Week 6 - Spring Break

Hello!  Week 6 is over and was a bit less stressful because it was Spring Break!  NO CLASSES!  Fortunately the school was open 'till 5pm everyday so I did get a chance to pump out some work on the old Audi R8.  So far I think it’s looking good but I have a few more things to work on before I pat myself on the back.  For now I will just hug myself in a warm embrace.  I'm so soft.  Alrighty, check out my sweet car!

Because the school was only open until 5pm I was able to spend some wonderful time with my classmates!  I got to try some Korean BBQ which was a new experience but a wonderful experience.  I learned that I have no idea how to use chopsticks and that some creatures probably shouldn't be turned into food.  I'm lookin at you squid!  The next day a few of us got together for a bit of a house party.  Thank you very much to the man with the house!

This week was also an excellent week because I had the opportunity to go on a tour of the EA Games studio in Burnaby!  After seeing this place if my motivation wasn't at the top already it certainly is now!  I can't really portray how amazing this was without talking to you face to face.  This blog would go on and on and everyone would eventually leave.  I got to meet some amazingly nice people and see some really cool work as well as a bathroom that had a TV above each urinal.  Yeah, it is that amazing!  Thank you very much to my Uncle for taking the time!

So that was my week!  I also got to go see "Sucker Punch" yesterday which was a crazy, cool movie.  Story was a little back and forth but I advise you to go to it to see the amazing CG and really, it’s got 5 good lookin ladies wielding swords and guns while killing a nice variety of enemies.  Hard to go wrong.  So, Vancouver has EA!  6-0 Saskatchewan.........your move.

Week 5 - Burn Rubber

I see you have come back for more of my shameless compliments.  Well don’t hold your breath you wonderful human being because I am not going to indulge your ego any longer!  Alrighty, now pan your beautiful eyes from left to right to read how week 5 went!  Week 5, where has the time gone?  It was a light work week mainly because our car project took over, so technically it wasn’t that light.

This week in Modeling 100 we received a lesson in car modeling.  Joe drove his technique into our brains and we took off!  From 0 to 60 in……….well I am not done yet so I will have to get back to you on that one but I do have some sweet screens of the car I will probably never own.  Much too impractical for my taste.  The car has caused me a few frustrations but I enjoy being struck by a challenge.  It was nice to put my mind in problem solving mode to figure out how best to approach the problems.  Check out my wheels!

My sack is done!  You all want to seem my sack, my classically drawn sack in all its glory?  It’s a nice sack.  You can wait all your life to see a better one but you will always think back to my wondrous sack.  Ok, well it’s missing the boxes but I will get them in there.  Enjoy my sack!

Do you like to walk?  I walk to and from school every day so it has grown on me, plus it’s free.  I call that student walking.  Walking is something you do and see every day.  It’s different from person to person but there is always one thing about walking that will stay consistent.  It’s a pain in the arse to make a 3D model walk realistically.  Now I haven’t done much animation so that plays a big factor but man, I certainly have to work hard to do it right.  I took a little screenshot of my fancy walkin’ bot for your enjoyment.

In Production 100 this week we explored camera movements.  We were tasked with framing up a few different shots in a pre-made scene.  You want a proper close-up?  I got yah!

My barrel for DIM 100 has been bumped and speculared and framed in a lovely production sheet.  BASK IN ITS GLORY!

Last for the week was Life Drawing.  We focused on faces.  Started with a base and went from there.  I haven’t done much drawing of faces so this didn’t start real well but I was able to use the whole class to just focus on getting the base as right as possible.

Done!  This week was a fun week in general.  On Thursday night a group of us from all semesters went and had some green beer at a place called Taylors Crossing.  Got to try out the city bus!  Not a huge fan but when the bus pulled up for pickup at the Quay the driver left the bus while we all got on.  I was encouraged not to bother with paying so I got a free bus ride!  Hopefully I don’t get arrested cause if so I will bring everyone else on that bus down with me.  Friday was a big day for the school as a whole.  It was the TTTC Friday Challenge!  Teams of 6 were formed and were pitted against each other in a fight to survive.  We were sent out into the mountains and the team that came back alive were victorious!  I only had to push a few people off a cliff so it wasn’t a really difficult win.  I hope you have realized that I was making that up and if not you can continue to believe that I did what I needed to do.  Our real challenges were as follows:

RC Car Balloon Race – Each team picked 2 drivers and a mini tournament commenced where each vehicle was equipped with a needle and had to pop all of the other teams balloons.  Thanks to our wicked drivers for coming out on top!

Pizza Eating Contest – Do I really need to describe this one?  Unfortunately we lost this challenge but it was fun to watch our teammate struggle with shoving pizza in his mouth.

Blind Dressing – 1 member of our team had to undress another member of our team while blindfolded.  And no, they didn’t undress from their actual clothes, they put on additional clothes for this challenge.  We got second place in this event.

