.

MARKETING

2009-06-23T19:43:00.000-07:00

All the group members attention! I would like you (when all the torture finishes), take your time and if you want- please design your own version of the poster. If anyone needs any pictures , textures or fonts, please let me know.

2009-06-23T19:08:00.000-07:00

This is not exactly final final outcome, there will be more improvements yet to come for degree show, but it is a nice proof that on the end of the day, despite all the problems, group did step together and -MADE IT! Congratulation guys!

Refference filming

2009-05-31T14:29:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago ( i forget the exact date) Anja and i came to college to film the references for several animation scenes so that anja could see how the human form works perfectly and create the best possible animation.

The girl that was asked to act out the role of Sadako, the films central character, is a Broadcast Post Production student named Kozue Sufu. She was chosen by anja due to her possible resemblences to Sadako Sasaki and due to the fact that Anja wanted a Japanese person to oversee the film a tiny bit (coincidentally Kozue should be helping me with post production on this movie) so that she could get the right feel to the movie.

We took many Photographs, some that I will upload shortly once i obtain them from Anja, we also filmed the Run and the Jump and even acted out almost all of the scenes from the movie, including the mourning scene where I had to act out the role of Sadako's 4 family Members.

Overall the references we took that day have been of a great use to Anja over the course of animating as it has given her the chance to really study the human body and its movement (something as im not too good at actually...) and create the perfect animations.

Group Tips [We learned together so we share together]

2009-05-31T07:59:00.000-07:00

Dan: This is just a few tips for the group, some are mainly for Anja whilst others are for Heba and some for both myself and Simon

For the Bomb scene possibly try to triangulate the scene as this should get rid of some of the bad geometry, though this can also make some worse geometry...but at least it connects everything together and cause the scene to run a little faster. Also Cache some of the particles if your happy with it, that way you can cache the particles from one building and then work straight away on the others without effecting or having to recalculate that building.

Anja: The geometry got complex, because I modeled some scenes with the help of Adobe illustrator, trying out the fluidity between adobe and 3D software. Once the illustrator files were imported into Maya, they were turned into the curves and then converted into polygons. I did Quadriculate them (this is because it gives much smoother surface and it affects the way light huts the surface). Afterward Charley converted the objects in the bomb scene into triangulate objects in order to do dynamics.

Clock Tree's Scene, well this is my scene to animate, and although it would have been horrible to rig due to the topology if i had cleaned it up this could have been better then bend deformers with a controller.

Animation:

This is mostly for Heba as Anja is a veteran 2d animator.
Try to draw just the outline when starting the animation as if the animation doesn't flow or things aren't correct then no time has been wasted adding the tiny details.
Also if the 2 wings of the crane are to animate identically then its best to just animate one and then once its colored and scanned in just mirror the animation as this should save time as it is difficult to mirror things perfectly by hand. I know it does seem a little obvious and common sense...but when i was in the 1st year i didn't know much about 2d animation and i was just redrawing eachframe for hours just to discover it was wrong and that id wasted 4 hours. Your work is very good and your working quite fast too.

Anja: Since we havent really animated since 1st year, it is extremely hard to catch up with it. We also encountered hard times working out the animation of a strange angles of a human body or even a bird animation. In this respect i have to admit I am surprised over the work Heba did. She progressed very fast and her animation of crane flight is really nice.

Dan: I agree with this, due to a lack of Hand drawn animation members of our team have had to begin 2d animation techniques practically from scratch. Though work is still produced at a great rate.

Topology, Although creating things using curves can produce some fantastic results it unfortunately doesn't have any benefits over normal polygon modeling. In a model all vertices and edges should connect to something and have a purpose, otherwise there are often problems with animating, and when using poly's created by curves this can have a huge effect on memory, which is something charlie is struggling with recently, due to Maya trying to calculate what to do with all the excess edges and vertices.

There is also a way Inside Maya to create text, though it does only create it as a curve unfortunately so lofting is just part of the process, though you can change the lofting options so that the polygons that are create are not like this ##### but instead are lower poly and cleaner looking.

Unfortunately it cant be avoided and sometimes it is best to use curves but if you decide to do something this way then you must clean the polygon a little so its less CPU intensive, one or 2 are fine but 9000 would probably cause maya to crash constantly (depending on CPU power and RAM of course...).

Textures:

The textures created by Anja are amazing, they give the film the most beautiful look, unfortunately if any texture is above 4096 pixels by 4096 pixels then Maya starts to crash and freak out. This is due to memory options, and if you convert your textures to.map files then it lowers memory usage and can sometimes GREATLY increase render time, plus it doesn't cause Maya to show multiple warnings when rendering.

Textures for 3d applications should primarily be multiples of 2. starting from as small as 1x1 Pixels.
Below is a quick list showing texture sizes preferred by most 3d programs.
1x1
2x2
4x4
8x8
16x16
32x32
64 x 64
128 x 128
256 x 256
512 x 512
1024 x 1024
2048 x 2048
4096 x 4096
I wont go above that as its rare unless you work for a large company on a big budget movie...that youl need to go above any of these sizes.

The textures don't usually HAVE to be square: they don't have to have the same size in both dimensions. But each dimension does have to be a power of two. So 64 × 128 is all right, for instance, or 512 × 32, or 256 × 256. But you can't make a texture image that is 200 × 200 pixels, since 200 isn't a power of two, whereas 1024 x 32 is (though generally i prefer to stick to square textures myself).

If you create a texture thats say hmm... 9011 pixels in heigh by 11 pixels in width then maya is NOT going to like it as maya WILL most likely crash pretty fast (though if you have a LOT of ram and some amazing HARDWARE then maya will still run, just not as smoothly as it should) as it cant calculate it propperly. This can be a problem and simply converting the file format to .map wont really help here either.

Photoshop textures

Most graphics hardware requires that your texture images always be a size that is a power of two in each dimension. That means you can use any of the following choices for a texture size: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024, 2048, or so on (but unless you have a really high-end card, you'll probably need to stop there).

