Parlo

Gary - We're pretty darn proud of our sci-fi heritage in these parts... Here's a sculpture that stands guard in Woking town centre. Imagine encountering that for the first time at 11:30 on a Friday night? You'd definately lose a grip on your kebab.

Interesting question Rodney - For ages I used to animate with a full, heavy patch count model and had to render a test everytime I wanted to check my timing. Obviously that was very time consuming - especially when I cracked open a bottle of wine whilst waiting for the render... By the time I got it.. I didn't really care anymore Anyhow... here's a comparision pic of my final "beauty" model... and the one I do 90% of my animation with... my "Proxy". You might notice that the "Beauty" model has black artifacts around it. This is a realtime screengrab. What I've done is go into my ATI graphics card settings and turn the quality vs. performance setting all the way over to performance. It doesn't have to look like a cutting edge first person shooter, it's just got to give me the fastest frame rate possible. With the proxy I get 40fps playback. I can pretty much see every twitch and bubble as I animate. So in short... Proxies rock!

Sharky - My best reply to you is to send you here. Keith's tutorials have been very useful to me. That and lots of practice. PlJack - Thank you! It's getting there. I've learnt more doing this clip than I have anything else in A:M. The main reason is that I've been strict with myself - I've kept it to one shot. Every time I came across a really difficult bit... I forced myself to solve it by animation alone. I'm not saying that I've been entirely successful.... but I do know that I've learnt from the process. Gazz - I've tried making the eyes slower but my tests have proved that you've pretty much gotta move them in 3 frames or less. Any slower than that, he stops thinking if you know what I mean. As for the whole intro - this is the whole intro.. or atleast as much of the intro as Richard Burton recorded for the album. I actuallly live pretty near Horsell common which was where the martians first landed. I live in fear of their heat ray. What with the recent events on mars... I'm getting pretty scared. Thanks again guys.. I'll post the final version next week.

I too am pleased to see that this one is still on the boil! Great poster, it's always fascinateing to see how projects like this have progressed over time.

Thanks again guys! Other stuff has been taking up most of my time but I've still been wittling away at this. Here's one last realtime render - I'm gonna polish off the last few gestures before doing my last (definately, and absolutely:)) proper render over the weekend. It's come a long way... and it's now in widescreen - oooohhhh QT - Sorenson3 - 1.4mb

I've done a bit more work on the lunch clip - just need to polish it off now. Didn't think that the clip warranted a new thread so I decided to post it in this old shabby one - QT - Sorenson3 - 700kb

Without revealing myself as too much of a wimp - I'd like to look at what you've done Ross but I'm seriously arachnophobic How sleepless would my night be if I looked at your clip?

This guy has real personality - just by looking at his proportions you can see how he should move. I like the new ears, even though they have changed his character a bit. He somehow looks a little more boyish, and more likely to be a little less dashing and "daring-do" than he thinks he is. All this from changing his ears! Can't wait to see him move!

I really like the style Shaun - She's got a realistic feel to her but she's also got a slightly cartoony feel going on too. The texture works so well I can almost reach out and touch the little lady. She'd be a great character to do some squash and stretch with, munching away on her leaves. As for a rig, I think you're right. You could porbalby make your life alot simpler by puting in a hand full of control bones for her spine and doing a series of orient likes - that way there would be less bones to deal with. You could also use a poses to deform each body section for squash and stretch.... this could produce a cute peristalsis type motion down her body. As for Skycast. Ain't it a beauty?

That's the intention - I'm trying to go for something very simple. Do you mean that it should take more for him to settle? I think that more tweaking is needed in that transition - he's stopped dead in his tracks, so his body needs to cushion it a bit more. Thanks for the comments guys

Some folks may remember this little fella - Well... I've been dusting off a sequence from this short and thought that I'd put it out there (-here-) for those who wish to opine. I've been trying out a different animation style with him and am pretty pleased with it.... Squash and Stretch are our friends! QT - Sorenson2 - 1.5mb Anyhow, all comments welcome. Bring a bottle.

You made me giggle as always - good stuff!

Thanks Zaryin and Animus - that door bounce is getting a lot of love! He was originally designed and built for a short that I'm still working on. I've been surprised by the direction in which his animated personality has gone... Expect to see a lot more of him soon.

