Week 12

In the last week I put all of my animation together into one file ready for editing. As the clips of each animation were quite short and focused to the point there was very little to do, other than adding sound.
I recorded sounds using an mp3 recorder and edited them using Audacity audio editing software. The sounds were fairly simple to add to the video as I just had to look for cues in the animation to help me place each sound file. I recorded the sounds whilst watching the animation so that I timed each clip as close to the video as I could.

I am fairly happy with the final outcome of this module and feel that my animation portrays a lazy/tired character. I found it a lot easier to work from my own video sources than finding random sources as I was able to detail exactly what I wanted in the animation.

If I were to continue with the animation or repeat the experience again I would make a few changes and additions to the work. In the final render I was unhappy about the background colour showing through the characters mouth. I know I could have stoped this happening my adding a shell modifier, but I found that it slightly disfigured my model and slowed the program sugnificantly. If I had the chance to lower the polygon count and tweak the model to allow for the shell modifier then I believe the renders would have looked a lot better.

I also feel that the animation shows too much of Burt snoring and the animation of his body is very minimal. I only used the Biped to move his head foward once. I think that if I had moved his head a bit more, it may have looked more natural.

I am very happy about the use of the morpher modifier in this animation. I feel as though Burt's facial expressions represented what I wanted to show perfectly. I was even able to make Burt's lip quiver as he snored in the second clip. One of my favourite parts of the animation has to be the use of the morpher to animate the inflation and deflation of Burt's belly. I think the large proportions of the model enhanced the animation of the character.

Overall I am fairly happy with how this module has gone and I hope to further develop my skills in character animation. Now that I have learnt the basics of what is required from a charcter, I feel that I am in a better position to go on and create better models and animations. I will certainly look at using the morpher modifier again and will continue to play around with Biped models to see if I can create more movement in the character.

Week 11

This week I completed the modelling and animation of my character Burt. To create the animation I used the morpher tool and one instance of Biped animation. The animation shows the character Burt snoring and being woken by someone shouting his name.

These images show the use of the Morpher tool to animate the model of Burt. Duplicate models of the character are made and their faces are altered to represent different facial expressions. These changes to the duplicate models are recorded by the Morpher on the original model allowing the animator to adjust the expressions of the original model. The adjustmetns are made by varying the values of each morph on the control panel. This panel can be seen on the right of the image shown above.


The two images above also show how I have used the Morpher tool to make Burt's stomach enflate and deflate with his breathing. Morph's can be used as long as the duplicated model is an exact replica of the original model. The duplicated model cannot be altered in terms of adding or deleting polygons. The animator can only alter positions of polygons to show expressions and movement.

Week 10

I have decided to attach my character to a Biped which will allow me to animate any body movement. I know I am concentrating on the facial expressions of the charatcer but I felt like having a go at attaching a skin model to a Biped. It may not feature much in the animation but it was worth the effort just to gain experience in using Biped's.

This wire render of Burt shows the components of the Biped. Each bone of the Biped had to be adjusted to fill the skin so that the model moved with the animation of the Biped. To ensure each of the sections of the biped were attached to the skin I used the envelopes in the physique mode to adjust what section of the biped controled sections of the model/skin.

Week 9

This week I have completed the model of Burt's body and I am in the process of attaching his arms. I have used the same process to attach his arms to the body as I did to attach the ears to the head. As I am not going to concentrate on the movement of Burt's body I am not to fussed about how well his arms are connected. If I were to use a Biped to move Burt's arms, then I would look more closely at how they are connected and how easy they are to manipulate.

For this module I want to concentrate on the facial expressions of a character, rather than the movements of a characters body.

Week 8

This week I continued with the model of the head by creating the ear. Again I felt that due to the nature of the character and his cartoon style, that I did not have to create an amazingly detailed ear.
Starting again with a single polygon, I duplicated and shaped the model until I had a basic ear shape.