The textures don't usually have to be square: they don't have to have the same size in both dimensions. But each dimension does usually have to be a power of two. So 64 × 128 is all right, for instance, or 512 × 32, or 256 × 256. But you can't make a texture image that is 200 × 200 pixels, since 200 isn't a power of two.

To convert a texture from .tiff (or whatever the format) to .map just simply go to the render prefferences (in maya prefferences) and tick the convert textures box.

Note: maya software will NOT read .map textures as .map is purely for Mental ray. To render in maya software you must convert the images from their original format to a .bot format. I am not sure how Maya hardware renderer works so unfortunatly i cannot supply a format for that, but it does reply on your system hardware only so if your graphics card cannot support a texture size then neither can maya hardware renderer.

Large jpegs over 6 meg can sometimes cause problems, for example im using a .tif file that is a total or 60 meg and it DOES cause maya to be a little slower so i decided to convert the file to .map to speed up maya a little.

Photoshop Textures:

For texture creation many people use Photoshop, some prefer to use Zbrush and other prefer to use Mudbox, but most people even if they start in a seperate program, eventually come back to Photoshop to clean their textures.

Photoshop CS4 has a new POLYPAINT ability for 3d, though unfortunatly this does not yet support layers and from my own personal experiances it doesnt look very nice as its in the early stages of development right now.

If you wish to texture an object in either Photoshop or Mudbox or even Zbrush...the object MUST HAVE ASSIGNED UV'S otherwise it will not work propperly and you will get some very ugly results. Also any ramps or anything applied in maya will not work in Photoshop, as the ramp is connected to the material and OBJ export ONLY exports the object and texture refferences, it exports UV's too but not the textures assigned to the UVS.

With an OBJ file there is a .MTL file, this is the MATERIAL refferences file, if you delete this then the OBJ will not know where to collect the textures from and all texture references will be ruined, this however does NOT delete UV's as the uvs are part of the OBJ file and MTL file is just for texture names and references.

On a quick side note...UVS and PSD networks are NOT related...a PSD network assigns a texture and a UV decides the texture coordinates, if the object has bad UV mapping then a PSD network will just look extremely ugly. PSD networks are created for the purpose of testing, so that when yo make a change it instantly updates in Maya, this is a fantastic feature for testing but not for the final result. Once all the textures are finished they should be converted to another format such as .jpeg, .PNG, or any other format you wish. Though PSD networks DO work when you render, but this is purely so that you can view your results faster and not for the final film output.

Anja: The way of texturing we used is with PSD NETWORKS.

Rendering menu: Texturing: Create psd network. Tis is a direct connection between an object and photoshop. This means that We can quickly change the texture, preserve the ramps we made in Maya and also we have much stronger control over anything connected with texture (transparency of teh object for instance).

It does not take any more time that normal texturing, but the problem is that it does not work on some objects with bad geometry (overlapping vertices), these need to be converted to subdivs and once textured- back to poly.

This is primarily for others who view the Blog, as this doesn't effect us as we don't use images Above this size so far as I know.

Unfortunately the MAIN drawback for PSD networks is that you cannot use any texture size, the maximum texture size that you can use in a PSD network is 2-49 x 2048 sized image, as the slider doesn't go any further and entering your own Numbers doesn't work. This image shows what i just explained. its unfortunate really.

Dynamics and particles:

Dan: Once something is finished and perfected with particles or dynamics they should either be Show Allcached (this saves it to memory and makes the file run a LOT faster then without a cache) or converted to keyframes. Dynamics act different upon each individual render so they need to be converted to keyframes and then edited if they arent already perfect. This changes it to an animation and increases both rendertime along with playback and playblast time.

I didnt know about dynamics caching or about converting them to keyframes and this caused a previous project of mine to look different in the render to in the viewport and i got a lower grade for it. I would prefer if my friends did NOT fail or get lower grades or even struggle because of something simple they didnt know, as sometimes when you spend all your time learning complex things...you dont notice the smaller things.

Also...trialgles are important...most renderers and game engines support ONLY triangles, many renderers convert things to triangles upon render to increase render times (im not sure WHY i just know thats how it is) .

On another quick note...Nurbs are good, though according to industry, many professionals only use nurbs in order to convert them to polygons, i have little knowledge of Nurbs but all the professionals ive spoken to for game design have said they don't use nurbs as most game engines don't support it... also many professionals have said that Nurbs are rarely used in the final output of things and 99% of the time nurbs are just converted to polygon objects for further tweaking...also you cant use nurbs in photoshop, zbrush or even Mudbox.

Group dates:

2009-05-31T07:33:00.000-07:00

Group Jobs

Heba: 1 - Fix moving hand animation

2 - Finish sadako Tiring animation

3 - Do window behind shot animation

4 - Crane - animate both sides

Charlie - Finish Dynamics

Dan: 1 -Animate the feathers and clock tree's

2 - Finish Ending Credits

Anja : Write exact test so dan can animate the credits ASAP.

Friday 22nd May

Heba: Do the inbetweens, Do the Run -side view

Louis - Animate the Branches

Simon - Finish Fish Animation, Begin crane turning hospital animation

Dan - Finish Animating the CLocks and fethers - They need to move more naturally and slow down

Sound Designer: - Explain changes in movie, decide if voice overs are worth it or not

Anja : Animate more

1: Dying scene

2: Bomb scene, hands with baby

3: Looks upwards

4:Mourning

Animate the Run

Tuesday 26th may

Heba - dO INBETWEENS for window scene!!!

Dan - Clock animation collected, ready to render

Blog updates.

2009-05-31T06:31:00.001-07:00

The reason we haven't added to the blog in a while is that we were simply all busy with work.

There are now just under 3 weeks left until the term is over and university is finished and the film has come a long way since the last post, as with all movies there have been a few small bumps in the road but everything seems to have been sorted for now. Some of the problems are due to software, others due to bad communication, whilst other are just as simple as people not knowing the best way of doing things. University is all about learning and experimenting so as a group together weve all slowly progressed through the year.

