Animation: Week 5

I was really intimidated by the animation we are expected to create, but once I'd read and tried out the tutorial I can see how it will all go together, actually looks quite simple to get that effect, but I will soon see when I try to make it.
Here is my render of the moving dominos following the tutorial.



Below is my attempt at making a more indept game engine machine, however it does not work how it is supost to. I spent ages applying the correct technique as used in the above one but no luck, i even looked at more tutorials hoping to get it working still no luck. It's stange as it doesn't even work at the start with the dominoes they just fly in the air, I even tried making them again to check I got it correct on a different file and it was fine so I have no idea why. My only thought is that I need to be doing something different when it get's to the ball, but if so that wasnt very clearly listed on the tutorial I worked from, 'Blender' also didn't seem to like it when I got into a lot of detail the page kept flashing different colours which was pretty anoying. Luckily I wont need this for my coursework but all the same it was a pretty frustrating process.

Animation: Week4

I usually take a day and work through all the work but this week I've been hit with a fluey bug so I shall be doing a bit at a time for as long as I'm able to work, pretty anoying as there are a lot of tutorials to do and this is only one of my four modules but cant do anything about it.


Right the first tutorial 'Basic Blender Particles' I was first very intimedated by the length of it but once I'd done i felt like there was a lot of repetition but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing as I feel very confident in what I've just learnt. I end of the tutorial saw us playing around with some different effects on the particles, I did a few renders of some of the nicer effects available. I found it very interesting how you can create something so different from the same thing, I look forward to using particles again.



This is the rings effect, It is by far my favourite it just looks beautiful. The effect reminds me of that pattern popular in the 60's? maybe i've got the decade wrong but I think you know what I mean.



This is using the flare effect, it reminds me of fireflies, I can see how this one would work nicely in the task for this week.


This is using the lines effect it looks like sparkly stars its really quite pretty. I can image how this effect would be useful for creating shooting stars, or even disco lights.






This is using the star effect, this is very similar to the flare effect but a bit more definied, but the name I imagine that it is used for simple star effects.





The next tutorial I tried wasn't as sucessful I followed the instructions as best as I could considering most of the buttons were in a different order but even parented the particles were just ordinary like the ones from the first tutorial they wern't the boxes, I got really stumped as I spent well over an hour trying different combinations I just dont understand why it wont work, I rendered my end result which isn't like theres but it shows some animation. It's really anoying as I think this would be a really useful technique.

The next two tutorials were fire related, the first one creating the fire, and the second one adding a lattice too it, I found that the second video with the latice didnt add that much difference but it's good to know you can add lattices to particles.

This is my fire from the first tutorial.

This is the fire from the second tutorial with the lattice on the particle.

I found creating the fire effect quite straight forward after I'd done it, however throughout making it I had a few problems trying to get it to look like I wanted to, infact I had to change quite a few of the settings, mainly making them higher. This was due to the fact that for some reason mine didn't rise as high as the one on the tutorial, but in end I think I did a good job on the technique, its pretty effective and I can see how it could be used for things such as rain and snow, just using it in the oposite direction, or even as fireworks if the lattice was made gigantic at the top.

The static particles fur was really awkward to do as so many of the buttons were non-existance due to the different version, I had to make quite a few guesses some of which may be really wrong but the end result isnt too bad, bit thicker than I would have liked bu oh well.

Week 3: Animation

First tutorial pretty simple and effective however I did mess up half way through and wonder why it wasnt working and starting it over again realised i'd named the wrong thing so the camera wouldnt rotate oh well sorted now.
However I am starting to wonder whats all the fuss about the monkey template why a monkey and not an elephant?

The next tutorial was easy to follow, however at the end I felt mine did look like the cylinders were crushing the rectangle but it didnt look like mine were moving like his so I went back to the middle and tried it again and got the same result, I'm guessing maybe its more like an alussion. The only difference with mine is that I exstruded the cross from the cylinder and he said he made it from a box so maybe that's the problem so thats something to consider in the future.

I was really dreading this weeks tutorials because of the task i'd seen that we had to do like worrying about it all day I was at work, but now i've done it it doesnt seen so bad, I guess thats because I just learnt the skills to do it. I rendered out two versions one with a standard camera and one with the camera path fly around effect on it. When it come to the initial process using the lattice etc that was fine I had no problems what so ever it was very clear in my mind still, but when it came to rotating the cylinders I got stumbled and played around a little bit, it was then that I realised how easy it was, that was because when I was rotating it in the y and z axis it kept moving the object but on the x axis it was fine so problem solved. This had made me feel a bit more confident as after last weeks disaster I was really worried like dreading doing the tutorial section of this course, I just really hope that they continue to go aswell as today, but knowing my luck they wont.

This is the render with a normal standard camera shot.


This is the render with the moving camera, after watching them both I prefer the standard shot you can see the process clearer, plus the quality doesn't seem as good on this one even I rendered them both on the same setting strange!

Animation: Week 2

The IPO curve window tutorial was yet another interesing way in which you can animate within blender, it was interesting to see the lines in which I had previously animated, it was nice to have a play around and change the directions and intesity of the previous animation, it was so intense that at one point the 'Monkey' goes off view, so it may look different than the tutorial that I actually followed, as I kind of took into my own hands. However I cant see that I'm ever going to really use it, but I may be wrong.

I was starting to think this is going too well, and ofcourse the problems start now, Benzier curves seem to have been put on this earth to kill me because they are doing the complete opposite of what i'm telling them to do. I make the plane and the ground fine, you add a Benzier curve into the mix and an hour is spent in frustration so much that you think maybe a degree is'nt for me should I quit and that is even an overstatment. I tell it to go one way and it goes the oposite way, so for my 'path' I have only gotten half way and that is due to me moving each bit manualy because when I click it goes the wrong way, So i'll try and carry on with the path half way and see if I can get more than two minutes into the eighteen minute tutorial otherwise I will be here all night.

This is a screenshot of the plane clearly far away from the path line, still comfused as to why but hey.

So I come back to it the next day a clear mind and all that, and it kind of went a bit better well I got it to work but not correctly, but I cant see how I'm ever going to get it to work, I've spent hours trying to do it and I cant take it anymore, it's anoying because I really liked doing the keyframes and this way obviously hates me. So this is my final result It doesnt work correctly like it doesnt fly where its supost to, I'll post a screenshot of that, but atleast it's following the path which is more than I got it to do last night. Hopefully I'll have more luck doing it using key frames in a minute.

Below are two videos one being my first atempt, dont know why it kept going underneath the ground, but i think I fixed it by the second one. However the plane isnt moving very excitingly this is due to the fact that whenever I tried to rotate it blender kept flashing colours across the screen and crashing so i've done my best with what I could, I'm clearly having a very bad week in regard to this module:(

This one is the pretty shocking one.

Right I have no idea why this has come out like this it is set up nicely with the camera I have no idea why it is just staying in one area when the scene goes across the whole landscape. The animate end is in the right place, i'd have another go but I am frustrated beyong belief with this weeks tasks to give it another go until a later date arghghhhhhhh