Planet Blender

Building a Better Dog
Open Source Animation - 2010-03-27 21:33:02

Any animated character exists at the intersection of realism and expressiveness. I thought I had finally arrived at a good crossroad with my original Laika character below.

But something about my original Laika failed to appeal the audience. On my last entry I received a polite but negative review by an anonymous apparent animator. The commenter said,

“I must tell you that this dog’s model is FAR from being
appealing.

“I’m really trying to say something positive and help you to make
an interesting movie. One of the 12 basic principles of animation
as taught by Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston say that our
characters need to be appealing. Unfortunately yours is not, and
this is a bad thing if you want a good response from your audience.”

With this in mind, I decided to recreate the mesh from scratch. (The fact that an anonymous commentator with a Braizillian IP address can bring a project I have been working on for months to a halt is at once the greatest promise and the worst annoyance of the Internet.) The commenter suggested the classic style of Disney animator Preston Blair, so I began by opening up a blank Blender project and trying to determine what makes Blair’s characters so appealing.

Of course, there are many reasons why this character, and all of Blair’s works, are so compelling. The model implies flexibility and motion. Even in a static pose, the buldog does not look like it was just randomly placed there – it looks it has a purpose, and could move at any moment.

But what about the actual design of the dog? I noticed that the entire character starts with a two or three basic shapes. Basic shapes help make the character easier to recognize at a glance while ensuring consistency thought the film.

So I applied shape-centric idea to my new model. I sculpted the head out of a sphere from a 2D view and a mussel out of a cube. The outline of my old model appears below in the background for context.

From a modeling perspective, there is a dramatic structural difference between expressions, known in animation as “squash and stretch”. It seems as if the entire face changes structure with change in expression.

The Blair sketch that looks most like my imagined Liaka is this expression chart of a young pup. The pup is deformed using squash and stretch techniques.

Using these figures as reference, I created a mesh with a significantly-reduced snout and drastically-increased eyes compared with my original model.

With the rest of the body, I took care to emulate the flexibility of Blair’s sketches. The end result leaves a much simpler body structure than the original model.

To judge any improvement, I put the two versons side-by-side.

I am well aware that a redesign which lifts a few tips from a classic 2D animator will not necessarily lead to a more appealing character model and a more appealing character model will not necessarily lead to a more compelling short film. But there is a lot a computer animator can learn from the pioneers of hand-drawn animation.

The Producer’s Report #109 - Graphic Novel & 1st Press Release
Phil McCoy's Posts - Project London - 2010-03-27 19:30:00

We just finished a Skype call with Branson Anderson, he's in Bellingham working on the graphic novel. He is making progress and the pages are stunning. We particularly love the character studies that he's done (above).

---

Many of you already know that last week we release 125 seconds of Project London on YouTube, et al. And along with that, we have been sending out our first press release. Some sites are picking up our story and starting to blog about us. You can see a complete list of known postings on the NEWS page of the official movie site.

We could really use your help!

1. Share the press release with any blogger or news outlet that might be interested in Project London.
2. Encourage friends to become a fan of Project London on Facebook, sign up for our sometimes monthly email newsletter, and follow Project London on Twitter.

We are a low (almost no) budget, crowd-sourced, indie film that doesn't have a budget for promotion so we are grateful for any help you can provide to spread the word.

The image above is a production still shot by Marc Studer and features (L to R) Henry Mark as Canada and Josh Truax as Nebraska. Just one of the many cool images shot by Marc and available in our electronic press kit (the link to EPK-1 appears in our first press release).

---

Current Top Priority: Recruiting a sound design team.
Thank you to the individuals who have responded to our call for Sound Designers. We are impressed with the quantity and caliber of the respondents. The next step will be to setup interviews with local candidates. I will be scheduling those soon. If you would like to be considered for the team, contact Phil McCoy at phil@projectlondonmovie.com and include the following information:

• Links to online sound design work samples
• A description of your sound design hard/software
• Detail on how many hours a week you can volunteer to the project
  

The Sound Design Team So Far:
Justin Faylona
Bob Forward

---

Cheers,

Phil McCoy, Executive Producer
on behalf of Nathan McCoy (left), also Executive Producer and Phil McCoy (right)

Sign up for our sometimes monthly email newsletter.
Become a fan of Project London on Facebook.
Follow Project London on Twitter.