I found that attaching the ear to the original head model was quite difficult as the amount of polygons on each of the edges I wanted to weld tended to vary. I had a lot fewer polygons around the edge of the ear than I had around the space which I had created for the ear.
To get over this problem I used the bridge tool to bridge the gap between the two pieces. This is a good way of attaching two pieces as you are able to specify and correct any twists or overlaps by simply adjusting values on the bridge tool bar.
Having attached one ear I applied a mirror modifier to an identical ear model so that the ears were symmetrical. I then repeated the same process as before to attach the two models.

This image shows the finished model of Burt's arm and hand. These will be attached to his body when I have completed it. This model was developed from scratch from a single polygon which was duplicated to achieve the shape of the arm and hand.

Week 7

I have added some picture this week to show how the characters head is coming along. I have modelled the whole thing from scratch using my sketches as references. I have changed the texture of the eyes to brown to fit in with the model. I have also added eyebrows, although I still have the ears and hair to add.

The model is very simple but it will do for this application. I feel as though I have enough of a model to work with, to create a believable character.

The model was started from a single plane which I then added to and shaped to form the basis of Burt's head. I was able to do this by using the edit poly mode in the 3Ds Max modelling options. If I were to create an anotomically correct character I could have used referance plates as guides when modelling. I felt that because of the nature of my character and the brief of the module, that creating a really complex model would have been un-neccesary and a waste of time.

The image above shows a rough sketch of the storyboard. The character Burt is snoring away when he gets rudely awoken by someone shoutin his name. He has a little grumble and then falls back to sleep. I would like to stick to this storyboard but there may be variations when it comes to the final animation.

Week 6

This week I have been thinking more about the character and developing his story and personality. I have now given the character the name Burt and he has the job of a general office worker.

I produced this report card for the character as a visual aid to help me explain the concept of the character and the animation to the rest of the class. As you can see from the picture on the report card I have started to model Burt already and I have completed the basic shape of his head and shoulders. To finish this section I will have to add ears, eyebrows and hair. I also think that his eye colour needs changing to fit in with the model.

I have some more sketches to show the character in situe. The sketches below show Burt behind a big extravigant desk but I think the idea will have to change, seing as though burt is just your typical office employee. It would take Burt a few promotions to get a job with a desk like that.

Character Treatment:

Burt is a fourty-two year old phone salesman/ office worker who lives alone in a run down one bedroom flat. Having worked for the same company for over twenty years it is safe to say that Burt is very stuck in his ways. This is the only life he knows and he sees his lazy, miserable attitude as normal.

The only person Burt socialises with is his mum as he has no life outside of work. Many people in the office have tried and failed to have a conversation with Burt, to the point that everyone now leaves him well alone. The only person that will approach Burt is his boss and that is usually to tell him to get on with his work or to wake up. All Burt wants in life is at least one promotion, but that seems very far off.

Week 5

This week I have continued with some sketches of what my character could look like. Taking the drawing of the head, I have now produced two full body sketches of the character in the proposed situation.


I think these images are quite funny and show exactly the kind of character I was aiming for. The character looks lazy, tired and disinterested.

Week 4

I have started to develop a character for my animation. I didn't set out to create an exact idea, I merely just started sketching off the top of my head and started to realise the bases of my character.
I like the look of the head in the top left of this image. I want a cartoon style character that will be farely easy to animate and I think that this is the one. The character in the top right of the image was based on something I looked at in a design magazine. Looking at previous animations and characters has helped me develop my own. I think the character I have chosen from this selection could work quite well with the characteristics I will be trying to show.

Week 3

Having looked again at the three videos I researched I feel as thought there are not many aspects of the videos that i'd like to show in an animation. Thinking about the brief again I would like to create a lazy/tired charecter. To incorporate one of the initial videos which I found I will base the animation on an office worker.

As I cannot find any good videos to work from I am going to film myself pretending to be asleep and being woken up. This will be the basis of my animation. I will develop a storyboard which will give a lot more detail.