This post will just be a brief synopsis of the work being produced so far, thought this could be split into several rather large timetable postings...nobody has the time to do so.

What was done so far by whom:

According to BBC Guy's advice we decided to do some minor changes to the story in order to make it more clear. We cut out a lot of running scenes and the main change- we decided to get rid of montage to make time more linear and more understandable for the viewer (so he or she doesn't lose the red line). Richard said we need to make cear what is the character fighting for (to make 1000 paper cranes to be granted a wish and run again), which needs to grow into something bigger- fight for world's peace.

Modeling is done:

AJDIN decided not to cooperate in our group, which he announced at the end of term 2, way too late for the normal flow of the group and just at the time when everyone was busy with dissertation. As a result Anja modelled all the scenes originally assigned to him in a very short time.

All the rest of the group handed in animation in a time decided:

Heba- all the hospital scenes. She did a good job modeling, but forgot to sort out the uv's and did the whole lighting.

Dan- his scene was cut out (the flowerfields, although he tried to model it). Instead of that he did other jobs.

Mehmet- finaished his bamboo bridge scene, a beautiful complex fish eye scene, also cut out later.

Louis: Modeled his Red sun scene surprisingly well.

TEXTURING:

Anja did the texturing of all the scenes. It actually took long to figure out the right way as she wanted to preserve some of the effects like ramps, glows, specular shading, play around different transparencies.

We chose to do everything with PSD networks. We came to conclusion that instead of having all textured with the same white paper (which we tried and looked quite boring), would be better to use different kinds of paper.

It was hard to get all the textures in high resolution, so Anja often photographed them herself.

More about texturing on her blog.

LIGHTING

Anja sorted out all the lighting which was extremely hard job as all is LIGHT LINKED. The reason for that is that she wanted to achieved a certain look which would be more crisp in case of scenes that are going on NOW (at the time of speaking) and the scenes, where the main character is imagining the past events soft lights creating dream like effect of fog and reflections in the water).

A lot of objects (lights in the hospital scenes for instance) are actually enlightened within themselves with the help of glow, incandescence and specular. shading.

RIGGING of 3D elements:

Moe: The 3D fish was rigged very well by Mohammed Warsame. Great job!

Dan rigged the clocktrees: As Dan put later in the blog- these were really hard to ruig as the geometry isn't too clear, but he succeeded.

Louis rigged the branches in the Red sun scene... 57 joints in one branch...hmmm hmmmm. He said he will animate them himself and we were all very happy with that. Thanx Louie!

The Lotus flowers in the Puddle scene- rigged by Simon.

3D Animation:

Simon: animated most of the objects in 3D scenes: Fish he animated with the help of the bezier spline, when the object in the scene is animated according to the curve. He encountered the problem when asked to change the timing- the spline deformed. We fixed the problem in the animation editor. Simon animated the reference objects, not the actual obects , which made the scene less heavy and animation thus more efficient.

He also animated the cranes to appear when camera dollys through the room. the cranes are referenced from another scene and all of them slightly rotate in a different way.

Louie animated his branches as perviously said.

Dan animated the clocktrees to run out when the reference object passes by on a bezier curve.

2D Animation :

All the 2D animation has been done by Anja and Heba. To help the imagination, we filmed and photographed the reference. This really helped the perception of very hard to imagine perspective angles and body deformations (shortening,...), to foresee the distances between objects in the backgrounds and to get the general feel.

Anja filmed the references already in a Term 1, but his time her end Dan did it more precise.

INKING:

The most important is not to loose the continuity in the film with binging together two completely different concepts of animation- 2D and 3D. inking needs to be very strong and precise. The edges of the animation refined, so they melt finely with the environment. The sizes of the charecters animated in 2D need to match perfectly with 3D camera moves and textures in 3D environments. In clocktrees scene we decided to project2D animation on an animated flat plane as a texture, so it matches completely. This requires a lot of experimenting.

NEW COLOUR FEEL

The " real scenes that are happening "now" we decided to do more crisp and clear as the ones where the main character imagines how it was before. The bomb scene from her childhood is therefore black and white with a grainy effects, to look more "imaginary". The hands holdng a child are blue and radiating, which might help to clear the possible confusion who is the child they are carrying (young Sadako and not her baby!).

Wit the coloring of the skin, textiles and hair Anja wanted to achieve the feel of flash, light reflections, the beauty of watercolor technique and make a step closer to Japanese tradition.

All the scenes are based on a contrast between Blue and Red, the symbolic color of geisha. Read about their meanings in older posts on this blog.

Scenes of suffer are more darkish mysterious, the imaginative are more white, virginal, like a clear unspoiled soul of a child, a victim in a war.

CAMERA MOVES AND TIMING:

Before animating Dan and Anja once more agreed on all the camera moves. These were tried out when they did photo and filming reference in the week 3.

RENDERING

In order to have more control over the objects we decided to render out everything in layers. To do so, all the scene needs to be sorted out, assigned to layers which makes it easier to render them out at the same time.

SPECIAL EFFECTS

Charlie-was trying out really hard for quite some time to animate the city explosion and particle animation in Maya. He was not very successful as the modeling with illustrator left very confusing polygon structure and this one was hard to animate., so we dropped that idea soon.

Anja-Instead of him, Anja solved the problem with making the explosion in After Effects. She also find the solution for creating the fog iand reflections in Maya.

POSTPRODUCTION

cutting out the 2D animation and matching it with the 3D appearance

THE SOUND DESIGN

Papery feel, keeping the old melody, surround, new voice over.

THE CREDITS

Here are the timings for the scenes:

Scene 1 - Bed Scene has now been cut from almost 20 seconds to 13 seconds.
Scene 2a - Bomb Scene - 00:30 - 01:02

Scene 2b - Bomb Explosion - 1:02 - 01:15

Scene 3 - Mourning Scene - 01:15 - 01:30

Scene 4 - Closeup eye shot - 01:30 - 1:46

Scene 5 -Window (Side View to back view then Zoom into the Red sun outside the window).