Orange Leggings – I participated in this event.  An orange is placed in a pair of leggings and then tied around my waist.  I needed to swing the orange between my legs to knock a ball around the room and then back to the finish.  Victory was mine!

Balloon Juggle – Pretty self-explanatory.  2 players at a time needed to see who could keep 2 balloons in the air the longest.  We placed second in this challenge.

In the end Team Success, that was us, came out on top as champions!  I want to thank all the members of Team Success for their dedication and kick-assery.  We are the champions!  On Friday we were also graced with the presence of Bryan Gillingham who is a Lead Animator who has worked at Blizzard on World of Warcraft.  He gave us a wonderful first-hand look at the gaming industry and then answered a ton of questions.  He also showed us some of his work on a Hulk game as well as a Star Wars game and of course, World of Warcraft.  A really nice guy who had some great advice.  Thanks Bryan for taking the time!

So that was week 5!  A very fun week.  I want to thank Think Tank for giving us all a break by hosting a Friday Challenge and inviting Bryan in to talk to us.  Week 6 is Spring Break!  No classes this week and the school is open only from 8:30am – 5:00pm.  All time to work on my car!  So, Vancouver has a crap load of game companies and Saskatchewan has none.  Van 5, Sask 0.  Sorry mom! lol

Week 4 - Put it into Gear

Hello again!  It is so good to see you.  You’re looking excellent.  Now that I have kissed your arse hopefully you will come back.  Week 4 is finito and unfortunately the weeks seem to be getting faster!  I still manage to get my assignments done on the same day as they are given but I have a feeling that that will change next week when we start our car in Modeling 100.  Alright, on to what you have all been waiting for…………….all my wonderful work from this past week!  I’m so modest.

Modeling 100 brought us a wonderful technique using instances to help us create the rims we will use with our vehicles.  With a little math involved we were able to create one spoke of our rim and rotate it around equally to create the full thing.  We sub-divided our rims 3 times to smooth them out.  After the rim we needed to create the tire tread.  Another cool technique was used for this.  We created one small portion of the tread and then duplicated it.  After the merge we used the bend tool to wrap the tread around and merge the edges.  Tire and Rim done!  Check it out.  I used a pre-set shader to make the second one blacked out.  It’s how I roll!

In Classical Animation 100 we went over the pencil tests of our sacks and continued to work on our final product.  I would like to think I am finished but I don’t think that’s the case.  Not as refined as it should be I think but I have to wait to see what Brett thinks when we have class again next week.  We are starting work in Flash too so hopefully the old knowledge I have of flash comes back quick.

3D Animation had us finish up our Robot at the Bar animation.  I went with something simple but the render out would have been too big of a file so you get a screenshot of my classy robot.  We had to use constraints to pin the hand to the bar and then the glass to the hand.  Just had to turn the constraint off and key frame it so he could put the glass back down.

YES!  We have finally begun to learn the most fun part of all 3D!  Laying out UVs!  I know it is hard to judge sarcasm through text but I can promise you, that was sarcasm.  In XSI this week we learned how to flatten out our models, in a way, to prepare them for textures.  If I could get someone to lay out my UVs for every project I would pay them handsomely in high-fives and encouragement.  I am a student after all.  Laying out UVs usually slows down my entire workflow.  Hopefully I can learn some new tricks to speed it all up because what I have been doing for the past 3 years hasn’t got much faster.  Our first UV task was to skin the man below.  Nothing like skinning a man and spreading him out to paint all over him!

Thursday started off with Scott and Production 100.  We went over some different renderers, popular game engines and rendering tools such as Global Illumination, Final Gathering and Environment Rendering.  I have used Final Gathering before but have not touched on the other two.  Interesting tools but I find with stuff like this, it would be better to just be told which is best and to stick with it but each are used at certain times.  We also went over volumes such as fog.  I haven’t used volumes much but it was good to see what kind of results you can get.  No assignments, just straight up knowledge!

In our DIM 100 class we went over our lit scenes and started our texturing journey.  We got a wonderful lesson on how to get certain effects from certain brushes to make our textures stand out.  We had the challenge of texturing a metal barrel.  I’ve done a lot of texturing so it was nice to see confirmation that what I have been doing is how it’s actually done.  Here is my finished lit scene and my barrel texture so far.  I will be finishing it tomorrow.

Last up for the week was our Friday morning Life Drawing class.  We had a nude, female model and we did some more gesture drawings as well as some more torso drawings.  We also did a few negative-space drawing which it how I basically draw.  I usually estimate the length of a line and then use it to measure where other lines connect and cross.  My drawings all start as outlines of what I am drawing and then I fill it all in, so these were easier for me.  We had lots of time as well so there was no pressure to produce so to speak.  Our homework is to draw five hand poses and then five more but with some creative changes.  Let’s hope I am creative enough!

