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Hash, Inc. - Animation:Master

Exercise 2: Chorus Line


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ooooo sweet rodney tell me when you got mine done i want to see it!

 

Will do Robert. It'd be done already but my laptop gave up the ghost (at least temporarily) and I had to start constructing/collecting from scratch.

 

Lots to do... lots to do...

 

Edit: Actually I can show you yours as it is now but it doesn't have any of your exercise images. :(

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ooTooo bad your laptop doesent seem to be the healthiest one huh?

 

Right now it classifies as 'dead' but it may be able to be recessitated.

I needed it to last 6 months... and it did! The problem was that I really needed it to last 7.

 

If anyone has a good lead on some sturdy/hard to break laptops please email me or see you in another topic. :)

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John Bailey

Exercise 2

April 16,2006

 

http://media.putfile.com/Exercise-2

 

I hope this hits the right thread.

 

Like a lot of folks, I had a really hard time with that left leg. I tried pulling it down with the foot bone, but then it wouldn't kick at all. I solved it by rotating both knees the same way in the first frame, and he suddenly began to dance along with everybody else. Whew!

 

:rolleyes:

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Rodney

 

Right after I posted the Chorus Line, I found out about the Good Knight and the weak kneed Evil Knight. I downloaded the Good Knight and he slew the Evil Knight and now resides in my library. However, if it's OK with you, since I have footage of Evil dancing not too badly, I'll leave him for all to see. I suspect that, Golum like, he still lurks about on my A:M CD

 

Johnnyb

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I did Excersise 2. I put the camera motion in by accident hope you still like it.Tell me what you think.

 

Dan the Man

 

I did the same thing with my camera on the chorus line exercise. I wanted to adjust it for a better view, but I did it at the end. Well, the camera just slid along all the way through the dance. It ruined everything. I had to fix it.

 

Here's what I did: I went to frame 1, selected Camera 1 (I had to deselect Stage first), placed the camera where I wanted it, jotted down the XYZ coordinates in the Properties box under Translate. Moved back to the last frame and entered those frame 1 numbers by clicking on each of the XYZ coordinates. The camera jumped into frame 1 position and there it stayed. ;)

 

Johnnyb

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Jason Young

Exercise 2

23-4-06(3a.m.i must be mad!)

The Art of AM Handbook + The web guy

 

<_ hi hope you enjoy this animation tried to put some extra touches shaggy the rabbit but>

i'm not sure if they show up too well?

 

See attached link to my Temp web page for the animation and other exercises.

 

http://www.putfile.com/youngman1

 

 

 

 

 

 

Web Space by:http://www.putfile.com

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Right after I posted the Chorus Line, I found out about the Good Knight and the weak kneed Evil Knight. I downloaded the Good Knight and he slew the Evil Knight and now resides in my library. However, if it's OK with you, since I have footage of Evil dancing not too badly, I'll leave him for all to see. I suspect that, Golum like, he still lurks about on my A:M CD

 

Johnny,

 

That's fine. Definitely works for me. :)

It is a good idea to read through the main exercise threads as you may run into useful information (like the Knight's knees problem) and that can save you a lot of time.

 

Jason,

Yes... I see the extra work you put into Ex 2.

Moving beyond the basic lesson is a sure sign that when all else fails your enthusiasm for the task at hand will carry you through. Nurture that ability and use it to best advantage.

 

Rodney

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I thought I might post this link to the Knight model that I believe fixes the glitch in it's knees.

 

Hello

 

The knight on the CD is bad. Here is one that is fixed: Fixed Knight

 

Have fun!!

 

Heath

 

I thought this might be a nice little update for all of us who are just beginning these tutorials.

 

:)

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Name: Ronn Trevino

Exercise Completed: Exercise 2 Chorus Line

Date Competed: 04.29.06

Remarks/Suggestions. The only thing that caught my eye was then jerkiness of the knights knees.. the other 2 characters look "realistic" (if I can use that word) doing the can-can.. however the knight's knees look way too crooked when bending.. maybe I did something wrong?

