Project Part 1 & Part 2 - Walk Cycle

Part 1: Standard Walk Cycle

Front View Part 1

Part 2: Jump over the box

Front View Part 2

This walk cycle exercise is quite hard to do at first. I did not know how to calculate one complete cycle because it was confusing. But after trying it a few times, I find it easy to animate the character. I actually had fun doing it although it requires more time and effort.

Walk Cycle Animation

It is not that easy to do the walk cycle animation because it took me at least one whole day to complete the animation. I had to ensure that the person is walking naturally and not like a robot. I need to know when should the body move forward and when does the feet need to bend. It's quite fun to do the animation once I got the hang of it.

Skeleton Rigging

 

The human rigging was quite confusing. I had to keep on redoing because I got stuck at video 8. At that time, there was a problem with the axis rotation which affects the joints. I cannot remember clearly but I just find it difficult to do. I had to keep on watching the videos carefully and understand what they are trying to do. It took me more than a week to complete the rigging.

Big Dog - Shift Weight

Ex 1

The sequence of leg movements for one complete step is that the front-right and back-left legs will move first followed by the front-left and back-right legs. This forms a complete walk cycle for the big dog. When the front-right and the back-left legs are moving forward, the front-left and back-right legs will be standing still on the ground to help balance the big dog's body weight. The same thing happens when the front-left and back-right legs move first. The front-right and back-left legs will be standing still on the ground to hold the big dog's body weight.

Storyboard

Step 1

Step 2

Step 3

Step 4

Ex 2 - Final Animation

After doing this exercise a few times, I felt slightly easier to do the animation of the big dog. It is not that easy to animate the dog because I had to watch the video many times in order to get a proper animation. I need to know how to apply weight onto the body whenever the dog moves. The animation may look a bit weird but I'm proud of what I've done after all the hard work.

Shift Weight Ex 1 - Spiderman

Final Spiderman Animation

My Video

Hanani's Video

Adlina's Video

This exercise was not easy to do at first because I had to understand which way should the pose of the spiderman be when when weight is applied to the body. After doing it, I feel that it is quite simple to do (although the animation takes some time to be completed). For the 3 video references, we had to try the shift weight exercise. The first video was mine. I tried to move on one leg to the other but some how I failed to do it properly. I know it looks funny when I did it because I didn't know how to. The second video was Hanani's. This video is slightly better than what I did. She tried to add weight onto one leg to the other without moving her feet. And the last video is Adlina's. Her video may look funny because she moved too much of her waist. But overall, it was fun doing the animation.

Spiderman Posing

Pose 1

Pose 2

Pose 3

Pose 4

This topic involves a lot of time and effort. I spent at least few hours to complete the first and second poses within one day because I faced some difficulties adjusting the body parts especially the arms. The arms were twisted when I adjusted the body. It took me very long to be familiarize on how to adjust the body parts to create a pose. The pose seems to be simple but it is actually not easy to do.

Week 1 - Elearning

Cow Modeling

This is a picture of the cow's head. I had problems modeling the cow head at first because the shape does not seem to be right. But after going through the tutorials from the video over again, I managed to understand how to do it. It took me about 3 to 4 times to redo the head. For the eye, I did not know how to extrude properly at first because it was extruded the other way round instead of extruding it towards the hole. As for the nose part, I did not know how to split the center of the hole therefore I left it. After modeling the head a few times, I somehow managed to do it. The same thing goes for the body. I had to redo a few time in order to get the right shape.

3DVA - Week 1 Character Development

Character Profile

The name of my character is Alexander. He is also known as Alexander the Coolest. Alexander is an arrogant, a show-it-all type of guy who wants to impress people by showing of his looks and talents. Despite his arrogant personality, he has a soft heart. He cares for the people around him.

Story Line

Magicians around the world have been practicing their magic skills at teenage age. Since young, they felt that magic was something impressive which could bring joy and fun to the audiences. Magic is not an easy task to perform. People need to have the interest of learning how to perform magic and also patience in order to succeed. Alexander is one of the many magicians who practiced hard everyday. He does not give up easily since he hopes to be the world's top magician. He performs hard on stage to amaze the audiences. Although he does make mistakes, the audience still applauded for him.

Driving Force (What motivates them?)

Alexander loves to see the people around him feel happy. He does not like people to feel bad about themselves therefore he practices magic tricks to show them that he could be the one to make them happy.

Traits that are unique to my character

Appearance:

- Alexander's key feature is his black and white outfit. He wants to impress people by looking good while doing magic. Most of the time his black and white outfit is the main thing that attracts people's attention because it makes him look cool and smart.

- Another feature is his long black hair, to show that he himself is cool looking magician by having this hair style. Everyday, he looks at the mirror to see if his hair is perfect.

- Another feature is his dark brown eyes. His eyes are quite scary looking but it does not scare people off easily.

Behaviour:

- Although Alexander appears to be arrogant, he treats people politely and even smiles at them.

- Whenever Alexander tries to do tricky magic tricks, he feels stress because he is afraid that the trick might not work properly when he is on stage.

Dialogue Sequence

Alexander: Abracadabra!

(The rabbit in the cage has disappeared.)

Where's the rabbit? Can you see where is it?

(Alexander asked the audience.)

Now, I need a volunteer to come up stage.

Audience: Me, me!! Pick me!!

Alexander: The little girl over there! Come up here!

(The little girl ran to the stage feeling excited.)

Now I'm going to cover the cage with a piece of cloth. When I count to 3, I want you to say "Abracadabra!". 1, 2, 3...

Little Girl: Abracadabra!

(Alexander slowly took off the cloth and, the rabbit appeared again. The little girl's reaction was shocked.)

LOOK! The rabbit's back in the cage!

Alexander: You did it! Well done my friend! Here's a little souvenir for you. You may now proceed back to your seat. (Little girl walked back to her seat.)

www.google.com

http://browse.deviantart.com/?qh=&section=&q=shimeji

Lineage

My character Alexander is a magician while the character that I found on Google does not do magic. Alexander likes to wear a black and white outfit most of the time because it makes him look smart and cool. He gets stressed when his magic trick does not work. When he is really tired from practicing hard, he tends to sit on the floor and sleep. Alexander is not a guy who is violent. In comparison to the character from Google, the guy is not a magician. He likes to wear a red coat and brown pants because he wants to be simple but cool looking. Most of the time, he does not like to wear his coat because he thinks he is cool looking when he shows off his body. He gets very excited whenever he sees food. He tends to be a little bit violent if someone tries to make fun of him.

IN3D Final Project

Scenario 4
Storyline

A robot named T-Rex was picking up boxes continuously, one after another. After finish picking 2 boxes and placed them at the side, there is still one remaining box which did not move forward. T-Rex waited for the box to move but failed. Suddenly, a big red box appeared. It managed to push the box forward to allow T-Rex to continue picking up the box. T-Rex then felt relieved such that the remaining box was stuck onto him. He tried to shake the box off till it landed on the ground. He was lucky that there was a big red box that could help him move the remaining boxes forward, otherwise, he would have a hard time.

Sketches

Bends down and up while picking up and stacking the boxes.

 Stops when the remaining box did not move forward.

T-Rex felt relieved when a big red box appeared to push the remaining boxes forward.

Success of Final Model/Animation & Errors made

I faced many problems doing the animation of the arm constraints. My boxes could not be stacked before probably because of the constraints. I had to keep on redoing my constraints. Therefore I decided to place the boxes at the side of the mechanic arm instead of stacking them up. At first, I intend to do 4 small boxes for my animation, but I ended up doing 3 boxes only because of the problems that I faced with the constraining part. At the end of my animation, I made the mechanic arm robot, T-Rex, felt relieved by lifting up the final box and then place it at the side. The final box was supposed to be placed onto the ground like the rest but I made the box flew off the mechanic arm by changing the blend parent.

