{"id":2176,"date":"2023-03-03T05:27:28","date_gmt":"2023-03-03T05:27:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/freestyleacademy.rocks\/~LucyW\/?page_id=2176"},"modified":"2023-06-04T18:37:28","modified_gmt":"2023-06-04T18:37:28","slug":"narrative-visual-perspective-in-animation","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/freestyleacademy.rocks\/~LucyW\/narrative-visual-perspective-in-animation\/","title":{"rendered":"Narrative Visual Perspective in Animation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Introduction<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

How effectively can I tell a story\u2014through 3-Dimensional design and animation?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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3D Modeling: Temple, weapon, table<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

In the past semester, I learned to create original models of an environment (of Greek temples), a weapon, and a table scene from basic 3-dimensional polygons provided in Autodesk Maya. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These I featured on my Reflections webpage, linked here<\/em><\/span><\/a> for you to check out at your disposal!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

3D Modeling: Character design<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

These modeling projects led into what I think was one of most important projects, character design. I say this because we ended up using these characters in a group animation project, writing her into an immersive narrative. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Say hi to Maya (named after my baby cousin who my character was supposed to be modeled after!):<\/p>\n\n\n

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Maya’s bio. Click to view larger image!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

During the process of my character’s body design, I took inspiration from characters I saw in 2D art online, often Japanese animations. Below are the steps I took to actually create this 3D character.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Step 1: modeling. In Autodesk Maya, I created basic shapes to build the form of a girl. I took inspiration from characters I saw in art online:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Step 2: ZBrush to add facial features (like lips), folds to clothing and skirt, texture of knit yarn boots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Eventually I ended up with my character like this. I continued adding some facial features and finally exported the detailed model as an OBJ. Before taking it to the next step (painting with color), I saved one version of the high-poly ZBrush model, and divided it several times until I had a model with a lower polygonal count (the low-poly model) and saved that, too. <\/p>\n\n\n

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Step 3: I imported the low-poly model to Adobe Substance Painter, then attached it to the high-poly model to show the finer details. The models must have been equipped with UV texture mapping from ZBrush; otherwise their polygons would not be able to be painted. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I played around with materials to add color and satiny skirt, glittery top, paint hair. Additionally, I learned that I could ‘paint’ images I’d downloaded of eyes, nose, and mouth features onto her face, as well as a knitting pattern to the owl hat. <\/p>\n\n\n

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While exploring colors and textures, I couldn’t resist assigning all sorts of random materials to my character. I kept some PNGs of these cool textures on my character:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Glass visor texture<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Black latex texture<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I exported this final base-color map and bump map, along with other associated maps like metallic-ness and roughness:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Color map<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Bump map<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I loaded these two maps above into the Hypershade interface within Maya so that I could attach the texture I painted to my model! The color shader I used was a Blinn shader. I also had to adjust the spectral settings to they wouldn’t result in an overly metallic luster. With any model selected, you can apply the shader to it.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Hypershade layout<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

After importing my now-detailed, low-poly model back into Autodesk Maya, I assigned the Hypdershade Blinn shader to my model. This is the permanent stage of coloring a model, because the color is rendered out with the character. <\/p>\n\n\n

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Character model with more details.
Click to see larger image!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

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3D Body Animation<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Now we’re at the exciting part – animation! Here is how I created animations with my character. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  1. These two photos below show what it looks like to create a ‘skeleton’ for my character. In the left-side photo, the orange proton-like circles over the character represent points at which I would create joints. The right-side photo shows the character after I connected the joints to create the “bones”, which show as yellow triangular prisms. <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
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    Creating joints<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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    Connecting joints to create the skeleton’s “bones”<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

    After binding the ‘skin’ of the character to its skeleton, now we have a rigged model. Rigging means that when you move around a joint, the character’s corresponding limbs (or torso or head) also move with it. Here, I’m moving the wrist joint of my character to lift her arm and change her pose.<\/p>\n\n\n

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    Sometimes the polygons of the skin get messed up when I move the joints; I think my character’s puffy ponytails stumped Autodesk Maya on this one. To try to fix this, I use the Paint Skin Weights tool, essentially to designate areas of the body to a particular joint and avoid interrupting movement. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    Once I got comfortable with joint movement, I made an animation showing a 3-action cycle for my character: a walk, run, and jumps!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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