Final Film

Here is the revised version of my film. Unfortunately I didn't make it into film day but i'm happy with what I have accomplished in the last two weeks and feel the film is better because of this last effort.

Totem Trouble from Lauren Scott on Vimeo.

Vanity Stills

Here are the vanity stills I had to produce for the data DVD hand in. I have also included the poster I designed after being confirmed as a shortlisted film for film day. I was very happy to be chosen as one of the best 20 or so films over 6 courses and 2 years and although I had had enough of making this film ages ago but the extra two weeks would give me a chance to correct the things that were really bothering me.

Gold hand in

Here is the film I handed in on the 13th May.



I had an incredibly hard time getting this done, resulting in the first all nighter since the pre-production stage. Although working down to the wire again, I feel this being the first and last all nighter of the 3D production process reflects well on my time management and organisational skills. Due to numerous rendering problems with shot 29 (the final shot fo the film) it looks very poor visually but this is purely down to the rendering issues and I am disappointed with this as well as in the flickers and un animated DoF in the first shot of the film. However my first and main aim when starting this film was to have a fully rendered film for the gold hand in, which I managed. And, because of that, i'm very proud of myself.

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes! (Turn and face the strain)

Below is a list of changes to be made, I hope to have most of them done by the originial deadline of the 13th so the extra 13 days can be used for rendering and compositing. (Lucky I'm not superstitious). Although it appears to be a lot, most are just minor, managable changes.

Shot01
* Try and have some movement in the leaves at the start of the shot.
*Include the 2Dparrot if possible.
*As a absolute last thing (if I have the time) add in a 2D chicken running around - purely for Kevin.

Shot03
* Have Oulou reaching out for his staf, then turn his back as he's turning towards the totem pole.

Shot05
* Hold the last frame for an extra second/second and a half.

Shot07
* Make hand and staff move together or make whole movement simpler.

Shot09
* Add a slightly confused look to Oulou's face.

Shot11
* Make the smile reaction faster.

Shot13
* Don't keep reaching, give extra time to anticipation of bite.
* Maybe have the totem man glancing across and reanimate the bit to be faster, more exaggerated and 'more violent'.

Shot14
* More expression with the pain, more intense.

Shot15
* When Totem Man runs off screen have Oulou turn fully with a more complete, exaggerated pose.

Shot16
* Camera shouldn't move up before Totem Man jumps up again, he should jump and the camera should follow.

Shot17
* Oulou should be in a more complete and dramatic pose before he starts to walk.

Shot18
* Oulou should finish walking in this shot so he doesn't start standing still.
* Action should be a bit more central. Move camera slightly.
*Totem Man should really throw the jug down and not just drop it.

Shot20
*Should start with TM in the air and then landing, as if he's jumped off the top shelf during Shot19.
*Perhaps reverse camera move. Start close and zoom out as he runs off.

Shot21
*Cut the first few frames so it goes straight into the jump and doesn't slow down the action.

Shot22
* Camera moves up after jump to show TM's face and eyes before it moves across the room.
* Hold the last frame, add shaking and anger to exentuate emotion.

Shot23
* Roof rattles a bit.
* Maybe have the parrot flying away again from the trees behind.

Shot24
*Bring the staff right down.
*Hold the last frame.

Shot28
* House sways, ladder falls forward, possibly the mask falls down too.
*Roof rattles and house shakes.
*Maybe have leaves blowing.

Shot29
*Camera pans over debris and maybe turns to find Oulou.
*Make sure Oulou is in full shot when we first see him.
*Make sure he looks wooden.

Film Day Extension

On Sunday I received an e-mail offering me the chance to possibly get shortlisted for the course's Film Day, I was very happy to have this opportunity and now have an extended deadline of the 26th May (Although I still have to hand in on the 13th). My first thought was that I didn't want to work on this film for an extra two weeks and had already started counting down the days until it was all finished. However, after scheduling and having one to one talks with both Kevin and Martin yesterday I have renewed enthusiasm to continue working on my film and making it the best it can be (even if I collapse!) I don't have much hope for getting much further than this extension but i'm still going to put in the effort.

I have pages of notes from yesterdays meetings - mostly from Kevin, I am going to update this blog with a list of changes that need to be made and keep it updated as I work through them. I hope to have enough time to do all, if not most of them, before I need to start re-rendering everything (sad face D:)

Thank God for the Render Farm!

Sunday 3rd May - Animation Finished!

All animation has been completed. Rendering is up to shot 10 of 29.

An updated Beta for my sound guy showing the last few shots now animated;

Beta Deadline

I was quite happy with the stage I was at for the Beta deadlineon Wednesday (29th) Below is the video I presented. However I had many more shots rendered by this point but I didn't have all the passes to put togeher in Fusion so it would've been a bit all over the place visually so I put together a few shots with the most passes completed to give some idea of how the film will look when finished. I even comped the finished magic particles from Fusion over the top of shot 7 to give a further preview of what it'll look like when it's finished (when, not if!)

