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...