Scene 6 - Running Scene +Red Sun (Distance)

Scene 7 - Puddle (Birds Eye view)

Scene 8 - Jump Upwards (Top view)

Scene 9 - Foot lands in the puddle - View changes to side view

Scene 10 - Jump over the puddle - Zoom out of red Sun

Scene 11 - Return to Window View (Side Angle) - 1:47 - 1:48 (May possibly Change to 8 seconds long).

Scene 12 - Zoom into the Crane

Scene 13 - Crane falls and Sadako Catches it - 02:04 - 02:06

Scene 14 - Sadako with the crane in her hand looks out happily.

Scene 15 - Camera Dolly scene in the hospital with Sadako making the cranes

Scene 16 -Sadako's family stands by her side begging her to rest as she is getting progessivly worse.

Scene 17 - Sadko finishes some cranes but cannot sit up straight any longer

Scene 18 - Clocktree Scene

Scene 19 - Sadako tires and her head begins to fall downwards in a slump

Scene 20 - The clocks stop as Sadako PASSES( symbolising the lack of time left for her)

Scene 21 - Camera zooms out of the Crane in Sadakos hand and the viewer can see she has passed away

Scene 22 - A shot from underneath a flying crane.

Scene 23- Inscription- a campaign against atomic weapons.

ANIMATION

2009-04-20T04:27:00.000-07:00

PROBLEMS WITH TEXTURING

2009-04-20T01:35:00.000-07:00

When trying to texture the scene with hand drawn textures, the Maya is keep collapsing. This happened to me before when I did the advert for National Gallery in 2nd year. The files I am using are considered "maya friendly" (tiffs). Alex explained me that if Maya is using texture files saved on external hard drive, that is a long way for maya to go, so it is better to put them on a local drive. Unfortunately this happens also if I save them there, so I might simply texture with different papers as origami and put drawing on top in postproduction.

MEETING WITH THE BBC SCRIPT READER

2009-03-19T22:16:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I had meeting with the BBC's script reader Richard Edwards.

He went through my script, animatic and storyboards of both versions of my story and we agreed on:

After the introduction of the character (she is dying, because of the atomic bomb radiation,...), the character needs to go on a journey, she needs to be driven by something strong (a wish to run again) and she can only achieve that through making 1000 cranes. Just before the end - after reaching the climax with conflict side (the illnes), she needs to realise that there is something strnger out there, something that she is fighting for - a wish for world's peace and running becomes secondary. The resolution - the afterlife- she changes into the crane.

The change in the story begins when she looks through the window in the hospital- she watches the kids playing outside (we show her sad, then we cut to what she is watching) and after that- the flash back on the happy days when se was running happens.We need to show that through different way of animation (maybe stop-frame look,...)

So... there will need to be some changes....

The Easter break aims

2009-03-19T22:13:00.000-07:00

- finish texturing - Anja

-title sequences done

-try out special effects (particle animation, fog, reflections)

- rendering research

-animation of the objects in the scenes (propellers, branches,...)

-rough pencil animation of the body (preferable- filming of the real model acting)

MODELING FINISHED

2009-03-19T22:09:00.000-07:00

I am really glad to see that everyone contributed with it's modeling share, I hope you will reference that well in your blogs. My aim was to learn how to do NURBS, POLY and SUBDIVISION modeling, what options they give me and what other tools are available.

(Mehmet, bamboo field )

another great reference

2009-03-19T22:08:00.001-07:00

Origami In the Pursuit of Perfection from MABONA ORIGAMI on Vimeo.

2009-02-27T13:27:00.000-08:00

http://www.petercallesen.com/index/index2.html

Amazing webite with paper cutouts by peter Callensen, Danish paper cut-out artist.

SUBSURFACE SCATTERING TUTORIAL

2009-02-19T05:46:00.000-08:00

Read that guys please so we could try it out (to achieve profuse look of thin paper) on textures.

http://highend3d.com/maya/tutorials/rendering_lighting/shaders/135-1.html

IMPORTANT!!!

2009-02-19T05:41:00.000-08:00

Guys, PLEASE FINISH MODELLING AND UV MAPPING ASAP as I need to start sorting out lights and animation!!!! i will be in all day on Friday 20th, collecting your work.

I would like to try out different kinds of rendering like SUBSURFACE SCATTERING (SSS) to get that beautiful profuse look of the paper.

Some more modelling references

2009-02-10T08:46:00.000-08:00

Guys, I would like it all to look like it was MADE OUT OF PAPER, so please use your imagination and do it so!!!

Here are some more references:

REFERENCE FOR CRANE FLIGHT

2009-02-02T12:22:00.000-08:00

amazing David Attenborough- nice video to study different body positions and animation of the movement

animantion of a crane take off

animation of crane lending

very interesting 3D animation with a painting look

TOKYO DAY IN LONDON 2009

2009-02-02T12:00:00.000-08:00

this year's Tokyo Day which happened on Saturday 31st of January, close to Victoria station, was an amazing event that gave an interesting- rather interactive insight into this city and Japanese culture.

EVENTS:

Traditional dance:

CALLIGRAPHY WORKSHOP: It is really hard to get all these lines right! The ink is special and also the rice paper very profuse, this is why you have to do the lines fast with punctuations on certain places. The paper has to have a prolonged weight on upper side of the paper sheet.

ORIGAMI WORKSHOP: Also this craft is nearly mathematical! Kids were doing much better than me!

TRADITIONAL CRAFTS:

Woodcut prints:

This is a very very painstainking job that demands high level of concentration, talent and also some physical strenght. Each colour (or maybe 2 colour combination as they dont use ink for it but special watercolour painted on the matrix) has its own print- so it demands quite some planning upfront! The best wood for this is cherry as it has the right density to be cut.

TOYS:

Japan is a country of quick technological development, which can be seen aslo in t5he wide diversity of all sorts of robotised toys:

TRADITIONAL TEA CEREMONY:

ANIMATION:We were shown only anime as this is traditional Japanese animation genre. Watching them I had in mind that probably nobody will achieve the quality of Hayao Miyazaki's work, but there were also some inrteresting atmospherical effects and background designs, which probably were more a product of induvidual talent and not a soulless copying seen in characetr design.

