Paul Forwood

Thanks, David. This is a project that I started many months ago but didn't get too far with. I've just been fixing some of the rigging and weighting issues. When/If I get him sorted out I will then make a small tribe and dig out my storyboards. You may remember this earlier experiment that I tried with another version of this model: Hunter Gatherer. CycleOnPath_A07.mov mp4 version: CycleOnPath_A07.mp4 This was just a single leap action, cycled along a path. No second pass has been made on it but that's what it needs.

Yes, Rodney. The foreground circle is all separate instances of the model. The background figures, (all facing the same direction), is simply a Crowd Flock. There does appear to be a problem with the action cycling on the Crowd. Oh, there is also a refresh issue with flocking where you need to do a quick render in order to get the flock/crowd to show up in the choreography. Once you have done the render it remains visible in the realtime display for a while. (I have updated the movie in my last post, above.)

I added a crowd to the test, just to test if crowds are still working since the last time that I tried them: BusyTest__FunA03b__A01c.mov Edit: (Modified movie... again!) mp4 version: BusyTest__FunA03b__A01c.mp4

What would you like to know, Steve? The caveman model is a very low-patch model, (1744 patches to be precise), which is great in most ways but makes it difficult to control body volume in extreme poses. Every control point has to be weighted to come under the influence of various bones. It takes time to get the balance right but is a must for organic models. After rigging a model I create a series of actions, which put the model through all the extremes that it is ever likely to be asked to perform, and then I tweak the CP weighting from those actions. The action in the movie above was just really for testing the shoulders and for a bit of fun I just threw a few of them into a choreography. The weighting is far from balanced yet. The model was built in A:M 14 and is now being modified in A:M 15.

As I seem to jump from project to project, and test to test, some things seem to progress very slowly. I have decided to use just one thread to post most of my WIPs and tests that I find interesting or require some criticism. So here are a couple of recent tests: First a clip produced while testing AO in A:M 14: GroupTest_A00d.mov mp4 version: GroupTest_A00d.mp4 This next one was produced from an action being used to tweak the weighting on the caveman: BusyTest__FunA03b__A00d.mov mp4 version: BusyTest__FunA03b__A00d.mp4

The characters and the environment look great but for some reason the grain created by the AO looks more like a static overlay of grain. When the monkeys move their heads the grain appears to stay still, particularly obvious around their snouts.

Ha! Great looking caveman character! Your post prompted me to take another look at my cavemen. Here is one with A:M 15 hair: Not so much fun as yours. Maybe they will meet someday.

Wow! That's pretty amazing! Sure it could stand some pollishing but you have planned your shots well and told the story clearly. I love the Warner Bros-like music! I think that your video experience is showing and I would expect to see some very interesting work from you once you become more accustomed to A:M. I'm going to guess that your final shot was... pulling away from the stop sign and pulling into the gas station. There is some good anticipation there and it looks as if you have even used squash and stretch.

Congratulations on finishing before the deadline, Mark. That was some challenge that you set yourself and I think you did really well! The new ending works well too.

Good model, Stian! Is this aimed at the UK market? That coin looks like it could be a 50 pence piece. Don't they realise that all our money has gone?

That looks very effective, Mark! The only criticism would be about the flame being emmited by the bat that is hovering in front of the moon, it could use some variation in its motion, but I guess just rotating the bat a little would do that. It looks like you are enjoying yourself.

Ha, ha! Well done, Robert!

If you are pasting by using a keyboard shortcut, (Ctrl+V), you might be holding down the keys too long. You could adjust the timing of the auto-repeat in your keyboard settings or practice a lighter touch or use the menu paste command.

Yes. Those are superb, clinical demonstrations. Very well paced too.

Thanks, Spleen. I'm not sure how dark it looks on your monitor but I just checked it on my CRT and it does look a bit too dark. I setup the lighting on a flat screen and I usually use a CRT monitor for graphic work. Does this look better or worse?: CausticsComp01d.mov I need to fix those hands and continue tweaking the weighting.

First caustics test using cell turbs with A:M15: CausticsTest_A00.mov I will have to play with the material some more and animate it.

Yes, the shark is simply constrained to a closed path and the rest of his motion is controlled with pose sliders. I intend to animate his gills in the final model and will be puting more character and controls into his face so the amount of sliders will increase.

Oxygum. I love it! I hadn't heard of Marine boy but there is a comic book character from somewhere early in my life that is playing around in my subconsciousness and influencing the direction that I go with this.

At the risk of boring you, here is a bit more: Comp_2a.mov

A couple of frames that I grabbed from a shaded test render: Lots to fix, I know.

Good luck, Mark. It all seems to be coming together beautifully and every time that I view one of your updates it brings Christmas a little bit closer. You have had a very productive year with your Pirates. Keep on sailing.

Thanks, Holmes. The choreography does have caustics and volumetric lighting but they are disabled. I will have to look closer and see what I did to disable them and why. Perhaps the render times were just too horrendous.

Thanks for the compliments, folks! Story? Uh, story... yeah, there was a story. I even drew some rough thumbnail storyboards and scanned them but can I find them now? If I find them I will post them. Basically the story was visualised as an ad for A:M. The mascot in this case is not one character but the team of shark and boy. The shark was to represent Animation:Master, the application. The boy is the A:M user. He is The Master and he is in control. The 'hammerhead' shark was chosen specifically to highlight the Ha:ma application which was being heavily talked up at the time. That was the basics of the concept. For the moment I'm just going to be tweaking and testing the models and building components for a dynamic sea world. At some point I will animate some much more interesting diving sequences, I hope. .

I went and voted. Phew! That had to be done in several sessions, because there are about 100 entries to view, but at least the process is easy. The ability to see all of the entries together, after completing the voting, is good and makes it easy to revise the score awarded to each entry. The competition is very strong! There are some very funny interpretations and one in particular which is downright cinematic but your entry still came joint third in my vote results. Humour is usually worth at least one more point on the score card. "Leave 'em laughing..."

I started playing with this old project the other day. We'll see how far I get with it this time: Comp_1b.mov