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Saturday 31 December 2011

Technical Exercises: Pre-Viz Thirds, Diagonals, & Perspective practise

Some more maya work but now that I've finished the texturing tasks its back to the pre-viz. Here are my thirds and diagonals guides in maya and examples I have applied them too as well as the other guides perspective, vanishing point, and combining thirds, diagonals and perspective in the tutorial.

Pre-vis thirds.

Pre-vis diagonals.

Applying knowledge to examples:

Finding Nemo's Use of thirds.
The main characters being right in the centre of the thirds draws your attention to them but is also effective in making the scene feel cramped with all the Jellyfish taking up the rest of the frame.

Pirates of the Caribbean's use of diagonals.
The use of diagonals here is effective in setting the scene and allowing the audience to keep an eye on the soldiers while their hero gets by safely.

Harry Potter's use of perspective.
Perspective here is effective in showing the journey of the Hogwarts Express but also expressing its size compared to Harry's tiny figure beside it evaluating the danger if he was to fall. The perspective fading to the right also stops to keeping your eye on the train all the time when the action is actually above it.

Up's use of vanishing point.
The vanishing point here is effective in showing the grand scale of balloon display and drawing your attention up as Karl starts his journey.

The Chronicles of Narnia's combined use of thirds, diagonals and perspective.
The combining here really sets the scene and shows the busy surroundings of Edward, it also helps suggest that some action is going to happen.


Research into Essay Topic

I have been thinking a lot about my essay for this unit recently and have been doing some more research into it. At first I started to face a problem in that when looking for quotes to back up points I will make a lot of sources focused only on the Uncanny Valley side of things in Heavy Rain. There was a lot of the same ideas in these sources just reworded and there is also the fact that I don't feel the want to just talk about the Uncanny Valley in relation to Heavy Rain when I know there is soo much more than this theory relating to the characters and I don't think I could fill a whole essay on just this one idea.

So I started looking into the uncanny effect in videogames more generally where I found a lot more evidence from sources to back up my points, also finding much more interesting discussion about uncanny things in videogames that I hadn't even thought about and which can all be applied to discussion on Heavy Rain.

Below is a sort of brainstorm/mind map...whatever you wanna call it looking at different elements of Heavy Rain I can discussion the uncanny idea about. I'll post my list of quotes I might use to back theses elements up soon.



Friday 30 December 2011

Film Review: Suspiria (1977)

Film Review: Suspiria (1977)

Film Review: The Wicker Man (1973)

Film Review: The Wicker Man (1973)

Wednesday 28 December 2011

Film Review: Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)

Film Review: Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)

Friday 23 December 2011

Technical Exercises: Introduction to Shading Networks

Double Sided Shader



There isn't the wooden texture on the plane because for some reason when checking why it wasn't showing up through the file it wasn't there so I reloaded it but it still wasn't there. I then checked throughout the downloaded folder and it actually isn't there either :(

Facing Ratio Shader 1


Facing Ratio Shader 2



Facing Ratio Shader 3

Before Glow



After Glow



Technical Exercises: Maya Santa Hat

Merry Christmas Everyone!!



Thursday 22 December 2011

Technical Exercises: Maya Introduction to Fur (Part 2)

Here are the rest of my results for the introduction to fur.

Controlling Density & Baldness

Default Global Density (50,000)

Global Density (5,000)

Sample Density

Density controlled by a map (Baldness=0.1)

Render to access default light

Render after shadows added

Low Density Render after Bake

High Density Render after Bake

Straggle added

Clumping added

Baldness added

Inclination added

Roll added

Final render-adding polar


Technical Exercises: Maya Introduction to Fur (Part 1)

Below is the Maya work I have done so far for the fur tutorials, I think I'm gradually getting the hang of it, fur was definately something I wanted to know how to create! Now time to get the rest done, hopefully this time Maya doesn't crash on me while I'm doing it!

100% Bear Fur- Default Render

100% Bear Fur- Added Shadows

100% Bison Fur- Learnt how to replace

50% Bear, 50% Bison- Learnt to blend

100% Porcupine Fur (Replace)

100% Sheep Fur (Replace)

25% Bear, Bison, Porcupine, Sheep- Multiple Blending

Polar Bear (Original)


Polar Bear (Fur lengthened)

Polar Bear (Added plane lambert)

 
Lighting and Self Shading

Thursday 15 December 2011

Technical Exercises: Maya Pirates Cove Finished!

Have finally finished the pirates cove! Am really happy that through all the strange invisible maps, unsuccessful bump mapping and that I managed to keep going without pulling my hair out.

Chest completed

Final result!



Wednesday 14 December 2011

Film Review: Don't Look Now (1973)

Film Review: Don't Look Now (1973)

Technical Exercises: Maya Pirates Cove continued

I managed to get the barrel completed today and the chest wood with the bump mapping and specular roll off. It's so satisfying getting that bump mapping and specular roll off added, really makes it pop!

Close up of completed barrel
Scene so far!



Tuesday 13 December 2011

Unit 3: Online Greenlight Review

Online Green Light Review 13-12-11


Links to additional unit relevant work




Monday 12 December 2011

Dan Witz's work

After browsing through the Unit 3 label on the group blog again I thought I would look further into Dan Witz's work because of the lighting that has such a big impact on the atmosphere and which helps create the uncanny felling of his work. I think this would be useful for my work because I want to create something that uses darkness broken up by areas of light bouncing about to create an uncomfortable, still mood.


I like how he places the majority of the light in the centre of the image fading out into nothingness, maybe this could be something I could think about in my environment.


I also find it interesting how he seems to isolate his key subject from everything else in the painting, its uncanny in this way because it doesn't feel as though the key subject should be there, as if it has been cut out and stuck there.


I have also noticed that Witz uses a lot of one particular colour in his pieces which is really effective because it suggests importance to this but is still ambiguous because we are unsure what the focus of the colour is.


Similarly to Edward Hopper his pieces feel like miniature objects as part of a replica scene like a dolls house but because of the realism this is quite unnerving to look at them in that way.