Twitter: 2010-03-28
Matt Ebb - 2010-03-27 16:31:00

• zombie march! RT @Tristan3d: apparently protesting lack of an R18+ rating for video games in Australia. http://bit.ly/96UznR #
• out for a day of eating! #
• @Tristan3d very cool! interested in reply to Tristan3d #
• off to see angus & julia stone with kat @ the metro #
• sick/flu/cough/bleh #
• restored fluid sim, mammoth commit! http://bit.ly/cW6E4E #
• @francoisgfx colour balance patch in svn now in reply to francoisgfx #
• midway through Waleed Aly's brilliant Quarterly Essay. very insightful stuff #
• @francoisgfx ack! first thing tomorrow… i promise #
• alice in wonderland: unfortunately disappointing #
• uniqlo calendar: http://bit.ly/16Ubmo #
• finally getting on top of restoring fluid sim baking #
• I am seriously getting fed up with blender.org's ridiculously broken bug tracker software #
• if i could marry a film, it would be fujichrome provia 100f #

Tip (v2.5x): Displaying Only Renderable Objects in the 3D View
Blender Newbies 3D Video Tutorials (Learn to Create 3D Graphics with Blender!) - 2010-03-27 16:23:00

A new feature added to the developing Blender 2.5 allows you to easily display only renderable objects. This is very helpful when you want to isolate only those objects designated as renderable, or when you want to quickly hide things like the Grid, Cameras, Lamps, Empty objects, etc.

(You'll need a recent build of Blender 2.5. You can download the latest builds of Blender from graphicall.org.)

From within the 3D View,


press the N-key to display the Properties Panel.


Scroll down to the Display section


and enable the Only Render option.


Done!


You can control which objects are renderable by going to an Outliner view and toggling the "camera" icon to the right of the listed object. Of course, objects like the Camera, Lamps, etc. are non-renderable by default so no need to adjust their renderable option.

technorati tags: Blender3D, 3D, graphics, Blender tutorials

Painting by the sea.
malefico's spot - 2010-03-27 15:09:16

This is a quick sketch I painted from the balcony at the house we rented for our holidays in Las Grutas, provincia de Río Negro, Argentina (in the middle of Patagonia).

It was a rainy day but at the time I painted this, the storm was vanishing and raining stopped. Unable to leave the house all I could do was painting

The feeling of painting in the screen the colours I was actually watching was a rush !

I painted this in Gimp.

Painting for Mercator
malefico's spot - 2010-03-27 15:04:51

I started this image as a quick sketch for the characters of my short movie project Mercator Project and then I got excited and kept painting adding detailes. Now I feel it gained the right to join the gallery

I painted it part in MyPaint and other bit in Gimp using the wonderful brush set of Gimp Paint Studio.

Criticism and comments are welcome

Mas pinturitas
malefico's spot - 2010-03-27 15:01:40

Esta imagen empezó como un boceto rápido para los personajes de mi cortometraje Mercator Project y luego me entusiasmé y seguí pintando y añandiendo detalles. Ahora creo que ya se ganó el derecho de engrosar la galería La pinté un poco en MyPaint y otro poco en Gimp usando las fabulosas brochas del Gimp [...]

Solar Survey – Results
Tinker Code - 2010-03-27 14:38:43

Here are as promised the results of the solar survey. Thanks again to all those who have taken the time to answer. Regards

My "tool" that I can't live without
digital janitor - 2010-03-27 10:01:00



This is a menu that I built that resembles some tools that you have in Softimage. I don't understand why no one else has made a menu like this...

Durian – Modeling and Animaiton Sprint Starts Today – March 27
BlenderNation - 2010-03-27 05:00:48

Your chance to be part of the Durian project! “Meeting in the #blenderdurian IRC channel on the FreeNode network, on Saturday, March 27th, between 1-2:00pm GMT+1 (Amsterdam), 12:00-1:00pm GMT. (Refer to Getting Started in Blender IRC if you’re not familiar with irc.) We’ll be in and out of the chat all weekend.” Details here. World Time Converter meeting [...]