There will be another event on 28th of February- Tokyo Art Day in Richmond, which I also advise to visit.

MODELLING PROGRESSION

2009-01-21T05:05:00.001-08:00

TASK CALLENDAR

2009-01-21T04:56:00.000-08:00

TASK CALLENDAR

JANUARY 2009

Modelling, Texturing, Lighting, Defining Marketing and Budgeting Plan

FEBRUARY 2009

Modelling, Texturing, Lighting, Live Action Filming, Animating (Backgrounds, character), Collecting Sound Effects, Executing Marketing and Budgeting Plan

MARCH 2009

Animating (character, backgrounds, effects), Special Effects, Finishing Sound Effects, Continuing Marketing

APRIL 2009

Animating (finishing all), Postproduction operations (rough), Marketing

MAY 2009

Finalising Post Production, Finishing Sound Design, Marketing

JUNE 2009

Final Arrangements, Marketing- invitations

TEXTURING AND LIGHTING

2009-01-21T04:51:00.000-08:00

TEXTURING

(all the objects in backgrounds are white, made of slightly see-through paper, Origami feel)

The tiff file of one same texture that will be used on all the objects will be uploaded on a group blog. Download it and keep it in the same file path as “scenes” folder (in “images” ).

So after your finish model will be approved you will be asked to do UV mapping of it and apply given textures.

LIGHTING

I would like to achieve a very subtle all through white scene (with the exception of the Bomb scene where everything consists of silhouettes), made of one same texture, where the lights and shadows actually define objects. To achieve that we need to do” light linking”, which means to define which objects are enlightened by a particular light and which are excluded. This option can be found in:

Window- Relationship editors- Light Liking- Light- centric.

When linking one lights with an objects it is urgent to exclude the other ones and this is only possible with clear naming everything in the scene ( otherwise the process becomes a mess).

FINAL ANIMATIC

2008-12-24T14:33:00.000-08:00

MODELLING

2008-12-24T06:29:00.001-08:00

Everything needs to look like being done out of paper, cut with scissors, folded, thin, fragile, organic (asymmetric, not very sharp), everyone that is given a modelling task is also expected to finish lighting and texturing of that particular scene.

EVERYTHING THAT YOU CREATE HAS TO BE CLEARLY NAMED AND GROUPED, so anyone that takes the scene over can understand what is going on and so the light linking is easier.

What needs to be modelled:

BACKGROUNDS (check Version 1 of storyboard)

the hospital

the bed from the top (dying)
window
room, making cranes

the run

1. clocks
2. puddle from the top
3. puddle from the side
4. fish eye scene with bamboo bridge
5. red sun scene
6. the top view

the bomb

the sky

1. from the side
2. from down up

NOTE:

1. They need to look FLAT, like PAPER CUT-OUTS or 3D like ORIGAMI PAPER STRUCTURES

THE RUN

1. Run Clock trees (Ajdin)

2. Puddle top (Anja)

3. Puddle from side (Anja)

4.fish eye scene with bamboo bridge (Mehmet)

5. Red Sun (Louis)

6. Run top (Dan)

HOSPITAL

1. Mourning scene (Heba)

2. Hospital window (Heba)

3.Hospital Room- making paper cranes (Heba)

THE BOMB

Bomb Background (Ajdin)

THE SKY

1. Sky Top (Anja)

PAPER CRANE (Ajdin)

(very subtile, photorealistic with all the paper folds, organic)

Background designs

2008-11-13T10:49:00.000-08:00

http://www.orientaloutpost.com/art/japanese-watercolour-painting.html

Tasks for Simon

2008-11-11T03:23:00.000-08:00

Dear Simon,

Please finish the 2nd version of the rough animatic until the end of this week (I will seat doen with you and help on Thursday, ok?)

This week please make sure you finish you essays as I would really like you to work on out final animatic until the end of teh term (specially in week 8 and 9).

Thanx, see you on Thursday!

Tasks for Heba

2008-11-11T03:11:00.000-08:00

My dear Habibty,please do these:

-fix the project plan until the end of the week in MS Project (please don't forget to ask Jared to give you the CD with the programme- note: be careful how you save the documents- they have to be compatible with the version of the programe we use in college 00-03)

-research:

1.Japanese woodcuts
2.Origami (how to do the crane and all about the phillosophy and etc about it)
3.Japanese dolls (specially the paper ones )- go to wiki and from then on research to different websites and books
4. Japanese water colours ( what ink and colours they use, what are the rules, the history and the art theory- perspective, forms,...)
5. The COPYRIGHT for the story that happened about 50 years ago and the copyright for the name "Sadako Sasaki"
in our group blog you can find a link to a museum of Atomic Bomb victims (1st post- about Sadako's life) and please email them to ask if we can use that. Make personal contacts, it is always good for marketing of project and also to spread the idea.

This is all for this week:

Next week I would like you to take my background psd files and clean out the whites of the chosen layers as I would like to finish them until we do proper animatic which will take place in week 8 and 9. So basically until the end of the term you have loads to work on.

this week please make sure you finish your essays.

AFX LECTURE Monday Morning 10.Nov.2008

2008-11-10T04:43:00.000-08:00

Bart's Masterpiece with Glow

HOW TO MAKE CUSTOM BRUSH IN PHOTOSHOP

2008-11-06T12:41:00.000-08:00

SETTING THE COLOUR MOOD

2008-11-05T14:23:00.000-08:00

Japanese Traditional and Ceremonial Colors

General Color Meanings

Chrysanthemums are favorite flowers of Japanese. In general, they prefer flowers that drop their petals one by one, rather than fall off in one clump. That is why the rose is not popular, and even considered bad luck. Sakura (cherry blossoms), daisies, plum blossoms are greatly admired. Something with many petals can also be related to many years of life (long life) which is another "good fortune" wish.

Ideas for backgrounds enlightened in a very soft blue- reddish complementary contrast.

