Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

In some ways this has been a better week than the last few, and we're moving ahead with the film, but we're still running into problems. On the plus side all the models are done, the scenery is all textured and lite, and we got textures on all the characters. The initial beauty shots of the characters in the rooms look very promising! Additionally, in the last class couple of classes the three of us had the opportunity to work together to resolve problems we were having in skinning characters. I think that helped - there was a little bit of bonding going on as we made it work.

At least, I hope so.

So this week we've gotten our assets together, created a master timing sheet, and are started to block out animation for the first 32 shots of the film. Additionally, I've done a test of the 2D animation that will go on the character's faces (see the link to youtube above for the test footage). It all looks good, things are moving ahead, and we might actually get this completed on time.

And now for the bad news.

In doing the test facial animation, and doing the blocking I've discovered a couple of things. One, the way we projected the UVs onto the characters doesn't work. The projections don't "stick" to the model and the image stays in place as the character moves. Secondly, I've found that the fingers on the characters are very tough to work. I'm not sure if this is a result of the mel script that created the bone structure o short cuts that were taken in building the characters. Finally, I pointed out a mistake all of us made in working on the characters - none of us included a name tag on St. Peter, Anubis, or Buddha. Hopefully we can resolve both of these issues quickly and re-reference the fixed characters back into the scenes. If not, our animation schedule will be out the window, and that's something I don't even want to think about.

We'll keep pushing on. Hopefully things will start smoothing out. Until next time, stay tuned...