Thanks guys! As for tweaking - I've already succumb to its siren call - about 5 minutes after I posted the link in fact! Despite this being the Showcase fourm, feel free to point stuff out. I better point you in the direction of this then - Lunch! This one is rough around the edges.. but getting there. I'm polishing off the WOTW clip today - it'll take a fair while to render but it should make a showcase appearance later in the week.

Click Me - 1.5mb - QT- Sorenson3 Here's the final version of a character animation exercise I've been working through in the WIP forum. It's now gone from a WIP to a FFN (Fine For Now) - I could go on tweaking forever, but there's other stuff to get done! Massive thanks to all those who've given their advice, comments or support.

Thanks for the comments guys - I had a really productive conversation last night with a few of the regulars on the Wednesday night chat and got some in-depth crits. Ed Lynch provided some good pointers on the "Coffee" clip, and I've tried to address some of the issues he brought up. I've also picked up on John's comment about moving his right hand - you were right.... happy now? I feel that there's more of a story to it now.... QT - Sorenson3 - 1.1mb

I've spent a bit more time on "Coffee?" The lip sync is now roughed in and I'm happy with all the poses. Just gotta smooth it all out a bit now.... Version 3 - QT, Sorenson3, 890kb

This is great - I especially like the fur reed fencing - it's got a strong organic feel to it. I want to live there (though the lady perpetually suspended above the pool might get a bit annoying after a while....)

Does anyone fancy some some lunch after their coffee? QT - Sorenson3, 673kb This is the third study I've been working on - concentrating on body language and a more snappy feel. Bring them comments on! (.... please )

Thanks! I didn't initially realise that my clip fitted into the theme of the contest - and by the time I did, I thought that I'd solicited so much advice in the forum, and that I'd aired my socks in public so much that it would be unfair to those who hadn't. I might post a version of "Coffee?" with the sync up by the end of the night. "No One" is still undergoing some minor tweaking. I've realised that a problem with my rig (it's quite an old one) is that it takes a lot of work to make the arms appear loose. I altered the rig for Coffee, and I'm considering going back and revisiting them in "No One" too. I've been working on a third new piece (the thematically suitable "Lunch?") which is much more frantic and snappy. The upshot of this is making "No One" seem very slow indeed - so I'm trying to add some more gear changes. Ahh.. I've been trying to get him in, but now you mention it I've pushed it more so that he gets even further in. I'll try the hand drop too... I was wanting to keep both of it's hands out of play as it were, but I can see how this will help the shift at the end. Thanks once again guys... This is proving to be a really productive exercise, and most importantly I'm enjoying the whole process more than I have in a long while! Word

This is great.. I know that I'd like to see those bones in action! ... please.

Thanks Shaun - the latest version of the other clip is Here (QT, Sorenson3, 2.3mb). I'm in the process of re-building some of the mouth shapes so I'm leaving the lip sync tweaking till that's done. Otherwise it's pretty much done - as an exercise in subtlety I think it was quite successful. I've got to the stage with it that I can't tell anymore though, which always happens!

Thanks for the comments. Nothing to really update with at the moment except to say that I've decided to revert in part to the movements from the first version - Looking to his left and around the door first seems more natural than the other way around. Oh, how I love the details.... I'll post some more when the lip sync has been added.

Spent another hour or so on it this afternoon. Tidied up some of the poses etc. Getting him in and out of the door convincingly with those legs is proving a bit of a problem soving exercise.... v2 QT, Sorenson3, 900kb

Vern, when I picked the clip I new that someone here would have a special connection to it! It's from "Glengarry Glen Ross" - the exchange is between Ed Harris and Alan Arkin. The film is one of my favourites, but this clip is perhaps the only one I could have choosen where the language is suitable for a family audience! Well.. there is another, but I'll leave that for another time. The door bounce is just something I've roughed in with the channel editor. Here is the y rotation channel for the door (the open close channel). You can see that it starts to close on 285, closes on frame 298 and then again on 300 - this give it that bounce. The sound on the clip really helps too. Interesting. I'll try this on my next pass. I like the attention to detail Thanks Rodney - I've got some ideas to break it up abit.. I want to do some more snappy animation on this than on my last one. I think that his initial entrance nad "look round" could be simplified... at the moment it feels like he's going through too many 'moves'. Thanks for the comments guys. I'm gonna give it another pass this evening. The previous clip is still on go too.. but I wanted to take a bit of a time away from it before I did the final polish. Now... where is that coffee?