Animaya...

So this semester, along with vis dev and bfa, im also taking a digital animation class. I originally wanted to take the class just to become more familiar with Maya and animating in 3D. The only other animating that I've done is the traditional paper flipping and vector/symbol based in Flash. I have used Maya before, but it was mostly just modeling and surfacing....barely any animating. So I figured, since I was just taking the class as an elective, I thought it wouldn't hurt to try something new.

So far, the class has been pretty enjoyable. I was struggling a bit at first. It took me a while to develop a steady workflow, just because I had to familiarize myself with all the tools and funcitons, and just figuring out how everything worked. The assignments went by fast....we started with a simple ball bounce, then immediately moved onto more complex stuff. By the third or fourth assignment, we were already animating human rigs. Pretty crazy.

So it's almost the end of the semester, and I'm just now starting to get a grasp of how things work. I'm starting to get the hang of it, and the process is becoming a little bit quicker. We're already working on our final, which is an acting/dialouge test. It's still a work-in-progress, there is a bit more refining I have to do, but overall, I like the way it's going...and my teacher does too.




It's my first semester animating in Maya....I must say, I'm pretty impressed with myself.

More Trees and Houses

So these are the more recent versions of my treehouse designs. I added a bit more to the exterior and completely redid the interior. They definitely still need to be touched up. Some are more successful than others, but I got some good feedback and I really need to bump up the contrast. Make the lights lighter and the darks darker. While I'm working in photoshop, the values seem to read ok, but whenever I have them printed out, it ends up being lighter. Still working on improving my digital painting skills. Gotta get back to work, enjoy!

-jeff