Self-Critique

3. Self-Critique

Final Storyline:

At the beginning of the animation, Henry, the robot moves slowly and sighing to show that he is bored of his job. He carries the first two green box with no energy to show that he does not have any passion in his job anymore. After carrying the second box, he turned to continue carrying the third one. He was shocked to see that it was not the same colour as the rest but in red. He find it weird and look closely to make sure that nothing is wrong and to see why was asking himself about the colour.

He then took the box and placed it on the other side so that it wont get mixed up with the rest of the green boxes. When he was about it to put it down, the red box got stuck on him. He tried shaking and spinning to get rid of the box but it was not working so in the end he gave the box a big 'BANG' on the platform and the red box finally let go of Henry. He got shocked and hide himself behind the two green boxes.

Discuss the success of your animation.

I made some changes in my animation. This is because there are some animation that I want to do in my initial animation but I have not learn, like changing the color of one of the boxes from green to red and so I place it in red from the beginning. In my initial storyboard, the box comes alive but in my animation, Henry, the robot and the red box does interact but the red box is not the main character. Henry is the main character that made all the different interaction with the red box. I did not get what I wanted to do in my animation so most of the parts I have to change and do some more movement on to the robot so that it does not look plain boring like a normal animation.

Overall, I'm proud of my hard work. I may need more details like making Henry looks more realistic like the research that I've done. Not only that, I made an effort to add sound effects so that audience are able to feel the situation that my animation is in. Like for example, the first part of the video, the video was slow and boring. After putting in some sound effects, it is clearer that I was trying to portray a situation whereby the robot was feeling bored and sad.

I make sure that the animation went well and tried avoiding any obvious mistakes. I tried making the animation a smooth and exciting one. The animation is one minute plus is because the first few scenes requires lots of key frame.

I enjoy doing 3D even though sometimes I feel like throwing my laptop away when I didn't get what I want but 3D is still the best ! And I hope you will enjoy the video like how I enjoy doing it. Thank you !

Also discuss how you applied the principles of animation, with examples.

Anticipation - Henry, the robot was very bored and the reaction when he saw the red box. He was shocked to see the box that he moves backwards.

Exaggerating - Henry tried spinning to get rid of the red box. The spinning accelerate and decelerate again. Accelerate to show how the annoyed he was and wanted to get rid of the red box so badly. Decelerate to show that he has given up and that strategy didn't work.

Staging - Its when the camera zoom in and focus on Henry and the red box when he got shocked and confused when he saw a red box there. The camera zoom in to focus on the important part when he looked closely on the red box.

Slow in and Slow out - This is when Henry spins his body trying to get rid of the red box. He spin slow at first and eventually gets faster but when he got tired, he slows down and stop.

Arcs - When Henry wants to bring the red box to another side of the platform. He crossed over the green boxes.

Research Done

With the sample video provided, I decided to research more about the movement of the "lamp" to show different expressions and reactions. And from there I observed on how the different movements are done.

Week 15 Lab 2

Thursday Lab

Animate stacking of 2 or 3 boxes (as 1 column or row) from a moving queue

1. Remove all parent constrains from 1 box
2. duplicate the box
3. parent constrain the boxes again

Project 2 Scenes

Scene 1 : Henry was bored


Henry stacks 2 out of the 5 boxes with his lazy gestures.
1.1 Bending down

1.2 Slowly looking to the right and left

1.3 Sigh(move little up and bend down again) and shake his head

1.4 Picks up the first box and carry it with draggy movement

1.5 To show more impact, the first box was slightly squashed

1.6 Henry bang the 2nd box hard on top of the 1st box and squashed it.


Scene 2: Henry throwing tantrum with his job


2.1 Picks up the third box

2.2 To show that he was fatigued of his daily routine, Henry threw the 3rd box(by turning his head only, body remains) to the right together with the other 2 boxes

2.3 Messed up the other 2 boxes that he previously stacked

2.4 3rd box slowly changes its color from GREEN to different shades of RED and finally to the hot striking red to show that it is furious being treated like that.
2.4 Shakes vigorously from right to left as the color changes.


