Paul Forwood

Great fun, Spleen! Perhaps you could establish that there is someone sitting on that bull in the opening shot so that I have just had a good laugh watching all of your other videos on YouTube. Rough but very spontaneous and entertaining. -------- Myron, do you have any more songs laying around?

Nancy, you really should illustrate some children's books. Vibrant! I wonder if your bold palette extends to your home decor? Suggested topic for a future image contest: "Nancy's House"

Nice model, TNT! Is he a relative of your avatar? Here is a quick distortion of his profile to give you a better idea of how you can rejuvenate him: Hope it helps.

Hey, thanks for the comments, Steve and Nuba X! Steve, jitter means 'to shake' and is the effect you see in this animation because I didn't filter it out when I saved the Action file from Zine Track. I could go back and do it now but I think that I'll just be more careful next time. ------------------------------------------------- Back to Clint: ClintZT_A00c.mov This is a slight update on the last movie. I smoothed out x rotation data for the errant lip bone with one fell stroke. Just grabbed the whole channel and scaled it down. I didn't know that was possible before. Great! I have also added a few more phonemes for "B, W and Oo" shapes. Although this has a fairly nice feel to it really doesn't do justice to what is possible with AM Track/Zign Track if you take a little more care with the initial filming of the actor's face and set your filters to remove the shaking.

Nice work, Shelton! Regarding the phantom group folders, have you tried selecting the geometry, making a copy and pasting into a new empty model window, saving and then starting a new project with the new model? I'm not saying that it will definitely work but if you haven't rigged him yet you have nothing to lose. Sometimes, when things get bogged down while modelling in A:M, it helps to start a new, clean project and just bring in what is relevant to that model.

(This movie has been updated in my next post.) I finally had a chance to try one of my old Zign Track Actions on Clint. There was bit more tweaking than I anticipated because it has been a while since I last used any mocap data, and this character's face rig is little different from previous versions, but after I made a few minor adjustments and rebooted A:M it was fine. I have shown this action before, on a completely different model, and it was obvious then that I hadn't filtered the jitters enough. I have added a couple of "B" phonemes, where the mouth shapes were not strong enough, and I have animated the eyes, blinks, head and neck motion by hand. All very rough but very quick! I need to find, or record, some suitable dialogue next. ClintZT_A00.mov

Beautiful character! I agree wih Matt, he does remind me a little of one of the lead characters from 'Eldorado'. There is probably more than a little post church influence in there too. TSM2 is now free, thanks to Raf's generosity, so you should be able to find a link to a download somewhere in these forums.

Wow! He looks terrific, Mark! That is a much better hairline and the grooming looks great.

Nice cowgirl! Open the stamp and adjust the splines in that area to get the star to be evenly distribued over those patches. You may find though that you need to edit the image so that it has the correct proportions.

This is an excellent breakdown, Mark! Very well presented too.

Persistence? Or maybe you just like your cephelapods with smooooth legs. Seriously though, he needs his suckers so for the moment he'll have to jump back into A:M 14. I've got to finish rigging his mouth and then give his eyes some attention. Some weighting issues to sort out too. Then he might start to look the part.

Thanks, Steve. That's what I thought too. Why_A00eComp.mov I tried bringing this guy into A:M 15 and had some problems with an action that I had made in A:M14. For some strange reason CPs in the face had become offset across the y-axis and nothing I could do would correct the problem. I checked their assignments and all was correct, including the weighting, but I couldn't get them to jump back into their correct postions. There was a "Splines" folder in the Action but A:M15 wouldn't let me delete it. Eventually I gave in and deleted the action alltogether. I then set my displacement map back to 'displacement' instead of 'bump', something that appears to be neccessary in A:M15 in order to be able to work with the realtime display, and A:M instantly became unuseable so I rebooted, set the displacement map again and it "took" so I tried a render. Everything that has the displacement map refused to render at all so I compromised again and ditched the displacement. (Sigh)

That looks great, Mark! Like he is stumbling about after enduring the wrath of the air squadron... or he's going home to face the wrath of Faye Ray. I agree with Matt. A little dynamics in the belly would emphasize his weight. Just limit it to about 5 or 10 degrees.

Thanks for all the encouragement, people! I have been a little distracted by my octopus models, trying out different approaches to a mouth and textures. So far I prefer the simplicity of old Blue, (no mouth), but I had to try some more talkative versions as well. Gazzamataz! Yeah, I'm still playing around in here. It has been a while but I can see that you have been busy with your AM studies. I checked out your new showreel and was just amazed at the leap forward in the quality of your work! You have some very convincing animation examples in there now. Looking very strong. Well done! Here is a species that you might find anywhere between the Carribean and Ethiopia: Rasta_B_A04c.mov

What better introduction could you have, Dusan?! I must say that quality shines through in every aspect of your work. The opening titles are no exception. Beautiful!

It looks fabulous, Dusan! Best of luck on the circuits! Perhaps a book to follow?

Yeehaaaaawww! I love that last pic. Very expressive!

Thank you, guys! Very much appreciated!

Video yourself or use a mirror. Study and absorb.

That's a good looking head, Shelton. It sounds like you are extruding central CPs, instead of just the edges, which will create internal patches that you do not want. Copy a spline ring from inside the lens frame and extrude to the correct thickness. Then stitch both faces as you want them. Give the lens an Index of Refraction of, hmm..something like 1.3, if my memory serves me correctly. This will cause the lens to refract and magnify like a real lens. Adjust your transparency to suit your needs. I would think about bevelling the arms on those spectacles. The edges are far too sharp to wear next to the face. Hope that helps.

I enjoyed both Ants and A Bug's Life. Ants had a darker feel but had some outstanding imagery and social comment while A Bug's Life kept things light and catered primarily to the kids. Thanks! I've made a few changes to the octopus: Blue_A01.mov He still needs loosening up and he also needs his 'suck and blow' apparatus. All of these textures are still temporary.

That's a nice intro, Spleen. Did you do it in A:M or After Effects? Very effective anyway.

Well it certainly cuts down on the amount of work that the animators would have to do but it also makes for a cleaner, easier to read, character. This guy won't be taking a lead roll and won't have to do half the things that the octopii in "Oktapodi" had to do. I have to give him a bit more character now and get away from that uniform shape. Thanks, Nancy. This is a test model that I did back in September: The rig didn't work quite as well as the new one. Not enough bones in the tentacles.

I have to put in a few bones that I didn't get around to doing and alter a couple more on the mouth before I finish weighting it for ZignTrack. That may not happen for a week or two but I will post something when I get around to it. Thanks, Steve. Not quite Clint yet though. In the meantime here is something else that I started: OctoTest_A00.mov ------------------------------------------------- Just testing the rig.

What version of A:M are you trying this in?