realistic movements and make objects feel sentient and alive, or move at the right speed, and I have much to learn. Also, I've learnt that the Graph Editor is a SUPER important tool in animating as it helps to weed out little niggles in the animation that would cause the animation to look weird. I've also learnt that scripts make life a hell of a lot easier, provided you know how to use them.
Finally, I'd like to give my thanks to tutor Mr. Douglas for being awesome with Maya. Cheerios~
WING.
Firstly, the problems I encountered. Animating a realistic floursack was very difficult, and to reproduce human actions in the floursack was a daunting task. I had to watch many videos of soccer players plying their trade to get the movement right, and even then, it STILL doesn't look right.
The second problem encountered was the render tool (or my computer?). My computer refused to render the scene properly no matter how many times I tried. I checked and rechecked the settings with fellow classmates and found myself stumped as to why my computer refused to render. I had to use a friend's computer in the end, and I managed to render what I wanted.
Now, the things that I have learnt in IN3D. Animating look easy, but it certainly isn't. It is incredibly difficult to animate realistic movements and make objects feel sentient and alive, or move at the right speed, and I have much to learn. Also, I've learnt that the Graph Editor is a SUPER important tool in animating as it helps to weed out little niggles in the animation that would cause the animation to look weird. I've also learnt that scripts make life a hell of a lot easier, provided you know how to use them.
Finally, I'd like to give my thanks to tutor Mr. Douglas for being awesome with Maya. Cheerios~
WING.
IN3D ! Journal~ (Tai You)
Over the past weeks of IN3D lessons, we have learnt alot from our lecturer. We have gained more knowledge on some useful techniques such as rigging and animating a flour sack, legoman and learnt several ways on how we can improve the realism of animations. One example is the squashing and stretching of bouncing balls. It will still look better despite having an exaggerated look. From the lessons, I can see that most of our classmates are very enthusiastic in learning new stuffs in Maya. We have learnt about how much the Autodesk Maya programme can do with its powerful features.
I personally felt that this module is especially essential and neccessary to us. As someone who is studying in a gaming course, the knowledge and expertise in Maya is very helpful to us. With the knowledge in Maya, we are aware of what Maya can produce for our games, and the realism in games which we can create with the help of Maya.
After completing the first assignment, creating a city and second assignment, creating an animation, I felt that it is a challenging assignment. The product of our assignments is based on our creativity. After completing the assignment after days of hard work, most of my classmates, including me are satisfied with our works.
After these semester of learning Maya, I am satisfied with what i have learnt and i have enjoyed the module. My interest in maya will encourage me in learning more about this powerful tool even after the module.
Journal 2
After learning IN3D for a semester, i find that 3D is difficult in many ways.
Firstly, starting off with 3D modelling, the tools are difficult to understand, and it is further complicated by the system processes and what the tools actually do. Therefore, the understanding part comes in. We would need to understand how it works behind, so we will understand what the tool do to the model, rather than just using the tool itself.
Secondly, after modelling, rigging comes in. Rigging is nevertheless an important part in animation. While learning rigging, i found that there are a lot of variations and each type of rigging would change the animation totally. Together with advanced animation tools and even optional plugins, i find that animation in In3D is simply limitless. But the difficulty is still there, and frame by frame animation, although it allow for precision, it needs a lot of time, and also some basic measurements, to make a relistic, and perfect animation.
On the overall, 3D modelling and animation had been fun and enriching. Despite of the huge number of tools of Maya Autodesk, the entire course had been manageable so far. And we learn some important tools to change animations and polygons to our liking. Thus in the end, we manage to come out with a decent animation with some hard work.
To conclude, 3D animation requires a high level of hard work, to present a good animation. But still, the tools that are provided in Maya, shows that animation in 3D is neverending and there are unlimited amounts of variations in designing and animating.
by: Pour Bao Guang
Firstly, starting off with 3D modelling, the tools are difficult to understand, and it is further complicated by the system processes and what the tools actually do. Therefore, the understanding part comes in. We would need to understand how it works behind, so we will understand what the tool do to the model, rather than just using the tool itself.
Secondly, after modelling, rigging comes in. Rigging is nevertheless an important part in animation. While learning rigging, i found that there are a lot of variations and each type of rigging would change the animation totally. Together with advanced animation tools and even optional plugins, i find that animation in In3D is simply limitless. But the difficulty is still there, and frame by frame animation, although it allow for precision, it needs a lot of time, and also some basic measurements, to make a relistic, and perfect animation.
On the overall, 3D modelling and animation had been fun and enriching. Despite of the huge number of tools of Maya Autodesk, the entire course had been manageable so far. And we learn some important tools to change animations and polygons to our liking. Thus in the end, we manage to come out with a decent animation with some hard work.
To conclude, 3D animation requires a high level of hard work, to present a good animation. But still, the tools that are provided in Maya, shows that animation in 3D is neverending and there are unlimited amounts of variations in designing and animating.
by: Pour Bao Guang
Journal 2
Finshed assignment 2, this assignment grealty deepen my understanding of how animation works with particular to frame by frame animation. Developing realism was also another factor that we were required to provide in our assignment. One such way was moving the floursack, gettign it to walk in a realistic manner requires us to obsserve carefully,good skills in animating was also needed.
Another area that tested our skills was exxageration of moving objects,e.g ball. To make a ball look more exageraated so as to provide some special effects, we were thought how to use squash and stretch in our animation to enhance the overall animation maing it look more interesting and comical.