Mouth Rig Test
Tube - Epic Production Notes - 2010-03-27 04:36:56

Welcome riggers!

Before going on to the final character rig, I found it prudent to do a few small tests. I’m planning on doing a layered approach to the face rig, with some basic deformer based (armature/latice/curve/meshdeform/etc) controls for major motions on the ‘bottom’ layer, and more specific facial expressions on top. The latter will probably be blend shapes, but I haven’t decided completely yet.

For the jaw, I wanted the ability to rotate the jaw freely (as well as push it back and forth) where rotating down results in opening the mouth/lips, and rotating up results in squashing the lips/face, no interpenetration. I mulled a few ideas, but finally decided on combining an armature deform (this could get a replacement in the final rig) to open the jaw, and a lattice deform to squash it, blending between the two based on the jaw angle.

The final result is a bit more complicated than that; I couldn’t find an easy way to blend modifier influences, so I settled for having both modifiers always on, but blending the influence of the bones that do the deformation based on the angle of the jaw. There is a slight risk here: two non-multimodifiers in the stack on top of each other might look bad splitting the deform, but the result in this test wasn’t too bad.

I present you with a quick video capture of the result:

Download link

Keep in mind this is just a test! for a real rig, a lot of refinement would be needed to create pleasing deformations; more complex rigging than just the jaw and head for deformation, more constraints, better weight painting, more careful placement and design for the bulge lattice, correction shapes, etc. However, for a test, this is showing some promise- though I would be more comfortable if I could use multimodifiers and blend the influence of the modifiers directly.

I’ll post more tests as I go along. If anyone is remotely interested in the .blend file for such a simple thing, let me know, I’ll be happy to upload it.

Last note: If you are on a mac and cannot view the video, download XiphQT. If you are using Windows download the Ogg codecs for windows . Firefox, Opera and chrome users should be able to view the video directly in the browser (as should Safari users with XiphQT installed). If it doesn’t work, just use the download link instead.

My planet
Vimeo / Blender 3D - 2010-03-27 02:52:33

made with blender. new try (better one i hope) for a xerox effect.

Cast: Yoann Carquet

Tags: blender, walkcycle, 3d, animation, planet, king and character

Background Character Sprint: Details
Sintel, the Durian Open Movie Project - 2010-03-27 00:45:39

For the sake of clarity, I thought we’d just post all the sprint-related info to the blog.

First, to answer some questions. The sprint will be taking place this weekend. We will be sporadically available throughout all of Saturday and Sunday. This is the time when we will be monitoring progress, giving feedback and direction, assigning tasks (if necessary) and hopefully maintaining a live stream on ustream!

However, we know this work takes time to do well, and we will be accepting submissions all throughout this week, ending at the end of next weekend, on the 5th of April.

An important instruction for everyone:

When you start working on something, please add your name and what you’re working on to this wiki page:
http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Org:Institute/Open_projects/Durian/Sprint/Assetlist2
This helps everyone keep track of what everyone else is doing. Also feel free to link to WIP images/animation next to your name.

Also, for now we’re holding off on animating kids, because we don’t have a rig for it yet. So please stick to animation of adults.
Keeping the modeling focus on adult characters is also a good idea. If there are kids in the market, they will be in the minority.

Background info

A little background info about the world our movie takes place in to get your minds going:

The world of the film is sortof a medieval fantasy. So technology-wise, we’re talking 1600’s or earlier. Dragons, obviously, exist in the world, as do other fantasy creatures. But these creatures primarily exist in legend. The city is populated only by humans.

The city of Ishtar is decaying. It used to be grand and rich, with a prosperous population, but it was destroyed by religious war and drought and the following famine. Apart from the wealthy few, most people who live there struggle to survive. They are a hardy bunch, a bit possessive and curt.

Character Modeling

Lets start with some model sheets!

We need city background characters modeled! A bit of common details in David’s character designs:

Crossed belts/leather, patched clothing. Only basic jewelry. Simple tools, simple weapons for defense. Uncut hair and tattoos are common.

Character List:
- Market Vendor/Seller
- young or old, boots/leather equipment/armor okay. Like Sintel’s design.
- Loud and busy.
- Commonfolk
- young or old, maybe primarily women doing the buying
- simple clothing
- Ishtar guard. Man of authority.
- Religious man.

