the Re Rigging continues...

Hmm, It's been a little while since my last post. Usually i would just chock that up to me being lazy but this time I've actually been busy :-). First, at work we started work on our new game. I'm actually very happy with how my level came out which is really rare for me. The best part is that I'm still actually pretty detached from the level. I find I work better when I'm detached, that way I can view my work more objectively and can make changes. Before, when I worked (about 5 years ago) I always had this super master plan and if other people didn't understand it or if it just plain didn't work it would be someone else's fault. They just didn't “get” me or my concept. Now, at the ripe old age of 27 I can say this is a royal piece of CRAP! Now, don't get me wrong, I still love to plan and figure out how to do things. Hell, I wouldn't be doing all this study with Bunny and Toonshaders, etc. if I didn't see the value in having a pipeline and a plan. What I try NOT to do anymore is assume that everyone is going to 'like' my ideas and that they are perfect. By being detached i'ved found that ideas have more room to grow to become more then what they are.

Okay! So after that rant. Here is were I am in my personal work.

Bunny: He is almost completely re-rigged! His face blend-shapes are more exadurated then they were before and should help his acting out. Also, as I said last time I ripped out all of his bones and re rigged him from scratch. The old rig had HORRABLE problems mostly from not properly attaching controls. Almost nothing could be zeroed out. (mental note: always make sure to group your controller in an empty node, like a group, before parenting them.)

the new things he has are:

1. No Flip Knee: You can no longer turn the knee inside out by rotating the foot controller too far. Handy for climing and other strange leg poses.

2. No Follow Head: Bunny's head no longer follow his body when moved around. This is cool because if I make a change to the body animation you don't need to counter animate the head.

3. A Pelvis Controller: I wish I had this before on the old rig. Now I can rotate the pelvis around without effecting the torso.

the last thing I need is IK/FK switching and matching arms. I've kinda hit a snag with this. The most used method I know requires a script. I dislike using scripts because I don't know how they work. Sometimes scripts break and unless you understand what is going on (or you have someone to fix it) your pretty much up shit's creak without a paddle. After looking into other methods though I think I'm going to have to use a script.

Jason S has a really great script that switches back and forth and matches wonderfully but it has one big flaw that I hate. When your in FK mode you have to select the bones to animate. I'm surprised that he did this because rigging rule number one is “NEVER EVER EVER select the bones to animate!!!” you always us a controller or make set driven keys to do that. Now, Norman made my Morgan also uses a script but that script turns on and off controlers that control the FK arms. But yeah.. Since i don't scripting i have no freaking clue how he did that. I think I'm gonna have to mail him or check out his website.

I want to try and wrap this rigging stage up because I won't really know if i rigged him well until I actually animate him. God, I'm rusty at animation too (and i was never really good at it to start with :-P )... I should do a bunch of bouncing balls and walk cycles to warm up. Also, this is the point where all the previous work i did comes together. The toonshader can now be tested on a complex model and then I can test out my new compoiting method to see if it works. All in all I'm aiming to try and make a really good 'final' test shot. Whew! :-)

Movies that I Like, the ever growing list.

Movies I like

Justin asked a very intresting question. While is offical question was “What Movies do you like?”. I will extend that question to “What movies do you like and why?”. The 'why' part, at least for me, is really important. I like a lot of things but i don't get emotionally attached to much. I tend to seperate good into two groups. There is Good as is in basically “ I felt something” whatever the emotion was I know it was honest emotion that resunates and stays with me long after the film is over. These are the films I usually can watch over and over and never get bored. Then there is 'good' as in “ it was well made”. I intlectually understand the parts that make up the film and why they work well but that doesn't mean i have an emotional response. I liken this to writing a good reseach paper. Sure, the paper takes a lot of work and energy and can be very impressively presented but i doubt it's going to be a new york times best seller. These films I tend to watch once and never watch again until they come out on DVD.

To sum this up I remeber the old saying “A craftsman works with his hands and his head, and artist works with his hands and his heart.” Many people work with there head, very few work with there heart.

So here we go! Films I love!

Kiki's Deliver Service

Treasure Planet

Joy Luck Club

Hero

Taxi Driver

Das Boot

Shaw Shank Redemtion

Forest Gump

Coffee and Cigerrets

Robocop 1 and 2

Ghostbusters

Full Metal Jacket

KIDS

Close Encounters of the Third Kind

The Never Ending Story

Chicago

Spiderman 1 and 2

Fried Green Tomatos

The Nightmare before Chrismas

Unico

Castle of the Cagliostro

Monster's Inc

The Incredables

Sinbad (the Dreamworks animated version)

Natural Born Killers

the last unicorn

Riding Bean

Iron Gaint

the last temptation of christ

Indiana Jones ( 1 and 3 )

Watergate

Catch me if you can

Paris is Burning

Birth of a Nation

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

The Breakfast Club

The Color Purple

Seven

Cinderella Man

Who Framed Rodger Rabbit

The Last Emperor

Alien and Aliens

Singing in the Rain

Seven Samuri

Rashamon

North by Northwest

The Last Picture Show

Apocalypse Now

Driving Miss Daisy

Aguirre, The Wrath of God

Run Lola Run
The Little Princess

Inharet the wind

JFK

Invasion of the Body Snatchers

Super Size Me

Brazil

Telephone Both

12 monkeys

5^th Element

Sin City

Saving Privite Ryan

Jurassic Park.

The Big Kahoona

American Beauty

The Big Laboski

I probably can get this list twice as long as soon as i remember more films that I have watched.

Next week, why i like these films :-)

Ona side note. Bunny's legs are rigged as of yesterday. These legs were done by Jason Schliffer (horrable sp.) and they are light years better the crappy ones i made before. This week I look into good spine setups! YA!