week 12

The animation is just about done apart from some hopefully minor changes.. This animation is fine for the moment, I am still not satisfied with the animation of the human characters.

The texturing is a very long process. I have tried to create custom textures with uv unwrap and pelt but I can't get it to work well. The bodies and clothes look good but the face doesn't look very good at all. I have found it almost impossible to get the features into the right position so that i can texture them properly. I think part of the problem is that I have to many faces on the model and it is hard to separate them. I am really disappointed as I was hoping that the textures would be one of the strongest parts of my animation. I will continue trying to get it up to a good standard with the little time I have left.

I had a bit of trouble when I tried to render the animation. One of the walls kept rendering black no mater how much i changed the lights around it or the texture itself. It took a while but I found out that it was a lighting problem i solved it by adding a sky light and turning the brightness down.

OVERVIEW OF ANIMATION

The overall animation, I think is very good. I believe that the camera angles and cuts are very good and I am very pleased with the way that they came out. The cuts build up tension in the way that i hoped they would. The textures for the walls and objects are very well done as well, they give the feel of the original clip very well it is very clear that this is the iconic laser scene from goldfinger that is being recreated. The textures of the characters on the other hand are no as good, this is especially apparent as there are close ups of the characters faces. The lighting is very good, giving the dark atmosphere of the film's scene. My favorite bit of the animation is the laser coming towards bond. not only does the lasers animation look good but the laser leaves a trail in the gold as it is cutting through.
 Another good thing about the final animation  is the camera shits. As well as trying to use a variety of different shots I also tried to frame the shots very well. I kept the rule of three in mind and I think the dynamic shots adds a lot to the animation.

Week 11

I finished on the animation of the characters using the bones as discussed before. I do however have mixed feelings about the results. The animation of the characters body are fine it was awkward sometimes but I got used to animating them. The arm movement are good however I did have some trouble rotating the character and the bones. I couldn't seem to rotate te bones all as one and had tonmove each bone individually and gradually. This was okay for the scene but was very frustrating when I wa trying to add bones to bond's character because he was lying on his back. I had to rotate the bones awkwardly to get them onto position to anate them. This was very time consuming. another issue I had was animating the faces and heads of my character as the bone in bonds head would not control all the vector of his head and just kept leaving points behind.

I went online and found a good tutotlrial on creating glass and I followed it. I like the outcome a lot.

http://www.3dvalley.com/tutorials/creating-realistic-glass-material-in-3ds-max 

I also started the textures for te characters I haven't got very far and I plan on using pelt a lot. I used this a few weeks ago and it worked well then

Week 10

I have finished the cameras and I found a useful video online that shows a good way to cut between camera shots. It involves sing one main camera and linking to the others so that it follows their movements.I used it and it worked really well.

http://area.autodesk.com/blogs/louis/switching_cameras_in_an_animation_in_3ds_max

I have started animating the characters and I am having a lot of trouble at first I started by just animating them as I did the last, but that was never going to animate properly so I did some extra research online and found the use of bones and skin to animate human characters. I have given it a little go and it has worked ok. I am having trouble making the bones only work for the desired limb instead they keep moving parts of the body I want to stay still.

I continued to work on the texture for the geometry and the props. I used a segmented texture for the laser after splitting it up Into sections. This made it easy to add all the different parts. It also used a bit of uv unwrap for some of the machinery and it worked fairly well. I think I might do them again given the time as it only involves drawing over a photoshop file which isn't that tedious.

Week 9

Continued with the animation. I worked on the laser and I have to admit I like the result. The movement it very steady and robotic which I want, plus I managed to get the laser to fire a beam and then for it to disappear. I am however not looking forward to animating the characters as the stiff jerky movements that lend themselves do well for the laser will look a lot worse on the people.

