jesshmusic

When they built the dam in my hometown of Hendersonville, TN several years ago, they had to move a very old cemetary for a 18th century plantation called Rock Castle because it would have been flooded. Even more horrifying... when the big earthquake hit the New Madrid fault in southern Illinois, the Mississipi river actually flowed North. When it turned back south, it formed Reelfoot lake. The floods also hit a couple cemetaries and people as far south as Memphis reported seeing half open coffins floating down the river. Useless trivia is always good, right?

After I re-rig Gnosh for animation and get my phone lines at home fixed I will have more updates to post. All I have left to do is his fingers. I really wish TSM2 would come out for OS X, but it looks like that won't happen til spring. Until then I have decided to post a synopsis of the story and characters so far. Later I will post stills of characters, ships, and sets. I am so excited that my project is slowly coming together. Almost time to do voices! Cast: DEUTREENUMS: A race of ancient, wise, people that live in peace on their beautiful, mountainous homeworld. They were warlike in their early days, but now the only time they resort to combat is in self defense. Their military is now too small to stop the onslaught of the Artoxians who are interested in the mineral Trenium, which is abundant on Deutreenum. Gnosh....... Main character, he is an explorer, scientist, and an engineer. He has a good heart, and would gladly give his life for his friends. Flin............ Gnosh's best friend, he is the quintessential warrior. Flin is a master of all weaponry and considers himself the greatest warrior since Jarek of Deutreenumian legend. Chancellor Oglish....... Oglish is the head of the Council of Three Elders, which rules over the planet, he is very wise, but also very stubborn. He is very naive, especially when it comes to the intentions of the Artoxians and the weakness of Deutreenum's military. Glix........... A very old (1,215 years to be exact) robot that Gnosh and Flin discovered during their explorations. They know nothing of it's origans because it's early memory is corrupt. Occasionally it will remember things from long before like it was yesterday. Gnosh finds Glix to be intriguing, but Flin thinks his rambling is annoying and likes only his ability to move large cargo boxes with ease. ARTOXIANS: Race of greedy, evil cybernetic beings. Little is known of their history or their motives. They are, however constantly seeking the mineral Trenium, possibly as a power source. They are led by a large Artoxian simply referred to as the Supreme Chancellor. It is apparently very old and as been around since the beginning of written history in the Galaxy. THE TRAVELER is Gnosh's starship. it is small for an interstellar vehicle and works fabulously with a crew of one, but best with one to fly and navigate, and another to run tactical and weapons systems. It has accommodations for no more than four (and one robot!) DEUTREENUM CRUISER ARGONA: One of the fastest ships in the galaxy and the pride and joy (as well as Flagship) of the tiny Deutreenum Space Navy. It will play a VERY important part in this story. ......More information to come. That was a lot! (whew!)

looks good! You should have A:M on the desktop! Are you going to model the keyboard and mouse also?

Here in all of its soundless, 15 fps, Quicktime Sorensen codec grandeur is the OPENING SEQUENCE. There will be some minor tweaks to this, like adding sound, music and titles, but for the most part, what you see is what you get. There are a couple of obvious errors, Gnosh's hands meld into each other and the Traveler clips its wing on a obelisk. The Character scenes are made with our favorite software, but the space and cityscape scenes are made in Lightwave. There will be more Hash scenes coming soon, I am just ahead on the Lightwave side because I was rendering LW scenes while I was rigging Gnosh. But now he's ready and so is his buddy, Flin. So it is time to start working on the scenes involving them. It will be a character driven stroy, so Hash will take center stage over LW. By the end of the story, Most of the action will take place in Hash. I am just better at mechanical modeling on LW.... a LOT better. C&C welcome as always.... Opening Sequence Quicktime

Good job. They hair looks very realistic.