So that was the week!  Quick but productive.  I was able to go see Rango with some classmates on Saturday and took the seabus as well as the skytrain!  Crazy sci-fi modes of transportation.  It was like I was on a different planet.  The seabus was pretty cool as I am very used to boating, but not on a boat that can carry 200 people, or something close to that.  The skytrain made me a bit uneasy with all the deceleration and acceleration while the tunnel walls flew by me but I can handle it.  Public transit isn’t so bad I guess.  Not sure about city buses yet though.  Oh, I also got to sample the tiki-style bar that’s attached to the school for the birthday of one of the girls in the second semester class.  A bit expensive and the drinks weren’t the manliest I’ve seen but it was still good.

So, Vancouver has this wonderful mode of transportation called the Seabus!  Put in on the board!  Vancouver 4, Saskatchewan 0.

Damn that was long.  if you are like me you probably read that and went, "damn that was long!"  Please come back, don't you remember how excellent I said you looked.  Yeah, you do.

Week 3 - Getting Deeper

Week 3!!!!  It is over, but it wasn’t too bad.  I finished my environment on Monday so the rest of the week was a little slack.  The lessons are getting more in depth now and we are really close to the meat and potatoes of what XSI has to offer.  I also found some time to watch a movie while I did some work.  I decided I would check out “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”.  It was a pretty good movie.  I didn’t expect much but I was surprised at how cool it turned out to be.  I shall recommend it.  Alrighty, on to what I did during week 3!

In Modeling 100 Joe taught us some new tools to make our modeling move along faster while looking more interesting.  The rest of the class was used to work on our environments as well as a side project to take a premade character and change him to make him look a little more custom.  I went with a Deadpool theme for mine.  Deadpool is awesome.  So here is my finished Interior Environment.  My apologies for the lighting.  Still tryin to figure out XSI's system.

And here is my wonderful friend, Deadpool!  We are going to rig him eventually.

Next was our Classical Animation 100 class where we started a new animation!  Now I’m not immature as I am sure most people would tell you, but this week we had to animate a sack.  Now our first sack is a rough animation to plan for our awesome, end sack.  My sack is amazing so far and some in the class would say that their sack is better than mine but I would have to disagree.  My sack is a perfect size and it moves and bounces very smoothly.  So without further ado, here is an animation of my sack!  We have 2 weeks to do it so this first week was the rough sketch.

After Classical animation we have 3D Animation 100 with Scott as usual.  This week was the beginning of another 2 week project.  We have our friendly robot character who is all pre rigged and he is standing at a bar.  On this bar is a glass.  Our job was to make Mr. Robot reach out and grab that glass using constraints and parenting.  Very cool lesson, it hasn’t changed my mind about what I want to do or anything but it did loosen me up a bit towards animation.

 I went with a very classy way of picking up the glass.  I'm like that.

In XSI 100 this week we went over our screen shots of the materials we used in our environments.  We only had to do a couple using clusters so here we are!  I found the materials very easy to use and manipulate because of the similarities between Maya and XSI but that similar theme didn't last.

The lesson was about texturing using projections in XSI.  It wasn’t difficult but it was different enough from Maya that I had to block out what I do in Maya so that I didn’t mix the two programs.  It went well enough but XSI seems to be a bit buggy when it comes to textures.  Not bad though!

Next was Production 100 with Scott where we worked on some new lighting techniques.  Our assignment was to light an attic style room with a point light that represented the sun and then two area lights that add some spec to the floor under two windows.  Easy enough but still very useful for a guy who wants to do environments.  I’ve never been very dynamic with my lighting so these are good tricks.  We finish lighting the attic this coming week.

After Production 100 is Digital Imaging 100.  We went over our creepy Frankenstein dudes and got some advice on how to better blend our pictures and how to add proper shadows too.  The latter was very important as our next project is to light a 3D screenshot in photoshop using some clever mask layers.  I am not done, but I soon will be!  Check out what I have.

We started with this.

And so far I have this.

Last but not least was our Life Drawing 100 class.  We had another nude, male model and we practiced more of the same techniques as we did in other classes.  It would seem my proportions are getting a little better but there is still no way I am putting any of it online.  Just imagine that it is really good, that’s what I do!  The class seems to be getting a little more loose which makes for a much more fun and relaxed atmosphere in a class that should be relaxing. 

So that was the week!  On Monday I actually had plans so that brought the weekend to a close and explains why I am posting this today and not yesterday.  Once I get my time machine working I can rectify these problems.  Next week we are starting our car models in Modeling 100 so that will be cool.  I promised my dad I would bust out a real nice one for him to print out.  Alright, that’s it!  I will leave you with a picture of the car I will be modeling as well as another reason why Vancouver is better than Saskatchewan.  I can see the ocean and mountains at the same time!  Its almost not fair.  Vancouver 3, Saskatchewan 0.