I also tarted working on the camera i have decided that I want to use a variety of shots and cut between them at speed. I want to use a variety of camera shots and I think scene lends itself to that. For example a close up of the laser between bonds legs or a long shot establishing were everything in the scene is or even a POV shot from bond looking at the laser. I have put a few if these ideas into the storyboard of the last hand in

Week 8

After the minor textures from last week I decided I would do some practice on animation, I created some simple animations on box moving about changing speed and size also adding an extract modifier. I think that this will be how I do that laser beam for my final animation. I will "insert" from the point of the laser and them "extract" the beam changing the length over the time.

I picked up the basics of animating in 3rd max quickly enough. But with most things I need to establish which techniques I will be using for the final animation and become efficient in them.

Week 7

After handing I'm the three main models for the first half of the assignment I decided I should get started on some textures. I decided that I would create my own as to improve the work. I started by doing some fairly simple wood designs that could be used on the floors. I am fairly competent in Photoshop and after a little while and a lot of layers I created some textures.

I used the film clip as reference when creating these textures

OVERVIEW OF FIRST HAND-IN

I was fairly pleased with my first hand in. The biggest problem wad completing the man character to a proper degree. If I had more time I would have improved this model especially the face, but as my first character model I thought it was good

week 6

I was finishing the character model and adding a few little extra details to the other models.

legs
the legs were not that complicated as they were just cylinders with tampered points and "champer" for the ankle.

Feet
When i was creating the feet i started by drawing a foot out line and then using a variety of "extract" and "chamfer" to model it. I also had to add a lot of lines to create a slight curve and to make the heel have an indent.

Hands
I started of with a simple box and then with used a lot of "insert", "extract" and "chamfer" to round the hand and create the curvature of the hand. The insert and extract were used to bring out the thumb and the finger portion.

Final Models

Table

Laser

Man/Character

week 5

I worked on finishing the laser model adding extra details that were not on the ladser such as lights and coils.

I also worked on the character.

Torso
 this is were i started i made the torso shape and thin used the "symmetry" tool so that when i worked on one half it converted over the the other. I used a lot of "insert" to create extra "polygon" especially for the chest portion. For the collar I used insert extract and then smoothed the area to make it rounded.

Arms
This is fairly basic geometry with a bit of "insert" and "extract".

Face
This was the longest and i used almost every type of modeling i knew how to.
"chamfer", "extract"," insert", smooth were used for the hair eyes and nose. I also inserting faces, points and lines by linking points especially for the chin. All this and general moving and adjusting.

Waist
The waist is mainly a modified box with a "boolean" sphere taken out of it.

week 4

I was finishing the table model this week. I was using the boolean to delete sections in the table to create extra details.

I was also using the "bend" modifier to create a wire.

I continued drawing and finished the three drawing for the three point editing. I knew they needed to be detailed as the character was going to be the  hardest model to design and will take the most time. I also have a feeling that i will have the most problems with it.

 

week 3

I continued to work on the models of the laser the table and started using the three-view editing to create a character model. At these stage I have just started on some basic sketches for a man figure.

For the table model I have been using a lot of "lofting" 2d shapes to create the awkward shapes like the table legs. I was also using extract and the mirror tool.

Table

laser

week 2

This week I continued working on the table using simple modeling tools. Mainly just creating different shapes and putting them together.


I also started working on the second model for my scene. It will be the main laser from the scene. This model should not be that hard and will mainly be cylinders and cones. All though I'm trying to think of how I will create the coils. I thought about creating a ring then splitting it in half and rotating one half from the pint of separation and then linking them back up.

I was using the "boolean" method of cutting sections from my model to work on the table. Also i used the line tool

week 1

After the assignment brief I decided that it would be a good idea to pick a scene from James Bond quickly so I could start work this week and not waste time


After some thinking I decided upon picking the "laser" scene from goldfinger. This is a very iconic scene and I thought it would good to model. T thought it would be good to model as there can be a lot of detail added to the laser, table or scenery.

I started by making a simple table and using the mirror tool to work on one corner but make it on all four corners