Final Idents

And now, I present to you the final three idents. I will also explain the changes I made to each one, except for the rather obvious inclusion of sound.

SRTV Ident 1 - Ton Weight


Ident 1 now has a background, a detailed grass texture (because hair and fur for grass takes way too long to render), omni lights and some shadows. The camera angle has also been changed, and the camera at one point has been animated so that it moves up and down quickly, so that you can really feel the *THUD!* as the SRTV branded ton weight hits the ground.


SRTV Ident 2 - Curry


The camera angle hasn't been changed much, but you can now see flames coming out of the curry before and after Ste sips the bowl, which hopefully makes it easier to tell that it's super hot. A window replaces the purple rectangle that was there previously, and the wall has also been decorated with wallpaper, replacing the yellow that was there previously. No lightning was included as it didn't work as I wanted it to, although a familiar looking holiday photo has been placed on the table... and for some reason, I also used wood materials for the window and photo frames, which probably can’t be seen too well in the actual video, so it took longer to render than it needed to.


SRTV Ident 3 - Space Shuttle


No major changes here, although the angle of the shuttle was changed in places to make its flight look and feel more natural, as previously it felt more like it was sliding along a surface. In both this and the original version, there is also an omni light. Initially I didn’t think I would need it, but without it Ste, the shuttle and the SRTV logo become invisible near the end of the ident.

And last of all, for those of you who want a better look at the holiday photo in Ident 2, here it is, complete with a photo frame:



It's basically just my August scene from last Semester, with the beach ball moved and Ste added, happily waving at the camera. I've always liked seeing these Easter Eggs in things, as they're always a nice touch, so I decided to add my own. It does seem kind of fitting that I made it into a holiday photo, especially since summer will be on its way soon.

So what did I think of this Module overall? I actually, surprisingly, thoroughly enjoyed 3D Modelling and Animation. I had my initial fears that I wasn’t going to be very good at it at all, especially at animating, but as it turned out I had a lot of fun with it, and my work came out better than expected, despite my modelling and animation techniques being very simple compared to that of other students’ work that I have seen.

Actually, this will probably be the only academic assignment of any kind that I will miss doing. It’s been a good run, and using a blog has been an interesting way of documenting my work as well, and it’s a much more relaxed approach compared to the essays and reports of other assignments. Although I think the most fun I had was seeing Ste, a personal mascot of sorts I have previously drawn on paper, come to life.

Will this blog ever live again? Who knows… but I hope you have enjoyed reading it as much as I have enjoyed making the stuff that has been put into it!

Tutorials

I think it's appropriate that I make the final versions of my idents the last post, so I will instead post the tutorials I used first, while explaining what each one was for:

Fire Material - http://3drockstar.com/creating-a-fire-material-in-3d-studio-max/
Fire Animation - http://3drockstar.com/creating-realistic-fire-using-particles-in-3ds-max/

Both of the above tutorials were followed for the same thing, that is, the flames featured in Idents 2 and 3.

Planet Earth - http://www.wonderhowto.com/how-to/video/how-to-create-planet-earth-in-3ds-max-154076/

That is a 3-part video tutorial on how to create the Earth, Moon, and a Starfield in the background, all featured in Ident 3

Explosion - http://www.the123d.com/tutorial/3dsmax3/explode01.shtml

This tutorial I only partially followed as it later became more complex, although I was able to learn how to make an appropriate material from it. Note that this was for the firey blast coming from the explosion, not the actually exploding of the shuttle, which was the bomb space warp.


Grab your box of tissues and prepare to blub as the next blog entry will be the last one.

Ident 3

This is, so far, the most complete one out of all three of my idents. Using the Space Shuttle featured in my previous entry, as well as a tutorial that helped me to make Planet Earth, as well as a star field in the background, this is what I have at the moment:




Poor Ste.

I will provide a link to the Planet Earth tutorial later, but now I will go through how I made the star field. Instead of using Render to render the video, I used the Video Post function: in that window, I clicked on a button labelled “Add Scene Event”, which allows you to choose the viewpoint or camera from which the video will render, and also allows you to apply settings such as a motion blur. Next, I clicked on a button labelled “Add Image Filter Event”, which then brought up this window:



I selected “Starfield” from the drop down box, and then on the setup button which allowed me to edit settings such as the star brightness, size and count. Next, the “Add Image Output Event” button was clicked, allowing me to select a save file and location. Finally, a button that looks like a running man, “Execute Sequence” was clicked, which then began the video render. This ident took the longest out of the three to render, and yet it also has the smallest file size...