Overall the assignments in IN3D are effective in helping me to learn how to use maya, the skills that i have pick up such as modelling and rendering, i believe; would help us a long way when we step into the game industry in the future.
-Leslie-
Another area that tested our skills was exxageration of moving objects,e.g ball. To make a ball look more exageraated so as to provide some special effects, we were thought how to use squash and stretch in our animation to enhance the overall animation maing it look more interesting and comical.
Overall the assignments in IN3D are effective in helping me to learn how to use maya, the skills that i have pick up such as modelling and rendering, i believe; would help us a long way when we step into the game industry in the future.
-Leslie-
IN3D Journal 2 (Kuan Wei)
Wow, time passes really fast, and after 5pm today, IN3D has more or less come to an end.
After a few nights of going without sleep, I am finally done with my IN3D Assignment 2! Although its quite tiring and VERY tough, I felt that it was worth it as the assignment was very interesting and taught me a lot. Having to model, animate and make sure that it looks realistic sure was tough. I encountered many problems when I was doing the assignment (some stupid mistakes too).
One of my biggest problem would have to be the timing of the whole animation. Its important that we make the timing just right (not too fast/not too slow) so that the animation looks good. I feel that I have not done particularly well in this area as my animation is too fast at the start and at the end, making my animation look unrealistic.
The second problem would be rendering. My laptop is unable to render the scene at all, causing lots of frustrations. Although it might show that the rendering is completed, the avi file would always be an empty file that cannot be opened. No matter what settings I used, it just doesn't render, causing a huge headache and a last minute panic.
The third problem would be animating the floursack and the legoman realistically. It might look very easy to outsiders, it is actually really difficult. Making the objects feel alive is even tougher! I feel that if I had more time, I could have made it better.
I guess the most important lesson learnt would be ANIMATION IS NOT AS EASY AS IT SEEMS! Last time, when I used to watch animations/cartoons, I used to think that it is not that difficult to model something like tt. However, having experience this first hand now, I seriously applaud and salute the animators. My animation is only 20 seconds and it is already so tough, imagine the effort put in when they model a movie! Wow!
Woooo maya rocks. 3D Modeling!!!
After a few nights of going without sleep, I am finally done with my IN3D Assignment 2! Although its quite tiring and VERY tough, I felt that it was worth it as the assignment was very interesting and taught me a lot. Having to model, animate and make sure that it looks realistic sure was tough. I encountered many problems when I was doing the assignment (some stupid mistakes too).
One of my biggest problem would have to be the timing of the whole animation. Its important that we make the timing just right (not too fast/not too slow) so that the animation looks good. I feel that I have not done particularly well in this area as my animation is too fast at the start and at the end, making my animation look unrealistic.
The second problem would be rendering. My laptop is unable to render the scene at all, causing lots of frustrations. Although it might show that the rendering is completed, the avi file would always be an empty file that cannot be opened. No matter what settings I used, it just doesn't render, causing a huge headache and a last minute panic.
The third problem would be animating the floursack and the legoman realistically. It might look very easy to outsiders, it is actually really difficult. Making the objects feel alive is even tougher! I feel that if I had more time, I could have made it better.
I guess the most important lesson learnt would be ANIMATION IS NOT AS EASY AS IT SEEMS! Last time, when I used to watch animations/cartoons, I used to think that it is not that difficult to model something like tt. However, having experience this first hand now, I seriously applaud and salute the animators. My animation is only 20 seconds and it is already so tough, imagine the effort put in when they model a movie! Wow!
Woooo maya rocks. 3D Modeling!!!
Journal 2 (Leonard)
Well, this is my 2nd journal for IN3D.
Overall, IN3D has been a subject that keeps me thinking all the way. From modelling to animation, creating simple blocks to rigging, IN3D has indeed been a really comprehensive subject. Mr Douglas might have been a strict teacher, but he has shown to us that he has a soft side to him. When problems arise and we raise our hands to ask questions, he will always be there to save the day...
The most interesting part of IN3D is no doubt the animation. Animation in Maya generally requires the usage of keyframes, and the characters' movement must look realistic. Also, collision detection is a must to create a great animation project. Without collision detection, the animation will usually be poor.
Well, the most difficult part of IN3D would have to be rigging a skeleton for the flour sack. Although the flour sack is a pretty simple object, rigging proves to be otherwise. Joints and IK(inverse kinematics) have to be implemented so that the flour sack will be able to move as though it has two hands and two legs.
The topic that I most enjoyed was the ball squashing. By implementing squash & stretch to the ball, bounces look much much better instead of just translating and rotating the ball. The graph editor was a good tool to create smoother curves for the ball bounces.
In conclusion, IN3D has been a really good subject. Although i'm not a really good Maya user, I have enjoyed working with it especially in the animation of the assignment. The only thing that I detest is probably the rendering time as it always takes a long time to render... (I'm sure everyone else feels the same way too). I hope that I will have the chance to use this program more often in the future so I can become a better animator...
Sayonara, IN3D...
Overall, IN3D has been a subject that keeps me thinking all the way. From modelling to animation, creating simple blocks to rigging, IN3D has indeed been a really comprehensive subject. Mr Douglas might have been a strict teacher, but he has shown to us that he has a soft side to him. When problems arise and we raise our hands to ask questions, he will always be there to save the day...
The most interesting part of IN3D is no doubt the animation. Animation in Maya generally requires the usage of keyframes, and the characters' movement must look realistic. Also, collision detection is a must to create a great animation project. Without collision detection, the animation will usually be poor.
