cfree68f
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Posts posted by cfree68f
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Tunesy,
I couldnt agree more. To be honest I'm in it more for the challenge. My favorite thing to do in the world is solve problems, and my favorite program is AM, so why not give myself a challenge?
Thanks for the advice.
Colin
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Well I'm liking what I'm hearing.
Pixmite... I actually have worked out a way that would just about eliminate the need for smartskin. I might try a little of both.
My thought was that I might try the near-real character first in order to keep the project as simple on all levels as possible. When I say this though I have a rediculous amount of flexibility planned for the character, which would essentially make it possible to create models that looked nothing like the original. If it didnt sale as well or people werent interested in it... or it was a major big deal to do I might reevaluate doing a phot-real version later. I want to take baby steps first. The uber eye taught me that it would be doable... but I'm still trying to keep the scope controllable untill I'm 100 percent confidant that it will be something well worth someone buying. I wouldnt put it out if it wasnt. I've seen too many reps suffer from half done work.
To answer the others... I have the idea to make one model morphable between a man and a woman first. Then when I do more complicated models later (if I do them later) I'll build a man and a woman. Of course I might change my mind in the process but for now thats my plan.
For everyone who wants photo-real... dont worry I think what I have in mind might interest you as well.
As far as price... right now I'm leaning toward something between $60.00 and $100.00 depending on the work involved. I'm also contemplating doing a tutorial on the making of "Uber-Man" to sell as an extra if people are interested in that. 10.00 to 15.00 extra, just thinking out loud here. How do those numbers sound to you guys?
Thanks again for the input.
C
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Bruce,
very impressive. Thanks for the pic and the movie. Coop wanted to watch them over and over.
A note on your observations. All of those tweeks could be applied in the position pose as well. Just set the target pose to on and make your adjustments. That way when you are done they'll be set for the model when the position pose is on.
You might want to delete the aim at link in the position pose after the eyes are positioned or you could leave it and just ignore it in the choreagraphy.
Thanks again for the images and the feedback. Keep them coming.
C
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As far as the sliding skin question. I think you missed a much more viable possibility. the Deformation lattice.
Take for example the skin sliding across ribs in an animal. If you created a model with out the rib deformation and created this deformation with the Lattice. then constrained the lattice to a bone that didnt move with the skin but did move with the animal or perhaps had an offset that moved with lag (probably the best option) Then you could easily simulate what you are describing and the time it takes to set up would be far less. Plus you wouldnt need to simulate every time you created a new action.
Just a thought. But maybe there could be other forms of deformation latices. I for one would love the ablility to create a lattice that deformed based on a grayscale image. This would be ideal for what you are describing.
my 2 cents.
Colin
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Ok, I know this topic might incite some to anger, but I'm just putting it out there to see if its viable.
I was inspired not long ago by a report on Pixar's Incredibles... specifically the fact that they use one model for all of there extras in the movie. The model they use has "pose" sliders etc and can be changed into a variety of different characters. Sound familiar?
Well... I was wondering if the AM users who "think" they cant model or choose not to model, or even people who might have a deadline and dont have time to model would be interested in having a "Uber" Character?
This would be something for Purchase of course considering the rather substantial time involved in creating such a character. I've been giving it much thought and experimentation (hince the Uber Eye) and finally have come to the point where... "the rubber hits the road".
So I'd like to guage the pulse of the Users to see if...
A. Is this something you guys want?
B. Is it something you would pay for? (I know this question sucks)
C. If A and B are yes... Would you want a realistic Character, cartoon Character
Or both?
D. What "features" would you want in such a character?
A little qualification...
I was leaning toward a character that resembled the level of detail in the Incredibles (ie.. not photo realistic, but not super cartoony either). And I imagined features like... Style of Hair, color of skin, Fat, thin, old, young, tall, short, male, female, heroic, strong, weak, wimp, Color of hair, Color of eyes, Simple outfit, Super outfit, underwear, shape of face, size of eyes, length of arms and legs, beard, Mustache, Bald, And poses for full phonemes, general facial expressions, Actions for Walking, Running, and maybe more.