Red and White are auspicious colors (good luck). You will find the two colors used for many special occasions, such as weddings, and births. Since tassels are used to decorate things of celebration, red and white are the colors you will find (unless it is black and white, or all black for a funeral). There is an observance in Japan that you may find amusing - you are in a train station and see a couple. The man is in an all black, double-breasted suit, the woman in all black kimono. Both are carrying a shopping bags (yes, shopping bags!) containing gifts. Are they returning from a funeral or a wedding? The only way to tell is if the woman's obi is colorful, or solid black, and the man's tie is white or black. Colorful/white is for a wedding, black/black is for the funeral.

Blue and White are also prominent colors in Japanese fabrics and dishware. Yukata is a blue and white cotton fabric used to make summer kimonos. I

The color list is referenced to Liza Dalby's book "Geisha", about her study of Japanese geisha life. The layering of colours for kimono and their surface decoration vary with the season and even the month. Apparently, as ceremonial kimono are very expensive, only geisha follow the tradition of changing colours for each month. This is one list of colours from a traditional school of Japanese etiquette. (Web master's note - Japanese culture is closely linked with the seasons, so each month is also represented by a nature reference.)

January Pine: sprout green and deep purple
February Redblossom plum: crimson and purple
March Peach: peach and khaki
April Cherry: white and burgundy
May Orange Flower: deadleaf yellow and purple
June Artemesia: sprout green and yellow
July Lily: red and deadleaf yellow
August Cicada wing: cedar bark and sky blue
September Aster: lavender and burgundy
October Bush Clover: rose and slate blue
November Maple: vermilion and grey-green
December Chrysanthemum: lavender and deep blue

http://www.ukiyoe-gallery.com/nightscenes.htm

Sadako died on 25th of October 1955, so ussage of the colour palette between those two nuances- rose and slate blue might be great idea to base the film on.

These colours appear the most frequently, along with black, (in Kimono). I was surprised over the amount of red ad rose nuances:

Ao (blue-green)
corresponds most closely to *turquoise-green*

Kurenai (scarlet-pink)
a bright, slightly yellow-toned pink produced from the benibana,*safflower*, an herbal
dye source. The closest thing to red in the fashion palette, since truer red, *AKE*
was primarily used to indicate rank.

Kobai (plum-pink)
a light red with a purple cast.

Suo (maroon)
another red, wandering in tone from purple to brown to orange. It is the name of the tree
(sappanwood) from which the dye comes.

Kuchiba (old-leaf tan)
(also the one I believe is closest to what she described as *dead-leaf yellow. The name means rotted leaves. If it were a bit brighter it would approachmustard.

Yamabuki (golden yellow)
a tree-shrub, the *Kerria japonica* with a roseate yellow blossom. A golden yellow like
that of the common freesia.

Murasaki (purple)
from the root of the gromwell, difficult to work with and restricted for the use of those of
high rank. A fragile colour, tended to fade. A range of purples included shades called
*fuji* (wisteria),*keshi murasaki* (a greyed mauve), *ebi* (red-violet), *koki* (deep violet
and *usuki* (pale violet).

Johannes Itten's colour theory (all about colour mixing, contrasts,...)

http://www.worqx.com/color/index.htm

A color chart for Japanese colors :

Generalized Color Meanings

In repsonse to requests for generalized color symbolism, here is a brief list with credit to Jasc Software/PSP Newsletter:

Yellow - In the Far East, a sacred color; but it the West it can mean treachery.
Red - Passion; gets the blood flowing more intensely.
Orange - Represents knowledge and civilization.
Violet - Stately and royal
Blue - Cool, passive, and also symbolizes fidelity (as in true blue)
Green - Restful and fresh
White - Purity and truth
Black - Gloom, sorrow and depresssion.

However, there are also many believed meanings to precious and semiprecious gemstones, and using these approximated colors can also transcribe meanings.

ROUGH SOUND DESIGN

2008-11-05T11:37:00.001-08:00

The Anti-nuclear Song that Sadako Sang to Herself

August 19, 1955 / Hiroshima Red Cross HospitalOn August 19, a delegation from China came to visit the patients in the Hiroshima Red Cross Hospital. At their welcome reception, the song Genbaku-O-Yurusumaji was sung. Sadako learned it and later taught it to her roommate Kiyo.

http://www.prato.linux.it/~lmasetti/antiwarsongs/do_search.php?idartista=598&stesso=1&lang=en

"A song by Ishiji Asada sung by Pete Seeger on The Rainbow Quest album (available on Folkways from globalsound at the Smithsonian for download or on CD: https://www.smithsonianglobalsound.org"

Furusato no machi yakare
Miyori no hone umeshi yaketsuchi ni,
Ima wa shiroi hanasaku.
As yurusumaji genbaku o!
Mitabi yurusumaji genbaku o
Warera no machimi!

In the place where our old home village was
destroyed, we buried the charred bones.
Now the white flowers are blooming there.
Ah! we must never allow, we must absolutely
Forbid another atom bomb to come.

(Contributed by Janet Patterson)

I also like the feel of Nine Inch Nails Song "Hurt" and the way they presented it, unfortunately I can't embed it:

http://uk.youtube.com/results?search_query=nin +hurt&sear ch_type=&aq=f

Music Video:HURT (by Nine Inch Nails)

Music Video Code provided by Video Code Zone

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_Japanese_musical_instruments

There are several types of traditional, Japanese music (hogaku). Some of the most important

ones are listed below:

H.I.S. Experience Japan Tours
Taiko Drumming Course & Asakusa Walk
A visit to the Drum Museum, taiko drumming at the Taiko Center and a guided walk around Asakusa.

Gagaku:
Ancient court music from China and Korea. It is the oldest type of Japanese, traditional music.

Biwagaku:
Music played with the instrument Biwa, a kind of guitar with four strings.

Nogaku:
Music played during No performances. It basically consists of a chorus, the Hayashi flute, the Tsuzumi drum, and other instruments.

Sokyoku:
Music played with the instrument Koto. Later also accompanied by Shamisen and Shakuhachi. The Koto is a zither with 13 strings.

