Rodney

John, Questions if I may regarding story "voice": I'm struggling a bit with my current WIP. Seems I have a conflict between humor/serious realistic/cartoony. I figure you may have some insight as your superheroes are most definitely cartoony (maybe better worded claymation-like)--truly awesome designs. From my perspective, without knowing where you are headed, I could see your characters performing humorously or on the other hand used to deliver a serious message, or at the very least act in a serious manner within their cartoon world. Boid of a Feather comes to mind as does your recently posted Advertisement. Humor and Seriousness--Cartoony but Realistic... Apparently they can cooexist but there's a fine line. If you can comment on the subject without revealing too much about your project... it would be much appreciated.

Zach wrote: You A:M guys are eerily psychic... truely scarely... I really doubt you had anything to do with the first two... But the third... Where will you be on the night of the 24 April 2020? Don't answer that question... until you talk to a lawyer.

Zach, I owe you bigtime! I logged in this morning and read your post just before leaving to take my daughter to school. On the walk, the subject of storyline weighed heavy on my mind. The overarching storyline is simply too epic in nature (and unfortunatley so to are all my creations ) The day of inevitable slowdown in progress is at hand. I'll be back to work (real world) soon. I took about a week off to relax... haven't done much of that! Anyway... Your post directed me toward the selection of a portion of the story that might be accomplishable within a reasonable amount of time. Concerning sharing a bit from the storyline. In time... in time... Your post reminded me that this is not necessarily "My" story. An important revelation to the whole structure of "My Robot Movie"--believe me!. I'd like to share the story but I'm not sure I can given the chaotic nature of all elements at this point in time. "Can" I share part(s) of the story with the list? I guess the answer is no for now as the story is just too broad... I see a script in the future... but in the short term images and ideas must continue to flow... Not to mention... revealing to much would definitely ruin any WOW factor. Certainly not enough WOW factor in the world. At least the part that I have any control over. I think all of this is coming together though... Spline by spline by spline... Now, on the way BACK from school, I remembered another storyline that PERFECTLY fits into "MRM" continuity. Unfortunately, it also is an epic of it's own...

John, Really looking good! It looks like you dropped a couple plastic kit models into a premade set. Very realistic. I especially like the window of the front mech. Very Realistic (to my mind). You mentioned the monthly contest. Don't know if I'll get around to entering... the idea I originally had is not coming together. Anyway, your stuff is so good you are scaring me off the effort! *** We have another month until the animation contest deadline though ***

...and a simple 360 degree rotation test for a helo prop. Here is the difference deleting the last frame makes. An accessory for militarized security mobile units. *Edit: Deleted a frame at the end for smoother cyclic action. I definitely prefer using Euler rotation in my experiments. I'll have to find out more about the other types and report the differences.

I'll post a couple more and call it quits for a little while... This one has more leeway in his programming than most. He's quite happy to adjust available parameters to meet your needs. Hmmm. I seem to have several robots that don't have upper arms. *** And One Eye! *** I do not know why that is...

Dances better than me! Looks like you've got the synchronization of audio and video down pat. Any suggestions for linking sound with animation? I'm not looking for anything specific but... who knows I might want to add music to the pictures some day Thanks for that link as well. I'll check it out.

I don't know how I missed this thread! Excellent work! and a belated welcome to A:M. Your teeth remind me of my last trip to the dentist so that must mean they are looking good! Look for to seeing more of your work.

Your site loads quickly... need to work on that aspect on my own. Didn't have a lot of time when I dropped in but keep updating! I'm watching!

You really should lay off the caffiene. I've got a PG13 filter on my mind so I'm not sure what you are talking about. Can we show such things on the internet? D Joseph Designs? You there? Feel free to steer me down the right path! Maybe I need to view the "March of the Rubber Duckies" a few times to keep me on the path. Now where's that link... Seriously though... There is a reason I'm a cartoonist. I get to much 'real world' every day... *Truth in advertisement: If making money is required to be considered a cartoonist... I am NOT a cartoonist.

Haven't found the Make Dragon Button yet but... the Build real model export plugin works nicely! Sorry if this is too small... trying to keep the images downloadable. May link to another if anyone cares to view. A older render. I was surprised I still had the .prj file. If I was to redo this scene I'd make a blank grid move forward with the spaceship making the spline model disappear as the 'real' one comes out of the screen.

Time for a few spaceships... An older model inspired by the spacecraft in Disney's Lilo and Stich. Rendered with Toon Falloff/Gradient[ The last one with lines obviously... Stay tuned... Animation view coming up!

Posted this in Roberts WIP area. We were talking about everyone having at least one one-eyed character... I guess my security robot technically only has one eye as well... just a 360 degree panaround version.

