Caroline's 3D Animation Blog

This week I was trying to work out how to do a Parent constraint on the can.

From Nicks lesson I kind of understood but needed a bit of help differentiating the different types of constraints. This tutorial from Sir Wade really helped.

From there it was a case of animating the three “prong” things to grab the can. I then added a Parent Constraint.

When I went to Pairblend, I could click select, so I could see the key frames

From there I could turn the weight on and off to turn off the constraint. It ended up being alot easier than I thought. I added a swinging animation when the arm stopped and that was it!

I am continuing with developing my previs.

Factory Scene

This is a scene that is inside the factory I wanted it to look like

I have been trying to make a abstract part of the factory when a ball is coming down the spiral and turns into a can. I first trying to achieve this by taking the ball and animating it going down the spiral manually.

I got a bit stuck on how to animate the ball on the helix. So it ended up looking like this, not smooth, and difficulty controlling the speed of the ball.

I needed to do a motion path, like I had learnt in Nicks class, with the shark/ whale however, trying to create a CV curve in a helix shape proved very difficult.

However! I found blogs and tutorials explaining how to create a helix shaped NURBS curve.

I created a polygon primitive helix and then selected an edge and converted the edge into a NURBS curve.

Tutorials That Helped me

https://autodesk-maya.wonderhowto.com/how-to/create-helix-shaped-nurbs-curve-maya-0124949/

I then adjusted the points on the curve to make sure it was follow the paths of the helter skelter structure I made.

I then made the CV go into the bowl thing.

I then adjusted it so that the points were going on to the floor.

Now the ball had a precise path to follow all the way from the top to the bottom of the apparatus to the bottom.

This method made the animation so much smoother!!!

I really enjoyed this scene because I feel like I’ve learnt loads about modelling, animating on motion paths, Blend shapes and constraints.

For this body mechanic I wanted one that would subvert the audiences expectation.

Having used to work with the elderly, I was influenced by the way some elderly with poor mobility stand. But as a twist I thought it would be cool if after they stand, they burst into ballet. This was my attempt below

After showing George the sketches and the reference, he gave me advise to change the second and the fifth thumb nail so there was more contract and bend and stretch

I wanted to gather loads references for the previs. I started with the corner shop. I wanted it to look like a typical corner shop in the UK but I wanted like a Mediterranean twist with the colours and cobble stones.

I basically wanted a smash up of several different cultures like in Big Hero Six where it is based Sanfrantokyo.

The look of the corner shop is super important to me as it will be the establishing shot and the ending shot. It will be where the cans first meet. I want it to have a bit of a rough look so that when the love story starts there is a bit of juxtaposition.

From theses images I was able to create several art boards. I gathered many images, these are just some have I was collated, however, I knew that the running themes were,

• colourful
• run down
• Quintessentially British
• tired
• cobble stones
• plaster pealing

Once I gathered all my references I used them to make a basic model in Maya. I will be redoing it for the actual final major project. But I like actual set up I quite like. I would like to replicate the fridge’s position in the shot. I like how it is visible in the window.

I have learnt alot more about modelling as well and feel like I am learning more techniques and becoming more efficient when I do model.

This week I was having a bit of fun with creating details for the project. I worked out that I could use UV mapping to add a label to the can. I didn’t what to use a real brand (/I don’t think I could use a real brand even if I wanted to…) so I took this opportunity to create a fake brand. I used Pinterest as inspiration. I wanted a really colourful brand that looked not only graphic but gave the sense that it was a cheaper brand of fizzy drink.

I wanted a tongue in cheek brand name. I wanted a something that would nod to climate change but had difficultly coming up with a name to fit this. But instead I thought of “Dutty Juice”, dutty being Jamaican patois for dirty. I wanted it to be a nod to it being an extremely sugary “dirty” drink. I wanted it to look appealing yet unappealing.

Photoshop

I first started in Photoshop where I could sketch out my initial ideas and create some colour schemes. I looked at brands like Fanta for inspiration as I liked how the brand used fruit on the packaging. I wanted to make it quite cheeky by adding a peach and for a different flavour which was aubergine.

I started with the peach flavour and liked the idea of having a pink and blue theme to start off with. I created a few artboards so that I could be quite free and experiment.

Illustrator

It had been ages since I had used Illustrator so was very keen to get back into it. I wanted to use illustrator as I had used it before for creating typography and thought it would be idea to get that clean graphic / vector look I wanted to achieve. I used a random Coke label I got from Google images as a way to help me proportion the label.

I started off by just tracing the design I created in Photoshop. In hindsight, I maybe could have just cut the peach and stuck it into the Illustrator design but I wanted it all to be vector. After tracing the peach and droplets, it was just a case of using the colour picker to select the colours I wanted from the original design.

I then moved onto the typography. I found a font from Adobe Fonts that I liked that I thought would go with the theme.

I like the font but thought it wasn’t super clear when I had it on the background I wanted. So I just slightly adjusted some of the letters like the U, Y and A’s. I just had do something called Expand Appearance which turned the letter into adjustable shapes. From there I could use the Shape Builder Tool to cut out the shapes to make them more readable.

From there I could use the colour picker to add the desired colours and added multiple strokes with different colours to give it a more retro feel. I then added a warp so that there was a bend to the words. I added a drop shadow to both the words and the peach and droplets.

For the background I then added a stroke that thinned out towards the centre and duplicated it around the centre. I added a soft light blending mode against the pink background.

The details on the peach were achieved by creating shapes that had gradients and then a Blur effect added on top.

For the nutritional information and the other things found on a can.

I then duplicated the document and just adjusted the colours which was easy, then got some reference images from Google and used the pen tool to draw the Aubergine.

I think I will need to do some tweaking but I was pretty happy with how it was looking so far.

Goals for this week

In class we built a little piston for the arm and I would like to move the thumb into place and create more of a hand shape.

What I learnt

Nick showed us how to use the Arnold Renderer in the Viewport which was really cool.

There are different options in something called the Debug Shading which has a variety of shading, in the example be

To create the piston I used a polygon primitive Cylinder, I learnt that it you hit the Shift key and drag a shape, it will automatically duplicate the object.

I also learnt that you can adjust the scale on specific axis’s by changing the colourful squares.

After creating the piston shape out of Cylinders that were manipulated in shape and size, we then moved onto rigging.

Rigging

Nick showed us how to rig up the piston by first adding a Locator. I learnt that a Locator is just an area in space that we can anchor objects to, to make them move.

I added to Locators to the top and bottom cyclinder and used the Snap tool to make sure they were in the correct place. Then changed the pivot point of the thicker outer case and the thnner inner case to also be the centre of the top and bottom cylinders, again using the Snap Tool.

Constraints

Next it was time to add constraints. To make it work I learnt that the object that is the master controller is the one that must be selected First, then the object that you would like to constrain. I constrained a locator to the piston and then the other to the outer case.

I needed a little bit of extra help because the different types of Constraints were confusing me so I found this video which helped me understand what the difference between a Parent and an Aim Constraint is.

The object, in this case the piston will maintain its position but will point to wherever the Locator is.

By applying Maintain Offset, you can control the position.

Then we applied a Point Constraint. This time of constraint will apply the translate only.

Planning my Pre-vis

In order to do my previs, I started out with a spreadsheet with a rough plan of all my shots in each scene that accompanies / fleshes out my story board.

I started out with the scene that I wrote out for my storyboard and then I used that to think about the different shots within that scene. I included what kind of camera angle or movement id like, the music or sound effects in that particular shot, the lighting or “effects”, for me this just referred to the light colour, and maybe if there was a slight depth of field on the camera.

Because I don’t know what it looks like inside a factory, I have taken a few pictures from online as inspiration for the factory.

I also then made a plan of the object that I would like to model or attempt to model. I have given an estimate to the level of difficult and what software I should use for it. I also have found some links to good tutorials to help me. I really want to attempt the modelling as I think some of it could be pieces for my portfolio.

So far I attempted to model a can, the “main character” of my story. I found a really good tutorial on YouTube on how to attempt this. I also brought my own cans and had them as reference. Below is an image I used as a reference in Maya.

I imported it as an image plane to use in Top and Front orthographic view in Maya

I first started off with a cylinder with all but the top deleted, from there I extruded it outwards to create the outer edge of the can. From there I was able to work into the middle and used other cylinders there were also extruded outwards to create the edge of the hole. I learnt that you can Bridge edges together to fill gaps and “fuse” mesh together. I also learnt if you go into perspective view and realise that the mesh is is not flat, you can select all the vertices and use the scale tool in the Y axis to make the mesh all on one plane.

I found that some of my mesh was looking black, this was due to reversed normals. I learnt that you can click on Mesh Display and hit “Reverse” with displays the normals… normally.

Another really helpful tip I learnt was that it is really important to have tidy mesh. Ideally, we always want four points in our mesh. So at this point I went about merging some of the the vertices together and tiding up the mesh. I find it difficult to see where to merge the mesh together to tidy it, I find it is like a puzzle, but after a while I got the hang of it.

This part was probably the easiest, I just extruded the edge of the tops and went into the front orthographic view to follow the shape of the can. It was just a case of extruding and scaling the edges.

I extruded all the way to the bottom of the can and used the tool Fill Hole and then Poke to create the bottom of the can. I then used the Edge Loop tool to create harder edges to better define the cans shape.

Then it was time to add the rim of the can, this was quite difficult and I didn’t find the blue print too helpful at this point so my actual can I had brought was very helpful as a reference. Again, I used the extrude tool and the Edge Loop tool. I again used the blue prints and a the same tools to create the cap.

By this time I was pretty much done with the tutorial I found and the modelling process for an open can. But I wanted to add a slight bend to the cap thing to make it look like it had been used to open the top. To do this I found it easiest to use the Tab key to select the bottom portion of the cap, then use the Shift + > keys to increase the selection. From there I used Ctrl + Shift + I to Inverse the selection so just the top portion of the cap was selected. Then it was just a case of using the Soft Selection Brush to move and rotate so it looked like the cap was facing upwards.

But then I realised that I also needed to model a closed can. My can again came in handy as a reference.

It wasn’t too hard. I selected the edges, and used the Bridge Tool to remove the hole. I used the extrude tool to make a “seam”.

This is the what the top of both cans look like.

After I modelled the can, I started doing work towards a 3D Story board. I used many of the tools that I used for modelling the cans.

In the first two images I did is the establishing shot of the corner shop. I wanted there to be a focus on the fridge inside the shop so put a material that added an emission, then keyed the emission on and off to look like there was a flicker. I was playing around with lighting colours and a HDRI. I like the warm orange and goes with my colour palette.

Then it transitions to a shot with the fridge. Again there is a emphasis on the fridge.

Then another still shot, a close up, of the two cans in the foreground of the fridge.

Then the next shot, the lighting become pink and I’d like to add a blur or more of a depth of field. I want it to be another close up shot of behind one of the cans facing the other, I am hoping this will personify the cans, to make it look like they are looking at each other. With a change in the lighting, blur/depth of field coupled with romantic music starting to play, I am hoping this is enough to make the audience believe that the Cans are falling in love.

Currently, I am happy with the way it is going but I am realising how much work I have to do.

This week George taught us about some fundamentals of cinematography. I learnt about the different types of camera shots

This image is helping me understand and implement some of these shots into my own scene. George also told us about the rule of thirds and how images look more appealing then the main focus of the picture of image is not in the centre, but following the rule of thirds.

The bottom images is more appealing than the top. The sun is in the centre at the top and the sun is in the bottom third in the bottom image.

Notting Hill Carnival

This is a mood board I made for the Notting Hill carnival short story. I really liked the Afrofuturist look and gathered pictures that represented this. The colour purple has futurist connotations and I liked the idea of the having a yellow in there to be the opposite of the colour wheel.

Can short story

For the Can Short Story, I wanted to included warm colours, lots of blues, green and pink hues that complimented nature. I wanted lots of shots of of grass and nature with litter, to imply that the human impact on earth is critical.

Bird short story

This was my favourite story board to create. I wanted to mimic really colours on birds I found AI generated images from an artist who got that abstract look. I really like the idea of having birds and flowers coming together by having an abstract creature.

I really like all the ideas, however, the one with the most defined story line and the one I can more easily pull off is the Can Short Story. I like the idea of being able to do lots of scenery shots and making the scenes look beautiful yet spoiled by humans. I want to play around with the lighting and the music to really drive the narrative