Animation Finished

Well i have finally finished all the animation, however this unfortunately doesn't mean the video is finished, i saved creating the backgrounds for later and now is later so I'm working on those next.
I'm also working on rendering, which i have never done before instead i have gotten to this point through playblasting, the rendering is bringing up hundreds of new problems as well which i have to find my way through so that's another bridge to cross.
However i am glad the animation is finally done, it kinda felt like it would never get finished and the project was starting to feel like a trainwreck, but the pieces seem to be coming together.

Oh! i haven't updated this yet so I'll mention it now, i had some of the animation finished which i presented in my viva, and submitted it to youtube to show my progress, like i said the background aren't finished, heck the church is still a giant wedge-shaped cube. Also not all of the clips are there since this was submitted before i broke up for Easter, it was also submitted to keep me on track. At any rate, here's the video:

Animation Test and Church Model

First new post in a while, i set my FMP aside for a while to finish my dissertation, after it was done it was a matter of getting back into things. anouther reason for the lack of posts is that i wasn't confident in submitting anything since it was unfinished

Over the christmas hoildays i also worked on designing the church the gargoyle is pearched on, its loosly based on the church near where i live in prestbury, i have also been told about this rendering tool known as 'toon shader' which lets you render a image in a cartoony style (thicks lines, more basic colouring) which helps to better blend in with the cartoony charather as well as a stlye i feel more comtable with. unfortunatly i am currently having problems with it since the lines keep positioning themselves in front of the camera when it is rendered, hopefully i'll be able to fix that problem soon so i can progress

Model

The final video is to be produced in the 3D program 'Autodesk Maya'. I originally intended to do my video entirely in 3D, however, seeing as my character modelling and rigging skills are poor and my 2D character animation is better. So I have decided to a 'puppet' technique similar to made the character similar to the TV show 'South Park' which is also made in Maya, the character is made of different planes with textures applied to them. Pictured below is the different pieces.

The reason it is in pieces like this is so that each individual part can be moved. To animate it each point will have its centre pivot point moved to where the pieces is expected to move and will be rotated on that point, for example, the head's pivot point will be moved to where the neck would be. The finished model is below.

The mouse will also be made this way. Although the characters in the video are 2D, the backgrounds will still be modelled in 3D which includes things such as the church/cathedral and the forest. I realised this is a style similar to 'Paper Mario', however, something i want to avoid that is in 'Paper Mario' is when the characters rotate and look as thin as paper which is similar to 'PaRappa the Rapper', i want my video to be more similar to 'Who Framed Rodger Rabbit' where a cartoon character is in a realistic world rather than a paper man in a realistic world.

Introduction

I don't feel comfortable posting my real name online but i am comtable enough to say the name to my youtube account, which is beats0me.

I am a university student at Swansea Metropolitan University and am studying 3D computer animation, I am on my third and final ear which is mostly based around my Final Major Project.
The Final Major Project will be a 2 minute video created in Maya (a 3D program we have been using throughout the course), we get some help from lecturers but the project is mostly self-led. Due to which, the project is themed however I wish.

For my Final Major Project I Plan to produce a documentary on the mythological Gargoyle, however treat it as if it were an actual animal. I'll be working on the project all year, so far its still in its pre-production stage, im currently working on cocnept designs ans storyboarding.

Since this is my first post i'll stop here to prevent it from being to long. I hope i'll rmemeber to update when i have good progress in the future.