Memory Tree First Animation Pass

Here is the first Memory Tree Animation Pass. Currently all characters are jumping from main poses and not a whole lot is fleshed in but it's the bare minimum in order to get a good feel for the cinematic.

Little Gemma Model

After talking with Tammy for a bit, I realized that Little Gemma couldn't be a squashed, disproportionate version of Older Gemma. So with her help (she came up with the design and tweaked the model to fit) Little Gemma was redone.

Shown below are just some quick renders. I intended to do them in viewport but the transparency issues turned her into something quite horrid. I also did some tests with apex cloth which is currently applied to her scarf and dress. Still needs a lot of tweaking but really, I better get to animating soon! D:

Tee Hee! *dimple*

Maya Hair Tests

My first attempts at using Maya Hair. Just attempting to style it proved hard. I went through and manually moved the CVs for each curve and it still isn't looking like the Hair I envisioned Gemma to have. Still, the dynamics for it were fun to play with.

Before this I had a mullet!

Loreal. Because I'm worth it.

Memory Tree First Camera Pass

So this is a bit overdue, but I finally got a camera pass of my storyboard. Maya Playblasts don't seem to support trax sounds so there is no audio yet. Also it seemed to render out of my camera shot so there might be some clipping issues that won't be there in the actual renders.

Thesis: Mental Ray Materials

I have to say, my knowledge of mental ray materials is pretty meager at best. I've only recently begun to dabble in skin shading and even then it was only brushing the surface. In truth, rendering in general has been a gray area for me. So researching mental ray materials and their usage in rendering was my first thought when picking a thesis.

There is a vast amount of things one can do with mental ray but I'm going to concentrate on characters. So sub-surface scatter (using maya's fast skin) as well as cloth, anything to showcase a character best in any kind of lighting.

The project that would benefit most would be Brynn. I have thought about applying this to Taerar as well but see as he'll be the first creature I'll ever do, I wanted to focus on it's sculpt. However, I do plan on compositing them both into one image (that awesome concept) so perhaps there will still be room for that.

Brynn Ardele of the Auburn Fist

My final portfolio piece is, as expected, a character. And she was requested from a dear friend last semester but I, sadly, could not commit. This time I'm planning ahead. Her request is a realistic sculpt of her character, Brynn Ardele of the Auburn Fist. A monk trainee delusioned into greatness as well as fists with flaming tendencies. My intentions here are to create a full character, fully textured and posed, similar to Mirician which I made during the Spring 2012 semester.

Below are some concept images and sketches provided by my friend.

Shades of Grey: Grey Polish

On second thought, lets go for something else... ARCHIVED!

I did a bit of thinking on what piece I wanted to polish and my mind constantly went back to the first portfolio piece I did while here at FIEA: Grey. It was a character I was quite fond of as his design (done by the awesome Vincent Angerosa). I had done the character in four days. Not sure how I did it but it's obvious he could use a bit more love.

Aside from a few anatomical tweaks, Grey seriously needs a Zbrush sculpt. The one he has right now is so minimal it's hardly noticable. I also want to flesh out his hair with more hair cards.

Shown below was his state at the end of Fall 2011.

Plushy Knight: The Memory Tree Storyboard

Seeing how Plushy Knight is finally moving on to the story stage of development, I figured this would be the best time for me to get my hands wet with cinematics. As such, I chose the climax of the game as my piece: The Memory Tree.

Still fresh in the planning phase though,

Spring 2012: Mircian

My first portfolio piece done in the Spring Semester 2012. 

Her name is Mirician Strongheart, a psion born with telepathic powers. She uses her doll, Comma, as an orb implement in order to augment her powers.

 

Spring 2012: Plusy Knight Animation Cycles

My last portfolio piece for the Spring 2012 semester. My focus here was to create loopable animation cycles that could be seen in game. I took several animation cycles from my capstone game, Plushy Knight, and polished them to 100%. I wanted to make sure that I nailed the basics (the walk and the run animations) before I jumped into something more stylized (the stalk and emerge).

Spring 2012: Female Tribal Head

My second portfolio piece for the Spring 2012 semester. It was a collaboration project which consisted of modelers, animators and tech artists. My job was as a modeler. I worked with Vincent Angerosa who developed the concept and orthographics and created the model. 

Summer 2012 Portfolio Outline

UPDATED WITH SCHEDULE

1. Plushy Knight: Memory Tree Cinematic

• Storyboard Iteration as necessary 
• Camera Work with Characters Air-planing around
• Little Gemma  Model
• Still needs textures... when will I do that? o__O
• Body Language (5/29)
• Facial Animation (6/2)
• Polish (6/4)
• Render (6/10)

2. Newcomer! Brynn Ardele of the Auburn Fist

• Model Sheet / Orthographics (6/12)
• Base Model (6/17)
• UV and Prep for Zbrush (6/19)
• Zbrush Sculpt- Take my time here (6/26)
• Texture- Probably will do in conjunction with the sculpt (7/3)
• Shader- if time permits (7/6)
• Render (7/8)

3. Newcomer! Taerar the Rage Drake

• Concept and Sketches (7/11)
• Zbrush Block In (7/14)
• Muscles and Anatomy (7/21)
• Detail and Skin (7/28)
• Pose (7/29)
• Polish (7/30)
• Composite (7/31)