For the final project of my first year at Freestyle, I was challenged to explore a topic unfamiliar to me with the goal of making an impressive product to show for what I had learned. The overarching purpose of the Explorations project was to seek out a skill or set of skills that we find ourselves interested in, but haven’t yet taken the steps to begin learning. In my case, it gave me the opportunity to bridge the gaps between the type of work I expect to do next year at Freestyle, my identity, and the hobbies that I enjoy on a daily basis. After many weeks of preparation and countless overtime hours of work, I am proud to present to you… My Explorations project.
ANIMATION
Music & The Machine
Going into this project, I knew I wanted to involve music somehow. Creating music and working with sound technology is probably the hobby I find myself most passionate about. I sifted through many ambitious ideas, but ultimately decided on creating some kind of music visualizer. There was one problem, however– I had already worked with music visualizers in the past within programs like Adobe After Effects, and creating a visualizer is a relatively simple process that is almost entirely automated. Thus, it was time for me to think outside the box.
Learning to Blend(er)
With the help of Ducky 3D’s tutorials, I began to get the grasp of the modeling workflow within Blender. Looking back, I can say with confidence that Blender is somewhat of a sheep in wolf’s clothing, if that makes any sense. It looks very intimidating, but after a few hours of tinkering, I learned how to command the software to my will. In creating the elements of my music machine, I manipulated curves, filled in meshes, truncated faces and beveled edges. Additionally, I learned how to use math to create arrays of objects and “soft solids” that bend and flex. As I modeled, it became clear to me just how powerful of a tool Blender is, especially for a free and open-source software. The modeling process is INSANELY fast, even for a newbie like me. Even though each module of the machine was modeled one by one, I estimate that the total time I spent modeling was no more than 2 to 3 hours.
After many hours of frustrated brainstorming, an idea struck. What if I made a music visualizer in 3D? I started researching, and found a tutorial (pictured left) talking about the many different ways that Blender, a 3D modeling software, can be used to create novel music visualizers. Additionally, the creator of this video had full step-by-step walkthroughs available to his paid subscribers. This was immensely helpful– for a small fee of five dollars, I had access to dozens of hours of in-depth content.
Coming to Life
Using Blender’s node-based material editor and the Cycles lighting engine, I learned how to create/apply materials to my model, and how to use various light objects within the scene to create ambient lighting with shadows and glare. Blender’s material editor is definitely an intimidating workspace– but one of the most helpful quotes I took with me while tackling it was to imagine the nodes as a big flowchart that the computer follows to create your desired material. Lighting, on the other hand, was a relatively easy-looking task that was a huge pain in the butt. In order to preview how my lights looked, I needed to have the computer constantly render my object in real time within the viewport. Every time I moved a light, the preview would slow down to 5-10 frames per second as it recalculated EVERY. SINGLE. LIGHT PATH. 0/10 would not recommend.