IN3D Week 13 Lab

1) Apart from their different sizes, it is obvious from Luxo Jr. that the big lamp is “older” and that the small lamp is “younger”.

How is this communicated by the animation? Give at least THREE examples.

We could tell that the big lamp is older and the small lamp is younger because of:

 a) Emotions

The big lamp was feeling depressed at first as I could see from the video that its head was bending down low. When the ball rolled towards the big lamp, it was trying to figure out who does the ball belongs to. It tried to return the ball but somehow the ball just kept on rolling towards it. When the big ball was rolling over, the big lamp was shocked. Instead, it just stood at one position, watching the small lamp running after the big ball. As for the small lamp, I could tell that it was feeling very excited and lively.

 b) Movement

The small lamp is obviously younger because it is moving around quickly or jumping around the room whereas the big lamp does not move actively when the ball is being passed to it.

 c) Timing

As humans age, our movements tend to be a little bit slower compared to teens and children. This is because  the older we get, our body cannot function as actively as the young ones. If we compare the big lamp and the small lamp, the big lamp is older since it is not quite active when it comes to wild games. Whereas the small lamp could still run quickly chasing after the ball.

2) Give an example from Luxo Jr of how timing is used for comic effect. Explain how the timing decisions contribute to the humour.

    An example of timing used for comical effect is, when the big ball rolled towards the big lamp. The big lamp felt sorry for the small lamp at first because the small ball was being flattened. But after the big ball appeared, the big lamp was shocked to see the small lamp chasing after the big ball.

   A character may be sad at first, thus the timing of movement is slow. Suddenly, when the character became happy, the timing for the reaction should be fast, making the character feel excited and happy. This timing decisions contribute to the humour when there is a sudden change in a character's emotions or behaviour.

3) When you create a joint chain, these form a hierarchy, with the first joint at the top and the last joint at the bottom. Explain why this is necessary for the joints to work properly.

    The joints must be able to work properly because the joints are like the movements and reactions of a character. If a character should be feeling depressed, their posture should be bend down low. It is necessary to create a joint chain so that we know which part of the body we should animate if we need the character to behave according to what we want the story to be.

IN3D Wk 12

1)  Do you need to be able to draw well to create good 2D animation? Explain your view.

   We do not need to be able to draw well to create a good 2D animation. 2D is quite simple to draw because it does not require much details of an object. It is just drawing the surface of an object.

2) Do you need to be able to draw well to create good 3D animation? Explain your view.

   We do not need to be able to draw well to create good 3D animation but we need to be able to visualize the dimension of depth, width and height of the object or character. When we know how to see the object from a perspective view, we can see the detailed parts such as how tall or short is the object, how thin or thick is the object, etc. From there, we can draw out the proportionate shape of it.

3) What do you think would separate a piece of poor animation from a piece of good animation? In other words, how would you go about deciding if a piece of animation is good or bad?

    I think one of the things that separates a poor animation from a good animation would be the lacking of principles of animation. An example for a poor animation would be like a character walking aimlessly without any expressions, and no different types of actions to impress the audience. An example of a good animation is a character exaggerating their actions at a specific time. For instance, the character receives a huge present from someone. When he/she sees the present, they expressions would be excited, eyes and mouth opened wide, etc. These little details will affect the audience as it tells them how to react.

4) In 2D animation, you need to be very aware of timing at a frame by frame level, using timing charts and other techniques - but for 3D animation, this is handled using the graph editor, which is more concerned with manipulating rates of change over time.

Does this affect how you approach your animation work? Explain.

It does not affect how I approach my animation work. Both 2D and 3D animation require us to take note of the timing. It does not matter which method is better to use. For 2D, we use techniques like key frames to take note of the timing for animation. For 3D, we use the graph editor to take note of the timing by adjusting the gradient or points of the graph.

