More Furry Stuffed Creatures

[NancyGormezano]

Inspired by Simon's quest for a teddy bear fur texture, I decided to make some bear type creatures of my own.

 

I started with the "Panda on Fire" model from the Hash 2001 CD, mainly because it had a terrific simple body shape, and simple claw/fingers: originally done by Josh Riley, modified by Cabbot Sanders according to the File Info.

 

I changed the eyes, ears, nose, added mouth, eyelids, re-rigged it with TSM2, added Face controls, decaled it to use displacement as the fur texture, added dynamic hair on top, and assorted accessories.

 

Obviously, Panda Monium is a close cousin of the Big Nose Bear species. And because, I stole some DNA, I felt it only right to upload the genetic mutation to the Forum.

 

(zip file/consolidated project contains the Panda Bear model only)

 

EDIT: Uploaded NEW ZIP file/project with IBL test render chor - "Dancing with the Stars" and relinked the images - Hopefully you won't have to search for missing links...let me know if it isn't working please.

 

If you want to test getting the same render results, then under tools/options/rendering tab, select "render using camera settings". When you go to render, pick a filename, type, location if you don't like the one that comes up when you click "render to file".

PandaBear.zip

Edited March 30, 2014 by NancyGormezano

[robcat2075]

Charming adaptations, Nancy!

[johnl3d]

Nice Nancy !

[NancyGormezano]

Thanks John, Robert

 

Here's what the original Panda on Fire model looked like

[Rodney]

This is a fail on several levels but I wanted to post something by way of saying 'Thanks Nancy!'

 

A couple areas that didn't turn out as expected:

- The panda's hair appears to have disappeared (I believe it is hiding inside his head) Edit: Looking again it may just be the global ambiance that is making it the same color as the background.

- I thought I would subtly animate the camera and overhead light to augment the landing... erk. Not so great.

- The whites of his eyes don't show up. Perhaps I need to up the ambiance.

- Too many other things to itemize...

 

 

Fun character though!

Love your rendition Nancy!

[NancyGormezano]

Rodney - That's so weird - I'm not sure what's going on there? (nice jumping, tho)

 

Can you just post a bigger still (just one) - at least 640 x 480, not a gif - can't tell what you did with the gif too small, and also gifs are reduced/changed color space (256)

 

This is the first time that I've consolidated and embedded, so I wonder if that has anything to do with anything. I will re-examine the zip/project. You do have the hair materials in the project? right? Particle Hair is only used on top of head, and on the feather. The body fur/hair is from using displacement (200%) and bump (100%) in the decals.

 

Also can you post your render settings/setup? I don't understand why there is banding from the lights (other than it's a gif)?

 

I did this project in ver 16b/32 (mainly because I wanted to use TSM2)

 

My render settings=

 

2 pass with FAKEAO (png or tga with alpha =OFF, depth buffer ON, apply post effects = ON). I suspect I could use SSAO in ver 18, and get fairly similar results.

 

particles/hair =ON,

 

ground is flat shaded, front projected, with the yellow background rotoscope

 

Global Ambiance type = Global Color = white, Ambiance intensity= 75%, Ambiance occlusion = 0%

rim/klieg light = 100% orange (255, 128,0) with spec, diffuse ON, Z-buffered shadows, 60% dark

key/sun = white - 100% spec ON, diffuse OFF, no shadows

fill/sun 45% default blue, diffuse, spec ON, no shadows

 

 

What version are you using?

 

It looks like you don't have any displacement going on (don't know why that would be, other than gif again), and it also looks like you don't have hair on (or as you say it is blackish - so it won't show against dark background, and the feather also looks weird? Maybe also because it's a gif?

 

Did you move the eyeballs?, eyelids? It doesn't look like any lights are hitting the Panda face?

 

I may not get a chance to figure this out until late tomorrow afternoon. But will need more info from you. And I will post a sample chor later if wanted.

[Rodney]

I should first apologize profusely.

 

I should have noted that my rendition cannot even be called your character anymore.

It's a rather long story...

 

 

When I opened your file there were missing images (for the hair... both feather and hair that is) but I wanted to play so I started tweaking the hair to taste which ended up being a tweak of almost everything in the model.

When I almost had everything done I animated a quick run cycle and... crashed... and lost everything.

 

So, I started over and tweaked more.

I used a (mostly) white image for both the hair on his head and the feather (after experimenting with a few other colors).

I then used Red (for the feather) and Green (for the hair) in the Group's Surface Properties.

 

As for the body... I didn't see any hair applied to the white of his body at all so I just added a little noise and specular to round out his shape after lighting the shot from the top in the Chor.

 

Also can you post your render settings/setup? I don't understand why there is banding from the lights (other than it's a gif)?

 

The gif conversion did that.

