Semester 2 - Week 13.

Basic Animation and Tools.

The aim for this semester is to create 3 TV idents to promote one channel of my choice. These idents should hold a corporate theme throughout, so that the channel can be recognised just by these idents.


For the first tutorial of semester 2 we learnt basic animation skills, firstly we created a sphere and used auto key to create a simple animation by selected the timeline and selecting which frame we wanted the sphere to move on then moved the sphere where we wanted it. Once the sphere had been moved the auto key automatically placed a key frame on the specific frame on the timeline to remember where the sphere was positioned on that frame. The auto keys are shown on the timeline as red frames.



So once I had played around with the time line and the positioning of the sphere I had created a small basic animation. For this animation the ball bounces then goes round in circles then back round the circle in the opposite direction and finally ends up back in the starting position in the middle.





I then learnt how to use the set keys. I used these for the second part of the above animation, there are shown here on the timeline as blue tabs on the frames, they start at frame 90.




I then looked at the time configuration settings, I found this at the bottom right hand corner of the window, it looked like a red clock half submerged into a box, I then opened this up and played around with the settings and what they can do. I changed the frames per second settings to speed up or slow down the animation, I also added frames to the animation by changing the length settings under the animation headings. I also experimented with the playback settings and the playback speed.

I then opened up the mini curve editor, to do this I selected the mini curve editor icon from the bottom left hand corner of the window, then this appeared,

I then used the slide settings to move the curves about and used the move keys to move the peaks of the curves around to change the animation settings, and looked how to add sound tracks to the animation.


I then moved onto opening the curve editor, to do this I selected ‘graph editors’ from the top toolbar, then selected ‘track view - curve editor’ then the curve editor window appeared.



I found my way around the curve editor, some of the changes I made were mistakes but helped me find out how to make my sphere rotate and do other movements, other mistakes made my animation jumpy and out of time.


Next I went on to learn how to create dummy object and link them to an object.
This is useful if you need the ears on someone’s head to follow the head and stay in position as they move. To do this I firstly had to create the dummy object,
‘Create’ tab then the ‘helpers’ tab then selected the ‘dummy’ button, then clicked and dragged out my dummy object onto the stage.

I then used the ‘select and link’ tool from the top left corner of the window to link the sphere and the dummy object together, I clicked the sphere and dragged the link to the dummy object.

I then opened the ‘schematic view’ window to check the 2 objects are linked together, this window shows a hierarchy view of the stage which allowed me to see the links I had created.

Finally once I had created my basic animation I wanted to render it to an AVI movie file. To do this I opened the render window, I edited the ‘range’ under the ‘common parameters heading’ so that the movie file would start on my first frame and end on the frame I wanted the animation to finish at .I named the file ‘ballll’ as this is what I wanted to save it as, I then selected the file type as ‘AVI’ so it was a movie file, then finally selected the ‘render’ button.



Then the ‘AVI file compression setup’ window appeared, I used the default compressor and selected ‘ok’ then the file started rendering,

Here is a screen shot of the saved AVI file and a screen shot of the animation file being viewed.

Final Thoughts and Evaluation.

Overall I have really enjoyed this module and found it very fun and interesting, I have learnt a lot this semester considering I have never done any 3d modelling before.
I actually looked forward to going to the lectures and tutorials for this project because I found it an achievement when I created something that looked good, or solved a problem that I had with the scene or an object I had created.

I learnt that when 3d modelling things may look good from one angle but once you look at it from a different view it can look totally deformed and nothing like you want it to. Also if something goes wrong you have to keep at it until you get it right and if I could get it exactly how I wanted it I would use the internet to help me or follow tutorials that I found.
As I had not used this program before or done any 3d modelling before I used a lot of tutorials and what I learnt in lectures to go off and create things. I also spent a few hours a week just playing around with different tools and seeing what I could create and what effects I could also create and add to the scenes and the objects.

During the course of the project I looked at other people’s blogs within my group and commented on their posts and their work to give them some feedback. I also received a few comments on my blog, but unfortunately none that I could use as guidance of how I could improve my work.

If I was to do another project like this I think I would base more of my time on one big main object in my scene and make it very detailed, rather than my approach of trying to model everything in the scene in detail. Unfortunately I found out that after I had spent time modelling each object with detail when I rendered the scene the object was too far away and too small to see some or most of the detail, I put this down to it being my first time creating 3d models.
I looked at other peoples work in the group and realised some people had only modelled one or two objects and placed them in front of a background image.

