mike meyer Posted July 5, 2005 Posted July 5, 2005 hello hashers, we've just finished the summer commercial for SATURN. check it out... a short description: Finally! The Smith family is longing for relaxation and out for holiday adventures in the "GEILLORCA" bargain oasis. One thing's for sure - their neighbours will be envious... greetings, mike and jo and the crew Quote
trajcedrv Posted July 5, 2005 Posted July 5, 2005 You continue to make amazing work!!! GREAT!!! (should I put some more exclamation points ? ... just in case... !!!!!!!!!!!) Great work, I am not reffering only to this movie. Soulcage department, you really really really do wonders... Congrats! Drvarceto Quote
pixelmech Posted July 5, 2005 Posted July 5, 2005 That's great - I love the way they all have their own unique walk. Quote
Steven Cleary Posted July 5, 2005 Posted July 5, 2005 Superb. I love the style and the colour range. Nice subtle touches to the character motion. My respect for the Soulcage Department grows and grows. Steve. Quote
dimos Posted July 5, 2005 Posted July 5, 2005 I said it before and I'll say it again. I HATE YOU ALL! (said in a harsh, envious loving way) Dimos Quote
KenH Posted July 5, 2005 Posted July 5, 2005 You're peerless. I love the hair on your characters. Quote
3DArtZ Posted July 5, 2005 Posted July 5, 2005 Saturn has parking for jumbo jets!!!! They must be huge! Great inpiring work guys!!! Mike Fitz www.3dartz.com Quote
jo b. Posted July 5, 2005 Posted July 5, 2005 well thanks to all of you. we're glad you like it. Quote
patrick_j_clarke Posted July 5, 2005 Posted July 5, 2005 That's great - I love the way they all have their own unique walk. I agree! The uniqueness to the walks instantly defined the characters. Rendering quality was impeccable! Great work guys! - pjc Quote
Mr. Jaqe Posted July 5, 2005 Posted July 5, 2005 Wow! And the worst thing was that the family looked exactly likemy own: a goofy dad, a decisive mother, a "barbie" daughter and a "rock'd" son. Spooky... Quote
jfirestine Posted July 5, 2005 Posted July 5, 2005 Excellent! Can you show us some "behind the scenes" pictures? Wireframes, characters, etc. As always, you do some amazing work! Quote
higginsdj Posted July 6, 2005 Posted July 6, 2005 Hey that was great. What I would love to see (and probably many others) is a DVD of all your work with some production sequences/notes/footage/samples etc on actually putting a project together from initial pitch to final delivery. Most of us have no idea (well I have no idea) - I'd fork out $50US for one (in english or at least with english sub titles) Cheers Quote
jo b. Posted July 6, 2005 Posted July 6, 2005 well thanks again. Excellent! Can you show us some "behind the scenes" pictures? Wireframes, characters, etc. As always, you do some amazing work! we don't have wires, but some character sheets and turns. the sheet isn't final, but i guess you'll find the differences - odd one out! the turns are a little rough in the compositing, cause we did them just to show the models, not the final look. the turn of the mother is missing though, cause the scedule was too tight to finish it. TURN - DAD TURN - SON TURN - DAUGHTER TURN - BEAUTY say hello to them... Quote
cosmonaut Posted July 6, 2005 Posted July 6, 2005 Awesome work as usual. I take it you guys are using V11 hair now? Looking very nice. Kevin Quote
3DArtZ Posted July 6, 2005 Posted July 6, 2005 Wow! Thanks for showing us the extra stuff. how about some stuff on how you built the store.... if you can:) Mike Fitz www.3dartz.com Quote
jo b. Posted July 6, 2005 Posted July 6, 2005 how about some stuff on how you built the store.... if you can:) sure. is there something special you want to know? cuz... there isn't something special about it. we just bulid elements and put them together in a chor. we lighted the floor and the celing seperately. we animated loops with stride length for the customers. that's it. Quote
3DArtZ Posted July 6, 2005 Posted July 6, 2005 Well, I was thinking about all the shelves with the items on it... are they real 3d items or is it a map on a flat surface? Mike Fitz www.3dartz.com Quote
Admin Rodney Posted July 6, 2005 Admin Posted July 6, 2005 No boring 3D turnarounds for Soulcage! Those look great and really convey the characters personalities. There is a reason you guys rock... you really have talent and know what you are doing. Great design, production and final execution. Saturn is lucky to have you animating their commericials. Keep the edge guys! Great stuff. Quote
Dalemation Posted July 6, 2005 Posted July 6, 2005 I can't say much more than has already been said....brilliant work again!! The animation of the girl, in particular, is superb. Quote
jo b. Posted July 7, 2005 Posted July 7, 2005 Well, I was thinking about all the shelves with the items on it... are they real 3d items or is it a map on a flat surface? just the shelves on the outer walls of the market are mapped. Quote
selahpoetic Posted July 8, 2005 Posted July 8, 2005 I'm still new to this so sorry if my response and question is a little vague but was wondering as far as rendering: the quality seems to have a greater look then what I've seen most do! (basically it looks really great) what did you guys do to achieve it. and the background in the picture that mike summitted (with what looks like to be mountains and a plane and clouds) are they 3d elements or painted pictures our photographs. Quote
Fuchur Posted July 8, 2005 Posted July 8, 2005 I think, for the renderingquality: They know how to use lights, and they know what shaders are It lloks a bit, like they used yves shader for faking SSS... *Fuchur* Quote
mike meyer Posted July 8, 2005 Author Posted July 8, 2005 I'm still new to this so sorry if my response and question is a little vague but was wondering as far as rendering: the quality seems to have a greater look then what I've seen most do! (basically it looks really great) what did you guys do to achieve it. hi selahpoetic, jo b. explained our preferred rendering method some while ago and you can read it here also check out the a:m resource matrix: rob allen wrote an interesting tutorial about multipass compositing best, mike Quote
martin Posted July 8, 2005 Posted July 8, 2005 Elm, from SoulCage, is currently touring the West coast of the U.S., and he stopped by the Hash office! We took him on a tour of the Columbia Gorge then out for local beer before he headed on. What a cool guy. What makes this so amazing is that we didn't know he was coming, and when he walked upstairs unannounced and said "Hi," we were all watching this commercial on the forum for the 1st time! Quote
Drakkheim Posted July 8, 2005 Posted July 8, 2005 hi selahpoetic, jo b. explained our preferred rendering method some while ago and you can read it here The error returned was: You do not have permission to view this topic dangit , any mod wanna maybe copy that thread into a non fellows only location? pretty please? Wonderful work soulcage guys, You got some really really nice hair in this. Quote
trajcedrv Posted July 8, 2005 Posted July 8, 2005 I second that: 'dangit , any mod wanna maybe copy that thread into a non fellows only location? pretty please?' pretty please with cream on top? Drvarceto Quote
jo b. Posted July 8, 2005 Posted July 8, 2005 ok. this explains how we work. the images are from "I'm walking" but it's the same way of setting up the characters and props. First the Flat Pass / Ambience 100. This is quite easy to setup and renders fast. Second a Dome Pass for simulating environment light. we mostly use the poissant domes with kliegs and z-buffered shadows. We don't need any color maps, but we need bump maps and we need transperency maps. Every group needs to be white. No Specularity turned on. Third a Sun/Key light Pass, with the same setup as the dome pass. Fourth a spec pass. No color maps, but bump- and transperency- as well as specularity maps. (Specularity turned on). Quite easy to setup with spec on diffuse off at the light/s. But ambience of every group needs to be at 0%. Fifth an effects pass for the Dust. Now everything has to be black and camera ambience needs to be at 100%, like the flat pass. We also need and transperency maps here. No lights needed. You can't expect any software package (EVEN not A:M) to render out the images with your desired look. It's always the postproduction and compositing where you combine your elements to give your project the final glance. Greetz, Jo and the rest of the Department. Quote
Bruce Del Porte Posted July 8, 2005 Posted July 8, 2005 Great Ad! I love the characters. Any idea on how many manhours were spent producing the characters and animation? Quote
trajcedrv Posted July 8, 2005 Posted July 8, 2005 Thank you guys!!! This is more of an explanation that I ever hoped for!!! I think that this will be noticed in my next (first) short (darn: I have to rerender a bunch of files) Thanks again Drvarceto Quote
zacktaich Posted July 8, 2005 Posted July 8, 2005 Wow! Looks like a lot of setup work for your style. A:M composite could really speed up your workflow. Quote
Elm Posted July 29, 2005 Posted July 29, 2005 Hi! Here's a picture of my visit at Hash Inc. It was a fantastic day, just like my whole west coast journey. Thanks again for showing us around, for the icecream, the beers we had, the tee shirts, the tattoos, .. . everything! See ya! Elm. Quote
Zaryin Posted July 29, 2005 Posted July 29, 2005 Love the new commercial. And I love that split pass rendering you do. I might try that on something new I'm starting. Quote
John Bigboote Posted August 5, 2005 Posted August 5, 2005 Jo B. GREAT STUFF!!! Can you elaborate on the compositing method for 'how you do it'... do you just overlay everything and mix levels and use various compositing modes? Are there any alphas involved? I've been trying to get my stuff in 1 pass 'out of the box' and need to learn your approach. LOVE the 'Beauty' girl! That picture of you and the Hash gang looked like the poster for 'The Usual Suspects' movie. Thanks for sharing! Quote
Elm Posted August 5, 2005 Posted August 5, 2005 do you just overlay everything and mix levels and use various compositing modes? Are there any alphas involved? Yes - that's how we do it. Of course we use the alpha channel. The layer modes during composing always vary, so it's kind of experimenting and exploring each time. greetings, Elm. Quote
cosmonaut Posted August 10, 2005 Posted August 10, 2005 A few more questions about your approach to compositing (the discussion on rendering in the main forum got me thinking about this). How do you guys handle motion blur with all these different passes? Is each pass rendered with motion blur? Or are only certain passes rendered with motion blur (or do you somehow do your motion blur outside of AM)? Also, do you guys render with the alpha-buffer or do you use multi-pass? Thanks ... Again, fantastic work. Kevin Quote
Elm Posted August 11, 2005 Posted August 11, 2005 We don't render out any pass with motion blur. For at least two reasons: 1. The only acceptable moblur result in A:M can be achieved with multipass adjustments ( minimum 16 passes ). This would take too long, considering the many passes we render out. 2. We like to have control of the moblur amount during post production. There's lots of tweaking needed to get the right results. That's why we use Reelsmart motionblur in After Effects during Composing. Thanks, Elm. Quote
John Bigboote Posted August 17, 2005 Posted August 17, 2005 OK JoBub...Elmer... I'm stuck! I'm trying to do what you are showing above...I have a character in my chor with a default light setup and I am trying to get the flat shaded 100% ambient-look you get in your first image... I try adjusting the ambiance for the character in the chor to 100 %...try setting it on the model itself under 'objects' I do not get the flat-shaded result, I do not get anything different at all... Do I need to go thru each group in the model (there's a lot) and make the setting change? Do I have to use the skylight/poissant lighting method? Quote
luckbat Posted August 17, 2005 Posted August 17, 2005 Have you tried turning on global illumination? Quote
John Bigboote Posted August 17, 2005 Posted August 17, 2005 What? I didn't know A:M HAD Global Illumination? Where? The last i heard you could do a GI 'fake' by setting-up a fast spinning light rig and rendering in multipass(is that the poissant rig?)...please fill me in. Quote
nixie Posted August 17, 2005 Posted August 17, 2005 Global illumination is radiosity? I don't think you want that, the way to fake GI is with John Hendersons Skycast ( http://www.artboxanimation.com/ ) But here the soulcage guys use yves skyrigs which do a similar thing. Your trying to get a flat shaded pass yes? i tried just now - click the model in pws - in properties go to options and choose flat shaded. youd have to do this for every model in a scene unless you can change a choriographys properties? Is that right? Quote
luckbat Posted August 17, 2005 Posted August 17, 2005 What? I didn't know A:M HAD Global Illumination? Where? Whoops! I meant "Global Ambience." It's in the camera properties. Sorry. Quote
John Bigboote Posted August 17, 2005 Posted August 17, 2005 Global ambiance! Coooool! Never knew that was there...I'll try it! But is that the way the SoulCagers do it? Now, I'll probably get stuck on the next step too... Quote
nixie Posted August 17, 2005 Posted August 17, 2005 I just had a crack But the soulcage guys have some sort of shading in their ambience pass? i dont get any; how do they acieve the 'edge lighting' ? Nixie Quote
luckbat Posted August 17, 2005 Posted August 17, 2005 If you leave the lights on, even when your model's at 100% ambience, you'll still get highlights. If you turn all the lights off and set your model's ambience to 100%, you'll get flat shaded. Quote
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