Tick tock Tick tock...

As of now, shots 1 through 20 are fully animated. That leaves 8 more including all the magic and smoke. Rendering has begun but with some hitches so I still don't have any final rendered, fusioned shots...

3 DAYS UNTIL BETA!!

Animating and Rendering ahoy!

In the last week I have finished the modelling and texturing of the interior environment of Oulou's hut and have placed all the (many!) assets within the scene. I have also lit it.

I've also done all the face morphs for both characters and made some finishing touches to the rigs, adding a few controllers etc. Below are a couple of tests using Oulou.

As well as this I have created and textured the totem pole itself and incorporated this into the scene too.

I have no started animating and rendering in preparation for the Beta deadline. Music and sound effects are reported to be coming on well and hopefully I will have these in a week, so I have time to synch it up before the deadline after Easter.

Here's to getting this bloody thing finished!

Update

The lack of updates for the last couple of weeks have been due to the amount of work I have been working on. Below is a brief summary of what has been completed when, I will update again including .movs and screen shots.

4th March (Alpha) - 11th March (Seminar 2) - In the week after alpha I committed myself to getting the first shot (the long outdoor shot) done. I fully textured the hut and other assets such as palm trees, the mask, ladder and stand. I merged these to a new scene where I then set about making all the different flower and leaf variations. There were done in Photoshop from scratch and were all placed on 2d planes with various bend modifiers applied to add some shape. This method was again used for the grass, however I am currently encountering some problems at the base where I get a dead straight line against the floor geometry, this is being worked on. I also painted a rough matte painting that is currently in place and is suitable for using (as it will be blurred in post due to depth or field) However if I have any spare time I will be going over this to improve it slightly. A sphere has also been added around all the geometry and a sky material applied.

The scene in it's current state is just over 860,000 polys but I plan to do some 'poly pruning' and cut away some leaves and trees that aren't visible to the camera as well as the back of huts. My computer is handling the scene fine and also renders it but for the sake of render times (mental ray is not loving the sheer amount of opacity planes) and ease of work I will be cutting the poly count before rendering this scene out properly.

During this week I also did a quick test of a 2D parrot, as Kevin mentioned it would be nice to see some secondary movement in the opening scene, either birds flying from the trees or butterflies. So I wouldn't have to model, texture, rig etc a parrot in 3D I drew one in 2D and split it up into 3 simple parts (body and 2 wings) these were then applied as opacity and diffuse maps as a material to planes in max and animated with a simple bend modifier. I like the result and hope to use it, the birds won't be close to camera and will hopefully blend into the scene well. I also plan on adopting this method for some butterflies too. During this week I also lit the scene.

11^th March (Seminar 2) - 18^th March - My task for this week was to rig and skin both characters to a useable level. I had many technical difficulties and a multitude of little problems which hindered my progress and really made the process a struggle to get done with regards to personal motivation. However I rigged and skinned both characters and to date only have to link some controllers and add face morphs before I can begin animation. It is also during this week I had problems with my max which a reinstall didn't solve. The selection box along the toolbar (geometry, bones, camera etc) is constantly blank in all files, this is more of an inconvenience than a problem especially when it came to rigging and not being able to just have bones selectable. I also have a couple of files where I tested the skinning of my characters where Oulou's cloth tabard moves to the same place every time the file is reopened, even straight after a save, it moves in world space and also has a different pivot point. This also happened with both of his necklaces, this was and still is highly annoying as when I use these files it really is a case of one step forward, two steps back. I've tried merging into a new scene, re-naming files and also saving to different locations (external HD) but to no avail. As this was only a test scene this is also more of an inconvenience than a big problem but I would like to solve it as I don't want it happening in my final scene files.

It was also during this week where I posed both characters for the ATI competition. I rendered them off on a plane background and also merged them with the opening shot. This tipped the poly count to over a million polys and max crashed once or twice when I was moving large amounts of polys around but all in all I was very happy it rendered fine and looked good, I took both the character pass and the environment pass into Fusion and Photoshop afterwards to add a fake DoF and do some subtle colour corrects etc and was quite pleased with the resulting image. The characters are not in the opening scene of the film so I don't need to worry about the poly count with regards to that.

March 18^th- March 25^th (Seminar 3) - After finishing the rigs and with all the problems I had and was still having with max I hit a real wall with the production process. I didn't want to continue making the film and felt very un-motivated. The problems had set me behind on my schedule by almost 5 days and I didn't (and still don't) know whether I will finish the film. I always thought that when I got to this point of the film I could envisage it finished but I still can't and it's starting to worry me. Although I have been reassured by both graduates and 3^rd years that most people hit this stage and then get over the hump onto the home stretch i'm still finding it quite hard. This week has not produced much physical work as my target was to model, texture and light the interior environment - Oulou's hut. This involved a lot of research into Polynesian tribal trinkets, from all the assets individually to the table, chair and bed. At this point I have the interior modelled and mostly modelled and textured the interior and have modelled all of the assets and textured almost all of these.