Shakuhachi:
Music played with the instrument Shakuhachi, a about 55 cm long flute. The name of the flute is its lenght expressed in the old Japanese length units.

Shamisenongaku:
Music played with the instrument Shamisen, a kind of guitar with only three strings. Kabuki and Bunraku performances are accompanied by the shamisen.

Minyo:
Japanese folk songs.

How to do cut out patterns in Maya

2008-11-05T09:38:00.000-08:00

Basically we could make cut outs only in photoshop and then enlighten and animate them in After effects, but I would like to do so in Maya as I have more control over arranging them in a 3D composition and lighting them, also simple rigging and animating.

So there are few options:

First one is to create a texture with transparent parts achieved by alpha channels in Photoshop.

So we draw a texture (a picture), then we create alpha channels wich means that we have to colour everything that needs to be transparent with pitch black and everything that is not white (if we want partial transparency, we use greys).

Then when we create lights in Maya, we need to make sure, that they pass through the transparent parts of a plane, making it invisible. We do that with adjusting matte opacity in ...editor.

The second option is to actually model the pattern in Maya, using curves. The problem in Maya is not so much the modelling of silhouette of the cut out (using create polygon tool) as the cutting out the inside holes. This is very time consuming if we work with polygons as with them we have to actually connect all the edges and model the holes inside,

while with the curves we just project them onto the geometry and once done we can still easily remodel the hole (picture below):

The forth option is to do all these in After Effects, but the problem here is that llighting isnt so subtile and controllable3D representation isnt so acessible:

THE ORIGAMI LOOK

2008-10-27T09:52:00.001-07:00

This is my final idea about backgrounds. I was thinking and researching for a long time to find out what exactly would I like and I came out with this idea of COMPOSITED PAPER CUT-OUT PLANES. I would only play with lights and shadows and different textures of papers to create the feel and look of space.

Here are some inspirational clues:

An amazing animation, all done with stop-frame paper designs:

Okami game, all made of 3D animated cutouts:

Im not quite sure either I want to do the backgrounds in photoshop and entirely animate them in AFX or do them in Maya and set the beatiful lighting and rig and animate them there... Im opened for suggestions, advice and ...practice as well!

THE STORYBOARD

2008-10-26T14:07:00.001-07:00

VERSION ONE starts with death and is all through one big flash back on what Sadako wanted to achieve.

VERSION TWO starts with flash back on the run, then continues with flash back of what happened to her when she was a baby and the whole thing is actually happening in a hospital, where she is dying. She turnes into a crane herself- in afterlife.

THE SCRIPT

2008-10-26T13:12:00.000-07:00

SCENE 1 : “THE DEATH AT THE HOSPITAL”

1.SHOT: INT. Hospital room, darkish atmosphere

The SASAKI FAMILY is mourning over the prematurely deceased daughter SADAKO.

Top view, the sounds of crying. Sadako’s body enlightened.

Camera slow PAN IN for one half.

CUT TO:

1. SHOT: The title sequence “ 1000 cranes for peace“

Dark background (paper), white inscription. A red seal on the bottom.

Music starts.

FADE OUT TO:

2. SHOT: Close up to Sadako’s face.

Silence.

CUT TO:

3. SHOT: INT. “ Inside Her head”

Her eyes close. The blinding light from outside world disappears. The complete darkness for a while.

The sound of her heart beat (the heart beat monitor) is slowing down on the back the remote sound of the bomber plane coming closer.

Camera still.

SCENE 2: “THE ATOMIC BOMB FLASH BACK”

1. SHOT: The same darkness from the last scene becomes more defined as an interior of a bomber plane.

Two live-action masculine HANDS in a shape of fist appear in the bottom of the screen and travel up.

The sound of bomber becomes louder.

Camera sill, when the hands reach the top edge of the screen- starts tracking.

2. SHOT: The city on the top of a darkness

City appears on the top of “darkness”. The fists collide with the city from underneath. They are joined by several others when penetrating through the floor, causing a big clash. Together they create the shape of atomic bomb. Particles travel down.

Sounds of atomic bomb destruction.

Camera PANS OUT ¾ in a slight bird perspective angle AND STILL.

3. SHOT

The particles fall in a slow motion. From one of them 2 woman hands appear, carrying a CHILD. The child radiates. The hands come closer and closer, then stop.

Silence.

Camera subtle PAN IN onto the hands.

SCENE 3: “THE BAD NEWS”

1. SHOT INT. Hospital room

Close up- the hands carrying a child morph into the hands of a mourning girl- SADAKO. Hands slowly move down the face.

2.SHOT

Close up to the face. Eyes closed first , then open and the tears are pouring down the cheeks.

On the back we can hear the whisper of Sadako's father talking to her doctor about her diagnose:

DOCTOR:

"I'm afraid your daughter has an A-bomb disease... She has a year at the most..."

FATHER:

"No, nooo, noooooooooo! Not my daughter! Not my dear Sadako!"

PAN INTO:

3.SHOT

Close up to the eye. The eye closes and when it opens again we can see the reflection of a crane with a hand behind.

Silence. Crane wings flapping and a children playing in the distance.

CUT TO:

SCENE 4, 5 “THE WINDOW, MORPHE AND THE MAKING OF THE CRANES” and “THE RUN AND MORPHE INTO THE CRANE” montage (alternating from slow to progressed action)

BRIEF SYNOPSIS:

When waiting for her death sentence in a hospital, Sadako remembers the happy days when she loved to run. According to an old tradition, She gets an idea that making 1000 paper cranes will grant her a wish and in that final wish to run again and that all the children of the world will live in peace she becomes a crane herself, joining 999 others.

SCENE 4: INT. HOSPITAL

1.SHOT INT. Hospital WINDOW

Sadako at the window, watching the cranes passing by. Children are playing outside, silence in the hospital. Sadako’s hand is falling down and the body becomes heavy of pain when the cranes pass.