Well, the most difficult part of IN3D would have to be rigging a skeleton for the flour sack. Although the flour sack is a pretty simple object, rigging proves to be otherwise. Joints and IK(inverse kinematics) have to be implemented so that the flour sack will be able to move as though it has two hands and two legs.
The topic that I most enjoyed was the ball squashing. By implementing squash & stretch to the ball, bounces look much much better instead of just translating and rotating the ball. The graph editor was a good tool to create smoother curves for the ball bounces.
In conclusion, IN3D has been a really good subject. Although i'm not a really good Maya user, I have enjoyed working with it especially in the animation of the assignment. The only thing that I detest is probably the rendering time as it always takes a long time to render... (I'm sure everyone else feels the same way too). I hope that I will have the chance to use this program more often in the future so I can become a better animator...
Sayonara, IN3D...
Journal2( Michelle)
Through the tutorials, we require to create 3 main objects needed in our animation, mainly - Floursack, Legoman and the Bouncing Ball.
At first, I took alot of time to make the bouncing ball work right. The squash tool either was too short or was separate from the ball. I did not realise it would be easier as time to come, where I have to create mulitple balls over and over again for different uses- such as a ball bouncing, a ball being kicked, a ball being thrown and so on. Different ball moves have different effects on the balls. For example, a golf ball do not squash and stretch, therefore I do not require the squash and stretch tool. Through my short experience, I was able to understand why I must lock certain values and not follow the tutorials blindly but understand them.
The floursack looked simple but was the most difficult to do. There are many steps to it such as rigging and so on. Even to move it was difficult. However, the outcome of the animation of it if it were to be sucessful is a good one (e.g. classmates' moving flour sack) that makes people smile or laugh; find it cool or cute.
LegoMan has limited moves. Therefore, I created a Legowoman in my project. A lego woman has a smaller waist and therefore is able to play golf that requires the movement of hands across the chest. Sometimes, objects can be modifed slightly to meet our needs for animation. In real life, we make characters that can move in their special ways. They have different functionality to move differently.
Rendering is a new concept we got a a little grasp about in this semester. It is useful as it makes our final product look more realistic.
At first, I was unfamiliar with animation using Maya and had trouble getting used to the keyframes. By the time I got used to animation in Maya, my computers crashed.
I was not able to fufill making the images realistic, but there is the storyline. Knowing that quantity is no better than quality, I also believe that the storyline is also important in an animation. A storyline definitely requires a nice animation to go with it. As I can see some of the classmates' work , some of their work really resemble or can be movie or game trailers. Camera angle is also important to show the views of the object, the expressions and the mood. For example from top view, object looks weak. From bottom view up , object will appear magnificient. Such techniques can be used in animation.
There are some rendering problems in some computers in school and we can search online for solutions and that includes any other problems or ideas we have in mind that we want to research or implement on.
Realism in important as it makes people interested in the animation. If there is something that goes wrong in the animation , people will be distracted with that and therefore not find the animation a good one.
One regret that I had was that I was not able to make my animations look that realistic or industry based. Better textures and shaders make objects look more realistic. Especially the movement of the characters, too.
Physics concepts are also important. Such as the falling of a ball will become faster and the ball will start to slow down in bounce level as it goes on.
Patience, creativity and passion is needed for a nice animation. Carefulness too. I think that perfectionists do well in Maya and we should learn from them and complete everything well.
At first, I took alot of time to make the bouncing ball work right. The squash tool either was too short or was separate from the ball. I did not realise it would be easier as time to come, where I have to create mulitple balls over and over again for different uses- such as a ball bouncing, a ball being kicked, a ball being thrown and so on. Different ball moves have different effects on the balls. For example, a golf ball do not squash and stretch, therefore I do not require the squash and stretch tool. Through my short experience, I was able to understand why I must lock certain values and not follow the tutorials blindly but understand them.
The floursack looked simple but was the most difficult to do. There are many steps to it such as rigging and so on. Even to move it was difficult. However, the outcome of the animation of it if it were to be sucessful is a good one (e.g. classmates' moving flour sack) that makes people smile or laugh; find it cool or cute.
LegoMan has limited moves. Therefore, I created a Legowoman in my project. A lego woman has a smaller waist and therefore is able to play golf that requires the movement of hands across the chest. Sometimes, objects can be modifed slightly to meet our needs for animation. In real life, we make characters that can move in their special ways. They have different functionality to move differently.
Rendering is a new concept we got a a little grasp about in this semester. It is useful as it makes our final product look more realistic.
At first, I was unfamiliar with animation using Maya and had trouble getting used to the keyframes. By the time I got used to animation in Maya, my computers crashed.
I was not able to fufill making the images realistic, but there is the storyline. Knowing that quantity is no better than quality, I also believe that the storyline is also important in an animation. A storyline definitely requires a nice animation to go with it. As I can see some of the classmates' work , some of their work really resemble or can be movie or game trailers. Camera angle is also important to show the views of the object, the expressions and the mood. For example from top view, object looks weak. From bottom view up , object will appear magnificient. Such techniques can be used in animation.
There are some rendering problems in some computers in school and we can search online for solutions and that includes any other problems or ideas we have in mind that we want to research or implement on.
Realism in important as it makes people interested in the animation. If there is something that goes wrong in the animation , people will be distracted with that and therefore not find the animation a good one.
One regret that I had was that I was not able to make my animations look that realistic or industry based. Better textures and shaders make objects look more realistic. Especially the movement of the characters, too.
Physics concepts are also important. Such as the falling of a ball will become faster and the ball will start to slow down in bounce level as it goes on.