Overall I am happy with my final scenes and what I have created and learnt this semester. I really enjoyed the project and 3d modelling so I think it made me happy to get on with it and do the work.

Forgotten Posts

After reading through my blog I realised that I hadn’t posted my mood or research boards from a few weeks ago. I also hadn’t posted my hand drawn plans of the scenes and my SWOT analysis, so here they are.

Calendar:
Mood and Research Boards

The three months I have chosen to do for my calendar are July, April and December. I have chosen these months because these months represent more to me than any other months in the year. So I though I would have more ideas of what to create for these months.


April:
April reminds me of the Easter holidays and Easter time, with Easter eggs, the Easter bunny and April fools day. It also reminds me of start of summer and when I can start skating and BMXing again because the weather has finally cleared up enough for it to be dry and warm, so it reminds me of spending my Easter holidays going on road trips with my friends to skateparks that we have been wanting to go to all winter but couldn’t due to the great British weather.
So for my April scene I wish to include things like a halfpipe to represent skateparks, Easter eggs and a Easter bunny to represents Easter time. So now I have to try and create a scene that can incorporate all of these objects.


December:
December reminds me of Christmas, Christmas trees, Christmas lights, snow, parties and fires. I see December as a month or socialising in the warmth of pubs at home by the sea with big open logs fires, or a party round my house with friends and family and a comfy homely setting.
I want to make my scene feel homely and wintry, by creating a log fire, but somehow also creating snow something that shows its cold outside. Also I would like to include a fully decorated Christmas tree and Christmas presents.





July:
July reminds me of my birthday and summer. July is a happy time for me as when its summer I get my BMX out and go to the local dirt jumps and spend days there or days at the skate park, it also reminds me of going to the beach and having beers and barbeques with friends.
So within the month of July scene I wanted to include things such as;
A Birthday cake, banners, presents, the sun and things related to birthdays.




Hand Drawn Plans;
Unfortunately I have never been very good at art, but I had ago, here are my hand drawn plans of my scenes.
April,



December,


July,

SWOT analysis:

I didn’t do the SWOT analysis on the week 6 it was planned to be done on as I didn’t think I had done enough to any of my scenes for it to be very detailed or to have a lot to talk about, so I analysed my work on week 9.

Strengths:
-Everything in my scenes have been modelled by me, so the whole scene is my creation from scratch rather than placing one object in front of a background image.
-The detail within my scenes is good because I don’t like to do half a job or cut any corners on any of the objects.
-The fire in the December scene is how I had planned it to be and is very life like.
-Sticking to my plans.
-Use of time within this project as a whole.
-Backing up my work regularly.

Weaknesses:
-Sticking to timescales for each scene.
-Not having any previous experience with 3d modelling or the 3ds max program.
-Not having seen any previous examples of this, I didn’t know what the expectations of the project were.

-Hand drawing skills.

Opportunities:
-I could use personally taken images and use them as maps and material within my scenes.
-I could use different ways of creating objects within the scenes to make them look more life like.

Threats:
-I could lose my work at anytime due to technical failures.
-Once I had used the free trial of 3ds max 2009 I could not open my files on the lab computers because they had an older version installed.
-I downloaded a trial version on 3ds max and it was only a 30 day trial, so I had limited time to use the product at home.

Lecture 12

For the final week of this project I just added the finishing touches to the scene and merged objects into the surroundings of the scenes to make the final 3 scenes for April, July and December.

April:
For the April scene I merged the 3ds max files of the rabbits, Easter eggs in the basket and the half pipe into the file that contained the grass field and the trees.
To add the rabbits to the scene opened the folder that contained the 3ds max file for the rabbit and dragged that file onto my scene.

Once I had dragged the file onto the scene I then had a choice of three options ‘open file’, ‘merge file’, ‘XRef file’ or ‘cancel’ I selected merge file, I then simple clicked on the scene where I wanted the rabbits.

I then wanted to add a background image of some woods to make it look a bit more like a real park and to give the scene a bit more character, so to do this I found an image of woods from the internet that I though would look good behind this scene and saved it as a bitmap image.
I then selected the ‘render’ tab then selected ‘environment’ from the render tab.

Then the ‘environment and effect’ window appeared, and I selected the ‘background map’ button from the common parameters rollout and the background settings, then the ‘material/map browser’ window appeared and I selected ‘Bitmap’

Now the ‘select bitmap image file’ window appeared and I had to locate the bitmap image from the containing folder and selected the ‘open’ button.

