CalArts 2nd Year Film

[mootsger]

Well its time again for my annual student film. This year "turtles & dominos (or dominoes)" with a title still in the works. So far the story about a turtle who is finishing a large domino setup when his nephew is dropped over for a visit. Based on an encounter with my own nephew.

 

The rules: as 2nd year students we are abided to....

- not exceed 3 min

- allowed to have selective color

- dialouge

- sync sound

 

A relatively up-to-date "nephew" wire render. Enjoy.

 

[phnxpyre]

Thats Awesome!!!!

 

I love the baseball cap, sounds like a good story line too!

[robcat2075]

ooohh... CalArts!... I am envious! If I could start over as an embryo... oh, well.

 

 

allowed to have selective color

What is meant by that?

[mootsger]

As frosh, we weren't allowed to have color in our films. B&W exclusively.

- no longer than 90 secs.

- no dialouge

- no sync sound (allthough i did), needle drop only

- and be turned in by the deadline.

 

2nd years are able to have "selective color" if i recall correctly,

which means that they can have small amounts of color throughout thier film.

Its to keep students from either wasting thier time fully coloring or worrying about coloring thier film.

It keeps them focoused on story, character, animation, perfomance, layout, and design.

 

If the students were to break these guidelines, they would not be eligable for the Producers Show.

[Paul Forwood]

CalArts! Lucky guy!

 

I love what you've got here so far. The character is appealing, the story sounds fun and the topic is one which anyone can relate to.

 

I hope you post more on this as you progress.

[bentothemax]

Hey , that sounds great!

 

 

I think it would be cool, if only the things important to the turlte were in color, so by the end of the movie, the nephew becomes in full color to.... ( kinda cheesy, but guarentteeed to make a warm happy feeling inside)

 

 

Ben

[mootsger]

My film will actually be in full color.

Selective color really only pertains to the tradional hand drawn films.

But color is allowed if the students finish thier films on time.

[mootsger]

This is an old first test of the dominos.

I made a model of one domino then imported it 10 times into another.

I created a pose to spread the 10 dominos over 10 inches.

I then wrote an action to topple the doms in about 18 frames, but on 1's.

Every successive dom does exactly what the one on front of it does at the same rate, only a frame delayed.

This causes the appearance of the textures to flow over the model.

I have already corrected this by squashing the timing on the action to 8 frames, so now 2.5 doms fall every frame.

By mixing in different action speeds the domino chain reaction will translate visually on the screen while actually travelling the path.

domino1.mov

[amarillospider]

Nice looking design's there. Fun sounding story.

 

Have you looked into the physics plugin that's floating around? Seems like that might work perfectly for dominoes.

 

Also you might get hair with decals to work for a really big long shot of lots of dominoes falling in a pattern.

 

Good Luck!

 

-Alonso

[mootsger]

Originally, i was going to try to simulate them, but the tests made the dominos explode or fall through the floor.

I also realized i would have to place each domino by "hand" in the choreography, add the constraint, and animate them.

I'm in the process of setting up a railroad-like construction setup. Straight pieces, curves (left and right), larger diameter curves, stairs, loops, etc. Aswell as some tricks consisting of non-domino items. I'll also have single dominos mixed in for variation.

I think this is the best way to do what I need to for the amount of time I have, what I have already worked on, and what I know. I believe this method will give the most control over composition & layout, camera tracking, and the pacing of the sequence.

 

I also did a calculation.

The fast rate of the doms: 10 doms in 8 frames = 30 doms a sec

And about a 1 min sequence = 1800 dominos....... yikes.

 

Thanks for the suggestion.

[amarillospider]

Just ran across these free plug ins and they made me think of your project. (Mainly because they are using dominoes)

 

http://www.sgross.com/plugins/plugin20/index_e.html

 

http://www.sgross.com/plugins/plugin18/index_e.html

[mootsger]

Thanks for the link. I'll see if I can use it. It would be really helpfull for organic curves.

[mootsger]

Here's a photo of part of a setup I did on Mon... er, Tuesday(12:00 am).

680 doms in 2 hrs 40 mins.

They didn't all fall.

[mootsger]

Here is the correction to the toppling action I made.

The first half of the path is the squashed rate.

The second half is the normal rate.

variant_small.mov

[forevernameless]

Excellent splinage on that turtle, and the domino effect is great. Thats really all there is to say. Great stuff.

 

Calarts? Lucky!!

[MMZ_TimeLord]

I'd like to second the 'Excellent splinage' vote. Very good use of splines to keep the model lean, but detailed at the same time. Good work!

[DanCBradbury]

Is all of this working trhough newton physics or are you moving every individual domino?

[mootsger]

Heres an update...

the young turtle is modeled (but still needs laces) and in the process of adding the skeleton.

The adult turtle is in the modeling stage, but needs work.

And I think I WILL be using the Newton plugin. Adios pips (domino dots).

 

I have 3 pages of dialouge and will be adding another, maybe 2.

Recording will happen as soon as the F/V recording studio is open.

I also have a music student composing the score for it. But the more I work on story, the less I like the idea of music during the entire length. I'm limiting it to the intro and domino sequences only, and possibly some accents on expressional movements. I like the idea of awkward silence between the two.

 

[dborruso]

Very cute looking turtle.

 

So Calarts uses a:m? or do you choose your own 3d software?

[agep]

Love the turtle. Very cute

[John Bigboote]

Yes! Nice clean turtle!

 

I'm glad to see A:M at CalArts!

 

I can recommend the Newton plugin, it should serve you well.

 

Good luck! Keep us posted!

[mootsger]

So Calarts uses a:m? or do you choose your own 3d software?

I use AM in my cube. The our dept uses the Exp.Anim's lab for now untill we get our own, which uses Maya.

The freshmen this year are being taught on a program called Reflex. But they're only teaching animation in our dept classes. We would have to take classes outside our dept for modeling and rigging, etc. in Maya.

[mootsger]

Well, I "finished" my second year film. Its not what it started out to be AT ALL, but people still seem to like it.

I ended up interviewing an 8 year old for an hour and animating his thoughts.

I had some trouble with the setup machine and the character's design (nasty twists in the wrists), so I hid what I couldn't fix... and that was everything.

But I'll let you be the judge.

 

Sidenote: what was uploaded was taken from a version that hadn't had its audio levels corrected, so you may need to crank your volume up in the middle.

 

[Frank Silas]

Cute character. Nicely animated. Very charming.

 

Frank Silas

http://www.franksilas.com

[Dhar]

Dude! That was great

 

Job well done.

[Zaryin]

I thought it was great, but I wish there was more.

[the_black_mage]

ok i'm sorry i'm off subject but were can i get newton physics the link dosn't work, it says the site dosn't exsitst.