Summer Progress

So over the summer I've been working on perfecting my character model and getting the xgen to work. There have been ups and downs - I'm still not loving the way my character deforms, but hopefully I can fix what I don't like with blendshapes. The pro - I GOT XGEN TO WORK. I figured it out through so much R&D, but it finally cooperates and is actually effected by dynamics. SO HAPPY. I feel like an xgen pro now (knock on wood).

I also did a lot of thinking about my thesis and why not only I was unhappy with it, but why I wasn't getting the audience's emotional attention. I realized that my problem lied in the character: she was passive, and to make her an emotional link she needed to be active. I was stuck on this vague feeling I had developed over my college career - it was a passiveness that had grown in light of the awful state of the world and the bleak future that awaits the younger generations. It was a helplessness I felt in the currents of the world - and this is a big topic not suitable for a 3 minute thesis project. So I switched it up; I created more close-ups shots to emphasize emotion and made the pace climax and recede. I hope the rethinking has paid off!

I know I have a lot of work now getting back into things. I feel like I accomplished a lot - though it might not show. But as long as I can feel like I made progress I'll be able to move forward and finish with a film I'm proud of! Here's to hoping I don't have any more maya hitches, and that SOMEONE WITH POWER DOES SOMETHING ABOUT THE RAINFOREST BURNING OTHERWISE WE'RE ALL DOOMED.

3D animatic no. 5!

just the 2D

for fun to show the dynamics

first pass walk cycle