Here is a shot of the scene without the background image,

Now here is the scene where the new background image is applied,

July:
I then moved onto my month of July, I looked at the scene and realised it looked a bit bare, so I wanted to add some presents.
As time was getting thin and I didn’t want to be caught short of time I decided to use the presents I had already created for the December scene. So I copied and pasted the 3ds max file of the presents into the July folder. I then opened the file and resized and re-scaled the presents to make them look different to the ones in the December scene.
I then wanted to add birthday wrapping paper to the presents, so to do this I searched the internet for images and once I had found 2 I liked I saved them as bitmap images and then opened the ‘material editor’ and applied the bitmaps to the ‘diffuse colour’ maps and applied to the presents.

I also changed the colour, scale and size of the ribbons and bows and the positioning of the presents.

Here is a shot of the scene without the presents,

As you can see it looks a little to plain. So I then merged the presents into the birthday scene.
Here is a shot of the scene with the birthday presents included.

December:
For the final touches of the December scene I wanted to add a rug to the floor to make the scene feel more homely, to do this I added a plane from the create menu and clicked and dragged it out to the positioning and size I wanted it in the scene, I then positioned it flat above the floor. I searched the internet for a rug, and saved the image as bitmap, I then added this bitmap as my diffuse colour to the plane using the material editor.

I then merged the files of the ball balls and star to the tree file and cloned the ball balls and positioned them around the tree and placed the star on the top of the tree, I then selected all of the objects and grouped them as one. I then merged this file into the final December scene. I also added the presents to the room and positioned these where I wanted them.

Here is a shot of the final scenes,
December,

April,

July,

Lecture 11

I spent this week on my December scene. I wanted to create the effect of being inside a cosy log cabin with a stone fire place, Christmas tree and a window looking out onto the snowy scenery.


Floor:
For the floor of the scene I create a large thin box then searched the internet for flooring ideas for the map I wanted to add to the box. I found an image of stone flooring on the internet, I though this would be ideal, so I saved the image as a bitmap, then opened the ‘material editor’ in 3ds max and added the bitmap as the ‘diffuse colour’ map. Here is what the floor looked like once finished.








Log cabin walls:
To create the walls of the cabin I used large cylinder and stacked the on top of each other, I then done the same but rotated the other wall to 90 degrees so it looked like you were looking into the corner of the room.
Here are the long walls.




Window:
I then wanted to create a window within one of the walls. I wanted the window to look as if it has 4 panes of glass, so to do this I created a rectangle for the window and 4 smaller rectangles for the panes of glass. I then placed the 4 smaller rectangles through the window rectangle, I then placed all of these through the log wall where I wanted the window to be.





I then selected the window rectangle, went to the ‘create’ menu and selected ‘compound objects’ from the drop down menu then finally selected the pro-Boolean button.
Once I had selected the button I then chose the ‘start picking’ button and clicked on each of the 4 smaller rectangles.



I then selected the logs where the window is placed and followed the same steps as above and booleaned a window hole into the wall.

I then wanted to add maps to the log wall and to the window frame. I wanted to add a bark effect to the logs, and a wood grain effect for the window frame. To do this I searched the internet for tree bark, I then saved the image I wanted to use. I then opened the ‘material editor’ and added the tree bark bitmap as my ‘bump’ and ‘diffuse colour’ map for the logs.
I then searched the internet for a wood grain that was a lighter colour than the tree bark image so that the window frame will stand out from the logs. I then saved the wood grain image I wanted to used, and then added it as a bitmap for my ‘diffuse colour’ on the window.

Once I rendered the logs walls I realised they were far to dark for my scene, so I found another image of bark that was lighter, this worked a lot better as a map. I then added a ‘UVW map’ modifier to the logs to make the bark map look realistic and not squashed or stretched.
The left wall here is the previous bark map and the right hand side wall is the new map with the ‘UVW map' modifier applied. Once rendered the new map looked a lot warmer for the scene and a lot lighter for the room, I was pleased with the new map.

To finish the window off I wanted to add an image outside the window that you could see as if you were looking out of the window from the room.
To do this I found a winter scene image from the internet and saved it as a bitmap,
I then created a plane the same size as the window box, and applied the winter scene bitmap as the bitmap for the ‘diffuse colour’

I then added a ‘UVW map’ modifier to change the positioning of the map so that you could see the winter scene bitmap clearly through the window.
I then placed the mapped plane behind the window, so you could see it from the room looking out of the window.

Fireplace:
I then created a fireplace from 5 rectangles, I also used the pro-Boolean tool to create a hole in the logs for the fireplace the same as I did for the window in the log wall.
Once the fireplace was the right size and in the position of the room where I wanted it.