Just don't let me see you start a "My One-Eyed Movie" WIP thread... Kinda neat idea though... after all our (real) world consists of an awful lot of people with two eyes. Stands to reason another world MIGHT have a majority of One-eyes. And Don't forget, a lot of people lathe the basic shapes of the body and even head and adjust from there... Hide some mesh... Copy some mesh... Delete some mesh... Add some mesh... Repeat as necessary. For the record here's one of my One Eyes:

Robert, Thanks! Lathing is Fun. Extruding can be work. But without extrusion it would be a very boring 3D world. One of the reasons I'm focusing on robots is that they are relatively straightforward to create. (at least the ones I've created by messing around directly in A:M) I plan to pull a few more organic ones from out of the past (pre A:M awareness sketches, etc.) That's where I'll be honing my skills! I would encourage you to do a little of the same. If you are comfortable with something do that BUT... add a little from your developing skills set each time. If you get stuck with a character... take a break... build the caracter's car, house... world. That should keep you busy for at least one afternoon. Once you start getting things built around your characters you'll find you have elevated your level of interest in the characters as well... and vice versa. After all once you've created parts of the world to interact with, you'll want to have your character interact with them. (Mainly talking to myself here I guess. Trying to keep splining) Thanks for listenin' *Added - Note to self: Spell Check

You've taken a big step into your future (Can you do that?) I think everyone has at least one one-eyed creature. You're in good company with Victor Navone, et al. Look forward to seeing where you are going with this. BTW: I've always wanted to tell you your avatar reminds me of Tron's central matrix (or whatever he was called).

Wow! Looks good enough to eat! Gotta see this critter in motion, please...

Mike, I'm still not certain how toon rendering will come into play... I have another project or two that require toon rendering but... they'll have to wait. Need to experiment more... I'll post a pic of 'the most interesting' toon effect I've achieved soon. It's a spaceship... the effect almost moves it out of the toon effect zone though... Don't hold me to it but unless I decide to use toon rendering as the primary style for the project the place you are most likely to seen toon rendering is on TV screens, digital (heads up) displays, etc. Of course there is the eventual crossover with the 'other' project where the toon characters enter the scene... but that's a different story.

Doug, I'll file your suggestion! Most of the robots in this particular world will probably conform rather closely to a 'real world' model. Real world in this case means that any 'personality quirks' would have had to have been programmed into the robot. It would make an interesting back story as to HOW this particular robot came to have this insecurity... There is ALWAYS room for the exception to the rule. Comedic relief will, no doubt, have to enter into the story from time to time. Keeps things intesting and helps flesh out characters, motivations, etc. Do these robots have motivations... if they are programmed thusly... Artificial intelligence and sentient or near-sentient behavior will be examined where necessary. What lies ahead: I'm returning to some ideas and imaginings I had as a child for this project. The mind of a child is a treasure trove. While my childhood may not qualify as such... I'll see what I can reach back and find. For instance, prior to seeing Star Wars, I had seen some photos of the cast in TV Guide or somewhere that sent my mind soaring to different worlds. It would be many years before I saw Star Wars but the characters I imagined based on what I 'supposed' C3PO and R2D2 were like may be revisited. I've had a host of abandoned ideas that I can return to for the project. I just need to make sure they serve the story and/or goals of the project.

Bet you thought I was kiddin' Now I know what they're using it for... *Adding a prop: green goo concentrated containment system

Cool. Another use for those barrels of green glowing liquid I've got all over the place. Thanks for the idea! ***Should have mentioned... The boots and hands/arms... I got lazy and decided to remodel them later. I too like the boots in the drawing.... and the face... and... But, I wanted to see how difficult it would be to launch the airplane. It went better than I expected. Concerning thumbs... I may have to resort to paper to figure out how they would best be designed. I had started to add them when I got distracted...

Beautiful! I'll never doubt you for a minute. I just wanted an excuse to open your WIPs and pretend I knew what I was doing. There's a reason you make money at this and I don't. I'd be most appreciative if you'd drop a comment or two my way concerning my latest attempt at a WIP: My Robot Movie It's really more than a movie it is an exercise in gaining experience in 3D. Since I can't spline like Jim Talbot I'm stickin' to robots for now...

...part of a toon render. A close up of our hero. Sadly, I can count 4 modeling errors without even trying... Jim, Rest assured, since the title is "My Robot Movie" I feel somewhat constrained to keep the robot count as high as reasonably possible. I do requests! If you'd like to see a certain effect or feature highlighted in "My Robot Movie" I'll certainly try to fit it in. I'm having fun coming up with a few ways to fit Hair and Flocking into the story...

I could lie to you and make up a good story but... I just dropped him into the scene at the time because I happened to be modeling him when I rendered the robots. He probably does fit into the story as of right now though he's off planet. He comes from a race of dog-like warriors. I believe he escaped the arena just before the civil war began... yeah... that's it... the civil war... now I remember

...and while I'm waiting on another render... ...a character I started a couple months ago. His name is Mags. Don't ask me why he's called Mags. Ask his Mom. After designing the head I didn't feel like creating a body so... I threw his head onto a robobody! There's a story there somewhere... at least there better be. *Added: The face was created as an experiment in QUICKLY modeling a cartoon face. The face is just a cylinder quickly tweaked into the shape of a face... worked pretty well if I do say so myself...