Patience, creativity and passion is needed for a nice animation. Carefulness too. I think that perfectionists do well in Maya and we should learn from them and complete everything well.
Journal 2(OYS edition)
Lets see
One semester so fast alreadly and we have learn so many things from IN3D. There were many fustrations and complaints and what soever but we still gain a lot wheter we like it or not. Mr Douglas was very nice to keep scolding us to keep us in check all the time. Even though most people would not like to get shouted all the time, I feel that what he is saying is very very true espically about the game industry stuff.
The assignemetns were a very big big killer and they took most of the time, wish I had did more for the city. The animation was another killer for the assignement as the main problem was trying to make the flour sack move like a flour sack. But with all the fustrations and other stuff, I had manage to still do it and so have the rest of the class. However it is still only 17 seconds even increasing the whole thing to 550 frames.
When I saw the other people's work as well, I got demoralised rather badly because when I compare mine to the other's, they have better textures and models of the scene. And all I have is just one sack,lego man, a ball and a plane. Wish I could have added more things to the scene to increase my marks just by a teeny bit.
Ah well, all well that ends well. Many things has passed and I learn so many things and thank you Mr Douglas for taking all our nonsense over and over again for the past 3 months. I hope I will not let you down in the future by taking my Maya skills to a higher level.
One semester so fast alreadly and we have learn so many things from IN3D. There were many fustrations and complaints and what soever but we still gain a lot wheter we like it or not. Mr Douglas was very nice to keep scolding us to keep us in check all the time. Even though most people would not like to get shouted all the time, I feel that what he is saying is very very true espically about the game industry stuff.
The assignemetns were a very big big killer and they took most of the time, wish I had did more for the city. The animation was another killer for the assignement as the main problem was trying to make the flour sack move like a flour sack. But with all the fustrations and other stuff, I had manage to still do it and so have the rest of the class. However it is still only 17 seconds even increasing the whole thing to 550 frames.
When I saw the other people's work as well, I got demoralised rather badly because when I compare mine to the other's, they have better textures and models of the scene. And all I have is just one sack,lego man, a ball and a plane. Wish I could have added more things to the scene to increase my marks just by a teeny bit.
Ah well, all well that ends well. Many things has passed and I learn so many things and thank you Mr Douglas for taking all our nonsense over and over again for the past 3 months. I hope I will not let you down in the future by taking my Maya skills to a higher level.
Journal II (Mock)
I have gone through the lessons in IN3D and they definitely helped me in progressing and working MAYA. For the small "homeworks" we need to complete everytime we go for lessons, and the major animation assignment II which contributes 35% of the whole subject. The lessons I have learnt help me ease and progress through them smoothly.
However, I encountered problems along the lessons, and asked friends to help, and vice versa. Some problems I encounter are the rigging and animating the floursack and the animating of legoman. For the floursack, rigging for it must be precise and accurate, or else when animating, I will face problems when rotating and tranlating according to my will. If not rigged properly, the shape of the floursack when moving will be awfully out of shape, like jagged areas, where I have to "weight" and smooth it down. "Weighting" is definitely not an easy process as it need experience and skilfulness to master it. Though difficult, I've heard that in sem 2.2, we have an animation course which requires this.
Animating the legoman is easy, however, making it realistic is difficult. Legoman lacks certain joints such as the elbows and knees to allow more detailed movements. Also, translating and rotating legoman's limbs are restricted in many ways. Some rotations around the X, Y, Z axis would give the legoman unrealistic movements, thus making a poor animation.
However, there are good encounters in making the animation, as well as during the lessons. Making the stretch and squash for the ball provides exaggeration for animation, thus increasing its realism for audience. The tutorials are also interesting and allows me to project a good animation if there is, in the future.
Animation itself is also one big problem I faced, when doing Assignment II. Set Key Frames is the MAIN MAIN MAIN thing, as well as the MOST FRUSTRATING thing in animation. As the objects in our animation, such as the legoman and floursack, have their respective parts, such as L_Arm, R_Arm, L_ArmIK, R_LegIK, Root_control, once I forget to KeyFrame a part, the whole animation before the current Frame will be affected, and no matter how beautiful the front part is, it will be destroyed! Though irritating, it still teaches us a lesson to be cautious and careful about our work. The run-time errors also remind us to save our work constantly, which is extremely important. But no matter how many tragedies we have gone through, at the end of the day, at the end of the animation, we WILL FEEL SOOO GOOOD!
Also, MAYA has a great user interface and many functions, such as having a smooth camera flow when animating or viewing my projects. The functions provide MAYA users with an easier access for complicated movements and animations.
I feel that having the chance to learn this subject will definitely help me in the future. MAYA has provided me with another option in my future career paths and life, opening more of a designing route for me. I will treasure the lessons I have been taught and will make it useful to my life, for now and the future.
However, I encountered problems along the lessons, and asked friends to help, and vice versa. Some problems I encounter are the rigging and animating the floursack and the animating of legoman. For the floursack, rigging for it must be precise and accurate, or else when animating, I will face problems when rotating and tranlating according to my will. If not rigged properly, the shape of the floursack when moving will be awfully out of shape, like jagged areas, where I have to "weight" and smooth it down. "Weighting" is definitely not an easy process as it need experience and skilfulness to master it. Though difficult, I've heard that in sem 2.2, we have an animation course which requires this.
