This week I wanted to create some concept art for my sword. This will help me visualise the creative aspects of my model, as this project for me is primarily about creativity and applylying this to a VFX model and animation.
First, I started with designing the orb. I wanted this to be illuninous and bright to stand out from within the sword.
I then started looking at more images to inspire my sword design. I put three elements from three different swords I had seen for inspiration, and added them together, tweaking some design aspects to create my first design possibility.
I added annotations for the animation techniques I will be using.
I then made another design using the same method.
This design has two blade design possibilities, one thicker and one more slender.
These are all at concept level and aren’t certain to be my final designs, Some challenges I might face with these designs are:
Difficulty level; these designs are very complex and might need to be simplified. There are a lot of sharp edges and detailed components which may be easier to draw than to model. I am striving for a sucessful model and if this amount of detail is posssible then that is a bonus.
Origonality; seeing as these are taken from inspiration I may need to tweak them even more to eleborate that this project is about my own design and creative input, and what I can make from this.
Texturing; these models, especially the first, seem to have complex topology and geometry, equalling is typically dense and hard UV mapping and texturing, another thing to consider about how complex the detail is on these.
This week I worked more on my terminal model, adding details and rough textures ready for our draft submission to our CGI lead next week.
I started by bevelling the bottom part of my terminal to suit the top peice.
I then added wires to the back of the terminal. I did this by scaling down cyllinders and increasing the subdivisions so I could sculpt them to be curved and bend in the way I wanted.
Some details at the back of the terminal
I then worked on adding a keyboard base for the keys. I did this by adding multiple edge loops on the baord to where the keys would be. I then extruded each key face so they came up from the base.
Keybaord
I then decided to add a texture to the screen. I got an image of green neon writing on a black screen, reninicent of our inspiration pictures and lo-fi styled terminals. However, wehn I went to put this on the screen, I figured it sould be easier to make the actual screen a seperate plate. This would make adjusting the texture on the UV editor simpler. I sculpted this plate slighly to make it seem risen.
UV editor for screen
I also added screws to the top of the terminal for extra detail, and added colour to the button below the screen.
Screen on the render window
I then added a plastic texture to all of the base on the terminal, and a rubber texture to the wires.
Developing textures
I also added the bulb texture to the lights, and duplicated the wires round to the side, creating a box for them to come out of, making sure these details would be shown in the final render.
My next task was to work on the keyboard. I tried to texture the keyboard using an image of a keyboard, however my key alignments didn’t fit with the images used, and it looked stretched. I originally wanted to 2D type the letters and numbers directly onto the keys, but Maya only has the option for 3D lettering, and this would increase the heaviness of the model in terms of geometry for rendering. Seeing as texturing wasn’t working and didn;t look the way I wanted, I decided to scale 3D meshes of type down and see how this would look finished. I will then consult the CGI Lead to see if this would cause an issue in rendering my model in the future.
Using duplicae special, I was able to duplicate the meshes with the same font and size so this made the process much more swift.
Whilst I was doing this process, I decided to add better textures using AI standard surface. I used brushed metal for the base, and a darker plastic for the keyboard. I also made the wires slightly darker.
I then finished the keyboard which ended up looking just how I wanted it.
Keyboard
I then scaled the terminal to the size of the model given to the group by grouping all the parts together and fidning an appropriate scale next to the model.
Scaled model
I then made some adjustments to the topology of my model, straigtening some edges and sculptimg the screen to look smoother, and I was ready to show the group my draft model. After this has some finished touches, I will be modelling a control panel and another terminal to be an addition to my models.
After our camera tracking workshop, we were all given the task to camera track the room using 3D Equaliser that we were going to be using for our Group Project.
I started by opeing the footage on 3D equakiser, setting the image input settings such as the gamma level to what we were taught to set it at, and then began tracking the tracking marks.
Tracking the points
Tracking the marks sucessfully individually took roughly a few hours, as I made sure each mark kept within the green area of bar when tracked. This meant changing the contrast, saturation level and brightness for different areas in the room, for example some areas have way more shadows within them, and the pattern of the cross and the green need to be emphisised to make tracking more accurate, so it can easily recognise the pattern through movement.
I then calcualated the tracking and viewed the camera movement in 3D.
