Quick Walkthrough

Deaths Skull

-First; The original skull. Second; I squashed it. Third; I used mudbox. Fourth; Was just a bit of fun. Ill keep the third one. I just need to re shape Deaths hood to fit the shape of the skull better-

Characters

-Click for bigger picture-

-Death still needs his skull which I forgot to render-

-I attempted to put eyes on her but it just didnt look right. I am hoping Jack will have the answer-

-I would have liked the hat to come further down on her face but I couldnt find a quick way to rectify this-

-Still a work in Progress-

Oops AKA production report week 10

So, though I have been sick this week, I did manage to make some all right progress with my characters which I'd like to post up here but I'm currently unable to fully move my hand (once again).
I do hope to put some stuff up tomorrow when I can use the mouse again. Iced packed my hand and its moving again-ish.

Also! Had a hard drive failure on Tuesday (awesome) spent today having to reload everything (double awesome). Luckily I didn't lose any of my work (non-sarcastic awesome).

Anyway. As with all of my other posts I can safely say that I am still behind. I have bitten off way more than I can chew. I thought I could have handled all of this work a little better than this to be honest. I do enjoy modelling, once I can make myself do it, and I'm hoping that the animation side of things won't take too long as most of what I've got doesn't seem to involve too much in the way of animating (hope that's not a bad thing).

Tomorrow after Uni I'd like to get my characters rigged (if the auto rig works) which will hopefully lead straight into doing the UVs then texturing (I don't really see that taking too long now that I kinda know what I'm doing).

I still need to create the convenient store and the street. The convenient store I should be able to do without help, it's more I need help with how to do the street because if I go out on my own everything will be hand made and really high polly and ill just end up wasting time.

Production Report Update 2 - Week 8

With all but the last shot blocked out and in After Effects I can finally move onto, well, everything else. Yes I am pretty far behind but at least I know that and I’m not kidding myself. I am glad that I can now cross something off my list of things to do.
(I haven’t blocked out the last scene because I’m unsure of whether or not to end it how it is in my storyboards, which would be easier, or to end it how I’d like to; which is to have Death put a condom on his head and then lean into kiss her thus not killing her.)

I think that the more difficult thing is now (almost) finished, now it’s just the more time consuming parts to finish. Personally I think they require me to think a little less about what it is exactly I have to do, I can work off my drawings and model everything which to me is easier than what I’ve had to do with the cameras.

My 1 minute time limit is now far exceeded with my running comp now at 1 minute 40, and a little bit more to go, so I’m guessing the animation will come in around 1 minute 50 (less the credits).

Though Jack as expressed his dislike at how I have blocked out the animation so far, and don’t get me wrong I do understand where he’s coming from because I am in a way wasting valuable time, I can better see how things will look so when I do get around to animating, I don’t have to think as much about how things will move and look I can just put it all together how I have already made things.

Jack has been very helpful in moving me along as best he can. The skeleton that I was given in class today is one less thing I need to worry about now.

Honestly I do whish I was further a long with the production, I hope over the holidays I can get a lot done (and I hope that it’s alright if things get done over the holidays and that it doesn’t look sus, like someone else has done the work for me. If I keep blogging my progress is that ok?)


One final note:

Over the holidays my blog should be filled with plenty of updates (I hope).

Production Report - Week 5

So it’s week 5 and I’m not where I’d like to be or where I should be. Basically I put this down to having zero motivation to work on my animation at home, and the constant travelling down to Geelong on weekends isn’t helping me get things done, though I do hope that I can get something done this weekend as I’ll only have to travel down on Sunday.

The saying is ‘work, rest, play’, at the moment I’m making it to Uni more than I was last semester, which is good, but I’m not sleeping as much as I was and not going out and doing things that I’d like to be doing which in a way is really my own fault but its draining and that has been reflected in my work.

I need to play catch up quick smart. Having cameras locked down in only a few of my scenes and so much to do by week 7 I need to get motivated before I fall too far behind.

Class time is where I’ve been getting my work done. I’ve started to listen to music more so as to help me concentrate on what I’m doing and not be distracted by what’s happening around me, which kind of makes me want to be at home where I know I wouldn’t be distracted by noise but that’s just not going to happen, so please excuse the head phones, I’m not ignoring I’m just trying to concentrate.

Initially I was going off the timing that I had from my storyboards and the After Effects running comp but after creating it in Maya and watching it back it looks like my shots need to run longer otherwise I wont be able to convey the emotions I want the audience to feel, if everything is too quick in the beginning it going to set everything up as being a comedy but I don’t want that, I want everything to seem ominous so when the comedy does kick in the audience wasn’t expecting it. In a way this has slowed me down quite a bit and I have to guess the timing then tweak it a lot to make it work.

Some decisions that I was still not too sure about at the end of first semester, mainly that of how Death will look, have been concreted this semester basically because of the time constraints that I have places upon myself. Sure it would have been nice to have had a nice flowing cloak and drags along the ground and interacts with Deaths movements but that just isn’t going to happen, I’ll go with a more ridged look where I still hope to have the clothing interact with Death, all be it in a more simple way.

After blocking out the street where the animation is set in I’ve realised that maybe I don’t need to do as much modelling as I had first thought. I hope that I can still get a nice looking street using textures instead of having to build all the fine detail.

I hope the realisation of just how far behind I truly am will sink in soon and make me motivated.

Anyway, back to it.

Playblast

The first shot from my animation.
I guess that's all I can say about it.


The low quality is due to it being a play blast and low quality render.

Store Clerk Animated

Just a quick animation of the store clerk falling asleep then looking around to make sure no one noticed.
My biggest problem with this stems from the model, he needed eye lids.
This isn't for my final animation, it was just an class exercise.

Restaurant

Simply put, this is the restaurant. The final scene in my animation where Death meets the lady he likes.
For the most part I liked the way it came out. Some things I would have liked to have put in there though are some dirt/stains on the table cloth, finger prints/lipstick on the glass and possibly some differences in the chairs, like rips/tears/wear marks, but I wasn't able to figure out how to implement these into the maya textures I had chosen.

-Click for bigger picture-

The store clerk

Heres a rotation of the store clerk.
Its all one piece of geometry, which may not have been the best idea as it made things a little more difficult to use in mudbox and photoshop to get the textures in the right place.
I would like to put some eye lids on him and get some jaw movement as well.

-Click for bigger picture-

Read it... but dont comment on it...

Synopsis

Death, feeling lonely, surfaces from the underworld to go on a date. Whilst he tries to purchase his date gifts he ends up killing everyone he comes into contact with. The date goes well but Death ultimately kills his date, undeterred he leaves the restaurant with the corpse.

Treatment

Death, feeling lonely, surfaces from the underworld in search of a date. He is drawn to a woman who he sees sitting in a restaurant. He attempts to impress the woman by purchasing her gifts. While buying a card, he accidentally kills the store clerk. As he attempts to buy flowers from a vendor, they wither and die. A Girl Scout passes buy, he purchases some chocolates but as he hands over the money he touches one of the girls’ hands and she dies. Death walks into the restaurant, pulls back is hood, shines his scalp, licks his fingers and straightens his eyebrows (though they are non existent). Standing next to the woman he slowly places the chocolates onto the table, nudging them closer to her. She looks up, smiles and gestures for him to sit down. The two eat. As he goes to pay he touches the waiter, he dies, and she giggles. He begins to touch other people, killing them, she continues to giggle, there is a pause for a moment and their eyes lock, they lean into kiss, they touch and she dies. Death lowers his head in defeat.