Animating the legoman is easy, however, making it realistic is difficult. Legoman lacks certain joints such as the elbows and knees to allow more detailed movements. Also, translating and rotating legoman's limbs are restricted in many ways. Some rotations around the X, Y, Z axis would give the legoman unrealistic movements, thus making a poor animation.
However, there are good encounters in making the animation, as well as during the lessons. Making the stretch and squash for the ball provides exaggeration for animation, thus increasing its realism for audience. The tutorials are also interesting and allows me to project a good animation if there is, in the future.
Animation itself is also one big problem I faced, when doing Assignment II. Set Key Frames is the MAIN MAIN MAIN thing, as well as the MOST FRUSTRATING thing in animation. As the objects in our animation, such as the legoman and floursack, have their respective parts, such as L_Arm, R_Arm, L_ArmIK, R_LegIK, Root_control, once I forget to KeyFrame a part, the whole animation before the current Frame will be affected, and no matter how beautiful the front part is, it will be destroyed! Though irritating, it still teaches us a lesson to be cautious and careful about our work. The run-time errors also remind us to save our work constantly, which is extremely important. But no matter how many tragedies we have gone through, at the end of the day, at the end of the animation, we WILL FEEL SOOO GOOOD!
Also, MAYA has a great user interface and many functions, such as having a smooth camera flow when animating or viewing my projects. The functions provide MAYA users with an easier access for complicated movements and animations.
I feel that having the chance to learn this subject will definitely help me in the future. MAYA has provided me with another option in my future career paths and life, opening more of a designing route for me. I will treasure the lessons I have been taught and will make it useful to my life, for now and the future.
Journal 2 (AME)
Lessons on IN3D are finally ending. But before that is the submission of Journal 2 and the assignment2 (AME). I personally feel that in order to model well or use maya, we must first understand the different functions that maya has to provide us. By having that knowledge, i feel that we will be able to understand better when we are ask to model, animate, rig or anything including the tutot explaining the technical concepts.
Assignment2 is a built up from some of the previous lab sessions. The assignment mainly focuses on animation. 40% of the marks go to animation! In my animation, i tried to make the ball stretch, squash and even use a deformer to make it look realistic when the ball hit a object or kicked. However, when i render the scenes, the stretch, squash and the deformer makes very little significance. ><
Another thing, before i render my scenes, i put in the ambience lights but i seem to have overdid it. I think i have made the scene too bright and it looks a bit wierd.
Furthermore, the camera has always been a huge hassle for me. I just cannot seem to make the camera rotate in a nice and smooth manner. Plus, i also cannot remember how to make the camera follow the nurb curve or something like that. I think i have to learn more about the functions that maya provides.
Another Huge "Monster" in maya is painting weights. It is so difficult to achieve a nice and good looking posture without affecting the postures in the other frames. When you paint the weights in an area, the other areas will also be affected.
~Kenneth
Assignment2 is a built up from some of the previous lab sessions. The assignment mainly focuses on animation. 40% of the marks go to animation! In my animation, i tried to make the ball stretch, squash and even use a deformer to make it look realistic when the ball hit a object or kicked. However, when i render the scenes, the stretch, squash and the deformer makes very little significance. ><
Another thing, before i render my scenes, i put in the ambience lights but i seem to have overdid it. I think i have made the scene too bright and it looks a bit wierd.
Furthermore, the camera has always been a huge hassle for me. I just cannot seem to make the camera rotate in a nice and smooth manner. Plus, i also cannot remember how to make the camera follow the nurb curve or something like that. I think i have to learn more about the functions that maya provides.
Another Huge "Monster" in maya is painting weights. It is so difficult to achieve a nice and good looking posture without affecting the postures in the other frames. When you paint the weights in an area, the other areas will also be affected.
~Kenneth
ITS THE END (yan)
time passes so quick when you're having fun..
before you know it, it has already come to an end for IN3D!! i have learnt many various tools in modelling as well as animation~ when doing the animation assignment, there were many difficulties faced due to bad base in animation. from painting weights to proper rigging, all these posed as difficulties which in the end, helped me learn more.
i have observed that rigging affects the way the model moves and how realistic it is. i have also learnt about rendering where the program gets every frame of the animation and linking them together to get a high quality of animation.
thinking back to my robot model, i realised that the complexity of my models have increased steadily throughout the IN3D days. this is partly thanks to my lecturer douglas who helped during times of needs. now, i know how animators have it tough when making an animation and will no longer take animation lightly. from making realistic textures to complex models, being an animator is no simple task. lighting and camera effects also affect a great deal in animation which in my opinion, is what IN3D is all about!
all in all, i have thoroughly enjoyed myself during IN3D by looking at the end result of countless hours of hard work and hope to be able to do more in future.
posted by YAN;
before you know it, it has already come to an end for IN3D!! i have learnt many various tools in modelling as well as animation~ when doing the animation assignment, there were many difficulties faced due to bad base in animation. from painting weights to proper rigging, all these posed as difficulties which in the end, helped me learn more.
i have observed that rigging affects the way the model moves and how realistic it is. i have also learnt about rendering where the program gets every frame of the animation and linking them together to get a high quality of animation.
thinking back to my robot model, i realised that the complexity of my models have increased steadily throughout the IN3D days. this is partly thanks to my lecturer douglas who helped during times of needs. now, i know how animators have it tough when making an animation and will no longer take animation lightly. from making realistic textures to complex models, being an animator is no simple task. lighting and camera effects also affect a great deal in animation which in my opinion, is what IN3D is all about!
all in all, i have thoroughly enjoyed myself during IN3D by looking at the end result of countless hours of hard work and hope to be able to do more in future.
posted by YAN;
JOURNAL 2: WEE YOU
Wow! Unknowingly, we have reached the end of the Maya. For this semester at least. There's still 3DVA nex year!
I had fun! I learnt a lot of stuffs about maya, from modelling, to rigging, to animating, to rendering! Modelling is a very fun thing to. It was very interesting to see the end results of the endless extruding and adjusting of vertexes. For eg, during the city, we were trying to model our buildings according to buildings found in the real world.
We also modelled cute stuffs such as the LEGOMAN and the FLOURSACK! Not only that, we put life into them by animating them. For example, we rigged the FLOURSACK and gave it IK handles, making it move realistically. This injects life into the FLOURSACK, as we can set a lot of real-life poses, such as a sad floursack, a whining floursack, etc.
Animating the legoman was also loads of fun. It is very interesting to see how you made your legoman move, and how cute it becomes. We also applied funny textures to the legoman, such as giving it hair, and letting it be "half-naked". This was done mostly using the UV Texture Editor. IMO, that is a really powerful tool that allows a texture to be projected on a non-plane surface. For example, by adjusting the UVs, it is possible to add a "sky texture" to half of the skydome. making it look realistic.
Another interesting thing I learnt was the rendering of the scenes. When I did the scene, I felt that my quality of work is really bad, probably due to the textures i applied. However, when I rendered it fully with lights applied, it looks magically beautiful. This is where special effects can be seen - the generated shadows, differences between blint and lambert, etc. etc. etc.
Rendering the scene took a long time though. Most of us lost sleep because of it, as we thought it would be as fast as "playblasting". Also, after we rendered, we realised how ugly and screwed the playblast was.
EDIT: OMG I forgot to mention about squash and stretch! It was such a fun deformer to use. It exaggerated our ball movement, making it look reaaally reaaaally nice.
Other than the Maya techniques I learnt, the assignment 2 was a precious precious memory etched in my heart forever. We fought through tiredness and sleepiness in order to complete our 3d masterpiece. Everybody was really tired, and was spamming coffee to stay awake. After we finished our work, we celebrated by singing and dancing crazily. This is because of the awesome sense of satisfaction we get from completing our work.
I'm sure I missed out a lot of points which I wanted to say, but in short, IN3D has been a very fun subject, and I learnt tons of things about Maya and 3D concepts. BYEBYE MAYA! For now..
I had fun! I learnt a lot of stuffs about maya, from modelling, to rigging, to animating, to rendering! Modelling is a very fun thing to. It was very interesting to see the end results of the endless extruding and adjusting of vertexes. For eg, during the city, we were trying to model our buildings according to buildings found in the real world.
We also modelled cute stuffs such as the LEGOMAN and the FLOURSACK! Not only that, we put life into them by animating them. For example, we rigged the FLOURSACK and gave it IK handles, making it move realistically. This injects life into the FLOURSACK, as we can set a lot of real-life poses, such as a sad floursack, a whining floursack, etc.
Animating the legoman was also loads of fun. It is very interesting to see how you made your legoman move, and how cute it becomes. We also applied funny textures to the legoman, such as giving it hair, and letting it be "half-naked". This was done mostly using the UV Texture Editor. IMO, that is a really powerful tool that allows a texture to be projected on a non-plane surface. For example, by adjusting the UVs, it is possible to add a "sky texture" to half of the skydome. making it look realistic.
Another interesting thing I learnt was the rendering of the scenes. When I did the scene, I felt that my quality of work is really bad, probably due to the textures i applied. However, when I rendered it fully with lights applied, it looks magically beautiful. This is where special effects can be seen - the generated shadows, differences between blint and lambert, etc. etc. etc.
Rendering the scene took a long time though. Most of us lost sleep because of it, as we thought it would be as fast as "playblasting". Also, after we rendered, we realised how ugly and screwed the playblast was.
EDIT: OMG I forgot to mention about squash and stretch! It was such a fun deformer to use. It exaggerated our ball movement, making it look reaaally reaaaally nice.
Other than the Maya techniques I learnt, the assignment 2 was a precious precious memory etched in my heart forever. We fought through tiredness and sleepiness in order to complete our 3d masterpiece. Everybody was really tired, and was spamming coffee to stay awake. After we finished our work, we celebrated by singing and dancing crazily. This is because of the awesome sense of satisfaction we get from completing our work.
I'm sure I missed out a lot of points which I wanted to say, but in short, IN3D has been a very fun subject, and I learnt tons of things about Maya and 3D concepts. BYEBYE MAYA! For now..
Journal 2 - Poh Zi Hao
Finally over with the crunch period of IN3D. I have thought that animating was manageable when I did the first exercise of the bouncing ball. But when I'm doing my assignment, I realise that the longer the animation is, the higher the chance of a single frame affecting all the rest of the animation. It is also incredibly hard to edit mistakes in the timeline as there are repercussions whenever I edit any frame.
The perculiar structure of the legoman and the floursack also forces me to apply creativity in whatever work I do. The limited joins of the legoman and floursack makes it less complex to animate them, but at the same time realism is affected.
Rendering was also a big problem, my laptop like many others' failed to render the animation properly, despite multiple attempts. What is previewed in the timeline and what is actually rendered also have critical differences that forces me to edit my work many times
Now that I have learned IN3D, I learned that modelling is hard, and animating models could be even harder. The IK handler and inverse kinematics also have unforeseeable outcome on the result of animating, and painting the weight, although useful in solving the problem is extremely difficult. I have also learned that the tools like graph editors, outliners and hypergraphs as well as weight painting tools are extremely useful in animating.