5) Give a brief critique of Maya as an animation tool. Don't just say Maya makes animation difficult, or easy, or that you need to learn a lot of stuff to use Maya - explain what Maya does well and not so well in terms of creating animation.

    Overall, I find that Maya can do animation similarly to Flash. We can use Maya to create effects of an object, control the animation timing, 3D textures and shadings, etc. We can also use polygons to create a character and position them at the right place by using the 4 different panels.

IN3D Wk 11 Elearning

Squash and Stretch Animation

Why is squash and stretch so useful in animation?

It is useful in animation because this is to give the drawn objects a sense of weight and flexibility. It also creates a comical effect to the character.

Think of a situation in which extreme squash and stretch could be applied to a character - try to be original.

An example is a sponge. A sponge is being squashed when a person use force to squeeze it. It also can be stretched when the person tries to make it longer.

Think of an animation example where squash and stretch would NOT be appropriate.

Squash and stretch could not be applied to real life humans and animals. Our bodies are not flexible enough to add the effect. Unlike animation, we can use a software like flash and Maya to change the flexibility of the character.

If squash and stretch doesn't really happen so obviously in real life, why do you think is it so effective in animation?
 (Look at the title of Disney animator Ollie Johnston's famous book about animation - do an Amazon search ... there's a clue in the title!)

One of the famous book about animation by Ollie Johnston is The Illusion of Life. It was also written by Frank Thomas. Inside the book, they had included the 12 basic principles of animation. Squash and stretch is the most important principle. It gives the drawn objects a sense of weight and flexibility. This can be applied to objects or even human faces. A figure can have a comical effect if it is squashed or stretched to an exaggerated degree. The purpose of using squash and stretch is related to the laws of physics - based on observations of physical behaviour. Given from the book title "Illusion" means visual stimuli, which represents what is perceived in a way different from the way it is in reality. Therefore, when "squash and stretch" is applied in animation, the character turns out to be even funnier whereas in real life, we can't possibly squash and stretch a person because we are not objects.

IN3D Week 10 Lab 1

Principles of Animation


Staging

There are 2 people standing at a distance away. This is to tell the audience clearly that they are throwing the wallet to each other.

Anticipation

As we can see from the video, that the girl on the left is anticipating to throw the wallet to the opposite party. This is to show the preparation of an action that will be done.

The girl in the video above shows that she is getting ready to jump.

Exaggeration

The person is trying to run in a normal way, but at the same time she is trying to exaggerate by expressing her emotions while she is running. 

Timing

This is a slow motion run.  Speed affects the timing. It also means that the person can change his/her actions when they are doing a specific task.

Straight Ahead Action and Pose to Pose

This action is fast moving. The action is being planned out and it starts from the beginning to the end.

Ball Animation

What is ease-in-ease-out in reference to animation?

Ease-in-ease-out is also known as slow in and slow out. Animation looks more realistic if it has more frames near the beginning and the end of a movement, and fewer in the middle. This principle is being used for characters moving between 2 extreme poses, such as sitting down and standing up. It is also used for in-animation moving objects such as bouncing ball.

What does frames per second mean?

It means the number of image frames being shown within one second. This is used for the measurement of a video clip.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGT_5itAv0E&NR=1

This is an example of ease-in-ease-out.

IN3D Project 1 - Part 1

Story

The story is about a drum pad which happened to roll down the tracks while the train is still on the move. A train travels from station to station. While the train was happily moving along, suddenly, the train was vibrating vigorously. The train could not stop on time although it was moving as fast as it could. Unfortunately, there were blocks blocking the way and the train crashed into the blocks and was hit by the drum pad.


Shape of Drum Pad

Amount and Type of Surface Details: 
- The center of the drum pad where we used to hit on, is a little bit rough.
- As for the rim surrounding the drum pad, its texture is smooth.
- There are also bumps at the bottom of the drum pad.

Number and Type of Primitive Parts:
- The drum pad is mostly made up of cylindrical shapes.
- At the bottom of it, there are rectangles and a hexagon.

Technical Aspects to be used:
- Extrusion: For the rim and the bottom part of the drum pad.
- Beveling: For the whole drum pad.
- Booleans > Difference: To create the hole for the ring and the screws.

Wire frame Sketches

Top View

Bottom View

Design of Original Drum Pad

Top View

Bottom View

Side View

Research - A Snare Drum which is similar to the Drum Pad

Side View

http://www.long-mcquade.com/products/2247/Drums/Acoustic/Pearl/Chad_Smith_Signature_Snare.htm

Bottom View

http://www.massmusic.net/category/Pearl-Philharmonic-Snare-Drums-2346

This is a snare drum which is similar to my final object in a certain way. It is cylindrical in shape just like the drum pad. The snare drum has screws that are extended at the side around the rim, while the drum pad also has screws surrounding the rim. One thing that is different about the drum pad and the snare drum is their parts at the bottom. The drum pad has 8 extruded lines, an extruded ring, a rubber surrounding it, and a hexagon-shaped screw, while the snare drum has a smooth surface with a metal chain in the middle.

Self-Critique - Final Model

Top View


Maya

Original

Side View

Bottom View


Maya

Original

Success of my Final Model:

Extrusion Method - My first conception was doing the extruded part for the bottom part of the drum pad and the rim at the top of the drum pad. I used to think that the extrusion method was needed. However, I did not use that extrusion method because I did not know how to select the vertices since the drum pad was a cylindrical shape. Therefore, I managed to use the rectangle polygon to make the extruded lines.

Beveling Method - I did bevel most of the parts of the drum pad such as the rim, the screws, and extruded lines at the bottom.

Booleans > Difference Method -  For the screws surrounding the rim and the hexagon screw, I used booleans > difference to create empty space in the middle of the polygon shape.

Errors Made:

With reference made from the original picture of the drum pad, as we can see there are a total of 8 screws from the top view, and there are 8 extruded lines at the bottom. However, in my final model, there are only 7 screws at the top of the drum pad, and 7 extruded lines at the bottom.

Another error is the smooth part of the drum pad which is those parts that are made of cylindrical polygons like the rubber at the bottom, the ring and the surface of the drum pad. They are meant to be smooth but somehow I do not know why it cannot be smoothen out when I select the edges. They just seem to be out of shape. I can still see the cylindrical polygons are not as smooth as the original.

Lastly, I was supposed to use the extrusion method for the extruded lines (at the bottom) and the rim (at the top) of the drum pad. I do not know how to extrude them because it was a cylindrical shape. When I select the faces that I want to extrude, the whole part of it will extrude instead of just extruding a single line. Therefore, I decided to use the polygon to create the extruded parts.

Week 4 E-learning

- Does multi-tasking give you a real or false sense of having accomplished something?

From my point of view, multi-tasking may or may not work for me to accomplish something. 

Advantage:

Whenever I have homework to do, I usually do what I can first. Then I will sign in to MSN to see if my friends are online so that I could ask them about anything if I'm having problems with any work. Usually, I will put my status as"busy", and then continue with my homework so that people know that I'm busy doing something and that I may not reply their online messages. This allows me to do my work without distractions.

Disadvantage:

If I have a project to do, or if there are lots of homework to be done, I cannot sign in to MSN because I cannot focus on what I am doing. It will take me a longer time to accomplish my work when most of the time I have been chatting online with my friends.

- Is learning 3D and design different from learning programming, or is all learning the same? Why?

Learning 3D and design compared with learning programming, I feel that they are not related. 3D and design is about designing objects by looking at them from a perspective point of view. It requires creativity and understanding of the objects' property - like how they should look like. For programming, it means that you are using technologies or software applications to make something work. It is often accomplished by using hard-coding. All learning may or may not be the same, depends on how individual apply the method used for their own learning.