Hmmmm. Not bad... I have always had trouble animating this type of action, but I think maybe he shouldn't bounce quite so high. I don't know how that will look, but something is off in my mind's eye. Also, I can't remember how to do it, but he should accelerate into the ground, decelerate to the top of the bounce and accelerate back to the ground. I believe you would adjust the ease to accomplish this. I would try that before changing the bounce height. If some good 'ease' could be set the high bounce might provide some good comedy! Keep up the good work, I like these guys and the very red sets they inhabit!

I wish they had TSM 2 for OS X and that I had money to get it! Looks great! Keep it up.

That wouldn't be very interesting, he should be concentrating on absolute nothing! He is supposed to be clearing his mind. I will check out the anim tonight, cause I'm at work. I look forward to it.

That is very nice. When I get home I will check out the animation, but I think the techinique sounds right. I like the idea a lot.

Wow! That was very nice!

Wonderful work so far! I am a huge Ravel fan, as a matter of fact my piano teacher in college had one of his pianos in her home. I think it was white and all ornamented... I will be definately keeping an eye on your progress!

Good idea for a character. How soon before we can see him posed?

Interesting start. I look forward to seeing some more... I will always be more impressed with greebles and nurnies in AM. It is so much harder to do (for some things, anyway!)

Excellent work so far. I would personally like to see some more nurnies on the little base, maybe dirty it up some. Can't wait to see more. My mechanical skills in AM are not even near your level. I like it. BTW: I would NOT want to be the guy in that base. Yikes. Wouldn't be able to handle the 'any malfunction and you are dead, no chance of escape' thing!

Thanks. I think you are right. His hips probably need to at least come level over his non kicking foot too. I will fix that tonight.

I am slowly working on this one. Here is gnosh inside his home. The home is unfurnished right now and still a WIP. I am testing a kick action. More to come! C&C welcome. Kick_test.mov

Benjamin Franklin invented it. Mozart wrote at least one piece for it. I think you have done a nice job so far. The bowls do go through a trough of water to keep them wet, as far as I know. It looks very nice so far.

Good character! I couldn't watch the anim at work, but the business suit version is a riot!

I am trying to procrastinate until I can get the Garritan Personal Orchestra software. It is such a pain to be judged by the quality of a syntesized performance of my work. I wish I had a 100 piece orchestra at my disposal! I will be posting the music very soon, possibly this afternoon while I sit at the cafe. Thanks for the comments everyone, keep it coming I need all the encouragement I can get. I outlined the scenes last night and this sucker is going to be a project and a half. I am still working on Gnosh. Once he is done I have to spawn the other Deutreenums like him from his model. Other items made in AM: All characters be it bad guys (Artoxian), robots, aliens Sets occupied by characters Props used by characters Some items are already made, the cockpit and the interior of the spaceship, for instance.

Here is an image of Gnosh, the hero of the story. i am retexturing and re-rigging him so he is easier to animate. Lot of work left to do for now. Here also is a sample of a scene on the Artoxian Home World. The main movie will not be Letterbox. This is an older file. All done with AM! It should give you guys an idea of what I'm going for. Not complex, but looks good. No music has been added yet. I will do that dead last. I just want to tell a story, so don't expect very complex models! Artoxian Home World Scene - Quicktime 5MB

OOOH! I was close! 40 ft. Dang, underbid! Keep up the good work, maybe you are going for the documentary animation niche? I think AM would be perfect for that.... anyway. Just brainstorming. You going to animate the first (and last) fateful voyage of the Hunley?

If I remember my history channel it only held 10 or so guys. Maybe 20 or 30 feet long. Model looks great, BTW.

I really liked this scene. Tolkien meets Disney. The Balrog is the perfect modern version of the creature from Fantasia. Are you going to tackle an animation to the entire piece? Wow.... if you did that would be a huge undertaking. I look forward to seeing more. I wonder if anyone actually knows the story Mussorgsky had in mind with "A Night on Bare Mountain"? I am not a big believer in programmatic music, but it would be interesting to know.

Looks good so far. the Staff walk cycle looks really nice. Can't wait to see more.

Right on! You really got Bender looking good. Throw in a cigar and have him steal something and pop it in his hect and he'll be perfect! I like seeing him realized in 3d.