Skye: Previs Take 04

With Phil's suggestions I have changed my previs, I feel as though it is a lot stronger now and more cinematic like what I had hoped for. I need to get the timings done as soon as possible as a composer is waiting upon the final previs so she can compose to it and to give myself enough time to animate. It's getting there though!

Skye: Previs 02 & Scene updates

After talking with Phil and Alan I have updated the scenes to a version which I feel is ready for animation and updated the trees more to fit with the environment. I am still undecided whether to keep the tracking shot of the leaf at the beginning and rather have it land at the window seal and start the animation that way or not but for now it will stay the same and probably be decided on how much time I have left to finesse the outside scene. 

So far the music is still not available unfortunately but I am trying to get that sorted as soon as possible. The sound effects also need some work with sounds of the mother coming into play when she is looking at her picture and the drawings in her hands. Although I do have the drawings back from the school! So I need to scan those in and decorate her room with the drawings from the children, next to start animating and lighting and a few tweaks on the shots specifically in the dark room I am still undecided on this sequence of shots.

 

Skye: Texture and Scene updates

I am currently working on my previs and getting that to a state where I can start animating properly with my scenes and as my outside shots are good to go I decided to update that scene in terms of modelling and texturing in readiness for the animation. I have also updated the textures for her room as that is pretty much complete now too, overall the story is starting to shape up nicely and more tweaks to the previs will come tomorrow, for now here is some textural updates and a quick sample of really simple lighting in the scenes. 

Skye: Previs First Draft

Finally the previs is complete and ready for people to see! After talking with Phil about the first half that I had done it made me re shoot some of the scenes to make them less complicated. I understand that a lot will probably still need tweaking and defiantly retiming but overall this is what I have to date. 

I have a few sounds to accomodate the animation but I am currently in the process of finding a music composer to help out with the animation as music in this piece will play a vital role for the atmosphere and storytelling. Obviously she isn’t animated properly but with blocky movements to judge how much time she will be in shot for. I need to make it a lot more filmic so any feedback is welcome :)

Skye: Walk Cycle Test

As im busy working on my previs for the meantime and my blog has not had much attention I decided to update it with the first stages of a walk cycle for Skye inspired by a video that Phil had showed me and experimenting with layering animation rather than pose to pose animation.  Still needs a rather alot of cleaning up especially in the arms but a good starting point :)

Here is the video for anyone else to reference from: https://vimeo.com/51370027

Skye: Room Blockout

The inside of the room is blocked out and ready to use for a previs, I need to fill it up a bit more and make it seem more like a girly room with toys and to put a sheet over the table, I need to uv and texture it still but overall I'm pretty good to go for the previs now.

Skye: Facial Rig Update

Finally after going through the trouble that rivets had caused me I decided to change my facial rig altogether to more characterful and artistic rig and that being blendshapes but I also wanted the deformation that rivets allowed you to have. So I found a tutorial series and redone my rig, I am really happy with the overall face rig even though the trouble it had caused but the deformations are a lot nicer now and I can achieve the different expressions which I couldn't of done with the previous rig. 

After a long process of setting up the joints and the different rigs (local rigs) and sculpting the blendshapes that she needed alongside the correctives too, she is finally animatable ready! Here are just a sample of the blendshapes that I needed to create. Oh and Shapes is a really good plug in for anyone needing to do correctives and blenshaping. 

Here are some of the expressions  I managed to achieve with this rigging style: 

 And finally here is a quick video I put together showcasing the rig in its complete state.

 

Now onto finalising the environment block out so I can start the prevising and animation!