The perculiar structure of the legoman and the floursack also forces me to apply creativity in whatever work I do. The limited joins of the legoman and floursack makes it less complex to animate them, but at the same time realism is affected.
Rendering was also a big problem, my laptop like many others' failed to render the animation properly, despite multiple attempts. What is previewed in the timeline and what is actually rendered also have critical differences that forces me to edit my work many times
Now that I have learned IN3D, I learned that modelling is hard, and animating models could be even harder. The IK handler and inverse kinematics also have unforeseeable outcome on the result of animating, and painting the weight, although useful in solving the problem is extremely difficult. I have also learned that the tools like graph editors, outliners and hypergraphs as well as weight painting tools are extremely useful in animating.
Journal 2 - Teo Chu Ping
Finished the assignment 2 just in the nick of time. In my opinion, the modelling of my characters were not bad. However, after including the textures, most of my characters got "screwed up". I tried to repair the problem to the best of my abilities but it did not followmy expectations. After the problem with the textures, there was the problem with the animation time. Most of my character's action seems either too fast or too slow.
I found many important and useful functions in Maya. The 1st was the hypergraphs. They allow me to select individual components of my characters and move them accordingly. The 2nd was the layer editor is also useful. It allows me to group my characters into different layers thereby allowing to select individual characters easier. (The reference function allow me to prevent myself from selecting extra stuffs like the background).
However, there are still many areas of maya i have yet to explore. An example would be the lightings, paints etc. I feel that it is a waste as these functions really provide a good model/animation. (From examples i saw while searching the internet for tutorials)
In conclusion. I believe that if i would have more time (alot alot more) i would be able to create a realistic and interesting scene. And also, i regret that i had allocated too little time for this project and thus resulted in a crappy piece of work.
I found many important and useful functions in Maya. The 1st was the hypergraphs. They allow me to select individual components of my characters and move them accordingly. The 2nd was the layer editor is also useful. It allows me to group my characters into different layers thereby allowing to select individual characters easier. (The reference function allow me to prevent myself from selecting extra stuffs like the background).
However, there are still many areas of maya i have yet to explore. An example would be the lightings, paints etc. I feel that it is a waste as these functions really provide a good model/animation. (From examples i saw while searching the internet for tutorials)
In conclusion. I believe that if i would have more time (alot alot more) i would be able to create a realistic and interesting scene. And also, i regret that i had allocated too little time for this project and thus resulted in a crappy piece of work.
My Will - Journal II (IN3D)
My god... IN3D IS NO MORE!!! so is sem 2.1! This last assignment is about creating an animation involving a ball, a legoman and a floursack plus some other thingy u wish to put. My scene is about a legoman kicking soccer with the floursack as the goalkeeper.
Well, the end product is not as nice as i expected. The lighting is screwed, same for the animation. The most irritating problem i find is prolly the IK handler for the floursack. When modelling the floursack, it will easily go out of shape and it needs to be manually fixed. Legoman is veri easy to animate as it is polygonal. The ball is also quite easy as there's a previous tutorial that teaches the ball's squashing and stretching. The goalpost is a simple poles-and-spheres modelling and needs no animation.
When i saw my rendered animation, I was shock to see that it was dark... But there's no more time to re-render the animation as the time is up. I guess there's nth else to say...
Well, the end product is not as nice as i expected. The lighting is screwed, same for the animation. The most irritating problem i find is prolly the IK handler for the floursack. When modelling the floursack, it will easily go out of shape and it needs to be manually fixed. Legoman is veri easy to animate as it is polygonal. The ball is also quite easy as there's a previous tutorial that teaches the ball's squashing and stretching. The goalpost is a simple poles-and-spheres modelling and needs no animation.
When i saw my rendered animation, I was shock to see that it was dark... But there's no more time to re-render the animation as the time is up. I guess there's nth else to say...
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Journal2
Finally, I have completed the course for in3d. Or at least i think i have. Firstly i would like to comment on the assignment that I have done. The assignment was much harder compared to the previous one. Animation requires much more thinking and determination. Animating a character is easy, but making it realistic is much more tougher.
After doing the assignment, i feel for the animators working for dreamworks for disney etc. I may have only done a 20 seconds odd animation, and i already feel the toughness. I feel for the animators doing a 1 -2 hrs of animations. They would need to observe how a particular character they are animating behave. Animation is not an easy job.
The hardest part i have learnt about the animation is the ability to make the flour sack move. As the flour sack contains a lot of joints, moving and shifting of various parts of the body is hard. And joints or IK handlers will screw up if I were not careful. Another difficulty i face is to make the flour sack run or walk nicely. I find it difficult to move realistically.
Overall, I felt that I have put in my best for this assignment compared to the first one.I thought that I've did a decent job for it.
As the course is coming to an end, I felt that I have done enough to make it through, I hope. I felt that I have learnt a lot about modelling and basic movement or animations of objects. The course is challenging and I'm looking forward to 3DVA in the next semester. Despite the course being tough and tedious, it provided a good learning experience for me.
Mr Douglas is a patient lecturer and is always willing to help pupils whenever they need him to. I feel that he cares for all his pupils even though he might not always show them from his facial expressions. But i know deep down inside him, he has a warm and loving heart for all his students, so that is why we are so successful in creating something nice and presentable. I would like to thank him again for all his efforts in teaching this subject.
The course was only made successful due to his teachings.