Calculated camera line
There were no breaks in the line, and you could see where different parts of the room were. I decided to use result and then bring up the deviation browser to see the average accuracy level.
Deviation browser
As you can see the accuracy number was quite high and needed to be brought down to as close to 0.5 as I could. Also, I was unsucessful at tracking the top of the table as it always turned out to be innacurate, these were the two factors I needed to change before exporting this scene.
I then remembered I could apply the lens distortion to the footage which would create more accuracy, I changed the lens to the correct camera option and copied the data of focal length, lens distortion and quartic distortion to be adjusted in the Parameter Adjustments tab. I then clicked adjust and this brought the accuracy to 0.7.
Parameter adjustment
I then went through the waves on the deviation browser to pick out the points that were lowering the average accuracy, andn re-tracked these. I also decided to track the top of the table which was difficult but with changing the image levels such as contrast I was able to track them.
This brought my average to 0.6 which was much better than what I had started with.
I then used the 3D model tool to mesh the points together uaing ‘legacy’ and create a 3D structure of the room, camera tracked.
Meshed points
I then exported the lens data to a Nuke node, and exported the scene as a Maya file, including the 3D models.
However, when I opened the mel script file in Maya, there was only the tracked camera, with no models or footage.
File in Maya
This is something I will have to solve and re-export this file from 3D Equaliser.
Choose a topic of interest: Convex Hull Algorithms
Keywords:
Vertices
Points
Geometric
Triangulation
Mesh
Algorithm
Topology
General internet search:
“We can visualize what the convex hull looks like by a thought experiment. Imagine that the points are nails sticking out of the plane, take an elastic rubber band, stretch it around the nails and let it go. It will snap around the nails and assume a shape that minimizes its length. The area enclosed by the rubber band is called the convex hull of P.”
“The determination of the convex hull is an example of a primitive operation which is useful for many analysis methods and has successfully been applied in application domains such as pattern recognition [4], image processing [28] or stock cutting and allocation [13].”
“The convex hull of a point set in the plane is defined as the smallest convex polygon containing all points.”
Böhm, C. and Kriegel, H.P., 2001. Determining the convex hull in large multidimensional databases. In Data Warehousing and Knowledge Discovery: Third International Conference, DaWaK 2001 Munich, Germany, September 5–7, 2001 Proceedings 3. Springer Berlin Heidelberg.
These were found by using Google Scholar. I like this academic search engine as you can determine what keywords need to show by uing speech marks, and it is easy to navigate and cite from.
This week we had a workshop on camera tracking using 3D Equaliser. This software was my favourite to date in terms of using it for camera tracking, as the elemts within the software are easy to follow and enjoyable to work with.
We were given footage within Camden, and we had to use camera tracking points to create the most accurately tracked environment and camera movement possible.
We had to create a tracking point, adjust the boxes to determine what pattern would be tracked. We also were able to adjust the gamma input, contrast and saturation to make sure the patterns were easier to track.
First process of camera tracking
Everytime a point is tracked it gives a bar gooing from green to red. If the bar enters the red area it means the tracking isn’t accurate, and as close to the green the bar stays the more accurate the tracking is. I found restarting tracking points that entered the red or even orange area enabled me to have more of an easy job towards the end of making sure all points were tracked accurately.
We then carried on to track down the path using this same technique.
We were then allowed to see the camera movement in 3D and how stable it was, and if there were any breaks in the line.
I noticed there were a few breaks in my camera line, so I worked out where I needed to add points and this was sucessfuly fixed.
We then added points to the bridge and the back walls to create a more full environment of the footage.
When we click ‘use result’ on the 3D page, it creates a graph called the ‘Deviation Browser’ of all the tracking points, and tells us the average amount of accuracy. The higher the line goes, the more unnacurate the tracking is. This was my graph for my first attempt:
Deviation browser
We were told 0.5 was ‘perfect’ so I aimed to improve my accuracy and get it much lower than what I had. This process consisted of getting rid of trackers with really high waves that brought the average higher, and gooing back and re doing some tracking points. This got my average point down to roughly 0.59.
We were then told to add the data of the camera used and implement in ‘Lens distortion’, which would match the camrea tracking more accurately.