 

EX2.avi

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TAoA:M Admin Public service Announcement

*************************************

Those of you that are using 'Putfile.com' may have to post a still image unless I can find a way to grab a screen capture of the video window.

 

These are great assets for storage and distribution of your work but they are a pain in Shaggy's butt when it comes to putting together Galleries and Certificates. :P

 

I'll eventually find a way to capture the image (amazing as it might sound I don't own a video capture card)

 

Thanks!

**************************************

This has been a public service announcement.

You are now free to navigate to another forum area on your A:M dial.

 

Ronn: I've got yours. Good job!

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  • 1 month later...
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Simply outstanding David.

 

Bravo!

 

I would suggest just a little more light on the Knight character but otherwise... perfecto!

 

Attached is a frame from David's animation for those interested.

Ex2.jpg

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hey everyone,

 

I've finally finished the second exercise. I spent a lot of time trying to write an arrangement of Can Can and record it along with another sound for this movie. Unfortunately, I don't know much about composing music, so this isn't a masterpiece, and I don't have really good software for all that stuff, but it was fun anyway. The movie kind of goes along with the idea from my first exercise. After rendering it, though, I noticed a lot of things that could be better (such as the knight's action and timing in a few places), but it took about 13 hours to render, so I didn't want that time to go to waste. Anyway, here's the movie. I hope you like it.

 

Name: Always A Kid

 

Exercise completed: Exercise 2

 

Date completed: 6/20/06

 

Instructor: TAoA:M and the Reference Manual

 

Comments: Thank you to Leo, Rodney, and the_black_mage for the kind words on the last exercise. It really helps to boost my confidence and encourage me to put forth an even greater effort while doing these exercises.

 

http://www.box.net/public/x9tj4rppkn

 

Here is my regular exercise 2 if you also want to see it.

 

http://www.box.net/public/pty8x8jhfd

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  • 2 weeks later...

Name: Bruce Winn

 

Exercises Completed: 2

Date Completed: July 3, 2006

 

Instructor:

 

Remarks/Suggestions for Improvement: I had to play with the rendering parameters to get this under 1MB, but I guess I learned a bunch in the process.

 

 

[attachmentid=17915]

Exercise2.mov

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Thanks, Leo.

 

The original choreography is 2 seconds longer than what I uploaded. The pause you see at the end of the uploaded version was actually a pause for effect before Shaggy waved to the audience (You can see that he has come out of the "cancan" action and dropped his hands). I cut off the last couple of seconds (the wave) to make the file size smaller.

 

A still earlier version had "Eddie" sneak in behind the dancers, wave to the crowd, and then do a dramatic death scene (all from library actions). The dancers kept dancing, oblivious to Eddie's antics behind them. That was way too big a file size, but it made me laugh.

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Nice. I like that! (small but nice)

There is something about the repetition of things that can be quite pleasing to the eye.

 

A link to the working Knight model can be found in the first post of this thread (and elsewhere too).

 

Rodney

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Nice. I like that! (small but nice)

There is something about the repetition of things that can be quite pleasing to the eye.

 

A link to the working Knight model can be found in the first post of this thread (and elsewhere too).

 

Rodney

 

Yeah, since then I've got the new knight, but I liked the Thoms better. I had already fixed "It's a Pitch" with shaggy too, so I'm doing an across-the-board snub to the knight. Weak-kneed punk. :P

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Reflecting again on your "Thoms Can Can" I think the effect generated is one of humor.

When we perceive the mirroring of the same character all joined in dancing the same dance... the brain laughs at the absurdity of it all... and smiles.