What do you think?
Colin
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How do you make use of this fantastic eye setup in existing models? Put differently, how do you combine two models into one?
Pieter,
Heres what you'll need to know to place and animate with the eye.
Open the model you want to import the eye into. Right mouse click (cntrl Mouse click on the Mac I believe) to bring up the menu. Import the eye into your model.
Chances are you'll need to scale it some and move it perhaps a little ( I put it in the sockets but dont worry about final position at this point) If you have to scale or move in the modeling window... You'll also need to reposition the bones for the eye. Go into Bones mode and select the Position bone for each eye. (I suggest you be in the top down view to make it easy. Then click on the move tool and Position the origin of the Position one in the very center of the eye. By Using the Position tool instead of just moving the bone.. You'll move all of its children as well.
Once the eyes are positioned and scaled in the Model window... Open the Position Pose. Now you can grab the position bones for each eye and properly position the eye. if the eye doesnt fit the socket completely and chances are it won't unless you modeled the face around the eye.. Then you'll want to use the cartoon shape pose slider to flatten the eye a little. this will make it less round and allow you to pull it into a tighter position next to the eye lids. Altenatively you can change the eyelids to rap around the eyeball better. Either works fine.
If you do flatten the eye some.. you'll also be able to rotate the position bones outward or inward as you need in order to make the eye fit perfectly. this will have the effect of making the eyes crossed or cockeyed.. but the target pose takes care of fixing that later. So dont worry if youre model can read two books at once in the position pose.
Once thats all done your good to go. Just make sure the Position pose is toggled on when you put your model in the choreagraphy.
In order to animate the color of the eye or the darkness or any of the none bone or mesh related pose sliders... You'll need to toggle the animate all channels button on the model in the choreagraphy. Thats the little hierarchy button next to the model in the Choreagraphy Properties. By default its checked to be off. just uncheck it and everything animates when you key it.
Hope that helps. Let me know if you have any questions.
Colin
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Hey Jamagica,
thanks for pointing out my ommission... I take for granted the fact that I break splines after I delete them... I forgot to document that. I'll have to edit the tute for that.
What I do is delete a section and then check for splines that jump or connect. I'll just break those with "k" or "shift K" and they go away.
I noticed you had some other posts about the tutorial. If you have any questions, I'd be happy to go over it with you. Dont give up on modeling a face. Its hard but once you've done one... you can do any.
good luck,
C
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yves,
You may have given me something else to do with that eye. Eyeyiyi...
As I worked on it... My only thought about what might be wrong with the multiple colors for the iris.. is that they tended to be mono chromatic... and most eyes have blue green or brown green mixes and even dots of yellow or red. I will have to play with layered iris textures to see if I like the results.
Thanks for the compliment though... I must admit it was fun to work on and its actually a test subject for a much bigger project I have in mind.
C
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Hey Brandon,
I checked out your site. Cool site dude.
C
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Ok... I hate to spam the list with a new topic every time I modify the Uber eye... but since my last post is still the last post on the previous thread ??? Anyway I just wanted to make sure no one missed this one.
I think it covers 95 percent of the things an eye should do. Here are the new improvements...
1. Fixed the modelling of the Cornea to allow the specular highlite to transition smoothly across the surface (no more hard cornea line).
2. Added a small gradiant texture to the edge of the cornea to soften the Iris edge. No hard Iris. If you want the hard line just turn the decal value to 0.
3. Added Pose sliders for Eye color...
0 - 30 = shades of Green
30 to 50 = Red and yellow
50 to 80 = shades of Brown
80 to 95 = shades of Blue and Violet
95 to 100 = Black for Cartoon Eyes.
There are shades of other colors mixed in there do to transitions from one hue to another .. so play around with it.
4. Added a diffuse and specular Map.
5. The diffuse Map is tied to a pose slider that allows you to lighten or darken the iris as well.
0 to 100 = very light ( almost no diffuse color ) to dark (100 percent of diffuse
map used )
6. Added a Color Map Slider which will add Green into the colors of the eye to tweek the color further still. this map could also be edited in Photoshop to allow a complete more full color decal of any color at 100 percent, or tweeking with different hues. I left it green only since that adds well with most traditional eye colors.
