"Ebon: chapter 2, scene 4" - anime-style two-minute short

[kattkieru]

I wasn't going to say anything, not wishing to seem ungracious, but yeah, that's pretty much the way it is. My best-case scenario for Ebon would basically consist of giving episodes away for free on the internet, then maybe selling a few dozen DVDs if it gets popular enough. It's never going to air on TV, and Universal is not going to be buying the rights to make the film version starring Thandie Newton as Ebon.

 

 

I can't imagine Thandie Newton bald, but she'd look good even in a burlap sack. I wonder if she could pull off bad-ass? I was thinking Rosario Dawson might be a better choice, but she's a little too tall.

 

On a total side note, have you read Octavia Butler's Fledgeling? It's about a small lady vampire with dark skin and the entire time I was reading it I couldn't help imagininig Ebon running around, overlayed over top of a bunch of live actors.

 

On to the clip. I've already told you a lot about what I think, but aside from a crack in the tiles on the wall (which I'd still like to see), I finally figured out what could make his impact read more: a camera jiggle.

 

The camera really rocks a bit when it turns around as she's spinning to hit him, but when he hits the wall the camera's moderately still. If the camera rocked at the time of impact (pitch it left and right), and there was a good sound in there, I think it'd read really well.

 

Incidentally, how strong, exactly, is Ebon? You still haven't given a full breakdown on that, or if you have I've forgotten. If she's strong enough to kick him into the wall like that and to have him collide with it at a decent speed, wouldn't that hit be good enough to crack his ribs or something?

 

Oh, and because this isn't suggested enough, something in the room needs to be lit on fire. Doesn't even have to be plot related-- just have something randomly spark up. ^-^

[luckbat]

I can't believe it's taken me a month just to do a five-second revision, but now that my new G5's fully operational, maybe the process will begin to speed up a bit. Here's a rough pass incorporating some of the comments I've received to date. Honestly, I've spent so much time on this thing I can't even tell what it looks like anymore.

 

[attachmentid=13928]

Here's what you should expect to see:

 

1. A much more vigorous (too much?) grab-and-yank, with more initial resistance from Ebon.

 

2. Actual hip movement.

 

3. More bobble-headed whiplash action on Ebon.

 

4. A new camera path. Not necessarily a better one, but the models ended up so far from their original positions in this revision that I had to completely redo the camera move, although I tried to preserve the spirit of the original. The framing's been slighly improved, in my opinion, but to most people it'll look exactly the same.

 

Still to come: There's no hand movement as yet, and I haven't paid much attention to arcs, either. But I wanted to get something up before I go blind from staring at this thing.

 

Feedback, as always, is encouraged.

shot_12_take_3.mov

[3DArtZ]

Much improved!!!!

I like the whole clip.

the guards right arm bothers me a bit as he is kicked up against the wall and then slumps down it....

But I'm not sure what the arm could be doing. It looks like it is sticking straight out.

 

Mike Fitz

www.3dartz.com

[Dhar]

Yah! Much better, more powerful. I couldn't see the kick but didn't need to, the aftermath explained what happened, looked very believable to me.

 

On to the next scene

[kattkieru]

I can't believe it's taken me a month just to do a five-second revision, but now that my new G5's fully operational, ...

 

... you'll show those rebel scum! Long live the brushed-metal Empire!

 

Still to come: There's no hand movement as yet, and I haven't paid much attention to arcs, either. But I wanted to get something up before I go blind from staring at this thing.

 

You have the rest of my comments already, but I didn't notice that there's "no hand movement," so whatever you were planning could probably be nixed in favor of saving some time. I agree that you could move on from here, cloak notwithstanding.

[C-grid]

Hello Mike,

 

From here you welcomed me to make some suggestion pointers, they will be based on the downloaded "latest_animatic.mov", this only from what I've seen, not knowing your intentions, reading your script(s), etc.

 

It starts with the taps, hands and the bubble, my advise: split the eye-attraction(hands/bubble) moment over time, or use field of depth(blur).

 

When the female-character is coming out of the window, there's a strange square on the right of her.

Her back would be full of light, if she is coming from the same place, as where we can see the other light is shining through the window.

