Muscle - Rigging

I decided to get some research on the muscles of the arm and the shoulder as I put to add those to the mesh.

The diagram above helped me understand where the biceps and triceps connect to which bones. 

The diagram above helped me understand where the Deltoid connects to. 

Facial Animation & Rigging

In this blog, I will write about my research on Gorillas and facial expressions. I did some research on how they express themselves. Most of the expression comes from the brow and the mouth, so it was key that the main area of focus. ]

In my research I found that when gorillas are not playful, they have a serious look, the brow a little lower than normal and no smile. The image to the left is an example of that. I did some research on the different expressions of gorillas. But I also did research on human expressions as some maybe be similar. 






I tried to get an angry one that didn't have his wide open, kind of before that. The brows are low and pushed together, the mouth is lower at the sides and high in the middle.

Rigging - Zombie

After having a quick go with the weight and learning how to use it. I started with the foot and I found fairly easy, I smoothed out the mesh using the range of motion and the weight tools.

The images below are some screenshots of the most extreme poses for the foot.

I tried to make the make the mesh seem realistic as possible, however being my first time skinning anything, I had a shaky start. Using the video tutorials I was about to get a rough idea how it should look and I went on from there.

I had the most problems with the back of the knee. I started to make a massive gap where the back of the knee was, I was later told it shouldn't look like that, it should crease, like clothes do in reality. I started to edit the gap, firstly trying to make it so it was only a tiny gap but still it didn't look real.

So I tried again with more success, the crease looks a lot more realistic and I was happy with it. Some of the mesh does overlap but I think it makes it look more believable. 

I finished the whole leg and there was no tearing or vertices having weights they shouldn't, as this was a problem in the early stages, I later learned that I should block all the vertices to the bones that would have majority of the control, this made it easier to blend between bones later, especially with the fingers. 

Another problem I had was the torso, I had ridges of the mesh and it looked highly unrealistic and had a lot of tearing. However I was able to using the symmetry modifier to get rid of the shirt hanging out his pants, so I could later use the mirror mode on the skin modifier to copy the weighting from one side. 

I had a go at the shoulder, I wanted to create a smooth bend from the neck to the shoulder after looking at myself as I did the motion, I noticed that shoulder keeps its bulge and i wanted to try and keep that as much as possible while keeping the flow.

 Another problem, I came across was the crotch area, I tried several different methods and weighting to get so it looked half decent, but it difficult to get it be affected by both legs and the hips. I couldn't figure out how much weight each vertices. After a few tries, I used some blending and seemed to work. Both is the nearly finished version, the back needed a bit more work.



After working on the muscle and facial rig, I have learnt an easier way to skin a mesh, using the paint tool. Using this tool and the weight tool, I was able to fix the tearing in the muscle rig and create great line-flow. 

Breakdown of VFX

Okay, this is a breakdown of my VFX project. While the scene is simple, there are many layers and several different effects and simulations. Firstly I started with a blue screen shot of myself, acting. Admittedly, not the best actor the shot was good. Below is the video i took. 

After I imported the file into After Effects, so my first step was to remove all the background in the shot to keep only the actor. I used the effect called Keylight. Afterwards i was left with all the blue removed from the scene, however the left hand side had some leftover background, I simply added a mask to remove all the leftover parts and I was left with this. 

Meanwhile, I was in Maya creating the scene in which my character would inhabit, I wanted a particle simulation for my clouds and a static, textured snowy hills. Firstly I started the snow, I created a NURBS plane and then using the vertex control and i started mold the landscape. I wanted the far end to be higher up, as if the actor was climbing a hill. After I was happy with the shape, I went online to find a shader that reflected the kind of snow I wanted. I found one, however I wasn't able to recreate the particle effect of the sparkles in the snow, but I was happy with the final product. 

Next was the clouds. I wanted clouds that moved and changes as clouds do. So I looked online to find some tutorials on how to make realistic clouds. Using the 3D container as a Starting point, I used the brush tool to create the clouds, leaving spaces in the clouds to create that realistic, however I don't think they were clear in the final one. But I am happy with it, below is the final version. 

Now back to the blue screen footage, I added the snow to the scene, lined it up with the actor, I precomposed the snow and added a gaussian blur to give the horizon a less definable line. This provided with the base for my scene. Later, I added the cloud simulation at the beginning of the scene. 

Next, I want 3 more effects to give a blizzard effect. Firstly I need a heavy mist that moves with the wind. I used a effect called fractal noise and scale it up to 600% which created a smoke like effect. I also added an evolution to made it change shape as it moved, like real mist/smoke. Then I copied the layer 3 times and changed the Z position to create different sized and shaped mist to create a 3D effect, I then tinted it a dark blue to give a cold feel. I also needed snow falling from the sky. I used a particle simulator in After Effects to create the effect. Using a large 3D box and a camera was able to make it look like the snowflakes where falling in the foreground and background. 

Next I copied the whole effect and removed the tint, then I masked all the places where the snow on the ground was. This was remove the need for a background and makes it look like a snow storm where the visibility is reduced. Finally I needed snow falling from the sky. I used a particle simulator in After Effects to create the effect. 

This is the complete break down.