Characters for an animation

[Glenfx]

Hey, well, im remaking an animation i did some time ago... now im making it in maya while i learn it :D

Here, hope you enjoy the characters... they will continue to evolve while i continue learning maya... BTW the ship has a long way to go currently is made out of basic shapes...
... the cow is missing a big lace in her neck, and a bell hanging from it.
oh, and the alien needs finger nails. ;)

As you can see, i dont know how to texturize in maya yet hahaha.

Ill make some expressions for the alien the rest of this week

http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/mooo.jpg

[Knut]

looks fun. i cant find anything wrong with the models:)
Topis subscribed;)

[Driver]

From the looks of it, That alien doesn't look too friendly.
Whats the alfalfa looking thing on the aliens space helmet/glass.
I like the chair in the spaceship.
That cow must be inbread. lol

Looks good!

[goat]

the cows legs look a bit strange. kinda bent weird. unless you made them like that on purpose. but other wise so far so good. keep it up.

[Glenfx]

LOL Goat they where made that way on purpose. it gives the cow a more dumb and indefence look :)

Driver, uhm... the "alfalfa" looking thing on the aliens space helmet is kind of an ornament.... it doesnt mean anything by itself, but gives him a feel of attention or awearness. (coudnt find the right word)

:D

[Glenfx]

And here are some blend shapes (morphs/facial animations)
im working right now.

BTW dont mind the text, im just making a manual with all im learning.

The image is reaaaaaly slow so i also placed a link *sigh*
i miss my old site ;____;

http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/BLEND SHAPES.jpg
http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/BLEND SHAPES.jpg

[Glenfx]

Here is an update.

The alien:
.-i rebuilt the body, gives me better deformations now and it looks much more like a space suit.
.-Made the blend shapes for expressions
.-gave him a squeleton and is all ready for animation.

The Cow:
.-Made the blend shapes for expressions
.-made the eyes work without loosing the oval shape by sing lattices
.-Fixed a bit the body to look a bit more like a cow.
.-its still not ready to be animated though

Here are the images
http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/Alien_Mixt.jpg
http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/Vaca_1.jpg

[Glenfx]

New UPDATE :D At last no?

Here is the final texture for the head, i had quite a great deal of problems with the head, so i had to detach it from the joints, then create the UVs, then add the blend shapes and finally attach and make the weights and set driven keys for animating the expressions :).... all over again.. XP Doh!!

http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/AL00000.jpg

Im now going to work on the textures of the rest of the body :). Ill update when its done.

Critts and comments are wellcome.

[Da3X]

Now that you've started the texture for your alien it's looking quite funny and amusing... I like this one. Nice work with it's own style. Congratulations so far.

AS for the cow I'll wait until the first texture because right now it looks by far not as good as the alien... especialy the body looks weird... but this might change with the right texture. For the alien the texture did a lot.

You said you've started to learn Maya... what did you use before? Do you find it hard to make the change so far?

[ido]

LOL hehehehhhh... ha ha hhhhhhh.... :D
this is so cool :cool: , I just love that alien guy,
is he going to abduct that amazing cow ?

[Glenfx]

Thanks for your comments guys :D

Da3X: Well, the body of the cow was meant to be weird, kind of like an abnormal/dumb cow :) its made for the animation that way.. youll see.

About changing to maya, well, ill tell you i started to know 3D with 3DMax 2.5(then 3 and then 3.1), i used it forallmost a year when i found Lightwave 6.5 and got hucked with it and learned quite a lot of technics with it and made a few animations.

Now, i find maya to be the best program ever, though i started using it thanks to a guy called "Alvaro Planchart" who has tought me amaizingly well how to use it, so i havent found the transition hard at all. :D

ido: Hehehehe, wait till you see the animation :), not gonna tell ya the script ;).

But if you want to see an early test animation here you can have a peek.
TEST ANIMATION HERE - 600k only (WinXP) (http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/Al02.wmv)

[nico3d]

ha !! they look awesome

try to post small previews of the animations

[Avatar-3DT]

Awsome character. He seems evil and dumb as hell. I wonder what will the poor cow will suffer from such an idiotic looking alien.
Great work, keep us update!

[fengclaw]

they look sweet man :cool: keep up the good work .
looks like a sweet project of yours.
-
Are the aliens antenas glowing ??

[Glenfx]

A new Update.