 

In the 29th seconds we can see her standing, unfortunatly hanging in the air, this mainly caused by a wrong light setting, her feet have no shadow, even later on, when she is walking where the floor is really dark. See the attached still with a real quick retouch.

 

In the 35th sec. she stops walking but it's too abrupt, put some ease in it.

 

In the 37th and 38th sec, the viewer knows he is standing there really short, if there were this much droplets on the floor, we certainly should see some drops on the hand on a close-up.

 

In the sec 41 and 42, she is pointing with her finger, although her body moves, her finger has totally no movement, this looks very unnatural, now it looks she is hanging on her finger.

 

From sec 51-57 the umbrella's on her back aren't moving itself.

 

Ok Mike, that's it for now.

 

I mean all these things in a nice way. (Did I need to say this...(?))

Hope this will help you in the right direction.

 

Niels.

 

 

ps.

The cap as seen in 1min1sec, she is pushing this to the back, and it looks really stiff, such things are indeed stiffer than the rest of the clothing, but not 'plastic-like'. I didn't place this in the section above cause I find it not 'that' relevant, it's not really annoying and fixing it doesn't take 2 sec.

[C-grid]

Hello luckbat,

 

 

How is Ebon doing?

 

 

Niels.

[luckbat]

Well, I don't like posting to this thread without any new footage to showcase, but since you asked, here's the low-down:

 

On Valentine's day, I got kicked out of my apartment. It wasn't totally unexpected--my 9-to-5 schedule had been cramping my musician roommates' lifestyles--but it still sucked. Fortunately, I was able to find a new apartment in time, and moved to a new place (with no roommates) on March 1st. Unfortunately, the move itself was incredibly costly, not only because my new rent is effectively double my old rent, but also because of the considerable expense to move my furniture. In all, I ended up shelling out about $5000. Not pleasant.

 

To help offset the financial hit, I took on a couple of freelance UI-design jobs, despite already having a day job. All my deadlines somehow converged at once, and I wound up putting in 42 hours of freelance work in five days, while still working 9 to 5 at my real job. It's all a blur to me now.

 

Don't get me wrong, there's no need to pull out the violins--my new apartment is quiet and comfy, and the freelance gigs are almost done--I'm simply describing what it takes to keep me away from this project for six straight weeks.

 

It looks like I'm going to end up spending one more weekend wrapping up the bulk of the freelance work, but starting April 3, I'm putting my focus back where it belongs: animation. Any more freelance work comes my way, I'm turning it down. It's just not worth it.

[luckbat]

Ebon's back, folks. And this time, it's personal.

 

For the last three months, I've been working on the rig to end all rigs: a complex web of interlocking bones capable of deforming my character's cloak into any conceivable position, yet still appearing clothlike while in motion. Two weeks ago, that rig became a reality. It took 212 bones, hundreds of constraints, and an eternity of trial and error, but I did it.

 

 

Yeah, that's right. I said 212 bones.

 

As rigs go, it's far from perfect, but it gets the job done:

 

 

No SimCloth. No dynamic constraints. Nothing but Aim At and Orient Like.

 

So now, at long last, it's back to animating. I wish I had more to show than yet another revision of shot 12, but it had to be done, and I really learned a lot while I was putting this together. If you compare it to my first attempt, I think you'll agree that the timing is much better. Another thing I'd been eagerly awaiting was the opportunity to cut shot 12 into the rest of the animatic, which, since it required me to re-keyframe shot 11 using the new cloak rig, was no small undertaking. I had to export the choreographies from shot 12 as actions, then blend them into the end of shot 11 so that the movements would match. But I think it works quite well. What do you think?

 

 

Download animatic of shots 1-12

(9.2MB, 82 seconds, no sound)

[luckbat]

And now that I'm posting again, let's address C-grid's crits:

It starts with the taps, hands and the bubble, my advise: split the eye-attraction(hands/bubble) moment over time, or use field of depth(blur).

Agreed. I've been using more and more DOF as I work my way through the shots, and I will probably recreate that opening shot with a strong DOF effect, though probably not a rack-focus. Those are cheesy.

 

When the female-character is coming out of the window, there's a strange square on the right of her...

That's a compositing glitch. When I do the final layering, I won't be taking shortcuts like I've been doing.

