Category: Animation tests
Didn’t you know? SVG isn’t just for vectors. It can also work magic on bitmaps. Including a sequence of bitmaps. That means you can tinker with video, particularly animated frames exported as transparent PNGs.
Perhaps the most promising SVG filters for animation are the lighting and shadow filters. The drop-shadow effect is obviously desirable, and needs no further discussion, except to point out that the offset and the softness of an SVG drop-shadow can be easily changed by replacing numerical values in the SVG code.
More surprising possibilities come from the Diffuse Light and Specular Light filters. These can add a compelling “half a dimension” to flat cartoon characters. And like Drop Shadow, these two effects can be manipulated by changing a few numerical parameters. This is explored in the following Diffuse Light SVG graphic and Specular Light SVG graphic.
Both the demos mentioned above involve SVG vectors, but the effect on bitmaps is similar. In fact, this bitmap was exported from an SVG file which applied the Diffuse Light filter to a transparent PNG of my Walt Whitman Animated character. Not shown is the even more impressive result that comes from adding a Specular Light and Drop Shadow to the same file.
Here we go again: another year, another significant improvement of my character design, using several techniques for customizing an iClone avatar.
The new body is based upon the G3 Nude avatar. I painted most of the clothing directly on the skin.
The cuffs on the shirt and pants are the Rolled-Up Sleeves from the G3 CloneCloth kit.
The Lower body mesh was resculpted using ZBrush; I improved the abdomen and thighs. The lower pants legs are accessories created from iClone primitives.
The forearms are based upon Superhero Gloves, resculpted in ZBrush.
The beard, hair, and shirt collar were created in Organica.
I extensively experimented with ZBrush to customize the head. I succeeded, technically, but failed, artistically. The previous head, customized using iClone native’s tools, was far superior to anything I could reshape in ZBrush, so I reused it.
The moral of that story is: I believe you can create ANY human likeness inside iClone, as long as you supplement the head with accessories. You don’t need any fancy tool such as ZBrush, Max, Maya, Mudbox, or Hexagon.
The only thing to add is that the color wheel is your friend. I rebalanced the color scheme to include more cool colors to complement the warm.
I’m still trying to define the look for my film, but I’m sure I need to move away from the “CG” look offered by iClone. This new experiment in a 2D look involves Photoshop’s Dry Brush filter, which gives me toon backgrounds halfway in style between the Xerox-sketch look of “101 Dalmations” and the flowing outlines of Art Nouveau.
I also want to inject a lot of attitude into the color keys, too. Lurid green is my choice for a nightmare color–a tradition that goes all the way back to Sleeping Beauty.
The grand lecture hall comes from 3D Warehouse and its ratty JPEG textures had to be extensively cleaned up for use in IClone. The iClone bitmap was exported for tooning in Photoshop and brought back as a texture on a plane.
An Art-Nouveau Look for my Walt Whitman animation
A second pass on this image adds a starry sky, an open door, and powerful tree silhouettes in the foreground. Takes it to a totally higher LEVEL.
I have now posted a preliminary shotlist for my animated short, This Beginning of Me. The document doesn’t rigorously follow known best practices for script formatting, but I think it does the job for now.
General Picture and LeavesofGrass.Org are pleased to announce that “Coraline” sculptor Scott Foster is completing a 1/6 scale macquette (statuette) of the Walt Whitman Animated character designed by Mitchell Santine Gould for his animated short-in-progress, “This Beginning of Me.” These photos show the clay and hard wax original in an intermediate stage before it was used to make a mold. Using the same techniques he employed at Laika Animation Studios, Scott is currently finishing a mold that enables the production of resin copies. “This unique piece conveys Whitman’s most crucial message to his 21st-century audience: RESIST MUCH, OBEY LITTLE,” says Mitch. “The command is engraved into the base of the model–a giant book that represents Leaves of Grass.”
Scott and Mitch collaborated on the pose, with Mitch’s Sony VAIO laptop in Scott’s studio displaying Reallusion’s powerful, game-changing animation program, iClone. “iClone‘s real-time environment enabled the two of us to define a compelling, realistic artwork,” says Mitch. “Scott guided me in posing the character to bring my concept to life.” By bringing a reference grid into iClone, Mitch was able to print out orthogonal views of the character which Scott then measured to guide his work.
Mitch recently provided a sneak peak of the artwork at a lecture on his animation efforts. A copy of the model painted to match his animated character will be ready well before Whitman’s birthday on May 31. Citing the words of Whitman’s beloved poem, “So Long,” Mitch likes to point out this case of life imitating art:
Camerado! This is no book;
Who touches this, touches a man;
(Is it night? Are we here alone?)
It is I you hold, and who holds you;
I spring from the pages into your arms—decease calls me forth.
Walt Whitman Animated 1/6 scale statue by Scott Foster
Walt Whitman Animated 1/6 scale statue by Scott Foster
Walt Whitman Animated 1/6 scale statue by Scott Foster
Walt Whitman Animated 1/6 scale statue by Scott Foster
Walt Whitman Animated 1/6 scale statue by Scott Foster
Walt Whitman Animated 1/6 scale statue by Scott Foster