MA 3D Computer Animation

My final work:

The showreel:

Links to blogs about the production process:

Here are three posters I made:

First:

Second:

Third:

I tried to make the effect of flame burning transition in AE. This is the screenshot of the software:

This is the final result of the fire burning in AE:

I make the modle of the gate of the city in Maya, then I transfer it into the Unreal to make the scene, a fire burns at the gate of the city:

I was trying to export the maya file and put it into unity to implement the AR effect. The video below is the final result, thanks to herman’s help.

I planned to model in Maya and then import the model into UE, so I chose to create the forest scene in UE:

Here’s the main characters facing off under a tree:

I made an appointment with the school’s motion capture room for motion capture, and this is the picture of using motion capture:

The captured data needs to be modified before it can be imported into maya. Here is the tutorial for modifying the data:

But the final data is not ideal, I made a lot of action changes in maya, here is a screenshot of the model link motion capture data in maya:

I spent a lot of time modelling and integrating the scenes and giving them texture individually.
Here is the scene outside the yard with a map:

Here is a screenshot of the street in the scene:

This is a screenshot of the gate of the city:

This is a model and material of the interior of the room:

I used the plugin to make the cloud in maya, render the export separately with a transparent layer, and then composit in the final product.

Here is a screenshot of the Maya file I created for the cloud:

Here’s a video sequence of the clouds I rendered individually:

Soldier model and texture:

The one-minute story version produced:

Style reference

This week, I tried to do some thinking and started building storyboards and plots for my project.
This is a short animation I like very much, and I want to use it as a reference for the project of FMP. I want to make a story with a beginning and a end， which is similar to this one.

The heroine of my FMP project is a character with personality. This reference is very consistent with the character of the heroine of my FMP project. Her fighting actions are very cool and attractive, and this reference provides a lot of inspiration for my plot design and role action design:

https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1MB4y1k7Fs/?spm_id_from=333.337.search-card.all.click&vd_source=b8aa05e327b77be35cdf641592a5145c

In addition, this is one of my favorite animations. It really showed me many good sences and gave me some inspirtions. The director created many impressive and exciting visual language ways. I especially like the composition and color combination.

https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1df4y1c7uP/?spm_id_from=333.337.search-card.all.click&vd_source=b8aa05e327b77be35cdf641592a5145c

This is my favourite animation. This animation director is a director I respect and love very much. This animation is very artistic, and some of the shots he designed are very tense and can fully inspire the audience’s emotions. I can learn a lot from it, such as lens design and camera movement, and so on.

https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1rx411d7Gf/?spm_id_from=333.337.search-card.all.click&vd_source=b8aa05e327b77be35cdf641592a5145c

Because, in my story, there is a fierce fighting plot between the hero and the main character. This is the reference of the fighting animation I found on the Internet:

In a word, I hope my FMP will be a complete short story with a beginning and an end. Maybe due to limited time, I cannot make a complete story animation, but I will describe my story content and specific plot in detail here.

Story content

Introduction of main background of male and female:

Hero: He is a general of the state of Jin, very powerful. He was ordered by the emperor to invade and annex the Song Dynasty in order to strengthen the Jin.
Heroine: She was from the Northern Song Dynasty. Because of the war, the people of the Northern Song Dynasty were destitute. She stole gold and silver from the residences of many officials in the Jin State and used the money to help the people of the Northern Song Dynasty. As a result, she became famous as a great thief in Jin and the Jin government offered a large reward for her arrest. This day, she secretly sneaked into the general house, going to steal the Military layout plan, with their own way to prevent the war.

My overall story is like this:

This story took place during the war. The Jin army attacked the Song Dynasty. Because of the war, the people of the Northern Song Dynasty were destitute. On a quiet night, the heroine secretly sneaked into the Jin dynasty’s general house, looking for and stealing the military layout.  Just as she was putting the map in the bag. She was discovered by the Jin general. He appears from the other side of the room and attacks her with a  weapon. She instant awareness, from the Jin general to avoid the attack.

The Jin general came slowly out of the shadows and said, “Now that you come here, so stay and be our guest.”
She shuns the layout map into the pocket, smiling: “As a pauper, I can not be used to staying in the general’s house.”
The male master face a change, and said: “This is not up to your choice.” The male master raised one side of the hand, general house in the dark ambush soldiers are open bows ready to shoot. She looked around, knowing he was in an ambush, she looked at the male master way: “If I do not try how to know.”, and throw a smoke bomb at the Jin general. The male master with a sword split, and instant smoke everywhere. She ran away, the heroine fled to the woods, the hero caught up at this time, from behind attacked her with the sword, and the heroine to avoid was injured in the arm. The heroine knows that running away can only lead to passive aggression, so she turns her head and fights the hero with the sword. Two people fight with a dozen moves, the heroine was seriously injured, was an attack heavily hit the tree. The heroine lost. The male master uses a sword against her throat.

I have a detailed story in mind for this project, but I don’t have enough time to draw the storyboard. I will elaborate on the detailed story in next week’s blog.

Reference and inspiration for the character design：

The preliminary conception of the storyboard:

Explore how the Wind Blows Away Poster is made:

This is the first version of the wind simulation:

This is the final version of the wind simulation: