Knee contollers and contrain pole vectors

Timelapse of slow moving clouds going on in one corner of the room and in the other, I am creating Knee controllers...

Create a text 'K' and snap to knee joint, then move outward on the Z axis

Delete History

Freeze Transformations

In outliner, select R_KNEE control first then select R_ankle_IK > Constrain>Pole Vector

The Photographer's Ephemeris

A bit more research on preparation for Timelapse...I have a Panasonic 4K professional camera, plus the Atomos Ninja Assasin...
Going to check out this link, to get some good information on sun and moon positions in various locations,,,

Love this Bach piano too

     
The Photographer's Ephemeris Desktop Web App - Demo from Crookneck Apps on Vimeo.

IBL

IBL lighting...class with Sang yesterday...

Showing the first image of the class; a sphere with an .edr file applied in Hypershade...
Saved the other images onto my U drive - rather than my pen drive. Doh!

Reflective Practice; Boredom Research 'After Glow'

http://www.silentsignal.org/afterglow/

A landscape locked in perpetual twilight becomes illuminated by glowing trails evocative of mosquito flight paths. These spiralling forms represent packets of blood infected with Plasmodium knowlesi a malaria parasite recently found to jump the species barrier from monkey to human.

I was inspired at how the collaboration between the arts and science can bring about a common platform and medium, where all can be inclusive; that being scientific data, mathematics, patterns, light, shadow, dark, animation, visual aesthetics and drama.

I particularly liked the photographic still shown below, from the animated film 'After Glow'; I watched it in the reception area of the Life Sciences Gallery, Dundee, University.

I had no information or knowledge regarding the subject matter of the film, and imagined that the swirling light patterns were DNA Helix spirals, and the flare points (bright spot with horizontal flash lines below) was a depection of cell synthesis mutation or growth...

My understanding from the lecture, that these spiralling forms represent Mosquito flight paths, and the flash points are when the opportunity of infection is present...

As part of the lecture, Vicky Isley and Paul Smith elaborated on their fascination with life cycles, patterns, growth, death, recession and expansion...
This particular image below ' Dark Storm Phials' reminded me of one of the shots that I've included in the opening sequence of Thaw....a stagnant and emotionally frozen woman, superimposed over a field of dying poppies...

Maya Rigging - using the Mirror Skeleton option box

Rigging; using the Mirror Skeleton option box

Rigging the ice man

The beginning of rigging the ice man...

I love how the rigging looks in the Outliner....the structure and order of it are very relaxing!

Maya Quad Draw - and Relax (tool)

Ha! Maya's Relax tool, in Quad Draw mode.....made my quads all neat and tidy...and relax...ahhhh

Ice Man below, ready to be duplicated, merged and become transparent!

Nuke X camera tracking

Camera tracking in Nuke X composting sofware...

Converting UHD 4K video to HD

Removing lens distortion, line analysis and drawing mode...drawing straight lines over any straight lines in the footage..

Analyse lines

Save

Input Read command and Camera Tracker...

Number of features 600

Feature separation 6

Select frame range eg. frames 50 - 300

Track

Once tracked, if there are any moving objects, such as people or cars, then remove those trackers manually.

Solve

Error value of below 1 is required.

The green markers are shown top left.

Any markers shown as red are rejected

Orange are to be solved.

The graph top right allows for the slider inputs to change the maximum error value. Tweak repeatedly until the error value is less than 1.

Hover mouse over view panel (top left) of the workspace and press 'TAB' to switch between 2D and 3D views

3D view showing Camera tracker cloud (white blob markers in 3D environment)

To import into Maya, in order to insert 3D objects that are embedded and move seamlessly within the scene, a scale and an origin need to be set; plus a selection of markers showing the ground plane need to be established.

To set origin in 2D viewer

Right click on a single marker on the ground

Select 'ground plane'

Select 'set origin'

To set scale:

Select one marker, SHIFT and click another

Right click

Select scene

Add

Scale distance (set scale dimension to the same as a known distance within the scene. In this case a paving slab of 40mm)

Magenta markers shown below in the 3D view, indicate the camera tracker markers that were selected on the ground plane.

Select markers on the ground

Right click

Ground plane

Set to selected

To test that the camera tracking, lens distortion correction etc are all working well, place a 'card' into the scene.

Select tracker

Create

Card

'TAB' key and Scanline Renderer node to toggle between 3D and 2D views

Card placed and rotated.

Apply texture if necessary with TAB key 'checkerboard'

Send Camera and locator to Maya

Select Scene 1 (shown as red circle in node graph below)

TAB key

Write geo 

Double click 'write_geo' node

File (black folder icon similar to file folders in attributes box in Maya)

Name file 'tracked_camera.fbx

In the options box (5 options, Geometries, Cameras, Lights, Axies, Point Clouds) just select cameras and point clouds.

Execute - select frame range

Open Maya
Set frame rate to 25 fps
Set project etc
File import 'tracked_camera.fbx
Can take a while as it imports a camera every frame, and each frame is key framed

Quad Draw practice

More practice with the Quad Draw tool; and following the tutorial and examples of good geometry around the eyes, nose and mouth....

Retopology practice and quad draw

Practicing today with retopology and the quad draw tool...
The eye shape is coming along, but I need to practice doing good loops around the mouth...

Re-group in more ways than one!

Reflective practice; examining unconscious themes in design development

Whilst eating a cake in the Grad Centre today, I noticed my research poster on the wall....I was struck by the orange guy on the bottom left of the poster...

I had literally done a material finishes test on my ice man model, about 30 mins before in the 3D lab, using the 'orange reflective' finish to see how it would look...

Interesting to see how many creative ideas from my first film concept (a character trapped in a camera negative, escaping to the light) have translated and adapted into Thaw.

The emotional theme is the same; and fascinating to see how many visual references are similar, and that I have unconcsiously carried through...

I think the Research Poster embedded some deep ideas and challenged me to be deliberate in my creative choices

Orange Reflective finish test in Zbrush

Final film, original concept idea...

Experimenting with Material finishes in Zbrush

Experimenting with materials in Zbrush; to give me some inspiration and some ideas for how this model and it's features will register and look in a glossy reflective finish

Dam_Standard and Move Brushes in Zbrush

Playing with the Dam_Standard and Move brushes in Zbrush.

My ice man material will be similar to transparent glass and I've deliberately avoided using lip sync, dialogue or eyeball animation....the net result being that my model has no internal mouth or eye geometry (as this would show up when the model is transparent) 

Zbrush; Death Star & Gluteus Maximus

Using new software (such as Maya and Zbrush) is like playing a highly technical advanced video game (blindfolded), with a controller that makes the Death Star look like a beach ball - and the game is to figure out which buttons make your character jump, crawl, spin and ultimately level up...and once you figure it out, accidently click a button you didn't know existed and jump into a completely new game/world/scene; freeze your software, loose your tools/emblems/wands/gems/coins and watch your Death Star incinerate....

Not today Zbrush!

Ice man creation....

Import Turbosquid model as an .obj file

Use the sculpt tools (clay build up, move, smooth and Dam Standard) to apply the muscular structure....remembering everything that was taught in Elizabeth Hammond's life drawing anatomy classes at Medway College of Art & Design (Kent Institute)....particularly the structure of Gluteus Maximus

The Accountant - critical review

Within seconds of leaving the certification screen, this film is intense.

The opening sequence is brilliant. Set against a tense soundtrack of gun shots and pleading fear, the first shots focus on extreme close ups of feet walking tentitively along a tenement block corridor; switching momentarily to a close up of the gun...

As the audience, we are given no respite from these intense camera views throughout the opening sequence. It's not until nearly the end of the film that we find out who the feet belong to; and why this opening scene is crucial to the narrative; very similar to how the storyline is engineered in Pulp Fiction.

As a storytelling device, this intense visual 'emotional lock-in' repeats throughout the film;  pounding strobe lighting and intense Radiohead music; whispered chanting; rage attacks; frantic equations and violence.

That said, the acting is actually sensitive and subtle, the characters are fairly well observed and, at odd moments, surprisingly humourous.

Although I found the storyline confusing, and I wasn't entirely clear who the main protagonist was at times, this film was gripping and the editing was great.

Re-sculpting a Turbosquid model in Zbrush

First tests in creating the ice figures...

Using a Turbosquid model, and adapted, shaping and sculpting the geometry in Zbrush...

To be continued!

Turbosquid trees, spotlights and an image plane

Hypershade in Maya, to create a quick image plane of winter trees

Lighting tests using an image plane, two spot lights and a couple of Turbosquid obj tree files...