 

...her feet have no shadow, even later on, when she is walking where the floor is really dark....

I'm not worrying about the shadows too much for these animatics, but I'll make sure the characters cast proper shadows once I do a lighting pass. I already had to render some extra shadows for Monk in shot 12 to better show his spatial positioning.

 

In the 35th sec. she stops walking but it's too abrupt, put some ease in it.

That was a bug in A:M v.11.1 that prevented certain kinds of blended actions. Now that it's fixed in v12, I'll be able to ease it out appropriately the next time I revisit this shot.

 

...if there were this much droplets on the floor, we certainly should see some drops on the hand on a close-up.

Pending. This was touched on briefly here: http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?s=&sh...ndpost&p=126796

 

...she is pointing with her finger, although her body moves, her finger has totally no movement...

Yeah, that's IK for you. That whole wrist flip segment has never looked natural. I have an idea of how to improve it, though, so when I do a second pass on that shot, I'll probably switch it back to FK.

 

...the umbrella's on her back aren't moving itself.

When I built that walk cycle, I didn't have separate bones just for the umbrellas. I have since added these, so when I get around to re-doing the walk cycle, I'll add a bit of 'brella sway.

[Dearmad]

That leap shot is vey vey nice... yes... vey vey nice.

[oakchas]

Mike,

Overall, I really like what I've seen so far... looking (again) from a consumer/viewer standpoint. I dont' see anything that I can critique.

 

That is not to say anybody else is wrong... just that I don't have enough experience tearing stuff apart and searching for the little flaws that don't make it work.

 

And the cloak rigging... WOWOWW whew! that haddabe a lot of work! I really want to see that move! (I don't see enough of it in the animatic) I like the characters so far, and the toonline/anime style...

 

I hope I can do as well.

[cory]

Wow! Overall it's very nice. It seems to be edited a little slow, but that would be due to the lack of sound. I'm sure with the sound or dialogue it would look good. There is a little here or there that can be touched up, I'm sure you are your own harshest critic, and I don't need to point things out. It's much better than some of my daughter's Barbie animated movies. I suppose they were made by a studio somewhere. Keep up the good work. when can we hear some sound with it?

 

Cory

[Zaryin]

I'm not really qualified ot rate your animation, but I thought it was great! I love the new cloak .

[Dhar]

Mike, I think this is coming along quite nicely.

 

I have a question; are you working on the shots in chronological order or do you jump from scene to scene and then stitch them (edit them) together later?

[luckbat]

It seems to be edited a little slow, but that would be due to the lack of sound. I'm sure with the sound or dialogue it would look good. [...] when can we hear some sound with it?

Soon, I hope! I want to finish the animatic pass before I do a lipsync pass, but hopefully that won't be much longer. I'm expecting this scene to be about 2 minutes long, so I'm more than halfway done with the first pass.

 

I have a question; are you working on the shots in chronological order or do you jump from scene to scene and then stitch them (edit them) together later?

Well, for this project, shots 1-11 are in one Choreography, with shots 12 and up in a second Chor. Each Chor contains multiple cameras, allowing me to render out the same sequence from multiple angles. Those rendered shots are then cut together in a compositing program, where I can fine-tune the color and contrast.

 

Any time I need to revise a shot, I make corrections to the relevant part of the Chor, select the appropriate camera, and re-render that portion. Since I render to folders full of targas, I don't always have to re-do the entire shot, just the changed part. And since the backgrounds are composited separately from the foregrounds, unless I change a camera position, I only need to re-render the characters.

[luckbat]

 

There is no shot 13.

 

There was supposed to be a shot 13, of course. It was a close-up reaction shot of Monk's face as Ebon takes a swing at him. But after all the keyframes were in, I felt it was better to stay in shot 12 for the duration. I've been dropping shots left and right since I started animating this thing. I don't know what it means, or if I made the right decision. But the result is that my scene's entire "fight sequence" is now contained in a single continuous seven-second shot.

 

I think it looks pretty spiffy.

 

That doesn't change the fact that I am completely, utterly, sick to death of shot 12. I assume you guys are, too. I mean, I've been posting the same five seconds of animation to this thread for five months now. Five months! If anyone were paying me to do this, they'd have fired me by now.

 

Ah well. It wasn't all hellish. I did learn a lot about rigging. I even figured out a way to keyframe my cloak rig's lag properties, allowing me an unbelievable level of control over how the cloak moves and flows. And I think I'm a better animator than I was five months ago.

 

But whatever. It was the most difficult shot I've ever animated, and now it's done*.

 

[attachmentid=17276]

 

_______

* Not counting the, y'know, finger movements, lipsync, facial expressions and lighting work I still have to do.

Shot_12_final2.mov

[Rodney]

I think it looks pretty spiffy.

 

I'm in full agreement here... VERY spiffy.

Now that is an action scene.

The time you've been putting into this has really paid off.

 

Outstanding work Mike!

[Dhar]

Whoa! That's awesome.

 

You may be sick of this scene, but I enjoyed every bit of its progress.

[3DArtZ]

I wonder how you were controlling the arm, IK or FK? Specifically when she swings her

right hand at that guys face.....

there is something about it that isn't showing up right in my head.... like the arm is too stiff/straight, or it looks like she is throwing her forearm at the guy, instead of her hand.

 

Fist or open hand going to the head, I think that the arm has to have a slight bend in it....

NOT that I'm saying it doesn't, it might just be the angle.

 

But, this is just nit picking...... overall if I were watching this on tv, I think it would look VERY spiffy!

 

Mike Fitz

www.3dartz.com

[trajcedrv]

lookin' great, luckbat!

 

Keep us posted!

[luckbat]

Specifically when she swings her right hand at that guys face.....

there is something about it that isn't showing up right in my head.... like the arm is too stiff/straight, or it looks like she is throwing her forearm at the guy, instead of her hand.

 

Fist or open hand going to the head, I think that the arm has to have a slight bend in it....

NOT that I'm saying it doesn't, it might just be the angle.

 

But, this is just nit picking......

I don't think it's nit-picking. That arm should be the center of attention in that moment, so it's important that it look right. I spent a few minutes jumping around taking practice swings, and you're clearly right. Both the arm and the hand position are way off.

 

Fortunately, it's an easy fix. I'll take care of it tonight. Thanks for pointing this out, Mike.

[C-grid]

I am glad to see, you're on the roll again.

 

Niels.

[Kricket]

Beautiful work!

[C-grid]

Hello Luckbat,

 

I just downloaded the movie.

 

It's worth doing a slowmotion of the round-kick right after it has taken place, continue with her strike, his head may move slightly later in time on the downwards-key, so that she swings just above the head, not 10cm, this will make look her strike and his defence more firm.

 

If you really have alot of time, you could make the head of ebon give some firmer movement at the beginning.

 

 

Niels.

 

 

ps.

I didn't ask for the slowmotion, just because 'it goes so fast', but it's well done.

[Stuart Rogers]

This is really nice. In particular I think the movement in the first half, before the camera swings around, looks very realistic. I like the movement of the cape too - all that work on rigging it has paid off. I also think you have a nice visual mix of anime characters and full 3D sets.

 

At first I was going to criticise the rapid movement of the camera, but now I've watched it several times I think a cut wouldn't work as well - especially when you have a good soundtrack to accompany it.

 

Two things that don't work so well for me...

1. When Ebon strikes the guy's head there doesn't seem to be much weight behind it. Again, good sound effects might help convey the action better without recourse to tweaking the animation.

2. The guy seems to be able to take Ebon's blow, recoil, and get his chop in far too quickly. The camera angle and the anime style don't show the full force of this chopping action. Maybe this sticks out to my eye because that's where the movie suddenly ends.

 

Even so, I think you have some nice timing here, with a good balance of action and pausing. I've only once tried choreographing two characters together and I found it very difficult to make it look as if they were on the same planet let alone interacting - so I'm particularly impressed.

[luckbat]

continue with her strike, his head may move slightly later in time on the downwards-key, so that she swings just above the head, not 10cm, this will make look her strike and his defence more firm.

Well, if he ducks even one frame later, her hand will connect with his face. But you're right, it does seem like she misses by quite a wide margin. I'll see what I can do.

 

This is really nice. In particular I think the movement in the first half, before the camera swings around, looks very realistic. I like the movement of the cape too - all that work on rigging it has paid off. I also think you have a nice visual mix of anime characters and full 3D sets.

Thanks so much, Stuart!

 

At first I was going to criticise the rapid movement of the camera, but now I've watched it several times I think a cut wouldn't work as well

Alas, a cut wouldn't work at all, since it would cross the camera axis. Frankly speaking, one of the prime motivating factors of that camera move is that it's the only way I can get the camera out of the corner it's in without creating a jump cut. (I could, of course, avoid getting stuck in the corner in the first place, but it's the best way to frame Ebon's close-up at the beginning of the shot.)

 

When Ebon strikes the guy's head there doesn't seem to be much weight behind it.

But... She missed!

 

The guy seems to be able to take Ebon's blow, recoil, and get his chop in far too quickly.

Completely agree. This was a compromise I had to make for logistical reasons. Namely, if I allow Monk any extra time to wind up, then Ebon practically has to move in slow motion to compensate. Hmm... If I have him duck lower, I might be able to follow up by having him push himself off the ground more forcefully. That might help sell it a little better.

[Stuart Rogers]

Alas, a cut wouldn't work at all, since it would cross the camera axis.

Yes. I couldn't put my finger on why I decided a cut wouldn't work, but I think that's it.

When Ebon strikes the guy's head there doesn't seem to be much weight behind it.

But... She missed!

It occurred to me this was the case, but not until I had posted, turned my computer off, and gone to bed.

The guy seems to be able to take Ebon's blow, recoil, and get his chop in far too quickly.

.... if I allow Monk any extra time to wind up, then Ebon practically has to move in slow motion to compensate. Hmm... If I have him duck lower....

I quite understand. I think one of the problems is that we're scrutinising this almost frame-by-frame rather than watching it as a movie, which is why I kept mentioning soundtracks - once the whole is together, these little nit-picky points won't stand out.

 

Before you dive into trying to fix this, I suggest you take a break from it and do something else - the next sequence perhaps. I find it easier to see what needs fixing after a break.

[luckbat]

Quick update to shot 12. I've made what I hope are some subtle improvements to the "swing-and-miss" portion of the shot, smoothing out both Ebon's swipe and Monk's dodge. I've also added one more second of animation, in preparation for the cut to the next shot. (One second? Hey, that's 14% more footage!)

 

Man, that had to hurt.

 

Some of the other changes I've made are mostly invisible--I resplined both Monk and Ebon's faces to allow for a greater range of expression and mouth movement when the time comes to do lipsync. I sharpened Monk's cheekbones a little. I completely rebuilt Monk's mesh and skeleton between the hips and the knees, as the old model wasn't able to accommodate this range of motion. (While I was at it, I also added some spline wrinkles to the front of his pants, but they're flattened out by the lighting in this shot. No biggie.)

 

Hope you like it. Coming up next: "When umbrellas tumble!"

Shot_12_8sec.mov

[robcat2075]

I haven't caught this one in quite a while.

 

It does look much improved! I like the play of expression across their faces.

 

Since you're doing the moving camera thing, how about a tiny camera shake when Ebon's head hits it?

 

I still think Ebon's (that is the one in the cloak, right?) elbow into Mr. CSPD's ribs is getting lost.

 

I'm still uneasy about the way Mr. CSPD travels to the ground after being flung to the wall. He's moving down but not really falling.

 

I don't understand the camera shake when he elbows Ebon at the end.

[Stuart Rogers]

I've made what I hope are some subtle improvements to the "swing-and-miss" portion of the shot, smoothing out both Ebon's swipe and Monk's dodge. ... I've also added one more second of animation, in preparation for the cut to the next shot.

That's a lot better, and the extra second helps - the previous edit's 'story' had a beginning, a middle, but no end.

Coming up next: "When umbrellas tumble!"

I look forward to it - the flying umbrella is a nice touch.

BTW Why does she carry two umbrellas?

EDIT: After the camera has moved around to show the fight, one of the cubicle walls moves in and out of the shot. Sometimes when I watch this movie that wall is really distracting. If it annoys you too, perhaps you could disable that wall as the camera moves into position.

EDIT 2: I see why it only annoys me sometimes... I've been playing the movie back full screen (it scales up beautifully) but sometimes for smoother playback with QuickTime on my iBook I select 'Full Screen' then 'Double Size', which shows the movie as double size with a black border filling to the edge of the screen, and that cubicle wall makes it look like the right hand border is wobbling about.

[luckbat]

It does look much improved! I like the play of expression across their faces.

Thanks! The funny thing is, there are no expressions in this animation. Well, okay, Ebon has a few keyframes on her eyes at the beginning, but Monk doesn't even have facial sliders set up yet. All of his "expressions" are the result of the tilt of his head and the shadows on his face. Which is not to say that I disagree with you--I think he does, in fact, look like he's sneering a bit as he delivers the last blow.

 

For the record, there will be real facial expressions added during the lipsync pass. When I start building the expression sliders, I'll post the typical grid-of-sample-expressions in this thread.

 

Since you're doing the moving camera thing, how about a tiny camera shake when Ebon's head hits it?

Technically, she doesn't actually make contact with the camera, but the real reason is, I want the camera swivel on Ebon's kick to be fairly dramatic. Up until this shot, the camera has remained completely static, except for the brief tracking move in shot 3. So, if I jiggle the camera around during Ebon's close-up, it foreshadows the switch to "handheld-style" camera movement later on, which in my view diminishes its impact. I concede I may be going a little overboard in the film-theory department here.

 

I still think Ebon's (that is the one in the cloak, right?) elbow into Mr. CSPD's ribs is getting lost.

This is probably the weakest part of the shot. It's not an elbow in the ribs, it's a shoulder to the chest, but the fact that it doesn't read that way is sort of the problem. Looking at it now (this part of the shot was done over half a year ago), I'm pretty sure Ebon's head swivels the wrong way before the hit, and Monk seems to react a few frames too soon. I'm open to suggestions.

 

I'm still uneasy about the way Mr. CSPD travels to the ground after being flung to the wall. He's moving down but not really falling.

I'll buy that. Too slow? Not enough acceleration? What would you change?

 

I don't understand the camera shake when he elbows Ebon at the end.

It's from the, uh--you know, shockwave.

 

BTW Why does she carry two umbrellas?

Umbrellas are essential when direct sunlight can kill you. The second one's a spare.

[Rodney]

I thought maybe the umbrellas doubled as weapons too. No?

I must have imagined that.

[the_black_mage]

lol yeah one of the chracters of soul caliber uses an umbrella

[Viper GTX2.0]

Very nice work. You can turn that in to a game i think.

[robcat2075]

It does look much improved! I like the play of expression across their faces.

All of his "expressions" are the result of the tilt of his head and the shadows on his face. Which is not to say that I disagree with you--I think he does, in fact, look like he's sneering a bit as he delivers the last blow.

The way the head is presented to the camera is a big part of expression. That's why game characters appear lifeless... the animator has no control over how the camera will be positioned during game play.

 

 

For the record, there will be real facial expressions added during the lipsync pass.

Don't over do it.

Since you're doing the moving camera thing, how about a tiny camera shake when Ebon's head hits it?

Technically, she doesn't actually make contact with the camera, but the real reason is, I want the camera swivel on Ebon's kick to be fairly dramatic. .

make it small enough to be sensed without the viewer going "Hey, great camera shake!"

 

I still think Ebon's (that is the one in the cloak, right?) elbow into Mr. CSPD's ribs is getting lost.

This is probably the weakest part of the shot. It's not an elbow in the ribs, it's a shoulder to the chest, but the fact that it doesn't read that way is sort of the problem. Looking at it now (this part of the shot was done over half a year ago), I'm pretty sure Ebon's head swivels the wrong way before the hit, and Monk seems to react a few frames too soon. I'm open to suggestions.

 

I'm still uneasy about the way Mr. CSPD travels to the ground after being flung to the wall. He's moving down but not really falling.

I'll buy that. Too slow? Not enough acceleration? What would you change?

Part of it is the camera is following him down too precisely; it's negating his downward motion. Another part is there isn't much effect on his body when his knees hit the ground. And yeah, he may be falling too linearly.

[robcat2075]

This is probably the weakest part of the shot. It's not an elbow in the ribs, it's a shoulder to the chest, but the fact that it doesn't read that way is sort of the problem. Looking at it now (this part of the shot was done over half a year ago), I'm pretty sure Ebon's head swivels the wrong way before the hit, and Monk seems to react a few frames too soon. I'm open to suggestions.

 

sorry , got the quotes messed up on that.

 

The timing and what I can see of the body position made it look to me like an elbow to the ribs. everything seems to be happening on the side of the body the camera can not see so that's getting inthe way of it being clear. Maybe it doesn't need to be clear. maybe just the flurry of activity will be enought to tell the audience that some kind of impact has happened. A lot of impacts in live action aren't clear at all because if they were clear we'd see that cowboy A's fist never came near Cowboy B's jaw.

 

But I would say put this shot up for now. If you can get all the other shots to look this good I think you'd have an compelling film and you can always revisit this shot with the knowledge you've gained by solving other porblems.

[luckbat]

Enough with the kung-fu stuff, let's get back to the walking! And the lying on the ground!

 

 

As tediously simple as this half-shot may appear, setting it up was no picnic. Due to Monk's root bone being oriented in the opposite direction of the walk path, my attempts to blend in a walk cycle resulted in an inverting of the translations and orientations, causing his arms and legs to pass through each other in a most unpleasant manner. I spent almost a day trying to compensate for it before I threw in the towel and just added a second model, constrained every one of its bones to the corresponding bones in the original, and then assigned the walk cycle to that one.

 

Ebon's cloak, as usual, gave me no end of trouble, and I was forced to re-work the rig yet again, this time de-coupling the base cloak bone from the spine bone so that I could constrain it to the floor at the appropriate moment. I can't believe how many things I've needed that cloak to do.

 

[attachmentid=18106]

Anyway, be sure to stay tuned for the next riveting installment, in which someone bends down and picks up an umbrella! You won't want to miss it.

Shot_14.mov

[dre4mer]

Hey mike, looking very good, I had missed the last two shots. Excellent work. I can only imagine the headaches trying to get the actions to work as you described. Though the result certainly doesn't show it. The motion looks good. I hadn't seen the whole kick and follow through either, also looking very good. It's especially cool to see you sticking to this, and fighting your way through the issues! Can't wait to see what's next!

 

My only tiny comment is that his arm does a small pop straight while he's rising, which catches my eye. Love the umbrella bounce.

 

Great work,

 

-Ethan

[Rodney]

be sure to stay tuned for the next riveting installment, in which someone bends down and picks up an umbrella! You won't want to miss it.

 

I will remain riveted to my computer screen until you post the next installment.

Please don't make us wait too long! (well take as long as you need BUT HURRY!)

 

I purposely didn't read the Ebon script just so I will be surprised by events as they unfold... and I like the way they are unfolding!

[Dhar]

That's such really cool stuff.

 

Hey, how come you can upload over 1MB movie & I can't?

[luckbat]

Hash Fellow.

[oakchas]

Dhar,

 

We gotta win a contest!

 

Thanks for bringing this back to top, Mike... I was going schitzy over spelling and such in other threads... I look forward to seeing this at home, don't have QT at work.

[Stuart Rogers]

As tediously simple as this half-shot may appear, setting it up was no picnic.

Looking good! I particularly like the way you keep Ebon moving in the background while we're focussing on Monk getting to his feet.

 

I have two suggestions you may wish to utterly ignore...

1. It might be more dramatic if the umbrella ends up closer to the camera. Make the viewer recoil from the impending impact and he'll feel more involved. Don't worry if Monk can only reach the tip of the umbrella from where he stands - a lot of people won't pick such things up directly but will grab the tip end and slide it closer before taking a firmer grip.

2. When he stands up, have you considered letting him stagger back slightly, to rest his weight against the wall for a moment? The previous action would have played havoc with his blood pressure, and getting to his feet after such exertions could leave him momentarily dizzy. (Well, it would leave this out-of-shape critic very dizzy!))

Anyway, be sure to stay tuned for the next riveting installment, in which someone bends down and picks up an umbrella! You won't want to miss it.

I look forward to it!

[luckbat]

Here is it, folks. Eight more seconds of action-packed "guy picking up an umbrella" footage. I just hope it can live up to the hype.

