3D update: CG tests

CG composited in After Effects

link to one larger

 

3D: CG update

initial test, looks awesomely hyper real when in motion.

this is just a really really simple test to see how compositing works.

more to follow.

 

animation progress

-gathered desert mountain images
-started photoshopping those (color correction/chopping em up into component parts)
-tried every single paint tool installed on the school computer (see what I did with the meat tool)
-decided which grass to use (and started tweaking its attributes)
-made a ground plane with rolling hills (that I’m not sure I can use anyway)

 

 
 

 

The mole man will be clay

Not the best claymation, but i like the woman’s eyes, and this gives me a lot of confidence that i’ll be able to acheive a more “realistic” effect with more time put into it.

At this point claymation seems like the best option.

 

Animation progress

Music
Ben’s ipod
emeliana torrini
kate bush
cowboy junkies
ben’s french chick
joanna newsom (instrumental?)
ben’s chick that sounds like newsom

Costumes
Rental monster
Latex built monster
Tunics for girls

Image Research
-black lagoon/swamp monster/fish man/mole man
-powerful young women/sisters/witches?
-acts of destruction/creation (indian, greek, roman)
-deserts
-english/oasis/gully
-death of child/victorian post mortem/dolls/funeral/open casket
-consumption and assumption of another’s powers
-cannabalism?
-”antique”/natural/wooden crown jewels and staff
Overall change
Play—————————->Real consequences
SUBTLE environmental changes
harmless animals chasing e/o_________> coyote chasing/eating rabbit
clear gradient sky—————–>turbulence

Cannabalism?
Death of part of self and consumption/assumption of dead part into remaining part/something new
Cannabalism as passive, mourning, gracious. Stones on the body, the body opening itself up magically.
Plant grows out of chest, lifts/offers heart
From behind, view living girl as she graciously takes it in her hands, brings it to her face
CASUAL CANNABALISM (yeah, that made me laugh, but I have a point.)

Forms of destruction
maggots, worms
explosions (of gas, fire, parasites)
dry up, shrivel
catch fire
grow perversely/cancer
eat self, turn on self irrationally, self destruct
get stuck
gruesomeness
crush things

Forms of creation
touch things
bring strength, life
flourish, grow
glow
fly, run, play
flower
abundance, lusciousness, too much, decadence
watchful, peaceful, guardian
healing of destruction/wounds
birth, multiplicity
eating, morphing

 

Proposal for final PART 2

Ideas from class (thank you, class):
check out: persona (by ingmar bergman sp?)
check out: sandman (neil gaiman) personalities/supernatural (specifically delerium)
check out: double life of veronique (wow that was hard to spell)
check out: tivon’s stop mo (cranks and stuff)

it’s important that the girls are touching (so few groups of people can touch like that, like young girls can)
it’s important that they are not verbally communicating, but only communicate through glances and touch
(these things make them more solid, powerful, confident, bound together)

think about: the girls as still photos, environment dynamic
think about: the motivation of land

what’s changed since class:
The new story:
2 girls sitting in an oasis in the desert, not talking, but touching in a sisterly way.
One creates and one destroys. They play with their powers, “battling” each other, showing off to each other.
Accidentally, a mole man is created, an abomination of nature (not evil, but unnatural in this world).
The girls are shocked, but self confident. The destroyer tries to destroy the mole man, and the creator tries to capture him (with vines or by summoning birds, etc)
Accidentally, one of the girls is killed, and the remaining girl is forced to take on both the powers of creation and destruction.
And then, is forced to re-balance, with the mole man (king and queen of this new altered realm).

Interpretations:
girls as yin and yang, balanced
but playing around they break apart, lose balance
and are forced to re-balance with this self created abomination of nature
king and queen. standing rigidly.

“this weird sense of guilt and beauty always remains from the act
one must move on
use what they have to their advantage”

“it reminds me of relationships
we destoryed each other but both ended up as a mixture of ourselves and the other”

“it’s like growing up
fighting against yourself, then maturing and fighting against the world… the way the two girls become one.”

 

Wanderlust (Bjork) Music Vid

http://media.ghostrobot.net/7020_wanderlust.html

 

Completely incredible. I aspire to this precisely. How could I have waited so long to check this out?

 

Proposal for final

I want to make a short video, compositing 2D animation, 3D animation and video footage.

I’m not sure how much of it would be CG. As much of it will be CG as needs to be to make it work, look right, but I’m not sure if that will be a lot or a little (though i’ve recently come to realize that a lot of 2D/2.5D animation is actually 3D or done in maya, so I feel like it would probably be a lot).

Here’s the scene:
Sandy, rocky, mountainous setting (mostly 2d composited photos. Red, yellow. Bright. Blue sky.)a dry, but lush, oasis (Combo of 2D and 3D paint effects [for the turbulence in really lush, heavy foliage], rendered in 2D and composited)2 girls (around… 13 years old) look very similar, dark hair, simple brownish dresses (more like tunics?) sitting in the field.  (These would be actresses, or one duplicated actress, composited in 2D)One creates, one destroys.

Desert ideas:

The girls:

a little less fancy than this, a little more straightforward. Not so vulnerable, but in a field like this, yes.

I love this image, I always come back to it. Maybe these colors and this scene can exist when the creative girl takes over. Fertile. Turning the Gobi into the English country side.  (Millais)

Not quite this creepy, but I had to acknowledge the visual reference. (Diane Arbus)

The oasis (in varying levels of creation/destruction, fertile/desolate):


could potentially shoot on location here ^ or below

Areas of technique development/research. Things I’ll need to learn or need to know:
I will really need to learn in depth how to paint objects and apply textures. Cell shading could be interesting on some parts.
I’ll need to learn how to really manipulate paint tools settings to get a variety of plants, and the foliage I want specifically.
I may model objects like houses (or a small shack), books…
Learning how to make paint tools grow/be animate.
Fire with particles (shouldn’t be too hard)
Particles/dynamics- I’d like to go more into depth with these.

Production process:
1 Storyboard (and find song, if I want to make it a music vid.)
2 Gather TONS of images (Excellent free stock photo site: http://www.sxc.hu/)
3 Take pictures at parks around Seattle
4 Start compositing 2D environment first
5 Then start creating 3D environment  and compositing that
6 get environment really solid
7 Shoot 2 girls
8 Tweak environment  (this means tweaking 1-5 in all honesty)
9 Polish it off
10 RENDER
11 Edit rendered footage
12 RENDER AGAIN
13 celebrate

realistically a lot of these actions can be going on simultaneously (like 1-5)

Timeline:
I figure we have 9 weeks left.
Week 1: Storyboard/song choice
Week 2-4: Image hunting/putting together
Week 5: Shoot the girls
Week 6-7: Tweaking/perfecting
Week 8: Rendering/editing
Week 9: a whole week for celebration! haha (week saved in case of disaster)

 

When You Grow Up (by Milk)

http://www.wearemilk.com/grow/

Putting real people into miniatures is great.
I love combined scales and composited images.
I love the low frame rate on the people, with the normal smoothness of the other objects (clouds, growth, ship, etc)

(…or do I? Maybe I’d like to see the people smooth too? Not sure.)

 

 

Samorost (by Amanita Design)

This game was the inspiration for Euphemia (visually-composited 2d images).

http://www.amanita-design.net/samorost-1/