Leanne
Stone
Animating and compositing my vfx
Modelling, texturing, lighting and compositing a clock;
I needed a clock to set the scene of my character waiting for something. During filming I stuck this tracker mark to the wall so I could easily do this and track my assets well onto the wall. This helped a lot when compositing this. One thing I did when filming that made it harder was not putting the camera on a tripod as the footage was somewhat shaky. It didn't massively affect tracking though, the hardest thing about this shot was the angle I had recorded it at. It was tricky to get the right angle for my render.
These are progression shots of my work in Maya. Instead of getting a png, 2D clock I decided to create a 3D model so I could get a better angle and experiment with lighting. I uploaded a picture of a clock so I could get the right shape for the outside of the clock, I extruded the edges in to create the middle. I then smoothed the mesh and put in the images of the clock face and hands to see how it would work with the lighting. Then once I was happy I imported a screenshot from the video this was being tracked to onto a camera and then viewed it through that camera perspective to try and get the clock roughly in the right place and the right size. I then rendered this image out onto this black background. I found it hardest doing the lighting here. I had chosen a white matte surface to make this easier to light.
These are screenshots for my work in after effects with the clock. I connected my premiere project to this after effects folder and imported the render of my clock. Luckily this was a good angle for my shot. First I had to track the cross I had put on the wall, I created a tracker and null object and did this without much hassle at all as the post production helped me here. I changed the mode to screen on the clock asset to get rid of the black background and used the 3D layer effect to move the clock into place creating a better 3D feel. I inserted the rest of the clock PNG images and used the 3D effect tool on these as well to put these into place. I connected all of these assets to the null object so they could all move together. I had to use colour correction on the seconds hand as it had a brown tint to it. After doing this I still felt the clock was too bright compared to the rest of the scene so I used a contrast filter on the main body of the clock to make it darker yet still have the lighting features. I then animated the seconds hand so that it ticked each second it is shown on screen. I had to set 2 keyframes next to each other to do this. This is a subtle addition but it helps. I am quite happy with how this has turned out, however I might go back and try to add a shadow as I couldn't figure out how to do this originally.
SMashing a window in maya and after effects;
I used Maya to put together the base effect of my window smash. I followed a quick tutorial when it came to the physics of this etc. I first inserted a screengrab for my video onto a cameras image plane. I then took a primitive cube and shaped it to the shape of the window. I used the edge loops and multi cut tool to make random cuts and jagged edges in the shape. After detaching the vertices I made a sphere to smash the window. I hide this in the outliner and set keyframes so it would smash through the glass. I then tackled the physics, turning off gravity at the beginning and then turning it on once the window smashes to be more realistic. I used wind noise to create a more dramatic smash and have the glass fly everywhere. I then textured the window using a Blinn texture and using an almost pure white with high transparency. I then deleted the image, changed the render settings and rendered it out. I think this bit could have been better if I had made more cuts in the glass. However I am happy with this as I can now use NCloths for particle collsions etc.
Changing my approach;
When coming to the rendering stage in Maya I got stuck, I was unable to do a batch render without it crashing or having a similar. After trying to tackle this for sometime I thought I would change my approach and figure out my issue with rendering once I know more about what the settings should be etc etc. Therefore I decided to see if I could create a window smash in after effects only, this would be useful as I am trying to learn after effects better for VFX and this is one big part of this project, learning after effects. So I found a tutorial with a window smash effect and looked into this. I loaded up an after effects composition, I first created a solid and used the 3D layer tool to angle it in a better way. I made the material a light blue so it wasn't completely transparent and unable to see. I then changed to a glass texture and this is where I worked independently from the video as I had a different space. I experimented with the different amount of repetitions in the texture and played around with both the radius and depth of the glass panel. I then decreased the opacity so that the glass was see through, this was the hardest value to get right as it couldn't be too low otherwise you couldn't see the glass at all but it couldn't be too high as the colour would be too separate from the other window. I keyframed the radius so that it starts at zero and gradually smashes through 3 different keyframes. I am happy with this for my first, quick attempt at smashing a window in after effects however I think next time I will try to add elements of light to the glass, and also try to correct the colour so that it doesn't look as off with the background that it's on.
Animating my 2d character
Above is the exported version of my chase scene before adding audio, and below are progress shots from animating my character. To animate each scene I had to link each shot that needed animation to an after effects file and then import the correct photoshop file for the angle of my character I needed for that specific scene. My general work flow for animating each scene was to first see if I needed any masking on the clip for the character, if so I would do this and then see if it is a still shot or a moving shot, to find out if I needed any tracking on a null object so the character follows the camera movement. Then I did the general keyframing for the position and scaling of my animated character in each scene before moving onto the layers of the character. In this I used the puppet pin tool to create pins so I was able to move the characters limbs better, also using the starch pin tool where necessary to keep the limbs in a somewhat decent shape. I went through keyframing each limb using the mesh rotation tool but also the deform tool. I had many troubles figuring out how to do this to begin with but did each scene quite quickly once I got the hang of it. When looking at this export I am not overly happy but when thinking of how much trouble I had with this I think it portrays the general idea of what I wanted from this animation process. There is a lot I would like to do different in the future to make an animation 3D and more realistic, however for my first time animating I think it went okay, there is a lot to learn about animation when doing this in future but this was a big learning experience and am somewhat happy with how this went in the end.
