Final Week - A Presentation of...Manny in 'Window-Ego'

Now Showing - Window Ego (One Animated Mannequin)

Character Profile:

Name: Manny

Product Serial Number: 0102034

Manufacture Date: October 2005

Hobbies: Watching Wrestling and Weightlifting (from the TVs in the Electrical Store opposite)

Likes: Passer's-by stealing admiring glances, being the only mannequin in this window!

Dislikes: Being forced to wear tank-tops and gloves...in the middle of Summer

Although consigned to this window, Manny gets all the entertainment he needs from here. Watching the All-American Wrestling Series and Worlds Strongest Man shows, Manny has been heavily influenced into feeling that, as he is the solitary mannequin in this window, his right is to demonstrate all that he sees from the world outside. This is also a true reflection of many a vain passer-by preening themselves in the glass in front on Manny, whilst they are unware he is taking all this in to be part of his own routine...

The actions and movements (along with the blatant arrogance and posturity) of the wrestlers and body-builders both confuses and fascinates Manny, to the point of his attempt at replicating their postulations and grandoise movements at every given opportunity.

This animation is a first-hand demonstration of that...

Reflection and Final Thoughts

The process of creating this animation has certainly has its highlights and less-than-perfect moments. Coping with the handicap of not having a decent head-mesh from last semester was, initially, ever-so-slightly worrying, as I wasn't too sure how I was going to find the time to create such a detailed facial model once more, and find the time to animate to a decent standard. Thankfully, I took a proverbial step-back and contemplated some more adventurous ideas that, incidentally, didn't come with the requirement to construct a complex head-mesh, as this would be superflous to the quality of the other parts in the scene.

Certainly, the time spent creating the storyboards to decide the order-of-events was preceeded by the complications that arose through the decision to create the torso, hands and arms all seperately from each other! Although it didn't seem such an oversight at the time, I have to conceed, looking back now, I should have realised that if I was going to insert bones to connect all these items up, why didn't I just extrude from the torso in the first place...

As a consequence of this poorly-managed construction fiasco, I spent a great deal of time trying to, not only merge the hands/arms in with the torso (and wasting more time by creating the tiniest inconsequential details like fixing points and figure curves, as per a real-life mannequin!), but then to introduce the animtion sequencing to these - a part of the project which caused alot of hassle, and subsequently led to a removal of said arms/hands to construct them properly, extruding out from the torso instead!

Once all physical modelling had been completed, the introduction of the Ink'n'Paint texture map really improving the aesthetic qualities of the scene and enhancing the cartoon-like appearance I was aiming for, it was down to the animation to present all the ideas I had had from the (modified) storyboard. As I had planned the positioning of the bones carefully, the use of the Weights tool allowing greater flexability and intuivity for this process, I could explore the possiblities of alllowing Manny's shoulders, upper/lower arms, wrists and fingers complete autonomy for the most part. This, coupled with careful management of the timeline, meant I could intricately time each cameras footage sepearately.

The combination of body movement and facial expression was never going to work out completely evenly, both in terms of visual content or relative complexity. I tried to focus more on the body language, intially to allow Manny a pro-active course of actions, but also to display him following thorough a routine, most likely seen by my real-life inspirations for this animation, as they worked through their introductions and then set about displaying their physical superiority, at every possible opportune moment. Facial expression was always intended to be subtle, and the movements enhance each small section of physical gestures also. In particular, the grin before Manny goes into his main section of movements and the wink/lip curl at the end serve to punctuate the combatory feelings he is expressing but, at the same time, perhaps treating the whole demonstration as a bit of a tongue-in-cheek situation.

Once a backing track was decided upon that best fitted the mood I wanted to put across, it focused my mind into really illustrating a sense of both fast-paced movement and following a high tempo to present Manny in such a way as to give the viewer a feeling that he, although possibly the most humane inanimate object possible, is able to gesticulate and move along with it. In this instance, the music's expression and musical order give a definate beggining , middle and end, which again coincides with Manny waking, toning and then appeasing his abilities at the end.

The animation itself, as a whole, went pretty much according to plan and while there were certain points within the process that caused a small amount of grief (and when doesn't that occur, I cry!), I am pleasently suprised how the final product looks. The combined efforts of dynamic camera work, intelligently-paced backing track and visual textures, although taking a good deal of time to synergise, are fundamental in producing a character animation that is both technically fufilling, but stimulating to the viewer too.

Week 9 - Advancement of Manny's Posing (w/videos & explanations)

As I had rapid success and advancement with Manny's poses last week, it was only neccessary for me to adjust a few minor points and create a few new renders that illustrated his best features!

Many of these were needed to advertise and illustrate the work I put in to allow his complete upper body (thats including his neck & head!) to be as mobile as it could be

I've decided to post each individual camera render and explain my reasoning behind the actions I chose to portray at each stage within the animation as a whole




Scene 1

As the backing track had been chosen at this stage, my intention to place an opening panning shot to demonstrate Manny's model and his shop-window environment seemed all the more relevant. The choice of opening volume on backing track also focused the timing of the camera's pan to move swiftly onto...




Scene 2

...this brief, but emotive shot, just as the opening chord is struck! Here, I was attempting to time the opening bigger chord of the backing track with Manny's awakening, his pupils suddenly appearing to appear as though he is about to come to life for the first time. The human emotion, although only focused on his pupils here, is very strong.




Scene 3

A common move seen performed both by wrestlers and body builders (the real-life individuals Manny's actions were based on) The rolling of the head side-to-side and the raising and falling of the shoulders/chest illustrates Manny limbering up for what he is about to do next. The neutral expression on his face demonstrates focus and concentration, whilst the movement of the shoulders indicates the attention he is paying to, looking after his vital limbs.




Scene 4

Manny's arms move to the front as he tests out their maneuverability, as well as clenching his hands up to demonstrate his self-assurance as to what he is doing. The camera angle indicates the scale of both Manny, in comparison to his environment, and just how much maneuverability he has at his disposal.

Scene 5

The arm's are then brought close to the chest as Manny presents the first of several power moves that he will display in this animation. The decision to portray all these shots as close-ups highlight, not only the time spend in creating an accurate scale model of a shop mannequin common features, but also the subtle, restrained movements that I have included that still demonstrate emotion and definate gesticulation not seen if otherwise in an open shot.

Scene 6

The proactive, sly grin is a facial animation again commonly seen by body builders, as almost a show of partial-arrogance, but that esteemed self-assurance that they know their position amongst others. The end of the shot where he drops his mouth is a variation, again seen in wrestlers and weight-lifters/body-builders where they will give away this hint of emotional connection, but then scrub it away at the last moment before they are about to 'perform'




Scene 7

The longest single scene, the camera is capturing a lengthy series of postulations and gesticulations all intended to present Manny's demonstration of his flexability and visible effect he would have (if he really was out there, in the real world!) Also ,the tempo of the backing track adds a feeling of urgency and fast-pacing to the actions displayed on-screen. The panning of the camera again indicates his scale compared to his environment, but this illustrates the feeling (and motioning) that you wouldn't want to enter his performing space when he is doing these actions - the pacing of the backing track accentuates this effectively.




Scene 8

The final pose, in which he displays a characteristic all too often seen by wrestlers especially. The gesture of bringing Manny's biceps up towards his mouth and the representation of him moving his head/lips towards them in defiance. The motion of them being brough down against his sides demonstrates a relaxed, but still all-too-alert feeling that is commonly seen after a body-builder has finished his round - the climax of the backing track adds to this feeling of tenacity.




Scene 9

Again, an extreme close-up can capture the finer details in this animation, but also command the viewing of emotion contained within it. The combination of the wink and the curl of the upper lip accentuates the sneer that Manny would portray as a feeling of "well, you've seen what I can do, now what..." The final clash of the backing track concludes this rather perversive display of facial gesticulation.

Week 8 - Manny's First Poses; he's such a natural...

This week was going to be a highly progressive one. Having chopped and changed so much over the past week or two, now I had everything where and how I wanted it, in relation to the boned mesh and the first cameras, it was time to get stuck in!

My animation process involved me duplicating the .max file I had of Manny in his starting position (arms out, iris's in place) each time I was to drastically alter the positioning of his arms and neck/head

The image above demonstrates how I managed to get Max's timeline to recognise the movements I was making with Manny's arms

Having set up the camera to be static at a particular frame (using Set-Key), I engaged Auto-Key and selected the requisite bone at the forearm (in this instance), and having right-clicked on the Rotate tool, I could manually specify how much along the Y axis I wanted to arm to twist - after confirming this numeric, two red-keyframes appeared on the timeline, of which the first I moved along the timeline to act quicker, in accordance with how quickly/slowly I wanted the movement to be

By setting up a/the camera/s in one viewport, I was able to keep track of how the animation would track in that camera field-of-vision

This is the result of the first three frames put together - further frames will include Manny's arms in all manner of sylistic poses and athletic stances, thats for certain!

Manny's (Advanced) Poses...

This is a static render from the third shot/scene in the animation. I was trying to recreate how you see the bodybuilders/wrestlers/posers psyche themselves up by rolling their head to either side and lifting up their shoulders (this also reduces fatigue in their muscles...yeah right!)

It was imperative that I still had the use of at least one other 'wireframed' window, along with the perspective window, while the other two were assigned as camera windows. This was so that while I could accurately adjust Manny's vairous limbs and torso, as well as giving me all the possible angles from which to work from.

Here I am recreating the movement in which the arms are rolled together, from around the shoulder ball-joint, and this is where the importance of including the bones along the breastbone came in; I could rotate them to improve the realism of the motion, but still conforming to how a mannequin would re-create this

This was also part of shot/scene four, where I had a little bit of trouble with the weighted bones pinching ever-so slightly up at the shoulder joint. This was inevitable, as the mesh itself would only try to conform to its original form as the skinning tried to oppose it, along a different axis - these were only small disconcerting niggles , much the same as the slight pulling on the left hand which, thankfully, only lasts a few frames of the animation!

Here, as part of the last two scenes of the 40 second clip, I was integrating facial movement along with the body. I intentionally kept facial movement to a minimum, as I felt it really only would succeed over the body movement in terms of expression should I have included some form of vocal lip-syching, but I still wanted to involve subtle lip gesticulation and eye-motion too

The timeline, as I eventually found out, was vey particular in the order/formation of which the facial movements would be implemented to Manny, in the event I was trying to combine both physical and facial movement alike

I may yet introduce the Morph tool, to achieve greater flexibility which facial movement and expression, although early tests have proven that this modifier doesn't allow as much minute subtlety as I could do with seperate motion from a designated camera, set aside from the flow of the body movement...

Week 7 - A Restart (of sorts)

Ok so, last time you met Manny, he was as this...

As he had rather haphazard and both disjointed animatronic movements and, perhaps, intended persona

Things weren't looking too promising...

First things first, I removed the un-connected arms I had (which only basically rotated on the spot!) and created some new 'uns straight from the Polygons making up the lateral torso area, just behind the arm-pits

This image above shows the newly created arms. The hands I imported on from the original model, and used the Attach tool to combine the two mesh's, and then Bridge to join them onto the arms (a little extra for the wrist helped in the next step)

You can see the boned section towards the foreground of the image. These were connected using the Link tool, starting from the bone at the breast-bone, and working my way down to the wrist. This was completed on both sides, the formation shown a reuslt of a simple X rotation from the forearm bone

Here, I'm installing the three bones that make up Manny's neck. I always intended to create my own bone structure, as I felt the biped, although very useful and well organised, was going to allow me the flexability and decisiveness I can achieve through using my own bone structuring

The biggest change comes in the form of my decision to drop Envelopes as a means of adjusting the influence-boundaries of a particular bone on each area of the skinned mesh - after having a great deal of problems with that, I decided to use the Weights tool, which allowed me to assign a numerical value to each of the selected vertices as a group (or individually) through the manner of 0.1, .25, 0.5, 0.75, 0.90, or 1. As a unprepared solution, this allowed Manny's limbs to act as how I'd intended, the arms rotating from the 'joint' at the shoulder. but not having any visible effect on that area of the mesh

Ignore the stretching on the right hand (for now!) This was a brief pose I struck to illustrate the flexability I am trying to afford Manny within this animation. The other big change is explained below...

I've also decided to change the persona of him - having created him in the pose shown here, the idea struck me - how about creating him in the mindset of a shop-window mannequin trying to show off his (pretend) biceps using arm curls and victorious poses in combination with his boned arms and neck.

This then allows me, as I have connected his arms all the way from the knape of his neck all the way down to his fingers, to create some pretty experimental poses...oh, to get an idea of the kind of real-life example I'm taking the rise out of, copy and paste this link into the URL Bar

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CobiH7hUgkw&feature=related

Week 6 - Part 2: Character Animation...well, the first 10 seconds of the thing anyway...

So, I also wanted to render some animation footage before the week was up, so I have a decent starting base for next week (7)

I knew the method I wanted to use for the video; create a selection of maybe half-a-dozen cameras (they will, luckily, be invisible should one stray into the shot of another) and move Manny into position/field-of-view of each one successively, rendering each camera as I go

This will save alot of time painfully returning Manny back to certain stances or positions if I was attempting to reel off the whole thing from one camera (I've learnt my lessons in past animation modules doing just that!)

Setting up the window display - a basic box, with the top and a side Polygon removed (to ensure all corners are connected, leaving no gaps between), and here I am placing a seperate face to act as the mirrored surface of the glass (a ray-trace texture will be applied nearer the end of the animation-process - I'm hiding it for now!)

Now, the Mirror-Object option under the Tools menu allowed me to replicate a Copy of Manny's right arm, with all connected bones and dummys, across to take the place of his left-arm, along the Z axis, which meant his hand was facing the correct way!

The top-left window shows the second camera I have set up with both arms in place

A render to illustrate my point - I am still very pleased how the Ink'n'Paint texture layer brought about such a suitable effect to both the mannequin and the environment...it even looks as though the pole itself is attached to Manny's torso, with that shadowed area in the centre underneath his torso!

Now, the real test for the mirrored arm was to see how it would react to moving up and down, as well as using its requisite dummy to open and close the hands.

The image shows this worked...well, almost...

Initially, it was fine, but as soon as I started to stack up actions using the Set and Auto-Key alike, along the timeline, the arm would reset back to laying flat against the body and the hand distorted. I tried repeating the Mirror command, actually creating a Copy and an Instance of the right arm, but this caused more upset with it all.

My final option was to merge in the left-arm from the original model, before Manny was joined together in this setting, however even that had similar, if not entirely destructive results - I wasn't too sure what next to do...

In the end, I knew that I had to come up with a clever solution, otherwise I'd spend countless more hours trying all sorts, to no avial, and I certainly didn't have the time (or patience!) for that

Taking the three rendered .AVIs I did manage to get working all right, I imported them into Windows Movie Maker (which, incidentally, I was going to use for the final cut anyway...) and, going into effects, I chose and copied the second camera shot; Manny's arm lifting, his hands opening and the arm falling again. By using the Mirror-Horizontal effect, I had an exact replica of the shot, but as if his right arm was doing it!

I wish I didn't have to do this, but the final animation needs to be as continous and focused (in terms of sequence) as possible, and this was a way to achieve that - I think I can adapt the animation to avoid the replication problems further along the line...

Week 6 - Manny's Final Details...also; Storyboards and my/his Emotive Influence(!)

This week beigns with the last few days I'm willing to spend on modelling Manny - it's been fun creating variations on a theme, but I really ought to be getting on with placing him in his window display and getting the first few scenes sorted

I have also drawn up a storyboard which keeps my mind focused on how to go about and progress with each section, bit by bit

Here, I have created a new .Max file from the original torso file, in which I have merged in his head and right arm. The pole/plinth combo is two Cylinders, one wider and shorter than the other taller, but slimmer one

Here, I was cloning Manny's right arm as it would be time-consuming to create a new'un from scratch. Only thing was, I realized (I must have had a geometric-positioning lapse!) that the arm was facing backwards e.g. the hand was a full 180degrees from where it should be; I'll have to sort that, or conjure up a good explanation as to why its like that...

The two images above illustrate the process of removing the bottom-most Polygons to slide the head over the section of neck I had left uncapped for just this situation. I did need to tweak the remaining vertices and edges to get it looking as flush a fit as possible, but it seemed almost seamless to me (until I start animating it, that is, and thats when it'll go haywire!)

The two images above illustrate the final adjustments I was to make around the eyes; using the Cut tool to create extra edges and then Removing them straight after, leaving behind the beginning and end vertices that allowed me greater flexability when shaping the outline of the eyelids/sockets

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I present Manny!

...Hang on. 

Ok, I've had a rethink...

Below is Manny Mk.2!

Basically, I thought that his overall construction and makeup wasn't working too well with my intentions of keeping him as visually believable in terms of the artistic textures and appearance; in other words, when looking through the Material Editor, I found a selection of Standard visual makeups that I could apply, whilst still using an existing BitMap, should I wish to

But, in keeping with the more traditional, hemp-style materials used with shop mannequins, this appearance rendered below is more in keeping - plus, it exudes an almost naive, child-like visual style which highlights all the right areas (the ones I spent so long getting just so...the smooth outlines of the nostrils, the lips and pecs, for example)

Well, I'm pleased with his transformation, to say the least!

Storyboards

Below are the set of twelve scenes that will make up the character animation; I have tried to instill a sense of fustration, but also desperation within Manny who, although the pinnicle of a humanely-relatable inanimate object, can't express himself from anything but his eyebrows and eyelids facially, and frantic arm movements physically

As there is, understandably, little video/animation showing these emotions with mannequins as the main character (those I did find always involved them in more uplifting scenarios, truthfully!), I had a tough time even thinking of the right terminology to use when searching, let alone finding the material in the first place.

I did, however, come across this which can instruct me on how best to approach the positions in which I can contort Manny's face to display a range of common human emotions: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PrUfxn3eXoQ

...and perhaps, as an illustrative aspect, from 3:42 on this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oee6XJSUe4 (beware, its a bit traumatic!)

I thought it was a good example of being trapped in a confined space and follows my intentions of giving Manny a human awareness of that confinement and it, subsequently, freaking him out

Week 5 - Making Manny's Bonce with all the neccessary features

                                               

  Before I wanted to construct Manny's head, I was given a simple and effective method of how to make eyeballs and to give them small details that can be incorporated into the animation to enhance my characters emotivity                    

                   

                                                                                        

Creating two Spheres, one a quarter the size of the other, the smaller coloured white and the larger black, I used the Chop modifier to reduce the smaller down to a half-moon - the bacl sphere acts as the iris, while the white as the sclera

  

Two other Spheres the same size as the larger white Sphere were created on the Stage, the Chop modifier applied to these also, and there were then rotated parallel to each other and positioned like so (to act as upper and lower lids)

  

Under the Forces Object-Generate tab and then onto Geometric/Deformable, I found the FFD(Box), which was able to allow me Points from which the form of the eyeball can be manipulated within (my intention was to use it as a means of allowing the perfectly circular shape of the object to nestle into the eye sockets created later in this post)

  

The images above and below are examples are me trying to act out the first scene in the animation - Manny's iris' will roll around to the front, as if to appear as though he has awoken and now has to realise the situation he's in!

  

As a side note, as well as altering the Pivot Point from where the iris itself can rotate, as if from all the way from the back of the sclera, I also tried to push the iris outwards from within the white sclera-Sphere as a possible alternative

  

To begin Manny's bonce, I created a Box, added the Spherify Modifier to give me the equilateral sides and dimensions of the box, but convexing each of those sides (as shown above)

  

To simplify the creation of the eyes, I used the Chamfer tool on a pair of edges equidistant from one another and made sure I checked the Open option within the modifiers window, to remove the chamfered material

  

The nose was created by the same process; chamfering edges and then re-aligning the resulting vertices ready for Extruding later one. The nose shape only really needed to be a simple representation, so I was to consider the inclusion of nostrils or a prominent nasal-bridge

  

One again, the final facial detail of the mouth was created with the Chamfer tool, making sure I had a decent amount of room between each lip to Cut in an edge to seperate them for upper and lower - they would be simply extruded as a simple solution of creating a complex lip-mesh

As mentioned, the central nasal area was extruded and, afterwards, scaled, making sure that I had enough Polygons to alter the noses form to appear as convincing as could be, without the unneeded hassle of an overley complex mesh

  

By bevelling the Grouped-Polys, I could create a slight discrepancy between the overlap between the upper and lower lips, and I was pleased that the shape of the lips (without any MeshSmoothing added) is fairly accurate to reality

  

Merging-in the eyeball from before, I changed the tones to match the colour of Manny's head, but also inverting the colours for the sclera and the iris, for added impact later. Note that the FFD(Box) is also brought in to carry out the Mesh manipulation with the modifiers control-points

  

As a demonstration of how adaptive the control-points are, I have taking opposing corner C.Ps and pulled them upwards on one side and downwards on the other to achieve this menacing glare (not that Manny would ever look at the camera in this way!)

  

Here I am, moving the eyes into position - I discovered that, to get extra vertices from which I can alter the shape of the eyelids and sockets more, using the Cut tool to create more edges spanning from the existing outline of the lids on Manny's head and then removing them left the vertices behind, allowing me to shape the lids and sockets to a greater degree

  

  Here, the FFD is being put to good use and, by moving the C.Ps around, I can compress and expand all corners and vertices of the eyeball to suit the overall shape of the sockets