==========

Instructions:
1. Download simple biped adult rig for proportion and size reference. If you like, you can also download a couple of our character files as a starting point (links provided below).
2. Hop on IRC #blenderdurian on freenode.net.
3. Look at the example concept art and reference
4. Create your model based roughly on the size and proportions of the simple adult rig, and based roughly on the concept art. Variation is strongly encouraged, but try to keep the size and proportions within the “adult” range, and keep the pose similar to the simple rig.
5. Post progress to the IRC channel. Pasteall.org is a great site for uploading your images.
6. When you’re finished, rename your blend file “description-name_for_credits.blend” Replace “description” with a simple 1-3 word description of the model, and “name_for_credits” with the name you want us to use to credit you in the movie if we use your model.
7. Upload the file to blendswap.com under the Durian Category (IMPORTANT!). Note that by uploading to the Durian category, you are licensing your model under a Creative Commons Attributeion “By” 3.0 License.

Other:
Don’t worry about fitting your character to the rig. We’ll be building custom rigs for the characters we use. Just use the rig size as a reference point.
Where possible, minimize multi-layered flowing clothing (skirts, dresses, capes) as this is tricky to deal with on our side for animation.
If you add hair, do it with particle strand hair.

Model Downloads for Reference and Reshaping:

Final Sintel Model: sintel_model.blend.zip
Ishtarian Woman (by Jonathan Williamson): ishtarian_woman_01.blend.zip
Tanner (by Jonathan Williamson): tanner.blend.zip
Simple Biped Adult Rig: simple_adult.blend.zip

Character Animation

What we need:

Walk cycles:
- Adult
- Elderly
- Kids (lower priority)

Misc market place stuff, for example:
- Person browsing at a market stand
- Person tending a market stand
- Person paying a vendor
- People sitting on boxes, resting their legs
- Two people bartering
- Anything else you can think of

Specific shots:
- Person pulling a cart, coming to stop (cart model provided below)
- Person startled by Sintel run/dodging around them (video clip provided below)

==========

Animation instructions:
1. Download simple adult rig (link provided below)
2. Hop on IRC #blenderdurian on freenode.net.
3. Look at the list of animation tasks/ideas (listed above)
4a. Pick one and work on it. You can ask one of us if there are any items that we don’t have enough of yet.
4b. If you pick a “specific shot” (above), please ask for further instruction. The requirements for these are… specific.
5. Animate the character directly in the rig file. Please *no* NLA. Work within a single action (NLA is difficult for us to transfer to other blend files). If you don’t know what any of that means, you’re probably fine. Just animate.
6. Post progress to the IRC channel. You can upload videos to youtube or vimeo, or upload video files to our public ftp (information below).
7. When you’re finished, rename your blend file “AN_description-name_for_credits.blend” Replace “description” with a simple 1-3 word description of the animation, and “name_for_credits” with the name you want us to use to credit you in the movie if we use your animation.
8. Upload the file to blendswap.com under the Durian *and* Animation categories (IMPORTANT!). Note that by uploading to the Durian category, you are licensing your animation under a Creative Commons Attribution “By” 3.0 License.

Other:
Walk cycles can either be animate in place or moving forward. We don’t really care. We can use it just as well either way.
All animation should be 24 frames per second. Non-looping animation should be 3-4 seconds long (our longest shot in these scenes is 4 seconds).

Files

Simple Biped Adult Rig: simple_adult.blend.zip and video tutorial on youtube and as ogg
Cart Model: person_cart.blend.zip

cart_pull.jpg

And here’s a short clip from the market scene. Each of these shots should be pretty much filled with people.
market.mov Alt: market.ogv
(Spoiler alert. But it’s really not bad. You won’t have any idea what’s going on. )

Public ftp info

ftp to: download.blender.org
user: anonymous
password: your email address
When logged in, go to the directory “incoming”. What you put there is visible here:

http://download.blender.org/ftp/incoming/

Please keep files to reasonably small file sizes.

OKAY, I think that pretty much does it!! Let’s do this thing!

–Colin & Nathan