I then added maps to the rectangles to make it look like a genuine fireplace.
On the 4 exterior edges of the fireplace I used a bitmap image of bricks for the ‘diffuse colour’ and ‘bump’ maps. For the back rectangle that is sunk into the fireplace I found and used a lighter colour brick bitmap for my ‘diffuse colour’ and ‘bump’ maps this was because I knew I was going to put logs in the fireplace and I wanted them to stand out from the fireplace, and I knew they would stand out from a lighted coloured background.

Fire logs:
I then wanted to create some logs to go in my fireplace, and I also wanted to create a log to be on fire to make the scene a bit more homely. To create the logs I created a few small cylinders and rotated them to make a small randomly placed pile of them within the fireplace.
I then found an image on the internet of a log, I then saved this image as a bitmap. I opened the ‘material editor’ and added the log image as the bitmap for the ‘diffuse colour’ and applied this to the logs.

Fire:
I then wanted to create some fire to go on the logs in the fireplace. I read a few internet tutorials of how to do this there are a few different ways to create fire, but I followed one internet tutorial that used a fire map I created and particle array.

Firstly I had to create the fire map, to do this I opened the ‘material editor’ and selected an unused orb and changed the sample type to a cube, because I was told that it would be easier to see what the fire would look like in a rendered scene. Then in the ‘shader basic parameters’ settings I made sure ‘blinn’ and ‘face map’ were selected.
I then lowered the ‘specular level’ and the ‘glossiness’ to 0.
Then in the ‘Blinn basic parameters’ setting I clicked the button next to the diffuse colour, and the ‘material/map browser window’ opened, I then selected ‘gradient’

Then I changed the three colours in the ‘gradient parameters’ settings, I changed colour 1 to red, colour 2 to orange and colour 3 to yellow. I also changed the gradient type to radial using the selection boxes, and raised the ‘noise’ amount to 1.0 and the size to 15 and finally selected the ‘fractal’ checkbox.

I then went back to the maps view and dragged the gradient map from ‘diffuse colour’ to the ‘opacity’ slot, once I done this the ‘copy (instance) map’ window appeared with a selection of choices, I selected the ‘copy’ checkbox.

I then selected the ‘opacity’ map and changed the three colours to black, grey and white, once I had done that I then selected the ‘gradient’ button and the ‘material/map browser’ window opened and I selected ‘mask.

Then a small window opened asking me if I wanted to ‘discard old map?’ or ‘keep old map as sub-map?’ so I selected the second option.

Then under the ‘mask’ option I then selected another gradient, this time I used the three colours, black, white and black. I then added ‘noise’ with a fractal amount of 1 and a size of 15.


Now this is my fire material created.

I then saved this material and selected ‘put to library’ and called it ‘fire material.’

I then went on to create the particle system, to do this i selected the ‘create’ tab and selected ‘geometry’ then used the drop down menu to select ’particle system’ then selected the ‘PArray’ button. I then went onto the scene and clicked and dragged, this created a box with 3 triangles, but this doesn’t show up once rendered, this is only to show that the PArray is there and exists within the scene.

I then went to the ‘modify’ tab and under the ‘basic parameters’ settings I selected the ‘Pick Object’ button and selected the log that I wanted to create my fire on.

I then played around with the settings under the ‘particle generation’ heading I selected 10 as my use rate, I also changed the settings within the particle timings so that the fire will start at the first frame and stop on the end frame. I also lowered the speed to 0 as I was going to use a wind spacewarp to control the movement of the particles later on.
I then went to the ‘particle type’ heading and selected ‘standard particles’ for particle types and ‘facing’ for standard particles. I then opened the ‘rotation and collision’ settings and changed the spin time to 1.
I opened the ‘material editor’ and dragged my fire material I created onto the PArray icon in my scene.

Wind Spacewarp:
Finally I wanted to add a ‘wind spacewarp’ to the fire to control the direction of the fire particles. To create the wind I selected the ‘create tab’ then selected the ‘space warps’ tab then finally selected ‘forces’ from the drop down menu and clicked the ‘wind’ button. I then clicked and dragged my wind box out onto the scene to where I wanted it to be and what direction I wanted the wind to go.

I then played around with the settings until I was happy with the results of the wind spacewarp.

I also changed the positioning of the logs from the previous positions because I think this looks a lot neater and I liked the symmetrical idea, so I created a small pile of logs either side of the log on fire.

Here is the finished fire place with the logs and the fire particle array and the wind space warp.