1st Semester Reflection

Overview

This semester has been full of challenges, victories and above all huge leaps and bounds in ability and learning. The main focus of this semester has been experimenting with both 2d and 3d and finding the pros and cons of both to further narrow down what I would like to do. The 2 hour class period has done wonders to productivity and the sheer amount of work I have been able to get dome is amazing and it dosen't feel like work. As class goes on i notice my work growing in complexity and my drive to make things better grows stronger and stronger to see what is the best my work can be. 

Quarter 1

1st quarter my projects were focused on 3d and mainly on the modeling aspect of that. I learned how to rig my models and started trying out walk cycles and creating and environment for my model also.  The quarter was also good for getting used to how to plan out my projects and for getting familiar with how much time goes into the projects so I can more accurately estimate the time a project will take.

Scrap

The quarter was dominated by my robot walk cycle project that then crossed over into 2nd quarter but the final project was much better than I had originally hoped for. With this project I learned new techniques for splitting up my workspace in Maya that i can now apply to all my future projects. I also became more familiar with the creation of textures for my models and how much a good coloring can set the model apart and help bring it to life. The final project was called Scrap due to the junkyard feeling I was trying to get from the project. I took inspiration from the Pixar movie Wall-e for my environment and then put my own spin off it by creating watch towers and other touches. While First Quarter of this project was dominated by the walk cycle and model of itself the start of second quarter was used to focus on the environment and lighting that help bring the scene to life. This project helped show me how much an environment can add to a project. The intro and finishing scenes on my project helped me give it a completed look and have a little fun experimenting with how to make these normally dull scenes more interesting. One of the things I loved about this project was that now that I have he models of the moon and watchtower I can use them in the future when needed and do not need to remake them. The final product turned out great and was able to help set the pace for 2nd quarter and the rest of the year. 

2nd Quarter

The start of my 2nd quarter was sent on finishing up my scrap project and then we moved on to a rotoscoping project. Rotoscoping is the process of tracing over video frames to create a frame by frame animation. This project was out of my comfort zone because I usually work with 3D and not 2D animation and because I used a Wacom drawing pad to create and draw my frames. This is the 2nd time I have used the pad on a project and the first time I have used it for a major portion of a project, but overall the experience was rewarding and fun. This quarter was spent mostly on the rotoscope project after starting to plan out a new modeling project.

Robo Rex Project 

As I was in between projects I began preliminary sketches for my project that would come after rotoscoping. While working on scrap  one of the problems I ran into was that my base sketches were not detailed enough and to scale with each other making work on the project more difficult. Since this model will be a full robotic T-Rex and is much more complicated then the simplistic robot I decided planning it out more throughly would be helpful. I started laying out the whole body and individual parts so that modeling from the drawings would be easier.

Rotoscope

My major project for 2nd quarter was to create a rotoscope that is loop-able with the option to add on a little before the loop to create more of a story. My original idea was to create a story of someone running away from a raptor through the jungle to eventually come across a locked door and pounding on the door to try and get in. The loop would be of them pounding on the door. due to time the final product is just the character running up to the door and then banging on it trying to get in. While working on this project I learned how time consuming drawing each frae can be and that the drawing tablet make things much easier. One of the major struggles was the original footage was blurry in parts making it difficult to draw over especiallythe hands of the character. I really enjoyed drawing out the background and getting familiar with the tablet was cool. I can apply my use of the tablet to later projects when making textures for my 3D models. This project was fun but I would prefer 3D animation and will most likely not continue to build on it and finish the story. My finished product is a little choppy with the cycle and I think it can be fixed with more work and time committed to it. 

Conclusion

As the semester comes to a close I feel that I have made leaps and bounds from where I was at the start of the year. Many of the things that I have learned this semester are generalized and can help in almost all my projects in the future. My foundation is growing and I have hope of starting to model the T-Rex project next semester and will need the foundational skills i've learned this year in order to be successful with this project and many more to come.