Created in Maya and After Effects, with music and stock footage courtesy of Andrew Kramer of Videocopilot.net (used with permission, in accordance with the VC license agreement).
Licensed Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0
Characters and title are the intellectual property of Jim Butcher, and their use here in no way represents a challenge to Mr. Butcher’s ownership thereof.
Actors’ names represent a hypothetical cast for this movie and do not indicate any endorsement of or association with this video or producer.
So I spent a couple of weeks learning that rigging is hard, and another few days learning that animating an improperly rigged model is equally hard. Nevertheless, I have finished a very clunky-looking walk cycle. Also, the texturing has been complete for a while now, although I haven’t had time for an update. So here’s the texturing job and a playblast of the walk cycle:
The upper body of the robot is almost fully textured now. My intention is for the little utility hand to have been replaced recently, thus the lack of dirt, grease, and scratches. I’m thinking it reads as unfinished instead, though. The gun needs some distressing, and maybe a bit more bump as well, but I’ve just barely started on that. As always, input is welcome!
Here’s another update on my progress. I spent a lot of time getting the displacement on the torso just right so that the little sensor spheres were the right shape and the rivets looked good. I also spent a good deal of time on the rocket pod. The way my UVs are laid out made it difficult to get the soot looking good—it tends to curve toward the front. I think there’s a way to make a separate set of UVs with a different projection, but I don’t have the time to learn about it at the moment. I am already behind schedule.
I anticipate that I’ll have the entire right arm done tomorrow, and probably the small utility arm. If I’m really industrious, I’ll also make progress on the handgun, which I anticipate will be among the most difficult pieces.
The current render time is a little under 3 minutes, which isn’t too bad. If I can keep it under five minutes per frame I shouldn’t have any trouble when it comes time to render entire shots.
As I mentioned in the process demo, turning on the physical sun & sky does wonders for the look of the texturing. I’ve also subdivided the geometry to get better results from the displacement maps. There’s still some work to be done on the reflections and specular highlights, but I’m feeling confident that I’ll be able to get the level of detail and realism that I desire for this project.
I intend to make another entry to the process demo on Monday evening.
I spent most of the interterm break laying out UVs on my robot. That’s finally done, so now I can start laying down the textures. The head will get a few more painted-on details, and then I’ll grunge it up more with dirt and grease in the crevices. There’s also more bump and shader work to be done, but here’s where it stands right now.
The team consisted of me, Alexis Tomashosky, Anyul Garza, and Ruth Mentzer. Breakdowns by shot follow:
Shot 1, Liftoff: Matte painting constructed in Adobe Photoshop CS4 by Bryan Ray using elements provided by NASA (the launch pad), and cgtextures.com (several sky photographs). The shuttle was modeled in Autodesk Maya (versions 2008 – 2010) by Ruth Mentzer and textured with Maya and Photoshop by Bryan. Animation, fluid simulation, particle effects in Maya and compositing in The Foundry Nuke by Bryan.
Shot 2, Leaving the Earth: Earth texture provided by NASA. Earth and stars modeled and textured in Maya by Bryan. Cruise ship modeled in Maya by Ruth and textured (so to speak—really just simple materials) in Maya by Bryan. Animation and atmosphere effect by Alexis Tomashosky in Maya. Composited in Nuke by Alexis. Greenscreen footage keyed by Anyul Garza and Alexis in Nuke and Adobe After Effects. Shuttle as above.
Shot 3, the Lobby: Lobby modeled in Maya by Ruth and Alexis. Textured and lit in same by Alexis. Keying in After Effects and 3d tracking in PFTrack by Anyul. Map element by Bryan. Alexis composited in Nuke.
Shot 4, the Map: Modeling, texturing, lighting, fluid effects and animation in Maya by Bryan.
Shot 5, Orbiting Jupiter: Jupiter and stars modeled and textured in Maya by Bryan. Animation and engine effects in Maya by Bryan. Composited in Nuke by Bryan. Cruise ship as above.
Shot 6, Cabin: Room modeled and textured by Alexis and Bryan in Maya. Greenscreen footage keyed in After Effects by Anyul. Matte painting created in Maya by Bryan. Hologram animated in Maya and After Effects (+ Video Copilot’s Twitch plug-in) by Bryan and composited in Nuke.
Shot 7, Dining: Keying in After Effects and 3d tracking in PFTrack by Anyul. Modeling in Maya by Bryan and Ruth. Texturing and lighting in Maya and compositing in Nuke by Ruth.
Shot 8, Sun Deck: Sun model, texture, and fluid simulation in Maya by Bryan. Deck modeled and textured in Maya by Ruth. Keying in After Effects and tracking in PFTrack by Anyul. Rotoscoping in After Effects and Nuke by Ruth and Anyul. Compositing in Nuke by Ruth.
Shot 9, Freefall Room: Keying in After Effects by Anyul. Modeling in Maya by Alexis. Lighting in Maya by Alexis, Anyul, and instructor Ognian Bozikov. Compositing by Anyul in Nuke. Flying rig by Daniel Mentzer.
Shot 10, Logo: Mars and stars modeled and textured in Maya by Bryan Ray. Animation and compositing in Nuke by Anyul. Logo created in Adobe Illustrator by Bryan. Additional compositing in After Effects by Bryan. Cruise ship as above.
Screen talent: Alexis, Bryan, Kat Michels, Todd Judd, Vince Chowdhury, Tasha Muhammad, and Marcus Porter.
Music: “Jupiter” from The Planets Suite composed by Gustav Holst and mutilated in Adobe Soundbooth and Premiere by Bryan. Voice over by Jessica Ray and recorded in Soundbooth by Bryan. Sound effects from an unknown library that’s been kicking around on one of my hard drives for years. Audio mastering by Anyul and Bryan
Editing by Ruth and Bryan in After Effects and Premiere. Special technical support by instructor Ognian Bozikov.
Thanks to the Art Institute of Colorado for the use of a Panasonic HVX200 camera, greenscreen stage, video studio, portable greenscreen kit, and the 60+ Macintosh computers we used for rendering on the weekends.
This is the base model for the Modular Urban Defense Robot I am developing for Breach. A variety of different arm and weapon configurations will be available, enabling the ‘bot to be outfitted for many roles. This robot will also be turned in for my Visual Effects Field Production class, so it may appear in several other students’ reels and projects.
I’m working on a humanoid robot for “Breach” (the project I’ve been helping Colin & Rob with), and I spent most of today working on the lower leg. Here’s a rough schematic drawing that I am modeling from:
