This blogpost is meant to recap my first pass on the Merlin’s ball animation.
With my first pass my primary goal was to build the necessary props and to create a video which is in many ways similiar to my thumbnails that I posted previously. The resulting animation is in stepped mode and has provided me with place to begin working on my timings and actions in a much more meaningful manner. (Yay for alliteration!)
Merlin’s Ball Playblast 1
This pass was completed on February 20, 2013.
With this pass my goals were:
1. To build the necessary geometry to capture the feel of the thumbnails.
2. To actually capture the thumbnails inside maya using the final(or close to final) geometry
3. To meet my conceptshare deadline of 10 pm February 20, 2013.
I’m happy to say that all those goals were met, and I’m currently awaiting critiques from conceptshare to upload here.
Feb. 22, 2013 – Edit
On Conceptshare I received the following critique from AJ Viviani:
Regarding the scene here, nice start with laying this out! =) Regarding effects(fire, sparkles and whatnot) I won’t be giving a grade on them. I’m only concerned with how well the ball and box move. In the project description I mention to avoid gumby slides and flying. However, in this case, so long as you have the ball and box continue with solid weight, I’ll allow it. But be sure to have the objects arc naturally! Flying is deceptively simple. If it feels too linear I’ll have to take off points.
I want to start out by saying thank you for the comment and the leniency in regards to the sprites. I’ll make sure to focus on keeping the ball and box moving in a more physically accurate manner, lots of squash and stretch. =) I’ll also try to make sure that they avoid sliding, which actually caused me a few problems in an earlier project and took a little bit of work to actually eliminate. My hope is to add the particle and fire effects after I have finished my fifth pass on the animation, I’m hoping that I’ll be able to have that done in time for the turn in. And finally I wanted to thank you for the heads up regarding the flying sprites, my original intention was to have them ricocheting in straight lines like a pool balls on a table when they get hit too hard, but I think that adding a bit of arc to the flight pattern will definitely result in a more enjoyable final result.