Ive been quite some time without working on this and i have finally found some time to work on it again. SO i started modeling the Spaceship. Its only 20_30% done, so its not the final model but i wanted to show what i have so far.

Any critts and comments are welcome.
Cheers
GFX

http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/AST.jpg

[Daniel]

hehe, cool I like it, should be a funny animation, if he abducts that cow an all

[Avatar-3DT]

Glad to see you back with the freacky alien! He's looking good and his ship is starting nice also aldo you should have go with the "cartoony goofy" ideea all the way and make him a spaceship made out of a potatoe or something. But its your concept and this was just an ideea. Post more, post soon.

[rubberduck]

Originally posted by Avatar-3DT
Awsome character. He seems evil and dumb as hell. I wonder what will the poor cow will suffer from such an idiotic looking alien.
Great work, keep us update!

I agree;)

[ido]

hhhhheee heeee heee he :D this little guy is great, very nice to see him again (avatar has a point about making his spaceship looking as idiotic as him)

[Glenfx]

HEHEHEHE, Thanks for your comments :D

Well, here is another update on the ship.... i think impretty much done with modeling, now i have to put more time on the textures... though i dont think theyll change that much... well see.

http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/AST001.jpg
http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/AST002.jpg
http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/AST003.jpg

[Glenfx]

Here is the finished texture job on the Alien, i still want the suit to be made out of an alien cow.... but these look more like an army suit rather than a cow :roll: though i like the "B" one more lets see which one you like the most.

http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/ALS.jpg

[Avatar-3DT]

The spots should be much bigger to create the "cow skin" impression. And try it with a light blue suit and darker blue spots. Just suggestions, feel free to ignore them:D

[Da3X]

I have to agree with Avatar that the spots are not very cow-like. Have a look at this example: http://www.vet.ed.ac.uk/images/clinical-rotations-services/dairy-cow.jpg (found via Google).

For the colors I'd try to use two colors of the same kind (both blue or both grey etc.) and try different shadings for both. They should not be of a different base color. So B is the best so far.

[Glenfx]

I think im going with the A instead, though i will make a test with bigger spots to see if i like him.

Thanks for the tip guys.

Now, here is an early test animation i did. It was encoded with windows movie maker 2, so youll probably need to update if your not using windows XP

Edit: DOH! i think i posted it before... but here goes again 9_9

(right click and save as)
http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/alien.wmv

[rubberduck]

Cute little spaceship and the alien is looking good too.
I agree with Avatar about the spots.
The animation looks good, nothing to crit about it, but after he sits down in the chair I would leave the hand(the right one) where it is and not let if fall down on the seat, but hey it's your animation;)

[Glenfx]

rubberduck : Thanks for your comments. The idea of that animation was to denote boredome, and that part with the hand i usually do when im bored 9_9 hehehe, i will continue that animation after i finish making the cow, wich is almost done.

Speaking about the Cow, Here is an update on her.
The Textures are not the final, they are only basic 3D paint tooled inside maya so i have it easy in photoshop.
The facial control system is at 80% done, i still need a few expressions to be added.

Also im done with the ship, i fixed some of the textures and made a few adjustments and aditions.

Of course itll look much better with propper lightning, right now it has the default ilumination from maya (That means cero lights have been added).

Anyway Critts and Comments are Welcome :)

http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/COW001.jpg
http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/AST004.jpg

[nico3d]

those space cows are absolutely AMAAAAAAAZING !!

[Avatar-3DT]

The ship is looking beautiful! Nice shader. As for the cow... Man, you do know how to create a stupid character. She looks like she's beging to be kidnapped:D. Anyway, I do have a crit, and that's the front legs. You've modeled the like in human shape but they look very different, more like this (quick sketch, please feel free to erase it after viewing).

[kuman]

this is looking great man :)

digging the overall look and style of these lil dudes, the riced out hot rod racer seems to fit their world perfectly

lookin forward to where you go with this one glen.

-k

[Glenfx]

nico3d :LOL Thanks :D

Avatar-3DT: Actually, i didnt pay attention to that part since i humanized the cow, i thought more about cartoons instead of real nature. Though you have a good point there.
I gave it quite some thoughts to changing those legs, but i opted to leave them like that since she wont be standing up.
Man, you do know how to create a stupid character.
LMAO Thanks :D

kuman: Thank you mate :)

I also was thinking that if i get good quality animation and overall look, i wanted to know what where the possibilities of sending this to animation festivals, what are the requirements and all.