Textured Character Turnarounds

There has been a lot of progress with the characters since my last post. Below are links to the turn arounds of both Oulou and the little totem man, both are fully modelled and textured. Oulou was at this stage by Saturday and the little totem man was finished on Tuesday. Both of the following turnarounds were presented at the end of my revised pre-vis which was shown at alpha deadline. I will be updating this blog later today with more detailed still renders and wireframes.

Oulou character turnaround

Little Totem man turnaround

Ammended Pre-Vis

After the talk with Kevin I changed my pre-vis drastically to fit with what was discussed. Here is the ammended and final version of the pre-vis.

Totem Trouble final pre-vis

Changes to be made to Pre-vis

Yesterday afternoon, after the Pre-Alpha session, I spent an hour with Kevin going through my first pre-vis. It was a very productive session. With the advice of Kevin I have drawn up a detailed list of camera angles and cuts to change in my film as well as a few shots to add.

Shot 1- Have camera fly slowly through the village, under ladders, through trees, possibly starting with the camera moving through parting trees. Have Oulou's hut off to one side of the screen, keep camera low to emphasise height and social importance of raised up hut.
Shot 2 - Don't pan up to face, pan across to belly, cut to shot 4
Shot 3 - Cut
Shot 4- Start moving the camera before cutting. Have Oulou reach for his staff (screen left) and turn before cutting.
Shot 5 - Cut
Shot 6 - Oulou has staff and is in the process of walking towards the camera, closer shot, don't have too much empty space. Pan wider as he gets closer as if cameraman is walking backwards from him. Have him walk out of shot to the viewers right.
*Remember time passing for Oulou is time passing for us, the viewer*
Shot 7 - Possibly add a shot of the totem pole with Oulou stepping into frame from the left.
Shot 8 - Don't fade into, time has not passed. Change camera to Oulou's p.o.v. Put camera in model's head to be accurate. Keep pan up totem pole, angle can be cheated if Oulou is too close and so the angle is too steep.
Shot 9 - Centre magic swing shot, too much wasted space to the left of current shot. Close up of his torso showing swing.
Shot 10 - Cut
Shot 11 - Show magic swirling up totem pole. Show pole glowing.
Shot 12 - Keep as is
Shot 13 - Cut Oulou's face out of the left of shot, do it from Oulou's p.o.v again
Add another shot - cut back to face.
Shot 14 - Centre slightly. Oulou keeps hold of his staff and stumbles back slightly with pain.
Shot 15 - Cut
Shot 16 - Bite shot - Keep as is.
Shot 17 - Keep as is
Shot 18 - Centre Oulou a bit more, too much wasted space on the left.
Shot 19 - Cut
Add an additional shot showing the little totem guy climbing up the table leg and possibly running along it.
Shot 20 - Have Oulou turning and looking at desk, maybe approaching but not up to the desk.
Shot 21 - Cut
Shot 22 - Move camera to the right so we see totem pole man throwing stuff off the shelf but also see Oulou in the background getting angrier.
Shot 23 - Slowly pan into Oulou getting angrier/determined, clutching staff.
Shot 24 - Cut
Shot 25 - Keep as is, don't cut, have the camera pan along following the totem guy along desk and include shot 26 here.
Shot 27 - Keep as is
Shot 28 + 29 - Merge, but keep all action from one camera angle.
Shot 30 - Keep as is, no fade out.
Shot 31 - Keep as is.
Shot 32 - Add a new shot of the little totem man running along the shelf as magic flies at him. He runs out of shelf he dives behind a reflective dish leaning against the wall. last lot of magic hits the dish and bounces back.
Shot 33 - Keep as is
Shot 34 - Keep as is
Shot 35 - Keep as is

Totem Trouble Pre-Vis

Link to the first pre-vis of 'Totem Trouble'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rz2cJEuJpBE

Exterior Hut Development

Concept Sketchs for Oulou's Hut

Coloured Concept Sketch

Oulou's Hut 3D Model

A Catch-up

'Totem Trouble' - Concept
It is a story about a tribal witchdoctor (by the name Oulou) who practices magic in his hut and brings a mischievous totem pole to life whom he must control as he attempts to change him back. The story concludes with sparks flying where unfortunately a spark is deflected back towards him turning Oulou himself into a totem.

Early Concept Work (Click picture to see full sized image)

Oulou Character Development

Final Character sheets

Oulou the Witchdoctor

Little Totem Man

Character comparison

3D Oulou Character Model to date

Blog Launch

This is the launch of the blog for my second year film 'Totem Trouble'. Pre-production and early production work to follow as well a record of my first seminar which takes place tomorrow.