What can I say, I somewhat partial to the ugliness of low quality.

I've been thinking of doing entire movies in low rez because I like the look of it. (although I recognize that few others do)

 

 

What version are you using?

 

v18.0b

Gotta run that new release through its paces!

 

So again, I apologize.

A larger image won't reveal anything important but I'll be glad to share the project file (or a larger render) if'n you really want it. (I can't image why anyone would)

I posted the small image mostly because there isn't anything else to see beyond what I have shown.

And I mean that seriously. I didn't even animate the character correctly enough to be rendered from a 3/4 view.

 

I am a truly sad specimen.

But I *was* having a lot of fun while I was doing it.

 

 

Edit: I see I missed a question or two:

 

Did you move the eyeballs?, eyelids?

 

I moved the Eye Target farther out in front of him so that when he jumped his eyes wouldn't get lost.

The Eye Target is stationary so that he has something to focus on (It's a Don Bluth thing)

 

It doesn't look like any lights are hitting the Panda face?

 

Probably because I didn't take the time to add a light to do that.

Doh.

 

Good eye!

[Rodney]

So that I'm not wasting too much of anyone's time I'll add some more into the mix.

While I've got a larger image rendering here's a screenshot from mid jump...

 

Note that I've made three changes since the last render (the one the gif was created from):

 

1 - Tweaked the hair again to see why it wasn't green (it looked like it had reverted to purple)

2 - Cranked the Cornea Surface Ambiance Intensity up to 100%... I tend to do this for all my eyes to get them to show up clearly... especially for toons

3 - I added a light just in front of the head to light the face (I made it a Light List Light under the Panda to keep it from casting a shadow on the ground)

 

And drat, a this larger size you can now see how lazy I was with positioning the mouth.

 

 

Stand by for larger render...

[Rodney]

A couple observations here:

 

- The hair is obviously present but is matching the camera color of the sky

I am assuming this is reflectivity but will have to check.

If not... we should invest in that material because it would be making things invisible... which would be highly desirable for split renders.

Edit: Interestingly, we can see a sliver of green hair underneath the invisible hair. This also suggests a reflection from the sky because that area is in shadow.

 

- Just as I was hitting render for this I remembered that I had 'disappeared' Panda's snout before rendering the jump.

My rationale for hiding that geometry in the Model was two-fold; first because it wouldn't really be seen and second because it made the panda look like he had two mouths.

If one looks at the bottom of the snout that itself can serve as a mouth... and in the current render if the (red) mouth were removed it would look like a goofy grin.

 

- During any project I usually have a laundry list of things I don't get to and this one had several. Colored ground plane was one and a more elaborate 'bouncing' of the ground when Panda hit was another.

 

In this render the shot is advanced one frame more from the screenshot.

This initially was to avoid a nasty tangent with the top of Panda's head and the ground... but then I altered the ground.

Not much of an improvement, but that was were I was heading.

 

If this were to be a full fledged scene I might have some trees in the background that launch up out of the ground every time the Panda hits the ground.

[NancyGormezano]

When I opened your file there were missing images (for the hair... both feather and hair that is)

 

Hmmm...I am only concerned that the zip/linking isn't working? I understand if you want to delete/change things around.

 

However, I looked at the zip file and the image used for diffuse color of the feather is there in my zip file (D/0resources/AMlibraryobjects/textures/things/roses/orangeTropical%20Twist), I did not use an image for the emitter. And the image used for the diffuse color for the hair on head is there as well (D/0resources/AMlibraryobjects/textures/surfaces/tones/dark blue Castle copy). I did use an image for the emitter (napkin texture), also in the zip file.

 

As for the body... I didn't see any hair applied to the white of his body at all so I just added a little noise and specular to round out his shape after lighting the shot from the top in the Chor.

 

Yes there isn't any hair applied to the body - the texture comes from using the thatched tile image as a displacement map and bump map in the decal containers: furry stuff except vest and vest color displ bump. Are you saying the displacement in those decals not work? (or did you delete/reduce the displacement?) Or this image was missing?

 

I moved the Eye Target farther out in front of him so that when he jumped his eyes wouldn't get lost.

The Eye Target is stationary so that he has something to focus on

You can constrain the eye target to the camera (or something else). But I prefer to turn off the pose "eyes aim at target" and then move the individual eyeballs to however I want that looks good from camera view.

 

And drat, a this larger size you can now see how lazy I was with positioning the mouth.

 

The mouth is quite small. Yes it will look grotesque if you translate or rotate the corners, lips too far. there are no limits on those bones.

 

Thanks for testing!

[Rodney]

Thanks for the follow up Nancy.

 

I looked at the zip file and the image used for diffuse color of the feather is there in my zip file (D/0resources/AMlibraryobjects/textures/things/roses/orangeTropical%20Twist)

 

I did note that there were both C and D directories but when A:M didn't find the images I didn't dig for them. In hindsight I should have.

I guess I was too anxious to play with that Panda.

 

Here is where I'll state that I don't like to rely on the Consolidate feature but prefer to embed files in the project and then make sure any images are in the same folder as the project and then zip up that folder.

Consolidate works great but copies entire directory structures. But the real reason I don't like to rely on Consolidate is that files still sometimes aren't found. I will note however that they are usually there and can found.

I like automation but some things just work well manually.

 

More importantly, it does appear that all your files (images/textures that is) are in the D directory created when unzipping your consolidated project file.

 

Yes there isn't any hair applied to the body - the texture comes from using the thatched tile image as a displacement map and bump map in the decal containers: furry stuff except vest and vest color displ bump. Are you saying the displacement in those decals not work? (or did you delete/reduce the displacement?) Or this image was missing?

 

This was another image that came up missing BUT... and this is an important BUT...

If I run into more than one image that is missing in a project file I will often check the box that says, "Repeat for each subsequent file" (or whatever similar message A:M displays) and then hit Cancel.

The file MIGHT HAVE loaded if I would have gone through each and every one and searched or canceled for those that could not initially be found.

I'll have to reexamine why it is that I do that but my memory says that when working with older files (such as for the Extra CD/Extra DVD) I got into the habit of discovering many links to missing files.

As such I'm really glad A:M has that 'Skip everything else that is missing' option.

Note that I usually don't give up on the image at that point... but I don't use A:M to find it.

 

And that should bring us almost up to date I think.

As I find time I'll try your Panda again with the correct textures!

 

Edit: You said:

You can constrain the eye target to the camera (or something else). But I prefer to turn off the pose "eyes aim at target" and then move the individual eyeballs to however I want that looks good from camera view.

 

Hmmm... I had only assumed that you constrained Panda's eyes to the Eye Target so that is why I moved the Eye Target back when I saw the eyes moving around too much during the jump.

Perhaps it was constrained to the Camera? Another thing I'll have to check.

 

That Eye Target is so useful I'd be hard pressed to give it up.

It's a rare event that it can't be placed where it won't work (i.e. on the point of interest of the subject, on the camera, etc.)

[NancyGormezano]

Here is where I'll state that I don't like to rely on the Consolidate feature but prefer to embed files in the project and then make sure any images are in the same folder as the project and then zip up that folder.

Consolidate works great but copies entire directory structures. But the real reason I don't like to rely on Consolidate is that files still sometimes aren't found. I will note however that they are usually there and can found.

 

Hmmm...I just used the unzipped project, and A:M didn't have any problems finding the images (but I will check tommorrow to see if it was pointing to items in my file structure and not the new hierarchy).

 

More importantly, it does appear that all your files (images/textures that is) are in the D directory created when unzipping your consolidated project file.

 

Great!

 

Hmmm... I had only assumed that you constrained Panda's eyes to the Eye Target so that is why I moved the Eye Target back when I saw the eyes moving around too much during the jump.

 

The eye target will move with the model bone - so if you weren't animating the model bone, and hadn't constrained it to some other point, then it probably was the reason the eyes were moving all over the place as it was jumping?

 

That Eye Target is so useful I'd be hard pressed to give it up.

It's a rare event that it can't be placed where it won't work (i.e. on the point of interest of the subject, on the camera, etc.)

 

No need to give it up, just sometimes it's more convenient to aim the eyes differently

 

And here is Panda rendered flat shaded (with displacement and bump values =0%), hair ON, and hair OFF (and no feather) and with default toon line settings, and mouth size more in line with original intent.

Edited March 28, 2014 by NancyGormezano

[serg2]

Very cute, Nancy!

[Simon Edmondson]

Terrific set of models and renders Nancy.

Great job.

 

Do you use colour swatches to choose your colours or personal preferences ? You mentioned some time ago that you had a collection of fabrics and surfaces that you liked and sometimes referenced ?

regards

simon

[TheSpleen]

Awesome designing

[NancyGormezano]

Thanks, Serg, Spleen, Simon!

 

Here is where I'll state that I don't like to rely on the Consolidate feature but prefer to embed files in the project and then make sure any images are in the same folder as the project and then zip up that folder.

Consolidate works great but copies entire directory structures. But the real reason I don't like to rely on Consolidate is that files still sometimes aren't found.

 

Yup, Consolidate does not seem to do any re-linking of images. So YES, the links to image files in the zipfile were incorrect.

 

So I manually changed the linking and edited my first post here to contain a new zip file with an embedded project that now also contains a chor for the Panda that uses IBL (image based lighting), 5 pass, hair ON, front projected, flat shaded ground plane. And yes I found that I had inadvertently set the color decal for fur =0%, so I changed that as well.

