Project 6 : Character Modeling

Reading:

Chapter 9, Section 10.6 (Kerlow)

In this assignment you will design, build and start animating a new character. This will be your introduction to "rigging", or setting up a control structure to make a character easy to animate. As you start thinking about your character and how it should move, use the eye for detail that you have been developing to study motion of things, people, animals in the real world. Once again, new groups have been created, and you will be collaborating at every stage of the process.

To learn about the tools for building and animating characters, read Learning Alias:

• Lesson 16
• Character Animation (pp. 331-340)
• Lesson 19
• Lesson 18 (as needed)
• Lesson 20 (as needed)
• Lesson 17 (as needed)
• Lesson 21 (as needed).

1. As a group, think of a new character you would like to animate. To help organize and record your plans, make a model sheet for your character. This document should include the following:
   • A blueprint of the character in its rest pose, with dimensions clearly labeled (you may want to use graph paper for this.)
   • Some sketches of the character in a natural pose (front, back, side, and/or 3/4 views as appropriate), in various other typical poses, and in a few extreme poses.
   • A brief written description of the character's personality.
   • Notes about the construction of the character indicating how pieces are grouped, the names of the joints and geometry as they will appear in the SBD, and the articulation parameters and rotation limits of the joints.

   While creating this document may seem like a lot of extra work, it will definitely pay off later as people attempt to animate the character. It will also facilitate communication within your group as you split up the tasks of modeling, rigging, and texturing. Think of the model sheet as a holy document. Distribute copies to everyone in your group, and hand in a copy in class on Monday.

2. Build the character. You may approach this in either of two ways:
   • Modify the "Ergo" charater. If your character design is roughly humanoid, you can take advantage of the existing skeleton given to you for the Motion assignment. However, you must delete the old geometry, and create new geometry for your character. You must also modify the proportions in some way (e.g. make the character female, a child, a giant, or even some other two-legged primate like a chimpanzee.) You should feel free to add or remove joints from the skeleton, and to change the rotation limits to suit your new design.
   • Create a new character from scratch. If your character is not human-shaped (or if you would just like the experience of building a new skeleton), you can build it from scratch. Anything that can be animated is fair game: animals, plants, kitchen utensils, whatever you want!

   You may use deformable models if you want (e.g. by using the Character Builder in Alias), but deformation is not required. Be sure to design and plan carefully. Some characters built now may very well figure in the final animation next quarter.

   Once you've built the character and it moves the way you want it to, pose it in the various sketched poses on your model sheet, and save at least three images:

   1. Rest pose (the character as it appears on the blueprint)
   2. Natural pose (a relaxed position typical for this character)
   3. Extreme pose (an action or emotional reaction).

3. (Optional) Animate a simple action that shows your character in a particular mood or reacting to a particular situation. Make up the story that leads up to the action. If we have time in the critique we will look at each action twice: first without hearing the story context and then again after.

1. The key here is coming up with a character that is interesting and expressive. Be creative! Think carefully about how the character moves and what the best way is to control it: what's the "root" of the hierarchy? Does it use deformable or rigid geometry? This is also a good time to think about how an animator would control the character. Do the rotations of the joints make sense? (Think of Ergo's shoulders and neck!) Should there be IK handles or constraints? All of this information should be included in the model sheet.

2. Here, the purpose is to implement the design of your character. The model should be built and shaded with the appropriate degree of detail: that is, as much as is necessary to make the character look good. But don't go overboard. The most important thing is that the character be expressive and animatable. An overly detailed character will be very slow to update, which will make it frustrating for an animator to use. As you go, practice posing the character using the controls you've added, and modify them until the character's easy to work with. The easier it is to pose, the more fun it will be to animate!

3. Put yourself in your character's shoes. As you did in last week's assignment, think about how your character's body language conveys its feelings. But this time, also think about what it is that makes this character unique: for example, how is a pigeon's walk different from that of other birds? Use this to guide you as you animate the character.

Monday, March 9: Bring to class a complete model sheet and any supporting sketches.

Monday, March 16, 2:30pm (remember, it's finals week): Before the critique, create a group directory in the critique/character directory and place there the following:

1. README file with who-did-what information.
2. At least three rendered images in .rgb format: rest.rgb, natural.rgb, and extreme.rgb.
3. (optional) A flipbook animation of an expressive action or reaction.
4. Any other interesting or informative animations or images you want to turn in. Please explain what they are in the README file.