Christopher BondProduction Journal

Contents

3 - 7. Establishing the Environment

8 - 13. Modelling & Texturing

14 - 15. Rigging the Conveyor Belt

16 - 21. Animating

22- 28. Creating the Stove Fire (VFX) & Shot 21 Continuation

29. Foley

30. Contact Information

Task 1: Establishing the EnvironmentMy first job for the team was to establish where the environment would be and how it would look. Initially the environment for the animated short was to be set out doors in a habitat you would expect to find a Beetle and a Mantis.

Rob, who came up with the idea for the animation said he took alot of inspiration from the Japenese theatre of kabuki. This is why I started looking into settings based in an East Asian outdoor environment.

Fairly early on the the original setting changed to a sushi bar as we felt it still stayed within the east asian theme and provided a much more engaging look.

These are some images I took reference from when designing the environment.

Below is an overview of how I wanted the Sushi Bar to look

These two drawing show where I was originally planning for the main stage to be, with the taps having significant importance in how the Mantis would meet his end.

Set Design & Props

Stool

Japanese Paper Wall

Sushi Bowl

Set Design & Props Bar Table

Table Mat

Light Cover

Sushi Bar Main Stage Top

Task 2: Modelling and Texturing

StoolSushi Bowl

Main Stage

Task 2: Modelling and Texturing

FloorJapanese Paper Wall

Table

Light Cover

Rendered Environmment Overview

Environment Development

Although I was happy with the environment so far, it didnt seem to fit the feel of the animation thus we decided to take the saturation out of all the materials to give a more gloomy look.

Afterwards I then added an effect from photoshop to make the texture look more stylised.

I saw that Rob had in some of his concept this red pattern in the background. I then decided to redesign the walls to have the same pattern as I felt it added a sort of hellish atmosphere to the piece which links in well with the story.

Small changes to detail I made were placing bamboo mats around the table aswell as remodelling the sushi bowls as i had made the mistake of having three chop sticks in each bowl in the previous model. I also added in the stove, the center piece to how the story concludes.

Final Environment Renders

I was very happy with how the environment ended up looking, I think it represents the feel and tone of the story very nicely.

Task 3: Rigging the Conveyor Belt

In creating the conveyor belt so that it always moved in the back ground while the main animation was taking place I did a number of steps. I first created a single conveyor belt part and attached it to a motion path I had created which followed the outer part of the main stage. Once I had one piece of the conveyor belt which followed the path at a good speed I then duplicated it until the conveyor belt was complete.

Task 3: Rigging the Conveyor Belt I then placed sushi bowls all around the conveyor belt and then parented each bowl to its nearest conveyor belt piece so that it followed its path of motion.

Above on the right is a top view of the mainstage with the conveyor belt now on it with a number of bowls attached.

Conveyor Belt Animation

Frame 1 Frame 30

Frame 43 Frame 77

Frame 150

Task 4: Animating

Above are some frames showing the key poses of the beetle in the first shot I had to animate. In this shot he has just be startled by a noise somewhere behind him and is thus then looking around himself with a mild sence of fear and curiosity.

Shot 5

Task 4: AnimatingFrame 1

Frame 46

Frame 75

Frame 56

Frame 30

The second shot I had to animate was from the Beetles perpective looking up at the Mantis who had just snuck up on him. As the Mantis slowly moves towards the Beetle he flails his claws open as an act of intimidation.

Shot 10

Frame 1 Frame 26

Frame 39

Frame 45 Frame 75

Frame 45

The third shot I animated was of the of the Mantis still moving slowing towards his prey aswell as quickly releasing his wings half way though, acting as another attempt at intimidating the beetle.

Shot 14

Frame 1

Frame 36 Frame 50

Frame 12

Shot 15

In this shot the Beetle is simply responding to the Mantiss acts of intimidation by straining with all his might while moving backwards in an attempt at releasing his own wings.

Frame 1 Frame 22

Frame 39 Frame 43

Frame 75In this shot a had to animate the Beetle from behind still straining with his wings quickly sprouting out in the process.

Shot 16

Frame 1 Frame 9

Frame 19 Frame 27

Frame 39 Frame 55

Shot 21

Task 5: Creating the Stove Fire (VFX) & Shot 21 Continuation

I created the small blue flame which surrounds the Mantis at the start of shot 21 using Maya Fluid Effects. It was a long process of trial and error before reaching the look and feel of the flame I was going for.

Main Fire Creation

In creating the main flame which engulfs the Mantis I again used Maya Fluid Effects, playing around with different flame sizes and looks until I had one which did the job.

The flame above I was most happy with in terms of its realism but I felt it didnt go well with the environment and was too transparent at the bottom.

With this flame I liked how it was less transparent thus doing the job of making the Mantis temprarily not visible but the colour was a bit too dark.

The Flame above I found was to bright with not much varietion in its colour.I found the flame below had a cool look too it but didnt resemble fire enough.Both were too large in size aswell.

This is the flame i eventually created which I was happy with. I felt the look of it went well with the environment and its characters.

Frame 1

Frame 78

The Flame had the right transparency so that it made the Mantis not visible aswell as having a good variety of colour.

Frame 85

Frame 110

Frame 124

Frame 209

I changed the settings of the fluid effect to make the flame ignite and release more smoke at around frame 120 so that the Mantis gos completly out of view so that you dont see the change from his normal state to his burnt state.

Frame 215

Frame 215

The shot ends with a close up on the Mantis completly burnt to a comical crisp.

Shot 21 Fire Animation

Task 6: FoleyAfter we had all finished animating our individual shots we spent a day in the Foley studio trying to create as many sounds as we could for the film. Below are two sounds that were created.

Sound 1: Fire Sound 2: Mantis RoarThe sound for the fire was created with three layers of sound. The first came from me trying to create the sound with my mouth and then editing its pitch and other properties in Adobe Audition. The second layer was another one created through my mouth and again edited in Audition. The Third came from me crumpling up an old plastic bag which provided a nice crack-ling sound.

The mantis roar was made through me roaring and then lowering the pitch in Audition and adding a sound effect onto it which made the roar have a gargle to it.

Click Twice to Play

Click Twice to Play

Christopher Bondca_bond@hotmail.co.uk

07787541167

Eddison House, Cross Lane, Marlborough, Wiltshire, SN8 1LA

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