An Andalusian Dog

Un Chien Andalou is a surrealist film from 1929 by Salvador Dali and Luis Buneul. It is a film based on the psyche and dreams and as such has no real plot, however there are many interesting concepts that are explored within the film. While I believe there is no true meaning or intent from the directors, the scenes shown in the film can be related to psychoanalysis, the unconscious and the teachings of Freud.

The film begins with a young woman having her eye cut by a razor. While gruesome and an example of abject horror, it could also symbolize the barrier between the Id and the Superego, since it is only the rules and social trappings that we have created ourselves that prevents us from freely killing each other. It is also interesting to see how our educated minds prevent us from doing such a thing, though it would only take a minor lapse into the unconscious to lead into cutting someone so violently.

There are also several scenes of people looking out of windows at other scenes outside. This could symbolize people's voyeuristic nature by highlighting the way windows are a portal to the outside world and into someones personal life, with the glass acting as a social barrier, making it acceptable.

In one scene a man suddenly starts groping a young woman without warning while having visions of her naked. This obviously connotes the more animalistic side of ourselves that run on instinct. When he tries to pursue the woman, he is seen being pulled back and chained to pianos, dead horses, stone tablets and priests. This symbolizes the culture and religion of our world holding such animalistic desires back, keeping them in check.

Another scene shows an oddly dressed man having his clothes ripped away from him from what seems like a father figure. This could symbolise someones sexual identity and how people are forced to stay in there chosen identities by their peers. Later the man acquires a book which transforms into a gun. The book could represent knowledge and the gun the power that comes from that knowledge. The man uses this gun to shoot down the father figure, who then appears in an empty field, perhaps representing an afterlife. The odd clothes later appear in a small box, possibly symbolizing the secrets we keep hidden away from the general public.

Un Chien Andalou is a very odd film that jumps around in time and has little to no plot. However this can be attributed to it's initial subject of dreams and the surrealist nature of its creators. It's odd structure can also be forgiven for the time it was created in, where standard film structure hadn't really been established yet.

Alien Animated

Here are the animations that I am going to use for the Alien turn table.

Unfortunately due to time constraints I could only create some simple animation for the turn table.

Cel shading

For our cinematic we would like a cel shaded style to our characters. To see what we could do I looked into games with a cel shaded style.

Legend Of Zelda: Wind Waker was one our biggest influences for making the game cel shaded. Even though the game was released in 2003 it still looks fantastic to this day. We can accomplish this by creating simple textures and applying toon shaders through Unity.

Other games that use this style are Dragon Quest VIII and Okami. Hopefully it is something we can emulate in our own animation.

Cutscenes: Do they actually matter?

Cutscenes in videogames have been around for a very long time. they were often used as  rewards for completing a level or to advance the story. However in this day and age cutscenes seem to be getting less and less relevant.

With graphics becoming more and more realistic in gameplay, cutscenes just seem like a waste of time. More game designers are integrating gameplay into cutscenes, such as quick time events in Resident Evil 4 and the choosable dialogue in Mass Effect. Perhaps Cutscenes are being seen as a relic from when video games tried to emulate films.

Could the future of advancing storys be through pure gameplay such as the scenes in Half Life 2? Of course cutscenes are still around to this day , but they may be a thing of the past eventually.

Animation part 3

FOr the final part of my animation, Tabitha will look through and open the sliding door, walk through and look down to a broken ALBUS. This scene is the one that I am most happiest with. Her movements look a lot more natural this scene and I finally got the hang of manipulating her dress.

I am not too happy with the way she holds onto the rails. Or rather how she doesn't hold onto the rails, hopefully this is something I can polish up at a later date. There is a lot of time at the end of the scene as I planned for different camera angles at this point.

With all the animation done on my part all we have to do is wait for Alex to finish his animation, then we can start putting together using Unity.

Animation part 2

I had to split the animation between her carrying the box in and putting it down due the parent constraint, but I feel this is a good split anyway. In this scene Tabitha puts the box down, spots Surveillance bot and he runs through the door way.

Synchronising the box with her hand was rather difficult to do and I feel that it is one segment that doesn't lok very good. However I feel that it works good enough for the scene. Surveillance bot looking around was also quite a chore as I didn't have much control with the IK handles. In hindsight I probably should of kept the joints with standard constraints.

While walking cycles are difficult, running cycles turned out to be even more difficult. This is probably the part I am most upset with as I feel it looks too amateurish. However, considering it is my first attempt, It looks okay. I have to remember that I shouldn't expect pixar levels of quality straight away.

