For this week we had to work with 2.5D tracking so we could follow the area the poster was going while the camera was also panning around. This was quite the same technique as the tracking we did to the phone in an earlier class. There was a difference in this one by the pole going in front of the poster. So this class we kind of relearned the correct way of planar tracking and adding an image to this track. For the pole, we did a simple rotoscope and connected this to the planar tracking so the pole will follow the camera movement and still overlay the extra image we inserted in this video. I struggled a little with the planar tracker here, you can see this if you look closely at the bottom right corner of the added poster. You can see it moving differently from how it is supposed to look.
I have started to create my own composition for the hot air balloon festival assignment. I added different elements to see what would happen to the composition and to make it a bit more interesting. for now, I decided to go with the extra element of having sea animals in the sky. The idea of sea animals moving around in a different place than the sea is something I enjoy seeing very much. This idea started from the music video of Coldplay, in this video they have multiple sea animals going through the sky. It starts off with a sea turtle going through a subway station, and after that you see big whales going through the sky. I love the video for all its abnormalities and differences in sizes, see below images of these animals shown in the Coldplay Up & Up music video.
Coldplay Up&Up reference 1Coldplay Up&Up reference 2Image of hot air balloon festivalNodes of the hot air balloon festival
There is still a lot that I have to change, like the color is not matching with all the elements and I also want to add particles to the sea animals as they swim through the sky. The hot air balloons I use are the once I made during the Maya classes, everybody had to make one of these hot air balloons. I still plan on remaking this hot air balloon so I can look up better references and sketch my own hot air balloon. so looking at this image now I still have a lot to do to make is more like the way I want it to look.
Try of particles for hot air balloon festivalExample of nodes in nuke for particles
This is the first sketch (layout) of how I want my hot air balloon festival to look. So the template is made out of 3 different sea animals swimming with the 3 hot air balloons in the sky. I also added an extra element in the back, this is a building that is supposed to get destroyed by the orca in the background. this is where I want to use the particles for to create a connection between the orca and the building. It is a video that I found that already had the building breaking now I only need to make it so the timing is right and recoiler it to fit the rest. also, the building looks a bit lonely by itself so I feel the need to add extra buildings so it will look more like a city.
During these two weeks, we have been busy with lip-syncing the head to an audio file. We made shape blends a few times during this term but also deleted them a lot to start over. I now have a small example of the start of my lip-syncing which I still have to change a lot. but here is a sneak peek of the model:
It is still missing a lot of movement, at the moment it is only a part of the mouth that is moving up and down and changes a bit. but as you see in the video there are a lot more things that are moving than only the mouth. this is where we need to use the blend shapes that we got introduced to. These blend shapes give us the ability to give our modeled faces a bit more expression. You have to open the rigg first as far as it goes at that part and then add blend shapes to animate it, these blend shapes are used for a more natural look.
For this week’s Nuke, we got some homework next to the hot air balloon festival. Again we had to rotoscope some areas in a video given to us. But rather than trying to correct every camera movement step by step, we got to use the planar tracking tool. We used this tool two times, First, we used it to cancel out the movements that the camera makes (as seen in the video) and after we rotoscope everything and put in the correct material, we put the movement back with a different baked planar tracker. I added my own Instagram to the phone, so whenever you press play you will see the person scrolling through my Instagram post.
for this week we did a rigg on the face model so that the mouth can open and close. We worked with the weight tool to make sure all the correct “muscles” are on the correct rigging point. we did this to open the mouth to add the teeth. We worked on this for most of the class so we get the mouth open in the right way. we used the rigg to slightly tilt up the head so we could open the chin to really spread out the weight.
This week we learned about coloring. We got shown different nodes in nuke that give you the ability to change certain colors in an image. As an assessment, we have to change the left image so that the plain and the background match the overall composition. I have used the Color correct node and the grade node to get the right airplane image. I still have to learn a lot about how to do this the way I would want to do this. for now, I feel like I just made the airplane and background darker to make them fit in with each other. It works but is missing a lot. So I really want to grow in this part of nuke.
close up of the bridges rotoscopeNodes of the bridge
In last week’s class, we learned how to rotoscope, for this week everybody had to have a finished rotoscope of the running man over the bridge. In this class we learned an extra step to rotoscoping, the rotoscope tracker: this is an easy way of rotoscoping a specific area of a video. This technique of rotoscoping is mainly used for larger areas that move simultaneously. So for one of this week’s assessments, we had to track the rotoscope of the bridge. For this, I made a few different tracks that connect to certain parts of the bridge. So just like the running man, this was not rotoscoped in one roto. This was a fairly easy assessment since the movement of the camera was not a large amount and we got introduced to the tracker rotoscope.
Final video of the Rotoscope of the running man over the bridge
After the assessment of the running man over the bridge, we got introduced to the beginning of the hot air balloon festival. This will be an assessment that would combine with the hot air balloon we are making in Maya. For the beginning of this project, we started with what we have already learned. So we started with a rotoscope from the mountain, this is where we could put the hot air balloon both in front and behind the mountain.
Rotoscope of the mountainNode structure of the mountain
During the Maya classes, we have been busy with creating a hot air balloon for this hot air balloon festival. The end result is the purple balloon shown in the image below, for me this balloon is still the first version since it is made while I hurried to follow the class. But looking at the rotoscope I have done for the mountain I think this will work very good in my hot air balloon festival.
Using the Quad draw tool close upusing the Quad draw tool imageThe end product of the use of Quad draw tool with live action.
week 5: For this week we used the Quad draw tool to draw polygons over an already existing face we got from Nick, We combined this tool with the live-action surface option. For this class, we focussed on the orbital structure around the eyes and the mouth and how to connect the different faces we created to each other. The images above show this technique we learned during the class, the blue polygons are the ones I created using these tools. The end product of the use of the quad draw tool is also shown in the images above. You see a little difference from the head we used to draw on. I completed the whole blue polygons on one side of the face and then mirrored them over the X-as to get a symmetrical face.
Example of using blend shapes
Week 6: We continued working on the face we modeled the week before, we pulled and smoothed parts of the face so I could make it look more like the way I wanted it to look. After this we got introduced to the shape editor tool, this tool helped us create different expressions for our modeled face so it would be able to for example frown or look happy. If you look you can see we used this tool to open the eyes of our face. A thing we also added this week is the eyes, since we are opening the eyelids with the blend shapes we needed eyes for in his eye sockets otherwise it would be hull on the inside.
For this term we have to create a hot air balloon festival for our nuke project, this project combines with our Maya course because here we had to create a hot air balloon that would fit in our own made hot air balloon festival. so in our Maya class, we started to work on our hot air balloon. we did this for 2 weeks with the knowledge we got from the other things we already created. Below you see the different parts of the hot air balloon created during the classes.
Balloontop rope connected to balloon
For the balloon and the ropes, we used the spline tool that we learned during the class we made the wine glasses. for the balloon, it is quite the same process as the wineglass itself. You create the shape that you want and then resolve around this. after you finish this shape you add some detail so you get the right balloon shape for your hot air balloon. For the ropes, it is a little bit more complex, yet you still need the spline tool to create the basic starter’s shape. At the top and the bottom of the rope, I added a loop and a few tubes to get a system that would be holding the balloon to the basket.
bottom rope connected to basketCoil
For the bottom part of the hot air balloon, we needed a basket that is connected to the balloon, this was quite a simple process with mainly cylinders connecting to some pipes that hold the basket together. and we added a coil with a gas tank for the realism of the hot air balloon, these were both cylinders where I pulled some edges and pushes some edges to create some extra texture. And we used the bend tool to create pipes going from the gas tank to the coil.
Coil to gastankBasketProcess of texturing the hot air balloon End product of the hot air balloon during class
For the hot air balloon we created during class I used a lot of basic textures to create the finishing look of the hot air balloon. Looking back on my hot air balloon I feel like it is missing a lot, it looks like a hot air balloon but it is really basic in my opinion. I worked really hard and fast on this balloon to keep track of the classes and be able to use a balloon for our nuke project. But I feel like I could do way better, so this is exactly what I am going to do. with all the knowledge I got I am going to redesign a hot air balloon and start from the beginning to create this balloon. You will see this in a later update on the blog.
Rotoscope animation describes the process of creating animated sequences by tracing over live-action footage frame by frame. Though it can be time-consuming, rotoscoping allows animators to create lifelike characters who move just like people in the real world.
Video about rotoscoping
For nuke, we now started to learn about rotoscoping. In class, we learn about rotoscoping and how to translate this into the nuke file. We got a file delivered in which we had to make the rotoscope, this is a file of a man running over a bridge. While looking at the video you might think that it would be easy since the camera doesn’t seem to move by itself. but if you look really closely you will see that it shifts a bit to the right.
Image of my rotoscoping work
We got the assessment to firstly rotoscope the man running towards us. He showed us how to start with the basic Rotonode, I made 5 different Rotoscopes of the man running. This is because a lot of his body moves in different ways which, if you would do it in one rotoscope, would make it a very difficult assessment. So I did the 2 arms, 2 legs, 2 feet, torso, and head separately so I could also jump from frame 20 to frame 40 and it would still look quite nice. this way I only needed to adjust the Rotoscope a little bit. The rotoscope, in my opinion, could have been done a little better but it is mostly for me to understand how the tool works. For my first time doing a rotoscope, I think I quite get the hang of how the tool works.