Scene 3: 3rd box decided to play a trick on Henry


3.1 While Henry was turning away (to his right), 3rd box bounces back to its original position

3.2 First jump, too low
3.2 Second jump, medium high
3.2 The 3rd jump was a successful one
3.2 Slide in slightly more to get to the correct position and stayed still

3.3 Henry picked up the box without realizing that it was the 3rd box. As usual, he tried to throw the box again (Repeat scene 2)

3.4 This time round the 3rd box was stuck on the Henry head.

3.5 Henry started shaking his head slowly(to the right and left) to remove the box
3.5 It doesn't worked and so he shakes faster and faster

3.6 He was pissed and turned his body around for several times
3.6 He stopped drastically and stretch its neck and back in


Scene 4: Henry gave up


4.1 Henry gave up trying and bend his neck all the down to rest and eventually fell asleep

4.2 3rd box detach itself from Henry and bounce up and down few times to show how satisfied it was

4.3 3rd box went back to its original place

The end ! :)

Project 2 (Chosen Scenario)

My chosen scenario: Scenario 5

There is a long line of GREEN boxes, as if on a conveyor belt. (You don’t have to model the conveyor belt – just pretend it’s there.) The robot lifts the box at the head of the queue and stacks it in a pile at its side.Once the robot has finished stacking a box, the rest of the boxes move forward one place, and the process is repeated.The robot lifts a box, turns to place it on the stack – but the box is stuck! The robot can’t drop the box! Animate the reaction of the robot, and how it deals with this sudden turn of events.

1. Character

Give a name to your robot.

Imagine that while it is doing its mechanical work, the robot is actually thinking to itself. Write a brief paragraph of what the robot might be thinking – write the thoughts from the robot’s point of view, ie. imagine it is speaking the thoughts out loud, if it could.

The thoughts must be relevant to the scenario that you choose.

Note: these should be the robot’s thoughts before the inciting incident – not while it is reacting to the inciting incident.

Robot's name : Henry

As you all know, humans call me 'machine' but hey, I have a name ok ! You can call me Henry, sounds better than that disgusting 'machine' as my name. I named it after my master's hairy little pet, a dog? What is a dog ? Well, the hairy little thing is cute and its name is quite cool. HENRY... And so, that how the 'Henry' name came about.

And so, this is my life. Trying to make my master's work easier. What a 'wonderful' life I'm having. Stacking boxes all day long. How I wish I have a friend to talk to. Don't ask me to talk to that Henry dog,he doesn't even understand my language. Useless human slave ! Wait, I'm a slave too. Gosh !

I need a friend ! A friend who can joke and play with me. Who wants to be my friend ? No one, I guess. I'm just a machine that was invented to make human's life much more easier. That's unfair for me. I have feelings too even though I'm made out of metals and have no heart. Maybe the boxes can be my friends but they are just boxes. They can do nothing just waiting for me to move them here and there. Such a waste of my time! I hope you can hear me out boxes, I'm lonely now. Boxes ?? Sigh..

Rendering Animation

Create a rendering camera
- Panel > Perspective > Camera 1 (Camera can be resize)
- View >Camera Setting > Film Gate

Get back to Perspective
- Create lights
Place lights behind camera and reduce intensity
1. Directional Light (sunlight)
2. Point Light (Cast Shadow)

Render Setting (Action icon with 2 dots)
For reflection,
Maya Software > Raytracing Quality > Check Raytracing

Week 14 Lab 1

This the animation of the crane that I did in class.

Resource: http://download.autodesk.com/us/maya/2011help/index.html?url=./files/Inverse_kinematics.htm,topicNumber=d0e17823

Week 13 Lab 2

Rigging/Skeleton Frame - Always rig in any or thographic view (NEVER use perspective)
First joint clicked - Parent joint
Second onwards - Child Joint


Animation > Skeleton tab.
Skeleton > Join tool(option) >Reset

How to move joints?
Use rotation tool on each joint.

Forward Kinematics(FK) - take parent joint, all child joints will follow.