Parameter Adjustment – Lens distortion
This got my accuracy down to 0.3, along with some more tweaking that I did previously.
Final accuracy level
We then calculated the final environment, and began to play around with using these points and the camera movement to see how we could implement 3D models into the footage.
We then used ‘Mesh points’ in the 3D model tool to make a mesh of all of the tracking points in each area to create the environment that can be imported to Nuke and Maya.
Mesh from points – Legacy
We then imported the lens data for Nuke, and the file including footage, tracked camera, and 3D models into Maya.
File in Maya
From this, we could see the 3D environment areas and the tracked camera so we would be able to include 3D models that would stay in the environment as the camera moves.
How a 3D model appears in footage
This workshop was immensely useful and I learnt how camera tracking can be used alongside 3D models to create scenes we see in films. It was very engaging and camera tracking was found to be satisfying by most in the class, opening my eyes to this being soemthing I potentially could also be interested in doing in the future.
This week I presented the presentation I made last week. The feedback I got is as follows:
It is a really focused project which is positive as I can perfect this without taking on too much.
I should try to implement an element which would stand out on my showreel when looking for a job, for example; showing the weapon implemented in a games software or adding game FX within my design.
It was good I was leading this project knowing what industry I was striving towards, and that I made this project proposal with that in mind.
After some thinking and time for evaluation after this presentation, I decided to go ahead with the fantasy sword idea. This would not only offer more of a creative and design offportunity, but the modelling would be less geometrical and more freehand, which is something I would like to develop, and something I prefer within modelling and visual effects.
I decided I will definately be going ahead with the animation of a glowing floating orb within the weapon design. Similar to the orb seen in this picture:
Orb inspiration
I also am going to add a fire or illunimant animation radiating from the blade. Fire and fog is something I havent experimented with yet, so this will be a huge learning development for me.
This week we established a main style of the lo-fi technology seen in ‘Alien Isolation’, the group were more than happy to go along with this as the screenshots I presented fitted perfectly with the design and concepts we all had in mind.
This led us to have several meetings mapping out which assets the Look Dev artists will do. My idea to make a terminal for the room was granted by all members as this was a crucial asset for our design plan, and the references I showed the others would fit the room perfectly. We went over the brief again and designated the compulsary assets to other Look Dev artists to ensure we did everything we needed to.
Our CGI lead also gave us a scale reference file of a man in Maya to ensure we are all making models to scale.
Scale reference
He also made a rough plan of the layout of assets, giving me a clearer picture of where my terminal will be, and what they layout will be in terms of design and scale.
Room layout concept
Going ahead with all of this new information, I decided to start making the basic shape of ther terminal. Using my reference picture earilier, I made a basic shape of a terminal and practiced more of using the sculpting tool, and the bevel mesh tool, to create a rounded screen.
Draft starting model
My aim is to make this terminal very detailed with appropriate texturing, and if I have time, to model another asset for the project that me and my group may need to improve the overall project.
Our group had picked the genre ‘low-fi’ for this project. I wanted to try this out as I have never experienced VFX of an old fashioned aesthetic, and I already had ideas and referneces I wanted to input to this project. Our task is to take a 10 second shot of an empty corridor and input tracked CGI assets and other visual ammendments to create a lo-fi styled corridor.
I chose the role of a Look Dev Artist, as modellling is something I want to develop especially in my personal and final project, so any development in this field is very helpful for my portfolio and future in VFX.
We decided on the sub-genre of ‘Cassette Punk’. Old fashioned technology that was thought of to be ‘futuristic’ in the past. I immediately thought to the game ‘Alien Isolation. When I had played this one of the things that stood out to me was the technology in the game on board the spacehip.
When it came to making our mood board I decided to take screengrabs from this game I had found during my research online and input these for inspiration. Our moodboard is here:
Group Moodboard
Here we can see we have established our consistent aesthetic we want to portray.
We then had our first meeting to talk about what each one of us should work on. As a modeller, I had to think about what my main asset to design would be. Given I was so passionate about lo-fi technology in games, I decided to say I wanted to create a terminal for the shot.
I used an ‘Alien Isolation’ screengrab as my main inspiration as to what I would like this asset to look like:
