New Designers: Character Turnarounds

Unfortunately only the Erlking got to be animated. It is a shame because I think it looks much more interesting even if it's only a subtle movement.

New Designers: The Erlking ver.5 - FINAL

A final version of The Erlking. 

The Art of The Erlking: Printed Version

A little sneak-peek of the Erlking book! After a long fight it's finally done!

New Designers: The Erlking ver.4

New Designers: The Erlking ver.3

New Designers: The Erlking .02

After recieving the feedback I sat down to apply it to the film. Unfortunately without having actual files for Father, Son and Horse animated scenes I could only work around them to make them feel a little bit more dynamic.

Few simple assets had been added to the scenes consisting of the Father character. I think they make it all more dynamic already. Few minor tweaks have been added throughout the film to improve the overall flow of the story.
Below is a comparison video of the previously submitted version and the newest one.

As always, any feedback is much appreciated. 

New Designers Turnaround: The Erlking

The playblast below shows the subtle animation I decided to add to the turnaround of the Erlking. Small things but I think they enrich the model.

The Erlking update

Samantha and Peta-gaye both worked on the animation to adjust and improve segments for the New designers Screening award,

Be Willing My Darling: Tweaking the Light

After feedback the scene below had to be edited in order to make it more dramatic. First thing was to stretch the geometry even more and then work with lighting. 

Below are different colours of the light that illuminates the Erlking's face when he is the angriest. It has also been suggested that the background lights should be dimmed down as the light on the Erlking's face becoming stronger. 

Animation Update: Come With Me

The next scene to be fixed was the Son listening to the Erlking's fake promises. The previous version was not clear in terms of the action and the Son's behaviour, but after discussing it and adding more fog animation, the boy gained a completely new animation.

Because that scene consists of both the Son and the Erlking, the amount of frames is split between the two, which explains why the end of this animation sequence is underdeveloped.

Further tweaking:

Comparison of the old and the new animation: 

Animation Update: Father, do you not heat? .03

Tweaking the animation of both the Erlking and the Son.

After getting feedback the Son's movement has been tweaked a bit further.

Comparison of the old animation and the new one; added fog and a texture preview playblast. 

Animation Update: Father, do you not hear?

Fixing the key poses of the old animation to make the Son's movement a bit more dynamic. 

Further tweaking of the Son's animation; not final yet. The Erlking's animation has not been changed so far. 

The death scene 02

 This is the death scene without the crying bounce of the father. 

Animation Update: Do Come My darling

Fog animation changed. 

The Son's animation tweaked.

The Erlking's animation added.

Further tweaking and refining. 

- Animation with no fog.

- Animation with fog.

Comparison to the old animation:

Updated Death Scene

The animation still needs to be smoothed out but I feel as though the elements of the scene are in place for creating a sad ending. 

Animation Progression The Son's Death Scene

The Son's death scene progression. It still needs work in terms of the timing but i have adjusted the camera added a zoom and I have changed the animation all together. The faces and the speed still needs adjusting.

 

Animation Update: Do Come My Darling

Fixing the animation of the scene for New Designers.
Attempt number one (fixing the Son, the Elking not edited yet):

After receieving feedback additional changes have been made to the Son's animation to make him feel more scared and distanced from the Erlking: 

There's still a lot of fixing to be done but it's much better than it was before. 

The Son Updated Pose

I changed the pose of the son and updated the lighting also for his turnaround.

Turnaround: The Father's New Pose

Major Project Submission Post

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Animation Progression

Below are the  additional final animated shots for the animation they all had many takes to refine the animation that is presented. 

Post-Production .01

Just a quick update of the progress of the animation. Early stages of post-production, adjusting levels and colours, sorting out all render layers and placing files in correct order. 

Animation: Son Covered by Twins

This scene proved itself to be really problematic and took many hours (count in days) to figure out the issues. From colliders to constraits I worked the way out of a problem and because it took a lot of time I am sharing a selection of fails (unfortunately some of the most dramatic ones didn't get saved).

And the final version where hair of both the Mushroom and the Plant twin works fine, doesn't have problems with scale or geometry forming into crazy shapes. 

Animation: Plant Twin Smiles

The beginning is for the dynamics to calm down. The actual animation is about 2 seconds long.

This scene has been rendered out!

Animation Progression

Animation: The Son Looks Through Fingers

A quick scene with the Son looking up at one of the daughters.