2.SHOT

Close up to the crane. It morphs into a paper crane and falls down into live action hands, which catch the crane and offer it to the camera.

The Friend reveals Sadako an old tradition:

FRIEND:

“ If you make 1000 cranes you will be granted a wish”

3.SHOT INT. HOSPITAL ROOM

Camera “dollys” through cranes that hang on the lines from the ceiling and reveals Sadako behind the table, making the paper cranes like obessed.

She is keep whispering to herself:

SADAKO:

“I wish to run again, I wish to run again, I wish to run again …
and I …”

4.SHOT

Close up to Sadako’s face, camera PANS OUT to the beginning shot of her on the death bed.

On the end of this shot her body morphs into the body in first shot of the last scene.

The whisper continues:

SADAKO:

“ …and I will write peace on your wings and you will take it around the wold…”

5. SCENE EXT. OPENED SPACE

1.SHOT

Sadako is running through the landscape cranes are always following her. We can even see them in shape of shadows, water reflections.

Sound of rustling, crackling paper and nature.

2. SHOT

Close up to Sadako’s hand swinging down as she is running.

Sound of heavy breathing.

3. SHOT

Close up to the cranes wing going up.

Sound of “swusssshhhhh”.

4.SHOT.

Close up to Sadako’s hand raising up as she is running.

Heavy breathing.

5. SHOT

Close up to the cranes wing going down.

Light Swusssshhhhh.

6.SHOT

Sadako puts both arms up as she will jump over the puddle.

7.SHOT

Her foot hits the puddle and pushes off. We see the reflection of cranes in the water.

7.SHOT

Sadako takes flight. She thinks she is a crane herself.

The Silence, soft sound of the plane in the distance, louder and louder sound of heart beat.

SCENE 6: “SADAKO BECOMES A CRANE FOLLOWED BY OTHER A-BOM DISEASE VICTIMS”

1.SHOT: EXT. SKY, EXTREME LOW ANGLE.

Sadako “flays off” and morphs into the crane.

Camera ZOOMS OUT and we see that she isn’t the only crane. They pass by, leaving clear sky behind.

Silence

2. SHOT

The inscription appears :

“ Today’s worldwide arsenal of atomic weapons is capable of repeating Hiroshima’ s destruction for 400.000 times!”

THE EFFECTS

2008-10-22T15:54:00.000-07:00

An inspiration for effects:

- LIGHT EFFECTS (LIGHT RAYS)
- ATMOSPHERIC EFFECTS (FOG)
- SMOKE
- PARTICLES

Manchester Orchestra "I can barely breathe" from clay lipsky on Vimeo.

I found in this exaple:

For reflectio in windows and light effects animated French Film Noir:

http://www.cyberpunkreview.com/renaissance-page-2-more-screencaps/

STYLE

2008-10-22T13:44:00.000-07:00

"PEACE" expressed in 2D ink, watercolour animation

"PAPER" as 3D paper cranes (done in Maya)- expresses the importance of a paper as material which helped to develop written word and human education, and whose importance is more and more underestimated in today's digital era- it alos expresses the idea of NATURE

"HANDS" done as live action footage composited over the animation- express the idea of beauty of human touch, tactility, emotional communication, hand crafts and arts

Interaction between the last two- BOND between NATURE and PEOPLE- environmental concern

INSPIRATIONS

Dave Mc Kean (Neil Gaiman)- interesting mixture of mixed media- ink drawing, photography and painted backgrounds

PSYOP- interesting storytelig (synthetic time, not traditional)
exchange of perspective angles (side, top, bottom angle)
distinctive visual style

Traditional and modern shadow puppetry- Nine Inch Nails music video for song "Hurt" with scrim (very thin layer of fabric in front of performers, film projected onto it) - expresses the idea of light = life, transparency= fragility of life, sound perfectly fits the visual material shown.Traditional Japanese art- ink, waterclour drawings and woodcuts
Litography- stone print- the prints are eep changing in a proces of printing, this is one of thechinques which allowes to transform photography into the beautiful crayon and watercolour effects.

Shadow puppetry also reminds me of my childhood, it was just something we liked to play

Traditional Japanese ink drawings, watercolours and woodcuts

and LITOGRAPHY- stone print- a great opportunity to transform photography into a beautiful crayon and water colour effects, besides the whole process of litographic printing seems like a sequence of animated frames as the pictures slightly differ from one to another print. This could be a great inspiration for backgrounds.

THE IDEA

2008-10-21T15:34:00.000-07:00

I will write peace on your wings and you will fly all over the world.
- Sadako-

The story of my film is based on a book I read as a child and it really impressed me with its deep message and compassion with a main character.

http://www.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/virtual/VirtualMuseum_e/exhibit_e/exh0107_e/exh01071_e.html

The book is based on a real story of young Japanese girl Sadako Sasaki, but I slightly changed it in wish to make it visually more engaging and to fit it to filmic language of animation.

Sadako was a healthy young girl with a passion for running.

But one day, at the age of 12, while she was doing what she loved the most- running- she collapsed.

She was hospitalized soon after. When she was 2 years old , the atomic bomb struck the floor just one mile away from where they lived. As a consequence of radiation she was diagnosed with a lethal blood cancer (leukemia) 10 years after...

Days were passing by in a hospital, where the lonely and frightened little girl was expecting her uncertain future

One day a friend visited and revealed her an old Japanese believe, that everyone who does 1000 paper cranes is granted a wish

This gave Sadako a ray of hope and she started to fold cranes .

She wished for herself to get better and run again, but for all the children of the world to live in peace.

...but sadly...more and more cranes she created...more the disease progressed

On 25th of October 1955 she passed away, after months of struggling with this awful disease. She left 999 cranes behind ...

She didn't really die, just imagined to walk into this beautiful landscape, where cranes were sunbathing in morning down and sunbeams were playing on the branches of the trees. After months of suffering she finally felt released and free of pain.

Contemplating this beautiful moment, she put her hands up against the sun into the shape of crane....suddenly the transformation began...Sadako turned into the crane herself

She became the symbol the peace and remained until today, in times when :