Anyway, an update.

Im finishing the Set and i will be making some animation this week, mostly the entyre intro secuence with the ship and the sets.
In the following images youll see two partial renders of the Set, and a quick test of the set with the ship.
I still am going to add some vegetation near the water, fix some of the textures and see how am i going to create the ripples in the water while the ship is flying over it.
And of course the engine heat and was thinking in adding some birds or insects flying around in the set.

Any Thoughts and advise would be really appreciated.

http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/SET_012.jpg
http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/SET_013.jpg
http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/SET_015.jpg

[nico3d]

Glenn,

how the heck did you those amazing trees and amazing vegetation? Are they RPC? although they don´t look like RPC´s.....

Also could you tell me how you did the overall model of the ground and its texturing? did you unwrap it and paint in PS? what about the grass?

Muy chévere todo, como dirían allá en Venezuela! :D Seguí así que me gusta mucho

[Avatar-3DT]

As I see it there are a lot of planes with opacity maps for bushes and trees and a high bump (or displacement) map for grass. Anyway, great looking. I will repeat myself by saying that you should've had kept the cartoonish look, but this looks great all the same.
As for the water I have two suggestions:
1. (implyes more poly's): many faces to the water plane and a wave or ripple space warp attached to the ship, interacting with the watter as the ship moves.
2. A particle generator that would mimic the foam, also attached to the ship.

There is a third suggestion (the most resurse costing) that implyes the use of both 1 and 2 for a better FX.

[Glenfx]

nico3d: Ehhm.... whats an RPC? (note.. im dumb at the moment 9_9 :))

The model of the gound was made with several square pieces of poligon planes, each plane is 50x50 poligons so i could have a smooth deformation, and i used the "Paint poligon tool" (Maya) to pull and push the geometry. And since its a plane it already has the UVs set so i didnt had to work on UVs :D. I also kept all the planes at the same size so the textures would blend easyer.

The textures are "Layer shaders", so i created the grass over another material for the ground and i created alfa maps for each ground plane where the water was going to be so that gave me the water ground :D.

The grass is a 2100x2100 noise map, i made it to be all even in PS, and applyed it in the bump map and in the color but altered the alfa gain to green.

The trees are Paint FX.. not planes :D, and there are some trees that are 3D, specially the big one (not shown)

Avatar-3DT: I mixed a bit of both... cartoon and real... i didnt want to cross either line too much.

About the water.. I just created the deformations made by the ship, now it looks much more natural and interesting :D. Though i dont have a clue on how to create the foam O_o'.
I think ill create an emiter and the particles get sticked into the water as the ship passes by, but ill have to work on that.

Thanks for the comments and suggestions, ill try to post more soon.

[Avatar-3DT]

For foam you can use sphere particles with a lot of motion blur. To create the fx of splashing, use gravity to make particles hit the surface of the water after getting splash.
If you want a more complex fx you can use a space warp deflector for gravity and use meta particles but I warn you, it's gonna crack your comp (unless, ofcourse, you have a graphic station or something similar:D ).

[ido]

very nice scene Glenfx :) I think the water will look better less transparent and more reflective. those two characters deserve 5 stars :D *****

[Avatar-3DT]

Five start from me too. Great work. And ido is right about the water.

[Vertigo]

Wow GlenFX, this is turning out very nice. I love the look of the characters. The environment looks amazing too. The sand below the water might be too rough and bumpy though, it seems a little distracting. Otherwise, great stuff. I can't wait to see more.

[Dedalo]

Nice work compedre looks realy good.

I wonna see that animation right now.:D

Saludos.

[Glenfx]

Thanks for the compliments :D

UPDATE

I fixed many things and am adding some new stuff, but i would like your oppinion. i will make some tests with some particles this week. (doh!, im falling behind my squedule)

Which one do you like the most, the one with the "flowers" or the simple one?

I tryed with grass and bushes, but they clutered the view and the ship lost a great deal of attention, so i desided to go with something less complicated...what do you think?

http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/SET_018.jpg
http://mipagina.cantv.net/mercyf/SET_019.jpg

Cheers :)

[Cyrenn]

Good Hussle,

This prodject is looking good man, I can't wait til I start my short.
Hopefully as soon as the quarter is over for school.


As for yours, keep up the great work, Im looking forward to see this adventure.

WIP - Android 69
http://forums.3dtotal.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=195676#post195676