                                                                                                                           

Thinking Outside the Traditional 3D Mindset

Extracts from “Thinking Outside the Traditional 3D Mindset“ by Pete Bandstra.

http://au.autodesk.com/?nd=class&session_id=7160

The access to education resources in today’s web driven world continues to grow with each passing day.

Today’s students are connected to each other through laptops and phones, social networks and other technologies to keep them up to date on what is believed to be important to their lives.

While in lecture, using a laptop to take notes, they will IM with someone in the room or across the country, watch a video, and play a game or check their facebook stats. By taking a short, survey of a class the students learned a great deal about the time they waste with non-productive events.

Although the debate continues on the topic of multitasking and if the distractions have any true benefit for students, research studies continue to prove that; listening to an iPod, text messaging, watching videos and doing homework at the same time does not work and the only benefit is a heightened sense of distraction.

Learning is actually a very complex operation for an individual.

- The article states that “Learning is actually a very complex operation for an individual”. Do you agree with this? Do you feel that you approach your learning in the best way – if yes, how, and if no, how can you change your work style?

Yes, I agree with the statement above. Teenagers nowadays tend to on their computers or laptops often because they feel that they can do their work better. Students like me have a couple of modules or subjects to take. Most of the subjects have their own difficulties in some way. If I do not understand what I am learning, I will not know how to start my homework or how I should study this subject. When someone asks me a question regarding any subjects, I do not know how to give them an answer. Sometimes, there is a need for us to go online to search for resources for our own learning.

I feel that I do not really approach my learning in the best way. I only study when exams are near. I should try to get used to the habit of revising whenever I have the free time rather than doing things at the last minute. Also, I could try to do some practice in order for me to experience what the problem is like.

                                                                                                                                  

The Chronicle of Higher Education

http://chronicle.com/article/Scholars-Turn-Their-Attention/63746/

The students for today’s industry have to have talent and the personality to fit in with the team. As a professional artist, communication is important and the ability to communicate well with other team members is an ongoing struggle. It is well noted that a business's success rides completely on communication and this area is no different. The ability to effectively write an email, give and take constructive criticism, articulate a solution to a problem, and in some situations talk with a client are foundational skills necessary for success.

- What are your thoughts about the last paragraph in the extract?

I feel that students do not necessarily have to have the talent and the personality to fit in with the team. As long as we do our work properly with much effort, people will respect us as what we are. We do not need to bother about what others might think of us. 

- Should your lecturers also focus on your work attitude, or just leave you to sink or swim on your own? Why?

Lecturers should focus on our work attitude without letting us to sink on our own. If they are not there to check on us, we probably would not do any work that is assigned to us. As for me, I sometimes prefer to get help from the lecturers rather than being stuck on a problem. This is because the lecturers know better than us as to what we are suppose to do.

IN3D Week 3 Lab 2

Track Modeling

Extruded Track

Ends of the track with beveling

Using Animation to bend/curve the track


Washboard Modeling

Creating the glass and extrude the faces for the ribs.

Beveling of the edges of the ribs.

Creating the top header, the top panel, and the stringers.

Creating the legs for the sides of the washboard.

Reflection

I found it quite fun to do both the track and the washboard. They were quite simple compared to the previous lab exercises. I managed to follow the instructions accordingly.

IN3D Week 3 Lab 1 Part 2

Bucket

With flaps at the sides

With holes for the screw

With screws to connect the handle

Final bucket with handle

Reflection

Although it was quite interesting to do this, I still find it tough. I was having problems with the handle part. I couldn't use the soft modification method because it didn't seem to work for me. And at the beginning, I couldn't get the shape of the bucket probably because I missed out a step or I did not quite understand the instructions. So I decided to ask my friend for help.

Wine Glass

Reflection

I know that we were supposed to design a vase, but some how mine became a wine glass. I don't know why it is like that. Any way, I still love the outcome of my wine glass. :D I changed the transparency settings to make it look a little bit more transparent so that it looks like a glass.