 

 

Now I know the question on everyone's lips is, "How did you pull off the umbrella pick-up sequence?" I know, right? Well, it's a funny story.

 

The umbrella is, of course, part of the Ebon model. It has its own bone, parented to her spine bone. However, the moment the umbrella flies out of its sheath, it needs to stop being a child of the spine bone, and start being a "free agent." To accomplish this, I created a separate umbrella model with an identical bone, set its transparency to 100%, and constrained Ebon's umbrella bone to it. So now there's an invisible umbrella controlling Ebon's umbrella.

 

I also wanted the umbrella to spin as it careened through the air, which was easier said than done. Spinning actions need to be keyframed precisely, or else it'll look like the object is accelerating in midair. I tried a variety of approaches before I settled on constraining the invisible umbrella's bone to a null oriented perpendicular to the umbrella, allowing me to spin the null using only its Z-axis, which gives me a clean set of rotation keyframes to work from.

 

Once it lands on the floor, Monk needs to pick it up, so I switched his hand to IK and constrained the umbrella bone to his IK hand bone. That seemed to work well, but naturally as soon as I transitioned back to FK, the umbrella slipped away, so I ended up having to constrain the IK hand bone to the FK hand bone to allow for for proper FK animation.

 

So, to review:

 

1. Ebon's umbrella bone constrained to hidden umbrella bone, then

2. Umbrella bone constrained to spinning null, then

3. Umbrella bone constrained to IK hand bone, then

4. IK hand bone constrained to FK hand bone.

 

The end result is what makes it all worthwhile, though. It totally looks like Monk is picking up that umbrella. He picks the hell up out of it. It was so worth the week I spent on this.

 

The other major change you'll notice (aside from the additional eight seconds, I mean) is that I went back and added "acting" to Monk's performance. It's not like I forgot, it's just that the "standing up" portion of the animation was already the toughest thing I've ever had to animate, and I wasn't sure my abilities were up to the task of having the guy rise to his feet and be in extreme pain at the same time. Nevertheless, that's a lousy reason not to do it. So, I gritted my teeth, slid all my keyframes over, and rebuilt the segment. Personally, I liked the old "standing up" sequence better, but it just didn't make sense for Monk to be able to shrug off a beating like that. Oh well.

 

Let's see, what else was incredibly hard... Hey, how about those animated volumetrics? Figuring out a way to render those as a separate pass was a chore, but it was fun to see them in action. I'll be adding that effect to some of the earlier shots once I have a chance to re-render them.

 

I guess that's all for this time. By the way, this shot is still to be continued, if you can believe that. There are a few more seconds of Monk's reaction I need to add. Hopefully it won't take me more than a couple of weeks. Stay tuned.

Shot_14b.mov

[Rodney]

Nice.

 

He seriously did pick up that umbrella.

 

The entire sequence (or is that shot) works so well.

You obviously put some serious time into the planning of it.

 

What is not seen (Ebon's disappearance in the second between when she is seen on the floor and when Monks body lets the camera (us) see where she was) is as great a touch of storytelling as any I've seen. You reveal more about the character of Ebon without even showing the character... sweet.

 

Powerful stuff.

 

Now I want to know more about those umbrellas.

[kattkieru]

Now I want to know more about those umbrellas.

 

Well I hope Luckbat doesn't mind me spilling a trade secret of his, but the umbrellas actually come from a tiny bodega on 54th Street in NYC. Which part of 54th is, I think, something I'll leave to you as an excercise in urban exploration.

 

You already have all my comments man; I just wanted to chime in and shout Banzai, Banzai! here as well.

[luckbat]

I am surrounded by comedians.

[KenH]

That's looking cool. I've missed most of the thread and it would be really cool to be able to view all the (final) clips in one continuous movie. If there is such a download, point me to it.

 

I also wonder why you didn't just constrain the umbrella to the hand. Maybe you mentioned it somewhere.

[luckbat]

Ken, you can see the whole sequence edited together here. (I haven't added the latest eight seconds yet.)

 

I also wonder why you didn't just constrain the umbrella to the hand.

Because I'm an imbecile. Constraining the umbrella to the geometry hand bone rather than the rig hand bone never even occurred to me. (Maybe because it's hidden?) Oh well, live and learn. Thanks, Ken.