trashdance

Hot off the press!

2008-08-22T12:32:00.001-07:00

The product of many sleepless nights...

Trash Dance from Oliver Fergusson-Taylor on Vimeo.

Been busy...

2008-08-19T21:34:00.000-07:00

No posts for a while, been real busy with rendering and compositing. Only 2 days till hand in :o

Got some screen shots for a sneaky peak...

Introducing...

2008-08-07T14:08:00.000-07:00

Mr Trash.

Finished the modelling and applied the geometry to the mo-cap data... now the rendering begins!

trash dance, sponsered by starbucks 'i'll sleep when i'm dead'

2008-08-07T11:18:00.001-07:00

final animatic...

2008-08-04T10:24:00.000-07:00

The timing of the cuts between all 4 shots and the tracking is done, i have also decided to break up the character on impact instead of from a standing position, one: because i think it looks cool and give the break up more meaning and two: because i have only a few frames of motion capture footage after this point and the break up look naff at any other instance. Sorry, no music... you will have to imagine that it fits well with the soundtrack... which it does ;)

The mother of all problems... solved

2008-07-31T20:45:00.001-07:00

Its always a bastard trying to get transparent materials to look real in 3d... Glass plastic, whatever. So i have been tackling this one for a while and it was giving me grief, finally cracked it today... Yay :D I can go home and sleep now x

Tracking test with mo cap intergration

2008-07-30T18:22:00.000-07:00

Just like it says on the tin...

;)

SDX 900 crispyness edit

2008-07-30T17:57:00.000-07:00

Re-shot the footage the other day, nice weather, better shadow information and the quality of the sweet SDX 900 the don-wonga of cameras. I have cut down the no. of shots to 4:

Shot 01: The establishing shot with the character morphing together.

Shot 02: The 'bitch of a shot to track' shot which will feature motion capture data.

Shot 03: A different angle of shot 02#

Shot 04: The character will dance a bit and then fall apart, curtsy of some of Houdini's ridged body dynamics...

edit: no fx

2008-07-23T14:16:00.000-07:00

first edit with no digital effects and colour grade. just to get an idea of style and pace.

oli

light intergration...

2008-07-23T08:37:00.001-07:00

With the test footage and HDRI references that i took last week, the model is a simple coke can which i created a shader for over the past couple of days. Compositing was done in shake.

Original backplate

Laters x

MoCap that ass!

2008-07-22T13:18:00.000-07:00

The motion capture session on Friday went really well and i have cleaned it up and applied some basic shape geometry to represent the different pieces of trash.

oli ;)

HDRI zing'

2008-07-21T16:18:00.000-07:00

Shot around 90 percent of my footage a few days ago and in the process of putting together an edit, just thought i would upload the high dynamic range images that i took on that same day. For more information on HDRI images have a gander at this link. I am basically using HDRI to get accurate light integrations and reflections for my geometry. I have also posted an early test.

Shutter at 1/10th of a second

Shutter at 1/100th of a second

Shutter at 1/1000th of a second

Unwrapped HDR image after being compiled with separate exposers

Early HDRI intergration test with simple can geometry

oli

FYI: old stuff

2008-07-21T05:00:00.000-07:00

If your interested about any of my past work and involvement in other projects then you can check out the following links:

Group Project: Connex

Urban Distruction

oli

a load of old rubbish (aka early renders)

2008-07-19T12:42:00.000-07:00

i have been modelling some trash in-between motion capture sessions and shooting and editing footage. it's thanks to the textures and the great scanner in the animation room that these look reasonably ok on low poly geometry. there is still some work to be done on the cider bottle and and the reflections on the can but there is definitely progress to been seen here... thank fook!

oli x

a new location

2008-07-19T12:33:00.000-07:00

due to my lack of transport and the demand of the other areas in my project.. oh and the awesome weather (not) that we have been having recently in bournemouth, i have decided to shoot in the uni, can't really get more local than that... its not that i want to do this, its more the fact of 'getting the job done' and in the short amount of time i have left (5 weeks to be precise it seems like the logical thing to do. the uni has some interesting angles though and i have a preliminary edit that ain't half bad :) some pics below.

Oli x

Houston, we have a dancer...

2008-07-02T04:55:00.000-07:00

Just got off the phone the Amy Beveridge who runs a dance studio called Pure Funk and she has put me in contact with a dancer called Exlis Staddon. I am really looking forward to working with him as he has allot of experience in break dancing and should make a big impact on the look of the project.

Progress... yay!

Character design

2008-07-01T05:29:00.000-07:00

I want my character to be simple in design but also flexible enough to mimic a particular dance style, it has to have attitude to fit with the feel of the music. I have a few sketches of how i will show it forming and a rough sort of look.

The area around the side of the alley could be used as an establishing shot.

The camera focuses on the rubbish that has fallen from the bin and is scattered on the street.

a closer look at the rubbish and we can se it starts to move.

The separate pieces of rubbish start to join to each other.

The character evolves from the rubbish (i like the idea of a low angle Citizen Kane style shot to make the audience feel small).

I really need to look at the exact items that are going to makeup my character to get a better idea of flexibility and establish an attitude...

Oli

Location, location, location...

2008-07-01T04:54:00.000-07:00

I wish you could just rock up and film, in and out in a couple of hours, no harm done... Yeah right, nightmare!

I have a couple of locations in mind for my project.

The local dump

Pros: Looks good (well as good a a load of rubbish can look), lots of trash makes for better integration of my character

Cons: Really hard to get a permit to film there because of health and safety issues...

or

The alleyway behind my house and the surrounding streets

Pros: Its around the back of my house! looks pretty glum too...

Cons: Its not as striking as a huge dump full of waste, so may detract from the production value of my project...

I am in the process of contacting a bunch of local council run and privately run waste sites but so far its not looking good, oh well keep trying i guess.

Oli x

Searching for inspiration

2008-07-01T02:58:00.000-07:00

I have found inspiration for my project in a range of places online, i have included some links and a brief explanation of their inspiral wonderfulness.

Robot Rock!

The classic Citroen C4 transformer ad that came out a few years back is a good example of motion capture and camera angles. would like to use similar low angle camera angles in my project.

Singing in the Rain

Singing in the rain by Mint Royale. Click here to view.

This is a good example because it mixes the style of character and dancing that i would like to incorporate into my project.

B-Boy Jr

This is the coolest break dancing i have ever seen, i would like to find a dancer that could pull off a few moves like this to help complement the low angle shots.

Thats a quick look at some of my inspiration next we can look at locations.

Oli x

A Trashy Introduction...

2008-07-01T02:36:00.000-07:00

Welcome one and all to 'trash dance'. This blog is aimed to document the progress of my biggest solo project to date... My Masters project in Digital Effects. I will be posting all sorts of interesting links and examples of stuff i have found and developed along the way.

I will be using an array of software to produce my final composition including:

Side Effects Houdini

Apple Shake

Adobe creative suite

I will be avoiding a particular piece of open source software *cough GIMP! at all costs.

so the clock starts here and now... T-minus 8 weeks and counting.

If your interested about any of my past work and involvement in other projects then you can check out the following links:

Group Project: Connex

Urban Distruction

Ciao for now,

Oli x