 

Something like that anyway. ;)

 

...and what a coincidense... tomorrow is national 'Be nice to a Knight Day'!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Name: Dennis Wheatley

 

Exercise Completed: Exercise 2

 

Date Completed: July 27, 2006

 

Instructor: Manual and online video tutorial: Not sure how to do a link here but you can find the mov. here

 

link-> www3.telus.net/public/a7a73462/Drawing%20files/CanCan.mov

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Evan,

 

If you are uploading a file that isn't accepted in the forum you may have to compress it inside a Zip file to get it attached. There is a file size limit as well.

 

On a PC one of the popular utilities for that is Winzip; http://www.winzip.com

 

Dennis,

There is an icon in the post window that looks like a World with 2 chain links. Think 'World Wide Web (Chain) Link' as that is the URL button to help place a link in your post.

 

Here's a link to Dennis's CanCan for those that prefer to click:

 

www3.telus.net/public/a7a73462/Drawing%20files/CanCan.mov

 

Edit: Thats the CanCan alright. Good job! :)

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  • 2 weeks later...
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Good job Shane.

There is a little *pop* there at the end that made me do a double take.

It looks like the knight jumps up on his toes or something.

Just informational... no need to adjust.

 

Rock on to Exercise 3! :)

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Rodney,

 

Thanks for the encouragement! I'm rolling ahead with exercise 2.

 

 

Name: Jim Pappas

 

Exercise Completed: Exercise 2

 

Date Completed: Aug. 10

 

Instructor: AM forums, tutorials

 

Remarks/Suggestions for Improvement: Before this I never tried the Volumetric setting on a Klieg, very cool feature.

cancan.mov

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Jim,

I do believe those are the best lit characters in Exercise 2 I've seen to date.*

Usually they are rather dark.

Nice job!

 

 

*and there have been some good ones. Someone has you beat in the overall lighting... but you've got the best in character lighting. :)

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Hey Rodney,

 

Thanks! On another note, I've been trying an Environment Map Material on the Knight so he can look reflective, without the render hit of real reflections. There's much to learn for me in this area, clearly I haven't quite got it....but the Knight makes another appearance in the Exercises so I'll keep experimenting.

 

-Jim

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I've been trying an Environment Map Material on the Knight so he can look reflective, without the render hit of real reflections. There's much to learn for me in this area, clearly I haven't quite got it....but the Knight makes another appearance in the Exercises so I'll keep experimenting.

 

Jim,

If there is a serious up side to people delaying their 'official tour' through the manaul this surely must be it.

Someone who already knows the basic functions of the A:M Toolset can dig deep and experiment in ways that one never could when starting the exercises on day one. This holds true for those who repeat the exercises too. We never stop learning.

 

My own personal habit of experimentation is to push until something stops or breaks.

At that point I probably should post the results in the forum... LEARN MORE about how to best approach the subject and use the tools as intended. As they are experiments without specific goals I usually just let them go. Applying these experiments to something with an actual goal... like the TAoA:M exercises... can really start to pay off and yield results. If something works in TAoA:M it is bound to work out in the wild.

 

There are plans... there are ALWAYS plans... to extend the TAoA:M exercises here in the forum.

Lack of time, talent and general tenacity keep things nearer the status quo. Thats a good thing... really. Do we really need new exercises that don't increase our knowledge and understanding of the toolset?

Better to work it throughly first and implement as we find the right fit.

 

I will say this, having people work through TAoA:M online is definitely a great way to demonstrate that people have advanced to the next level! Once the basics all taken care advanced information is a lot easier to bring online.

 

Environment Maps eh? Looking forward to seeing that Knight again! :)

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Name: Mike Vogel

 

Exercise Completed: Exercise 2: Chorus Line

Date Completed: Sunday August 13, 2006

 

Instructor: TAoAM Book

 

Remarks/Suggestions for Improvement: Not a suggestion, but does it look to anyone else like the Knight's knee is going way high in that clip? Or is it maybe just the dead-on angle making it look that way?

 

Link To the completed avi:

 

CanCan...Can!

 

:)

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