Rodney

Love the new Material Clone/Copy/Paste feature. I was missing that duplication capability recently and had no idea it was being added. This implementation is even better than I was hoping for as it allows us to copy/paste materials from one project to another. Nice! Here's a quick material created via copy/pasting and tweaking:

@Jason Simonds Can you check and see if it is actually v19.5D that you've uploaded and linked to? I'm seeing v19.5c for both 64bit and 32bit. Edit: I did find files named v19.5d on the FTP and after some initial issues I was able to download and install. Some of those installation issue related to having Animation:Master open while trying to install.

Nice. That is a very considerable (and successful) simplification! It isn't clear to me what we need to do to allow the program to maintain curvature a little more strictly. I suppose we could attempt a (user adjusted) tolerance value where if a CP is found within a certain distance from one marked to be retained that new set of CPs is removed and if outside of that tolerance it is marked to be the next CP to measure tolerance from. In a way this almost looks like a reverse 'loft' or sweep. This particular kind of shape at least. Aside: I thought I got my attempt at that program to close the end loops but who knows where I put that code.

The bones for this 'not a giraffe' are simply placed and not at all designed for precision. I added new child bones on the fly as new parts of the model were added. A functional rig which makes me want to investigate more that gap between such simple functioning rigs and what might replace it later as a more fully articulated rig if the simple model were upgraded to a highly detailed one. The jaw bone in particular was an attempt to just get a little bit of movement to those areas to hint that there was an actual mouth there. There is something I really like about this doodling approach to designing a character in that while working through it I start to see those things that would need to be updated and replaced. If diving into the more detailed and final model a lot of time encountering errors would make that a frustrating experience. As opposed to this approach which to me feels more like drawing and sketching ideas. Not as fast as drawing but with the benefit of actually having a working model as opposed to ideas on paper that still need to be implemented.

So much that could be changed! Regrets? I do wish I had used more cross sections when lathing the neck as it would allow for better placement of his differently colored belly. His mane/back scales need more detail/definition. Perhaps a sense of bones/webbing. Mouth. Need mouth. Nostrils. If the entire eyes were patch images or decals I probably could get away with more there and have better control of the look/feel. Why do I always resist just modeling the stuff in the first place? I wanted to have his horns be more turned but perhaps for this guy these are the best? More ornate horns might be reserved for other dragons this guy would encounter. Some additional deformation/detail and the cheeks and chin would suggest scales/hair. Ears... not very subject to gravity in this iteration. Those might be some of the obvious areas to work on. What else?

I was lathing a shape and thought I could easily turn it into a giraffe's head... A few hours later this dragon thingy appeared: The motion blur... a bit thick no? I thought I'd be lazy and make the eyelids be patch images that turn on/off. That was probably more work than it should have been if I would have just made actual eyelids. It kinda worked though. Had fun with a few things that won't be particularly apparent such as having the color of the horns change so that the lightest/grayest horn is always in the back (presumably aiding in giving a sense of depth). This guy technically has no mouth although he does have a jaw bone. He really needs a mouth. I was going for flat shaded and almost got what I was after. I need to explore that more and get that approach into muscle memory. He needs a body no? I thought about faking the reason for not having one by adding ripples of blue to indicate water. Added: Definitely needs eyebrows! It was a fun 3D exploration that reminds me that when doodling especially... there is always something more to tweak!

The consensus seems to be that everyone wants to see a little more of this. It's as if we all instinctively know there is more of this story that hasn't been told. You've set up the scene and run through the performance. (I do like the idea of some resistance or exaggeration such as @fae_alba and @Roger suggest. A happy dance wouldn't be out of the question either eh @Pizza Time?) Now... how about that payoff! @Roger's suggestion of the big sniff is a good one as mentioned. So many things that could be done so this not so much a suggestion but an exploration. It'd be nice for instance, if there at the end the camera zoomed in really close to show his face and the flower. What is he looking at there? Is there something on the flower? What is his intention in plucking the flower in the first place? How does that relate to our currently hidden payoff? Ah... the possibilities. All this to say, keep up the great work!

VERY smooth animation Steve! When I see animation as good as this I get an almost uncontrollable urge to want to see the animation curves to peer into its secrets. The animation however speaks for itself. Love the sound effects too!

Not particularly related... A generated depth map from video: DogTurn_vis.mp4 My general sense is that of leveraging these depth maps and such for smoothing, blurring etc. whether applied to 2D or 3D.

Next up (I think I captured a character but not the character in the rotoscope. Thought this guy's jaw would be easy to rigs so added that.

Figured I'd post some of the modeling I'm doing with @Pizza Time (who doesn't like pizza???) I'll be glad to post the models here but I'm giving them to PT first. In the meantime I'll share some turn arounds and perhaps add some detail about what I did... why I did it and... maybe even why you shouldn't do it that way! (Disclaimer: I don't know any of these characters names so the names I supply very likely will be random) First up:

Also, the AI and SVG Wizards work in much the same way (SVG being the more accessible format these days). Any complex fonts and symbols not available can be created in other programs and brought in that way.

If you are talking about the Font Wizard then... Right Click in the Modeling WIndow > Plugins > Wizards > Font Wizard You should be able to use all True Type fonts installed on your system (not just Ariel).

This is not an great example but I think just creating some models (even if only flat shaped) and overlaying those on top of your shot could be the quickest way to success. Then you just place the control points for the laser beams where you want them and animate where you need them to be. All this to suggest the shot will dictate the approach. Doing some simple placement such as in a model overlay however will allow precision without the setup becoming overly complicated. Then once placed and animated you can get as fancy with the look and feel of it as you need.

There are so many ways to do lasers. How to do it without making it overly complicated... now there's the question. We could use: Multiple models Material Effects Boolean Cutters (to make lasers models appear) Patch images Layers Action Objects Odd approaches such as using Hair Objects on paths Particles! Lights! Let me stop there for a moment because Lights might be the way to go. Why? Because they can easily be placed, animated, turned on/off, brightened, and they can have Lens Flair and effects applied to them. Hmmm...