Animation part 1

The environment, Tabitha, Albus and Surveillance bot are now all completed. We can now begin the animation process. We have decided to split the animation work in half. I will animate the first half  and Alex will animate the second half. All while Sophie works on the textures.

The first part of animation I did was her going through the door and carrying the box. To help with the animation process I parent constrained the box to her main controller. This would mean I would have to start a new scene for when she puts the box down.

I had some difficulty with her going through the door, as well as controlling the dress, hopefully I will get better with this in future scenes.

Populating the environment

While Alex is working on the main environment, me and Sophie have been making some props to be placed all around. First we made some sketches and technical drawings for what the props we need.

Once we had some good references we then modelled them in Maya.

 We had to make sure these were quite low poly, as they were only background extras that are not going to be looked at that much. Originally 'Box bot' was going to be a moving character, but due to time constraints, he had to be demoted to a background prop. These props will be textured at a later date by Sophie.

Surveillance finish

The Surveillance bot is now complete!

Since last time I have added in the texture that Sophie had made for the model. I have also created SDK's for the feet, a scale slider to alter it's height and width, and a Quick Select Set for ease of animation.

With the key I needed it to spin constantly and also travel with the model. To do this I first keyed the key (no pun intended) to spin 360 degrees over 30 frames. I then went into the graph editor and made this action repeat endlessly using the infinity tools.

I then grouped the key with itself, this would allow me to move the key around while keeping the animation intact. I parent constrained the key group to the core joint of the skeleton, so when the model moved around, the key would follow it.

Now that I have completed the Surveillance bot I am prepared to use it in animation. Once Tabitha and ALBUS have been fully rigged we can begin work on the cinematic.

Surveillance Rigging

WIth the model for the Surveillance bot complete I began the rigging process.

With the practice from the alien, the initial skeleton making process was quite easy. The only difference es was the lack of arms and head. The three cameras had leg like skeleton appendages. I did not create any joints for the key, this will be important when I need it to spin constantly. Once I had made the skeleton I created the controllers, which, again, went by a lot faster with my practice work on the alien.

I then constrained the joints to the controllers. I used IKs for the cameras, so I could have an easier time moving them around. Finally I skinned the model. This was a lot more complicated than the alien as certain limbs had influence in odd places that they shouldn't. It took quite a while to weight paint these issues out but I eventually got it done. Once again I left the key out as skinning it would  not allow it to spin as I want it too.

Surveillance model

I have created a model for the Surveillance Bot. This a lot different to modelling the alien as I decided to make the limbs separate meshes. This makes more sense for the model as it is a machine and as such as a lot of unnatural shapes. I have decided to keep the model unsmoothed as well, as it looks odd being completely smooth, losing it's harsh edges.

The model doesn't follow the turnaround exactly. Some changes have been made, specifically to the feet. i have made them more intrinsic and larger to fit the foot models. Other than that, the model is pretty faithful to the turnaround. I did have some problems creating a clean topology for the model, though with Alex's help I managed to keep it simple and efficient.

The UV mapping also proved to be a problem, as there were a lot of awkward shapes that needed to be unfolded. I eventually managed to get the whole thing completed though through planar mapping at new angles.

Surveillance Turnaround

From the sketches that I have made, I have created a turnaround sheet for the Surveillance bot.

I have done it in the same style as Alex's turnaround, which will good to show at presentations. With this, I can begin work on modelling the Surveillance bot.

Alien SDK's

When creating walk cycles, a certain amount of accuracy is needed in the feet. This can be helped by creating SDK's (Set Driven Keys)

SDK's are custom channel attributes that can be attached to joints. This allows the user to scrub through the channel alter the position of the joint. First you must create custom attributes (peel heel, toe tap, stand tip, twist toe, twist heel), after that you can key certain positions to certain numbers. So when the channel reaches 10 on 'stand tip', the alien will stand on the tip of his toes.

This is an extremely useful tool that I will make sure to use in my own models. I have also created SDK's for making a fist and blinking.

Alien Skin Binding

With the skeleton constrained to the controllers, I can now bind the rig to the skin of the alien.

This takes the nearest vertices on the model and connects them to the joints. Often times however it is not perfect. Certain joints will have influence in odd places and make the model look awkward. This is most prominent in the jaw, as the inside of the mouth is quite complex, the jaw controller simply stretches the face where we want it to open the mouth.

To fix these issues, I have to go in and paint the weights. This allows me select what areas of the mesh are affected by what joints. For the jaw i had to get rid of influence on the top and roof of the mouth to get it to open. I also had to paint weights on other limbs so that they moved in a clean fashion.

Alien Skeleton

Now that I have the model completed I can work on the rig of the Alien. This will allow the alien to move.

I first started with the legs; creating joint chains going along the shape of the leg and stopping at points that it will move. After that I created the spine, arms and head, joining them all up. I had to make sure the hierarchy of all these joints made sense so that limbs could move naturally.

After the skeleton was made I started building controllers for the alien. These would the manipulators that the animator would use to make the character move. I used NURB circles and curves to create simple shapes that represented each part that moved. I then colour coded the controllers so that right limbs were red and left limbs were blue.

After that, it was a case of constraining the joints to the controllers. IK handles were used for the legs, orient constraints were used for the spine, arms and head, and aim constraints were used for the eyes. By attaching these joints to controllers, I can just move the controller and the joint will move with it.

Storyboards

We have now finalized a storyboard for the cinematic and figured out some story elements. The girl is now called Tabitha and the robot is called ALBUS (Automated Lifting Bipedal Unit Solution). Surveillance bot is still called Surveillance bot.

To figure out the storyboard we all made a quick one ourselves. We eventually settled with Sophies storyboard. Alex, as part of his Manga Society, will be making a comic based on the storyboard.

Here is the storyboard that I created.

Alien Texture

I have now added the texture to the Alien. With the UV map it was pretty easy to add. Although it is difficult to add patterns to the back, as the back is located on the edges of the UV map. I will have to make sure to remember this when making textures in the future.

Surveillance bot

As Surveillance Bot will be appearing in the cinematic, I decided to do some more sketches.

UV problems

Unfortunately, I have hit quite a major problem with my model. I mirrored the alien and began preparations to create a UV map. However, when it came to unfolding the UV map out, it simply would refuse to work. I believe this is due to a poor topology, if I had begun with this in mind I believe I would not have a problem. Unfortunately, as I cannot pin down what the exact problem, I have to now use the pre-made model for future workshops. I will have to make sure to research a lot more into proper topologies so this issue doesn't repeat itself for the cinematic we are creating.

With the new model, UV mapping became a lot easier. First I made a planar map of the entire model from the front. I then cut the UV edges of the limbs and separated them out. Finally I unfolded the UV's out so I could then paint them with a texture.

Initial idea decided

After a moment of deciding, we have decided to go with Alex's idea of a steam punk setting with a girl finding and fixing a broken robot.

Right now we are still in the concept stage, developing the characters out and getting into the mindset of the setting. We have agreed to also put the 'Surveillance bot' from initial planning into the scene as we all enjoyed his design.

As we all want to work on different parts of the scene, we have decided to roughly split the work by characters. I will work with the 'Surveillance bot', Alex will work with the main robot and Sophie will work with the girl. I am sure we will also be splitting the work on other parts as well.

Better Topology and Arms

Since last time I had blocked out the alien, however I didn't take into consideration the topology of the alien.

I added more detail and more edge loops into the model, this will allow for better control when animating the alien. A clean and efficient topology is important for game characters as they will be the center of attention in most scenes.

I then proceeds to block out the arm of the alien. This took me a while as I couldn't get much information from the side image plane, however I eventually completed it.

New Team and Initial Ideas

For this module I have made a team with Alex and Sophie. Not only are they very talented and hardworking but I also teamed up with them in a previous module last year so I was confident that we could work well together. We then started on brainstorming some initial ideas for the game cinematic using the three subjects (Surveillance, Exchange, Stolen) that we were given.

We all had many ideas including mobster trade-offs, classic cops and robbers, kids stealing ice-cream, characters based on the zodiac, skeletons stealing bones, robots stalking people and so much more.

Alien Blocking out

To teach me the skills required to create the game cinematic I am first going to practice by creating a model of an Alien. To begin with I started with acquiring the turnaround images and setting their sizes up in Photoshop. I actually struggled a little while to do this as I do not own Photoshop but eventually I got two images: The Alien on its side and on its front.

I then set up a new Maya project and placed these images in the image planes. With these I could block out the alien much more efficiently and accurately.

I have only blocked out half of the alien. This is due to the alien being completely symmetrical. I can model only half of the alien and them mirror it at a later date. I will have to make sure that the topology of the alien makes sense so that I can have an easier time UV mapping and animating.