 

It would be great Rodney (or anyone), if you could try that new one please and let me know if something isn't working. Render was created in 16b/32 (no FAKEAO). My render times at 640x480 was 16 secs and at 1280 x 960 - 49 secs.

 

Do you use colour swatches to choose your colours or personal preferences ? You mentioned some time ago that you had a collection of fabrics and surfaces that you liked and sometimes referenced ?

regards

 

I don't use any color swatches. I go on instinct, personal palette preferences. My method is by experimenting, testing, selecting on whim "very unlikely images" to use for decals and see what happens, so lots of pleasant surprises happen that way. The images are collected from a variety of sources, and contain a selection of colors, patterns that attract me. I also create some especially for each new project.

 

I tend to re-use images from my collection. And I also create my own mix of blended tones, colors in multi-gradient images to use for backgrounds, surfaces.

 

For example - I used an image of an orange rose, with green foliage to color the feather on Panda's head, and the star image (in the background) is also used to color the Panda's Irises. His white furry parts are textured with a paper towel pattern (from a photo I took).

Edited March 29, 2014 by NancyGormezano

[Simon Edmondson]

..

 

I don't use any color swatches. I go on instinct, personal palette preferences. My method is by experimenting, testing, selecting on whim "very unlikely images" to use for decals and see what happens, so lots of pleasant surprises happen that way. The images are collected from a variety of sources, and contain a selection of colors, patterns that attract me. I also create some especially for each new project.

 

I tend to re-use images from my collection. And I also create my own mix of blended tones, colors in multi-gradient images to use for backgrounds, surfaces.

 

For example - I used an image of an orange rose, with green foliage to color the feather on Panda's head, and the star image (in the background) is also used to color the Panda's Irises. His white furry parts are textured with a paper towel pattern (from a photo I took).

 

Nancy

Thank you for outlining your approach it is very effective. I started out as a painter and still do when possible. When a student a visiting lecturer upset some fellow students when explaining his use of colour, as " I believe any two colours go together. If you want them to..." and another artist I was interested in at the time explained how he used a structured and random approaches to colour, and always got more out of the accidental method because it generated combinations that were unexpected. I tend to do that with my own paintings too so find it difficult to generate an appropriate 'palette' for the cg work. There was an article in 3D world a couple of years ago on how Pixar choose and use their colours. I'm always impressed by that too.

regards

simon

[Rodney]

Success!

 

The only thing I changed once the files were open was the image filename, filetype and location to render out to.

This render is with whatever default settings were setup on my end (I'm pretty sure that was the case).

 

This may be an opportune time to deal with talk that out too although it might be a best to bring in some newbies and discuss it in a new topic.

I'd recently reset my settings to default and that appears to be what my render settings defaulted to for your project.

Does a project override a user's settings that might be set to 'this dialogue' (local settings) over that of the camera?

 

I ask this because I'm wondering what the optimum approach to 'publishing' A:M Project files is with regard to getting everyone to see a project exactly as the one who submitted it.

This is largely due to my current orientation which believes there is no better 'viewer' for A:M files than A:M itself but some variables may not get all the way through?

It's my understanding that for such a thing as rendering, the user might have to be told to change the setting within their options tab to render using the camera.

My gut feel has been that a Project saved that uses the camera will render perfectly (i.e. as directed by the camera settings) but ONLY if not overwritten by the user's use of 'Render using this Dialogue' setting in the render panel.

Sorry to bore you will this off topic stuff... I actually hope I'm wrong in this and it should be easy enough to test.

I'd like to think that due to Netrender usage the default will always be the camera but... I think A:M defaults to 'Render using this Dialogue'.

 

Thanks for the prestine project file Nancy!

(I saw that rose in there and wondered where you had used it)

[NancyGormezano]

Success!

 

The only thing I changed once the files were open was the image filename, filetype and location to render out to.

This render is with whatever default settings were setup on my end (I'm pretty sure that was the case).

...

 

It's my understanding that for such a thing as rendering, the user might have to be told to change the setting within their options tab to render using the camera.

My gut feel has been that a Project saved that uses the camera will render perfectly (i.e. as directed by the camera settings) but ONLY if not overwritten by the user's use of 'Render using this Dialogue' setting in the render panel.

Great! Thanks for testing.

 

Was just thinking about this and realized, Yes, I probably should have said to change under tools/options/rendering tab to select "render using camera settings", because I think "render using this dialog" is the A:M default? My guess also, is the project settings are overridden by the user's settings under tools/options. And as well, I should have mentioned to pick filename, type, location for rendering the image, if you don't like the one that comes up when you click "render to file".

 

Thanks again.