PARENTING
1. Select child object
2. Shift select parent object
3. Press P to parent

UNPARENT
1. Select Child
2. Edit > Unparent

Window > Hypregraph Hierarchy

Skeleton > IK Handle(option)

Week 13 Lab 1

Polygon
Create > Create NURBS Primitive > sphere (option) > End sweep angel 180 degree
Go to Attribute Editor > Render Stats > Uncheck Double Side, Check Opposite
Add image: Assign Material > Lambert > Sky image/Flooring/Ball

Flooring: Window > Rendering > Hypershade
Change Flooring to make it repeat(Repeat UV)

Add Lights:
*Note: Must be inside the sphere*
1) Directional Light, press T to target to the ball
2) Point Light

keyboard shortcut key T > Target/Shinning tool.

View > Camera Setting > Change to Film Gate
Maya software Render Setting (Common tab)

File Output:
File Name Prefix: *your choice*
Image format:MOV/AVI

Start frame and end frame.. (1 to 100 fps)
For beginning, only render till 10 frame to see.

Renderable Camera
Camera: Perspective Camera

Image size
640 X480 (HD TV)

Maya Software Tab
Anti-aliasing Quality
Quality: Intermediate

OK !
Save project in a file
Render > Batch Render

Save MB file to MA file

Week 11 Lab 1

Week 10 Lab 2

I could not upload the rest of the videos that I did in my laptop.

- Heavy Bowling Ball
-Light Beach Ball

Week 11 Lab 1

2D animation - PENCIL

1. Timing (realism) - how long did object takes to move ? Ask important questions to yourself to plan timing.
2. Bring exaggeration
   
3. Keyframe(KF) - frame per second(fps)
4. Start -----Stop (minimum of 2 key frame)
5. in-between key frames - tweening
   
6. Plan Your Animation

Frame - Single image(cel)
cel - drawing of an image used for animation

TV/Movie - 24 fps (24 images per second - frame rate/playback rate)
HDTV - 60 fps (60 images per second)

EXERCISE 1


i) Animation chart for chosen ball (including squash and stretch)




Bouncing Ball

Bouncing and Glowing Ball

This is a basic animation that was thought in class. I used a software called "PENCIL" and just play around with the keyframes. I need to make sure that the ball bounce correctly and not out of position. After the first try, I tried playing with the colours of the ball. Make it glow slowly.


Heavy Bowling Ball

Before i can start planning how the heavy ball is going to drop and the impact, I have to visualize everything. I planned the movement and try applying it. i move bit by bit, as heavier ball would move slower than the lighter ball. The impact of of the ball falling is slower and it would not bounce that high as the first bounce again.


Throwing up ball

This task is a little tedious to do as I can't do duplicates, or maybe I didn't really explore so I have to do it one by one. Instead of following the video that I chose, I used my hands so that it would be easier to visualize how the movements of the hands should be. I think I did fine for this exercise.



EXERCISE 2

Ease-in-ease-out :

The Custom Ease In/Ease Out dialog box displays a graph representing the degree of motion over time. The horizontal axis represents frames, and the vertical axis represents percentage of change. The first keyframe is represented as 0%, and the last keyframe is represented as 100%.

The slope of the graph’s curve represents the rate of change of the object. When the curve is horizontal (no slope), the velocity is zero; when the curve is vertical, an instantaneous rate of change occurs.

Definition of frame-per-second:

The number of times an imaging device produces unique consecutive images (frames) in one second.


Animation chart of an object bouncing with linear speed with ease-in and ease-out.

Week 10 Lab 2 Videos

1. Squash and stretch
2. Anticipation
3. Staging
4. Straight Ahead Action and Pose to Pose
5. Follow Through and Overlapping Action
6. Slow In and Slow Out
7. Arcs
8. Secondary Action
9. Timing
10. Exaggeration
11. Solid Drawing (same or different as Weight)
12. Appeal

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Principle of Animation used: Stretch and Squash
Reason: She is stretching when she is jumping upwards with her hands pointing to the sky and back down on her knees like being squash.

Principle of Animation used: Slowing in and out
Reason: The guy started running fast but when he gets nearer, he slows down.

Principle of Animation used: Appeal
Reason: When you watch the video, you will find it funny because of the 'chicken dance' song and dance and our facial expressions

Principle of Animation used: Arcs
Reason: When passing the object, there is an circular shape form because it is being throw up high and back down to another person.