While I’m at it, I may as well go through how I made the space shuttle explode. Basically, it's a funtion within 3DS Max that's called a Bomb Space Warp. To make an object explode, you simply look for the Bomb in the space warps menu under the create panel, drag it into the scene and link it to the object to make the object explode.



In the above screengrab, I've labeled where I've placed the bomb. It doesn't need to be placed directly into the object to blow it up.

It sounds easy, but you can't just put it straight in without changing the settings: to get the explosion to look just how you want it to, you need to adjust the settings, for example the detonation time, otherwise the object will blow up straightaway, like in this video for example:



As for the fiery blast in the ident itself, that's actually a sphere with a specially made material. I attempted to follow a tutorial which demonstrated how to make a nuclear explosion, however, only the making of the material proved to be useful in the end.

Now I need to go and get my other assignments done as well, but in my next entry, I will post videos of the final versions of the idents, complete with sound!

Space Shuttle

In my third ident, Ste will be exploring the Final Frontier... in this:


This space shuttle was fairly simple to make, as all I really did was recycle my plane from last semester, making the neccesary changes to make it look less like an airplane and more like a NASA Space Shuttle... or at least, something closely resembling one.

Immedietedly after making it, I made a couple of simple animations of the shuttle in flight. Here's the first one, where it flies down and pulls back up:



And in this second animation, it's going to "Do a Barrel Roll!"

Ident 2

Based on another random idea that entered my head, here is Ident number 2, in its early stages of development.




Here, Ste is shown happily sipping a bowl of curry/chilli/whatever your interpretation is of what's in the bowl... until he discovers that it's super hot and spicy, resulting in him running up and down the room breathing fire.

In this animation, there are actually two versions of Ste, with the one breathing fire acting as a sort of "stunt double". Here's a screengrab showing how the scene has been laid out:



Ste 1 is initially shown in the foreground, sipping the bowl. As he disappears off-screen, Ste 2 starts to run from left to right, with the flame moving at the same speed, making it look as though the flames are coming out of his mouth.

If you look carefully, you'll notice that Ste 1 has the original, motionless pair of legs, which you'll see if you pause the video about 6 seconds in... so he's basically sliding away from the table before Ste 2 runs in with the moving pair of legs.

More test animations

Here are some more test animations, showing the facial expressions as featured in my previous blog entry.

Firstly, the happy face:




And here's the other test animation I made, which is of Ste running. I previously attempted to use bones to animate his body, but that was difficult to master, so instead I've just adjusted the pivot points of a secondary pair of legs I made for him, and used key frames to animate the legs.




The legs are both moving at the same speed as each other, so they create a motion blur for a humourous effect.

But wait... what exactly did I mean by a secondary pair of legs?

Basically, the legs of the original character model are one solid object, which I initially hoped to animate using the 3DS Max bones. As previously stated, I had difficulty learning to use that function, so instead I replaced the legs with a pair of cylinders and adjusted the pivot points, making them easier to animate. Here's some screengrabs showing his two different pairs of legs:



The first pair of legs is (are?) used when his legs are not moving, for example, when he stands still for most of the first ident. The second pair is used when I need to make them move, like in the above test animation.

Facial Expressions

In my second ident, Ste will be displaying more emotions and facial expressions than his standard blank stare, blink, and the wide-eyed, surprised facial expression seen briefly in my previous test animation.

The following two screengrabs show the two new expressions that will be showcased in my second ident. First of all, here's a "happy" face:



Continuing with his Anime-influenced design, Ste is shown here with two "n" shaped closed eyes, which in Japanese Anime is used to show happiness. To make them, I used a Torus shape, which is basically like a ring, and manipulated it to suit my needs.

Secondly, here's a more... well, not-happy-at-all face:



Here, Ste is shown with his eyes squeezed shut and his mouth now open. This kind of facial expression, unlike the happy one I made, is not used exclusively in Anime, but has also been seen in American cartoons such as South Park. It could mean any of the following: anger, pain, fright, frustration or despair.