I finally got some decent updates to show. I went back and re-rigged the entire character with a better bone setup than before, now he moves properly. I got some test animations done for the facial blend shapes, I still have to make the eyebrow and eyelid blends. I also got half a walk cycle going, checkout the videos below.
View Facial Blend Shape Test
View Walk 1 | Walk 2
I just figure that since I have to create some poses for both characters, might as well make wallpapers out of them ^_^.
So here they are, they're 1280x768 (specifically designed for widescreen monitor) in resolution. If you wanted them in different resolution please feel free to contact me.
This is a .mov file of Billy's walk cycle that I've created for today's presentation. Any comments is welcome. Enjoy.
The file is 4MB in size so if you have a slow connection, please be patient. Thanks.
• Billy's Walk Cycle
I know I haven't been updating for the past week but due to some family issues I had to be sidetracked from the project but I was away for most the time I did manage to render pose animation for both characters. Here they are, ENJOY!!!
PS: The files are 3MB each so bear with it if you have a slow connection.
Well, it's not the greatest...Shervin pointed out modeling mistakes that would have made the rig come out better, but it's animation ready finally. I forgot the hair, I will insert it back tomorrow. Textures of course are default at the moment, we haven't polished anything in that area yet. Tomarrow I will get the face expressions done so there is more life to this character, I am sure I can get some sort of animation up this weekend, stay tuned. And yes he has 3 fingers...
This is just a quick update, not more so with the progress of the work but rather the installation. I wanted to have our movie play on a nice TV at the show so I contacted a source at Samsung Canada. They will happily lend us an LCD/PDP TV for the show which is great news. Now all we need to decide is if it should be wall mounted or stand based, and where to exactly place it in the show.
I haven't updated for a bit for good reason. I have had a fair number of setbacks. I started getting into face rigging and was making progress however when I showed my MJ model to Shervin yesterday he spotted a few problems that needed correction. My character IKs were messed up and I have to now go back and do the body rigging again to get it working right. Also we are now presenting our work in progress on Jan 30th, and I am afraid we wont have our first bits of animation to show for that day as Ferry has not started rigging yet. Hopefully I can re-rig the character quickly and get back to the face rigging and get this character moving a little before the end of this week. The rest falls on Ferry...
I got to talk to Shervin again today, thank god I did. As usual I had to go back a step which meant all my hours cursing at my computer this weekend were a waste. Shervin provided some AWESOME tips that really helped in doing some good rigging today, "ALWAYS ADD never subtract". Following these wise words of Shervin wisdom I went back and adjusted the skeleton and started re-rigging MJ today. It's 2 am and I got the perfect shoulder movement done in 1 hour so I am sure I can now move much faster and get a fully rigged character by tomarrow night if I work straight through Ed's class. All of you who do character RIGGING, you are true masters...Now I know how hard it is!
Ah... This is a rendered version of Billy The Kid using a better graphic card. I'm not sure if you guys notice any difference in it but I did update the model slightly and change a few texture. So let's play "Find The Difference"!!!
No he's not screaming.
This is the textured version of Billy the Kid. I'm going to post a cleaner and better graphic of him tomorrow. It seems like my computer at home didn't have a powerful enough graphic card to produce the maya rendering I desire.
What can I say? Wasn't this much better than it originally was? Once again KUDOS to Asim!!! I'll start texturing it today and hope to meet the due date on Saturday. In the mean time, enjoy the render images above ^_^.
First of all, let me tell you guys that I'm alive and well. And second, KUDOS, to Asim who applied his magic touch to the Michael Jackson face which I had created and turning it 100 times better than it originally is. You're SUPERB!!! Loved the whole costume too!!!
Putting that aside, this is the first progress work we'll be showing of Billy The Kid in 3D ^_^. This is the basic model that I've created and awaiting for Asim to apply his magic touch (again) to make him better. Than it'll be down to texturing him which we've already predicted should be done by Saturday.
We've also been assigned for our next presentation which is scheduled to be on January 23rd which is in less than 2 weeks. We've decided that by that presentation we'd like to have at least finished the first scene of the movie to be presented in class to get feedbacks about it. So we'd have to get both characters ready (created, textured and rigged) by that time.
I got a chance to talk to Shervin this week and got some tips on how to add more life to the character with textures. I also learned that I UV Mapped my character in high res and should go back and do it in low poly form. That took out 2 days, but the character is now UV Mapped in low poly. The UV Mapping is simple to start with, I didn't do proper stitching for areas we wont even apply detailed textures to, my main concern was the face and chest so I spent more time on those maps and setting them up. Maya's UV Texture editor is just a PAIN to work with. Tonight I am going to add any final adjustments to the face and mouth maps and move onto rigging the character for animation. I will skip detailed texturing for now as I feel it is more important for us to have maximum time to animate. I could spend weeks on just texturing but we don't have that sort if time. Our characters are also stylized and not hyper-real so I won't get into texturing till we are ready to render our first scene. Ferry's character model is coming along he is a few steps behind me but he can catch up when I move on to lighting and setting up our set location for shots. I want to still stick to my goal of having atleast a walk cycle done this weekend. This week is running on 6 hours of sleep and lack of GYM time, which sucks...
I spent a good day on the eyes because I really wanted them to be alive. I found this free 5 hour online video tutorial "Creating Believable Eyes" here and decided to give it a try. The outcome is a lot better than what I had before. The character looks more alive. Also, I think the character would look more believable with the longer hair MJ always has rather than something tied up. I decided to give a stylized cartoon look a try, it still needs to be stitched and smoothed but I think it is a lot better. I am going to meet up with Ferry tomorrow to catch up on progress, if we both can agree on this hair I will start rigging. I need to ask Shervin tomorrow if how to make the skin look more skin-like and alive, and the proper material characteristics for the costume, belt, and boots. So far it's coming together and by next weekend I want to have the first walk cycle completed. At this point, sleeping is not an option and coffee is going to be my best friend.
Tomorrow's goal = rigging, wish me luck on this painful journey...Oh and click the image above for a high res version, it looks nicer.
Here is a skinned version so far. I am overall not happy with the outcome yet. I think the costume needs some colour correction and the face looks very lifeless. It needs more work, I am going to remodel the eyes with a different approach. I also think the hair needs some adjustments before I start rigging. Overall I do think the texturing is poor but the appropriate files have been created and mapped so they can be improved even after rigging is done. I am hoping Sherman can help us out with getting the textures to look right, giving more life to MJs face next week. I will still move onto rigging as soon as I get the eyes right and fix the hair a bit. He's starting to look like a Tim Burton character, lifeless and dead.
I love this logo...agent M...I had to finish it so I did. I think it is good enough and I have to draw the line here. The model is complete, it needs eyes but otherwise it is complete. Next stage, texturing and rigging. I have to finish these last 2 stages in the coming week.
Scary isn't he? By the way this was my first attempt at modeling an actual face, I got away with making helmets and buckets in my previous animations.
Wow, this has been a crazy week. Tons of gaming and modeling. I have pretty much finished the body work and have attached the head, I am just tweaking it all to look proper now and then I will stitch it into one mesh today. My goal is to have this character rigged for animation before the 8th. I also had to take the face Ferry did and work with it for 2 days to get it to look closer to what we originally planned. It is definitely closer but not something I am 100% satisfied with yet. Anyways, here is the holiday update. I think we can get away with a cartoony MJ :)