Thank you Mr Douglas! :)
-Ang Yujian
After doing the assignment, i feel for the animators working for dreamworks for disney etc. I may have only done a 20 seconds odd animation, and i already feel the toughness. I feel for the animators doing a 1 -2 hrs of animations. They would need to observe how a particular character they are animating behave. Animation is not an easy job.
The hardest part i have learnt about the animation is the ability to make the flour sack move. As the flour sack contains a lot of joints, moving and shifting of various parts of the body is hard. And joints or IK handlers will screw up if I were not careful. Another difficulty i face is to make the flour sack run or walk nicely. I find it difficult to move realistically.
Overall, I felt that I have put in my best for this assignment compared to the first one.I thought that I've did a decent job for it.
As the course is coming to an end, I felt that I have done enough to make it through, I hope. I felt that I have learnt a lot about modelling and basic movement or animations of objects. The course is challenging and I'm looking forward to 3DVA in the next semester. Despite the course being tough and tedious, it provided a good learning experience for me.
Mr Douglas is a patient lecturer and is always willing to help pupils whenever they need him to. I feel that he cares for all his pupils even though he might not always show them from his facial expressions. But i know deep down inside him, he has a warm and loving heart for all his students, so that is why we are so successful in creating something nice and presentable. I would like to thank him again for all his efforts in teaching this subject.
The course was only made successful due to his teachings.
Thank you Mr Douglas! :)
-Ang Yujian
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Journal 2 (Kenny)
IN3D is ending soon after the submission of the AME assignment. I personally felt that throughout the past few months, I have changed my perspective of looking at 3D modelling as well as how to distinguish the specific detail in modelling to make the models more realistic.
Assignment 2 focuses on mainly animation, which combines both 3D modelling and animation. In the assignment, I have tried to apply the principles of animation such as anticipation and exaggeration. Without those principles, my animation would have been a load of junk but that doesn't mean I have applied the principles well. I still have much to improve on with experience.
I personally think that Assignment 2 gives too much freedom to do what we want as long as the animation is good, but sometimes some restrictions can help in testing the ability of animating in 3D. Camera angles can fool people to make a world of a difference in animation, maybe introducing the tips and tricks of camera usage would be good.
Often when problem arises, my first reaction is to google my question such as painting weights. "Painting weights is a killer", I finally understand what Mr. Douglas meant by painting the weights professionally may take up to days with no progress.
I felt that IN3D gives me the feeling that there are more oppurtunities in jobs in the gaming industry other than programming as GET is more of a programming subject, adding IN3D into this diploma have definitely been a good choice as I look forward to 3DVA.
Final thanks to Mr. Douglas for imparting his knowledge, be it for attitude or technical stuff.
Assignment 2 focuses on mainly animation, which combines both 3D modelling and animation. In the assignment, I have tried to apply the principles of animation such as anticipation and exaggeration. Without those principles, my animation would have been a load of junk but that doesn't mean I have applied the principles well. I still have much to improve on with experience.
I personally think that Assignment 2 gives too much freedom to do what we want as long as the animation is good, but sometimes some restrictions can help in testing the ability of animating in 3D. Camera angles can fool people to make a world of a difference in animation, maybe introducing the tips and tricks of camera usage would be good.
Often when problem arises, my first reaction is to google my question such as painting weights. "Painting weights is a killer", I finally understand what Mr. Douglas meant by painting the weights professionally may take up to days with no progress.
I felt that IN3D gives me the feeling that there are more oppurtunities in jobs in the gaming industry other than programming as GET is more of a programming subject, adding IN3D into this diploma have definitely been a good choice as I look forward to 3DVA.
Final thanks to Mr. Douglas for imparting his knowledge, be it for attitude or technical stuff.
Monday, August 4, 2008
Small Note. So small that u dun reali notice...
There's a nice texture for the floursack that was already in-built in MAYA. After assigning material, click the button at the utmost end of the color bar and select cloth. Change the color using the U and V Color bar. I guess the Gap Color hav no nid to change...
Sunday, August 3, 2008
MAYA Assignment2
Assignment due soon. But my floursack seems wierd.
Duno if it is my floursack or what, i jus cant seem to resize it together with its other counterparts. ><
Haiz, got to think a way out of this.
I have already model the floursack and legoman at least twice, no problem.
But!!! Here comes the difficult part!!! Animation!!!
In the first assignment; the city, i have a hard time animating the cars and etc.
Now i have to animate the legoman, floursack and ball in a realistic manner!
Got to spend more time on it... Not easy at all...
Plus, after animating the objects, the camera also gives me a huge headache.
In the city assignment, i jus cant seem to make the camera move like i want it to.
Teacher have thought it in class like the lesson before handing in the assignment but i cant figure out how to do it.
Now worse, i totally forgot liao. Haiz, back to my assignment...
~Kenneth
Duno if it is my floursack or what, i jus cant seem to resize it together with its other counterparts. ><
Haiz, got to think a way out of this.
I have already model the floursack and legoman at least twice, no problem.
But!!! Here comes the difficult part!!! Animation!!!
In the first assignment; the city, i have a hard time animating the cars and etc.
Now i have to animate the legoman, floursack and ball in a realistic manner!
Got to spend more time on it... Not easy at all...
Plus, after animating the objects, the camera also gives me a huge headache.
In the city assignment, i jus cant seem to make the camera move like i want it to.
Teacher have thought it in class like the lesson before handing in the assignment but i cant figure out how to do it.
Now worse, i totally forgot liao. Haiz, back to my assignment...
~Kenneth
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