Render stills and depth of field pass:

Textured playblast:

 

Non-textured playblast:

Animation: Twins Appear .01

After a rather fierce fight the scene got figured out. Below are light test, a playblast of the animation and a final render. 

Animation Progression

009-013 Updated 

I added a few blinks to the father and animated his brows 

Animation Progression

009-013

Meeting the father and Son 

Final Lighting

Animation: Twins Appear

After re-thinking and re-designing the section of storyboard with the twins appearing the time has come to animate it. I decided to break the scene into smaller segments, because of the weight of the files. The first to work with was the Mushroom Twin.

The dynamics have been tweaked and overall animation added. First 100 frames are not going to be used in the actual animation, as it's the time for dynamics to settle and snap to point.

Next it was the Plant Twin with a similar process to go through. Her hair is still to be tweaked.

For the son's animation I decided to go with a really subtle movement as he should not be the main focus of the shot. 

And a test of the Son and the Mushroom Twin together in one scene (again, starting between 00:03-00:04). 

Back to Pre-Production: Storyboarding the Daughters Scene

The scene starring two daughters and the son had to be re-designed in order to create more dramatic emotions and also because the set proved to be memory intensive and ways around the problem had to be found. Below is the re-designed section of the storyboard.

Animation: Be Willing My Darling

Camera movement and animation base. 

Animation tweaked and facial animation added. 

Animation: The Beauty I Covet

1. The set separated between layers

2. Dynamic train added, fog movement tweaked. 

Scene ready to be rendered!

Animation Progression

107-112
King Appears in the distance

I added a camera shake as the horse ran by . 

Animation: The Beauty I Covet

Animation base. Few more tweaks to do and the fog to add. The end of it is going to be a close up of the Erlking's face, although I am planning on rendering out the whole sequence presented below just in case.

(for some reason after uploading the video to YouTube it glitches out in the end. I apologize for that.) 

Animation: Will Play Them With Thee .03

1. Elements of the scene split between layers

2. Lighting tests

3. Luminance Depth Pass

Animation: Will Play Them With Thee .02

A bit more tweaking to the head movement and the arms and shoulders. 

Subtle facial expression added.

Background fog added. 

Animated fog added. More layers of the fog rising up will be added in post-production. 

The Erlking's train added. Again, for some reason the dynamic system within the scene was broken and needed re-creating.

Animation: Will Play Them With Thee .01

   

Base animation in which the Erlking is controlling the fog. It has been suggested that the pose in the end should be more menacing. That and general smoothing and tweaking.

Still a bit more tweaking to be made. 

Animation: I Know Nice Games .05

Lights tests:

(unfortunately only 50% of the actual size)

(Further light test and final light; 100% size)

Luminance depth:

The scene divided into layers:

Still renders (no post-production):

This scene is ready to be batch rendered!

Animation: I Know Nice Games .04

After recieving feedback the camera angle and the positioning of the characters and the environment have been changed. The animation has been tweaked a bit further. 

A textured playblast showing the fog movement. The beginning of the shot is going to be cut slightly, in order for it to fit with the music track. 

Animation added to background and foreground fog. The Erlking fog's movement tweaked. 

For some reason the Erlking's train lost it's dynamic properties which means they had to be redone. After exporting the cache it has been added to the scene.

Animation Progression

000-007

The Opening Scene 

Animation: I Know Nice Games .03

Animation progression

218-221

Fast run through the forest 

Lighting test 

 Final Lighting

Animation: I Know Nice Games .02

Latest update of the scene. Not final yet.

Animation,Lighting and Assets Progression

Additional Assets also had to be created for some of the scenes that I will be tackling  two simple crows were created and textured 

The Reins had a IK made to help control them that is parented unde the wrist of the father and additional controls to help unpick the reins when they pentrated the horse's geometry 

Scene 007-009 

The horse quickly runs by 

Lighting Test

Final Lighting

Animation: I Know Nice Games

Another scene blocked out. Next step is to clean up the keyframes and refine the movement.

Animation: Do Come, My Darling .02

Latest update of the scene.

Animation: Do Come, My Darlking .01

Animating the scene so far. Still quite a bit to tweak but it's getting there. Version one with no fog, version two with textures turned on and a fog with broken transparency... (to be fixed as well).

1.

2. 

Animation: The Erlking's First Appearance .05

1. Luminance Depth Pass

2. Render layers.
This time I tried splitting the elements between few more layers to discover if it makes the post-production process easier.

This scene is currently rendering. Time to move on!

Animation: The Erlking's First Appearance .04