Principle of Animation used: Anticipation
Reason: He awaits for the book to drop onto his hands before being able to throw it up again.

Principle of Animation used: Staging
Reason: The first part of the video shows a close view of girl's facial expression that is 'anger' and an expected movement that will be made next.

Principle of Animation used: Exaggeration
Reason: Making different kinds of facial expressions

Principle of Animation used: Stretch and Squash
Reason: They are playing with only faces. Stretching by opening mouth and tongues out and squashing by closing mouth and and muscles of faces being squashed.

Week 11 Lab 1

2D animation - PENCIL

1. Timing (realism) - how long did object takes to move ? Ask important questions to yourself to plan timing.
2. Bring exaggeration
   
3. Keyframe(KF) - frame per second(fps)
4. Start -----Stop (minimum of 2 key frame)
5. in-between key frames - tweening
   
6. Plan Your Animation

Frame - Single image(cel)
cel - drawing of an image used for animation

TV/Movie - 24 fps (24 images per second - frame rate/playback rate)
HDTV - 60 fps (60 images per second)

Self-Critique

Rating:
For the effort made in developing the toy below, I think my model looks 65% alike.

Reason:
This is because I took so much effort to make it look similar as the image on the right side.

Critics:
I was not really satisfied with the work done as it looks stiff and some of the edges are not properly organize especially on the legs area. I think that the legs makes the shape of the body of Mickey looks a little distorted. I tried my best to use other tools to make it look better than it was before by merging vertices. As for the ears, I was not able to make it bend so that it would not look so stiff and be more flexible but I used 'select faces' to make move the middle part of the ears inwards to make it look more realistic and similar to the image. The body of Mickey wasn't that much of a problem as I managed to make it look smooth. In this project, the two main important tool I used was 'Extrude' and 'Merge'. It really helped me a lot especially the Merge Tool. Merge Tool helped me to make the edges or any other parts of the toy looked smoother by merging vertices.

Research Done :
Initially I wanted to only make half (right side) of Mickey because the another half (left side) was in a mess, so I did a research on how to mirror object. But I could not mirror half of the toy because the inner part of Mickey was unorganized and I could not get a perfect half so I decided to complete both sides.

Mirror: http://www.wonderhowto.com/how-to-mirror-geometry-maya-new-school-way-261210/

After the whole object was done, it was quite smooth before rendering but when I clicked on the render images, the hard edges was everywhere. I asked classmates if they know how to smooth the edges other than using bevel but no one knows so did a research on YouTube and found this. It helps!

Smooth edges: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z66n40d_v1s

p.s. I can learn better with videos than reading.

Lightings:

Ambient Light(Blue/Pink)


Area Light(Light Green)


Directional Light(White/Yellow)

Point Light(Light Pink/White)

Mickey Progression

Final Outcome :)

Firstly, I need to have 2 cube polygon. The smaller one is for Mickey's head and the bigger one is for the body and the legs. I set both subdivision for the width, height and depth as 4 so the when I want to combine the head to the body, I have same amount of lines.

I started with the head first. I created a long nose for my Mickey by extruding a few faces. I changed the mode to Face and click 2 rows from the bottom of the cube While extruding, I keep moving it upwards because Mickey's nose is facing up.

Next, I created the ears. I also used extruding method to developed the ears.

I beveled the edges of the head so that it looked more rounded than squarish. I played around with the beveling tool to get the right shape for Mickey's head.

One the second cube polygon that is Mickey's body, I made 4 holes in Mickey's body. This is to merge the head to the body.


I created 2 hands for Mickey by using extruding method.


Next was the legs. The legs was the most troublesome part of the body compared to the rest. It was not easy to develop it. I also used extruding method for this.

Created a small neck for Mickey.



And when everything is done, I merge the head to the body and end edited everything together.

I created the eyes and mouth after I get right shape for the whole head.


And this is the outcome before coloring. In the process of making the Mickey's shape smoother, I played around with Merge Tool. Merge Tool really helps me to get the shape of the toy nice and neat. And lesser edgy edges. I used the tool more for the back of the head because mine was a little squarish after beveling.



Put some colors for Mickey and lastly I made the whole toy smooth by using the Mesh > Smooth.