7. Added tweeks to the iris Shape Slider that allow the iris to stretch to ellipsoid shapes...
0 to 10 = more horizontal to Circular
10 to 20 = Circular to more vertical
20 to 30 = More vertical to small circular
30 to 100 = small circular to large circular
8. Added tweeks to the pupil Size slider that allow the pupil to stretch to ellipsoid shapes...
0 to 15 = more horizontal to Circular
15 to 30 = Circular to more Vertical (Cat or reptile like)
30 to 49 = Vertical Slit Iris contract
50 to 100 = Pinhole Iris to Wide open.
9. Added a Decal for Veins with a Bump map. This can be controlled with a Pose slider as well.
0 to 100 = Transparent Veins no bump to Full Veins and 100 percent bump.
Here are some images of what the eye can do... just some quick tweeks.
and here is a Movie that shows a little more...
http://www.colins-loft.net/free/eye.mov
and finally here is the zipped file... It contains the model file a project and all the decal images I've used....
http://www.colins-loft.net/free/UberEyes.zip
Now some notes to remember... The Iris tweeks are limited in there application in that they warp the shape of the Eyeball. So be carefull how you use them. I suggest playing with them before using them on some model that you have to have perfect.
The thing that can help with this is the Cartoon shape slider. Just flatten the eye a little or alot and the distortion from the odd iris becomes less of an issue.
The Odd Pupil slider doesnt have such an impact on the shape of the eyeball so its much better to use.
Other than that... Have fun. If you make a model and use the Uber eye in it... Please send me a pic or post a pic here so I can see it.
Now back to work on my other projects.
Colin
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Its still there, just the copyright free ones though. Heres the link...
http://www.colins-loft.net/free/particle%20emitters.zip
There are only about 65 now. but they are all copyright free, and they are as good or better than the originals I posted.. IMHO
Enjoy.
C
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Yeah I meant to make the black part. I had made it before I textured the iris to simulate the dark area around the iris.
Anyone interested in a super easy way to make irises with a photoshop action ... Which is how I did the original iris... Check out this site...
http://www.kandsdesign.com/kim/eyemap-tut.html
Its got a downloadable action as well. Works like a charm.
Colin
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Done and Done! Thanks for all the help guys. I hadnt thought to delete the entries in the model properties tab.
That did the trick.
Now I have one or two additions I'm going to add tonight for your diligence in helping me with that problem. I think you'll like them and I can finally get off this little side project (truth be told I cant put something down untill I get it out of my system and something about the eyes just doesnt seem finished).
Thanks again,
Colin
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It looks great! Makes me want to keep improving the eye. There's only one thing I can think of that bugged me about it aesthetically(the uber eye, not yours) and that was the hard like between the white and the iris. the cornea usually smoothly flows off the eye.. but do to a modelling error on my part its sharp. This becomes very noticable in the specular hi-lites.
So many little projects and so little time. sigh...
Post more if you keep working with it.
C
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You know I did the model Properties right click and delete... but the Pose sliders still showed up. Not sure why. I thought perhaps that they might have accidentally gotten added to one of the other relationships, but I cant find the linkages if they are there.
Could this be a bug in the current version? Perhaps theres a way to open a file in a text editor and delete the reference to the pose in the slider window? Any other ideas?
C
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Actually you should be able to import the model and the poses and sliders should come along for the ride. At least thats the way I set up the eyes on Robin. If someone is having trouble with that then let me know and I'll fix the way it works if I'm wrong.
Actually that brings up an interesting question? And Vern this may blow you impression of my knowledge of AM. But you may have noticed there are two empty poses in the slider menu... Thats because I couldnt for the life of me figure out how to delete them. I deleted some other things, and even tried deleting one or two things that made AM crash.. but I never could get rid of those darned pose sliders. Any one know an answer to this?
Colin
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I didnt think the Uber Eye I did earlier was ver usefull by itself.. So I modified the project to have 2 eyes.
