Final Animation - Finally!

Here it is! Of course there are still some things I wish I could have finished before I turn it in this afternoon. I would have liked to do some experimenting with fur on the beard and eyebrows. This has been a great learning experience.

And, as for you Publick, this horrible Monarch impression is the price you pay for not replying to my email. This voice could have been yours!

Looped Version Here

Final Animation - Surfacing and Materials

First pass with the new textures. I ran into a little problem with the UVs and got this CRAZY result. It's like The Mighty Monarch on drugs:

I found the problem! I forgot to delete the non-deformer history in the model file, which got referenced through the pipeline, and just wrecked havoc all the way down. When I deleted the history (to fix the problem), I lost my blendshape node.

Don't worry though! I reattached the blend shapes, and the animation I made transferred to the new node, no problem. BUT! I used the old blendshape node to drive the teeth and tongue, and all those driven keys were lost. I did a quick repair, and the teeth are looking a little funky, but it's not bad!

Animation Assignment 12 - Textures

Animation Assignment 11 - Developed Action

Looped Version Here

First pass for eyebrows, eyeballs, and head action.

Animation Assignment 11 - Lip Sync and Animation

Lip sync is looking all right for the first pass. I still have to add eyebrows, head motion, and eye motion to enhance the "acting" in the scene.

Assignment 10 - Clusters

The main clusters for the top half of the head are complete. He can blink, scrunch his eyebrows, and squinch his cheeks. The mesh has also been completely UV mapped. Still a little behind, but ready for to move ahead.

Assignment 10 - Final Audio

"Well, I couldn't do it without my wife, my indomitable genius… and my henchmen. They'll strike if I don't thank them."

Assignment 10 - More Progress

 

Looped Version Here (not recommended) 

The visemes in order of appearance are: 

1. "a/i"
2. "e"
3. "o"
4. "u"
5. "c/d/g/k/n/r/s/th/y/z"
6. "w/q"
7. "m/b/p"
8. "l/d/th"
9. "f/v/d/th"

 The visemes have been built and they're looking... good enough to move on for now. Next step is to place clusters on the face so that the top half can be expressive. I figure the eyes are where most of the acting will be. Don't let me forget those eyebrows!

The looped version is not recommended because although I tried to put a 12 frame handle on the front and back to smooth the loop, this looper cuts off right before that, making it a little jumpy.

Modeling Assignment 10 - In-progress Update

I have completed working models of the basic visemes (according to the Preston Blair sheet in one of the previous posts). I hit a little snafu with the teeth and the tongue, but I think it might just be an issue with the order the input nodes.

consonants above, vowels below

The next step is to have all of these targets refer to an invisible reference face. That face will then be linked to the main face. Why this intermediate step? I planned it this way so that I could weight paint only one face to the main mesh instead of doing it 9 times, because I don't like weight painting. This also makes it easier for me to predict which part of the mesh will be affected by the blend shapes and which will need additional help from clusters.

Modeling Assignment 9