It has the same poses, now they just work on both eyes...
In addition now it has a positioning pose. So now all you have to do is import the model into your project. get the eyes in close to the right position (dont worry about getting them perfect).
Then go into the "Eye Position" Pose and position them exactly. Using the Position bones (these may need to be unhid) And use the Cartoon Flatten Pose to tweek them just a little or alot to fit the sockets. To twist them for positioning just rotate the position bones to make the eye fit the socket. They may look cockeyed in this pose but dont worry about it... in the Choreagraphy once you have the aim at pose turned on... They'll line up perfect!
Check out a movie here...
http://www.colins-loft.net/free/eye.mov
And Download the zip file with all the things you need here...
http://www.colins-loft.net/free/UberEyes.zip
Any questions.. just ask.
C
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Here he is so far...
Not really 100% happy with the boots, but they'll do for now. If you have any ideas I'd like to here them.
I've made him a good bit taller and shrunk the head down to match the body. I Liked the kid look but it didnt really match the body after all the tweeks.
Now to get a cloth cape on him.
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Vern,
You guessed it!... another factor I'm guessing is the number of patches your bear has versus mine.
The system setting is a way of tweeking the whole system to have more or less hair. I work as low as possible and then crank it up when I'm doing final renders... if I even need to. The idea is to only have just enough hair to get the effect you need. Which in most cases should actually be less hair than will actually cover the mesh.
What? thats not right... yes it is... The real effect of fur is to give the furry effect (or hair as it may be) to the edges of the model and to add that furry noise to the overall look. If you use a texture map on the model that "looks" like fur... you can get away with alot less density on the material.
Sometimes though you just want to crank it up! I figured since the renders where only taking 4 minutes or less.... it was safe to go higher on the system density.
another trick is to just thicken up the spots that need it with the grooming tools. That will keep the overall desity down.
Hope that helps.
C
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I've been playing with a secret project and I've put together a eye that can be used for almost anything.
Its built in a way that allows you to slide poses to...
1. Change the iris size (could be modified easily to change the shape as well)
2. Change the pupil size
3. Flatten the eye to a cartoon shape or just squish it a little , while still allowing to the iris to travel around the eye without distortion (or at least too much distortion).
4. an on/off pose that will aim the eye at a target, which could be contrained to another object.
here is a movie of it doing its thing...
http://www.colins-loft.net/free/eye.mov
And here are the project files/model files/ and a .tga file for the iris...
http://www.colins-loft.net/free/UberEye.zip
if you have any questions or comments just let me know.
C
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Zaryin,
So far I havnt used Porcelain.. But I might if I'm not happy with the end result.
KenH,
Nah his hairs still blonde, but I'm thinking about getting him an Elvis wig or something for his Costume. I'll post pics when I get them. The Robin model is sort of taking on a life of its own, plus Cooper would only be impressed if it was as heroic as possible.
C
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And heres another looksy... I lengthened the legs quiet a bit... They where modeled after a 2 year old and he's 4 now, plus he was starting to look like a midget.
I gave him a more kid like muscular build and legs... just need the belt, boots and cape and then the fun begins.
Thanks for the feedback guys, its helping.
C
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Just keep spreadin the love Vern... just keep spreadin the love.
C
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Ok Vern,
I couldnt resist trying this myself. So I made 2 fur Materials and zipped them up in a project. With a Manikan Bear for testing. Anybody that wants them can have them...
Download them here....
http://www.colins-loft.net/free/FurProject.zip
here's how they look... Both images took less than 4 minutes to render with Z-buffer shadows (P4 2.5 Ghz with 1 meg of ram) Pretty Quick.
One has more kink in it than the other. The project also includes the image I used for the fur witch is what allows the fur to be less dense but still look furry. Its the same Image I used on the hair in Cooper's Tutorial.
Hope that helps someone.
Colin
PS. Frank... Thanks.
Question regarding Models for Purchase.
in (2003-2004)
Posted
Ok guys I'm convinced. Just a little more testing and I'm on it.
Jon you read my mind.
I'll make sure I post progress reports for you guys.
Thanks again,
C