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Been working on this for years. Finally 2/3rds done! Looking for first impressions. How does the promotional material grab you? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uruh8zKDPlI 
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Nov 21, 2014 04:01
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| # ? Apr 20, 2024 09:08 |
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I'd be more excited if the trailer demonstrated the acting ability of the participants (which I find to always be lacking in indie productions) instead of the special effects. Frankly, nothing about this looks particularly professional. In close up the CG movements are unnatural (the CG itself isn't up to standard but that's pardonable for an indie film), the poster is cluttered and somewhat awkwardly laid out. The premise has promise, although certain logical pitfalls come with it, and it'd be interesting to know whether you deal with them. Okay, I looked at trailer #1 on the channel, and I hope the sound quality improves for the screening.
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Nov 21, 2014 05:05
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supermikhail posted:I'd be more excited if the trailer demonstrated the acting ability of the participants (which I find to always be lacking in indie productions) instead of the special effects. Frankly, nothing about this looks particularly professional. In close up the CG movements are unnatural (the CG itself isn't up to standard but that's pardonable for an indie film), the poster is cluttered and somewhat awkwardly laid out. The premise has promise, although certain logical pitfalls come with it, and it'd be interesting to know whether you deal with them. Yeah, we just finished ADR. The next trailer (after the test screening) will have dialogue with quality audio. The VFX are still work in progress. Which movements caught your eye as needing polish? Which Logical Pitfalls come to mind? Thanks for the feedback 
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Nov 21, 2014 05:11
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Fuzzy Modem posted:The VFX are still work in progress. Which movements caught your eye as needing polish? Well, mostly it's anything that flies. The vehicles seem to move along perfectly smooth trajectories, and the door in trailer #3 opens without any effort... also the "dinosaur" exerts barely any effort while flying or landing - any flying animal I can think of flaps almost frantically while it sets down, even if in flight it glides without a twitch. Realism demands slowdowns and speedups and random jerkiness. A pneumatic door first pops off and then slides away slowly. A regular door starts slowly, requiring an initial burst of energy to overcome friction. Airborne vehicles deal with changing wind and turbulence... Upon rewatching the tailer for the tenth time, it starts seeming like I'm too nitpicky. Well, if you've accounted for the forementioned problems since the earlier trailers, maybe you haven't considered that some of your CG movements are too fast, such as the two aircraft that at one point zoom away under another aircraft. quote:Which Logical Pitfalls come to mind? I'm not saying that I expect you to have missed these problems, on the contrary, but there is no obvious solution that could be derived from the premise. They would be irrelevant for a short story, but for a series, there are certain trappings of the fantasy genre that you have to be careful with, such as prophetic dreams, keeping watch while everyone else sleeps... Hey, why does the night side need all those artificial lights?
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Nov 21, 2014 06:13
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supermikhail posted:Well, mostly it's anything that flies. The vehicles seem to move along perfectly smooth trajectories, and the door in trailer #3 opens without any effort... also the "dinosaur" exerts barely any effort while flying or landing - any flying animal I can think of flaps almost frantically while it sets down, even if in flight it glides without a twitch. Realism demands slowdowns and speedups and random jerkiness. A pneumatic door first pops off and then slides away slowly. A regular door starts slowly, requiring an initial burst of energy to overcome friction. Airborne vehicles deal with changing wind and turbulence... Upon rewatching the tailer for the tenth time, it starts seeming like I'm too nitpicky. Well, if you've accounted for the forementioned problems since the earlier trailers, maybe you haven't considered that some of your CG movements are too fast, such as the two aircraft that at one point zoom away under another aircraft. Good eye! I'll work on more nuanced mechanical motion with acceleration/deceleration, and I'll re-render the escort to break formation more slowly. The Dragon's movement has been hard. Flap too fast and they feel small. Flap too slow and they feel like they're going to fall out of the sky. The tidally locked setting has been a fun challenge. I've had to be careful not to include terms that come naturally like "tomorrow" or "some day" and I've thought hard about what life on such a world might be like (living in Alaska makes it easier to imagine I think). I've tried to add nuance to the subtext to illustrate the differences between cultures (for example, those on the Nightside drink their water hot by default.) Certain concessions have been made though, such as two cultures divided by thousands of years both speaking modern English. [edit] One of the nice ways that science works to my advantage is that on a real tide locked planet, like Gliese 581, it's speculated that most of the planet's storms would occur along the border, creating a natural barrier between Night and Day. Fuzzy Modem fucked around with this message at 06:34 on Nov 21, 2014 |
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Nov 21, 2014 06:31
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So, a fairly large bird - http://youtu.be/hecXupPpE9o And it's starting to seem that the main problem with your flying reptiles is the rigidity of their movement. The wing doesn't move far during flight, but it moves everywhere along its surface, and your wings actually seem to be in parts stuck at rigid angles. Also, this - http://youtu.be/-7IVjCQ26pE This eagle basically doesn't move its wings during flight (or maybe it does, otherwise how would it change the angle), but there is definitely some fluttering during landing, which is understandable because the bird is large and has a lot of momentum. Of course, the particulars depend on the anatomy of your creature. You might want to consult http://youtu.be/bP3JkC0FyMI , too. Those guys spent lots of time making reptile flight believable. Edit: I realized that I might be mixing my messages, so, to clarify, yes, the problem is both the excess and lack of fluidity. supermikhail fucked around with this message at 07:47 on Nov 21, 2014 |
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Nov 21, 2014 07:29
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supermikhail posted:So, a fairly large bird - http://youtu.be/hecXupPpE9o The rigidity comes from key framing joints, I think, rather than using motion capture or dynamic influence. It's something I can fix I think by carefully adding more keys, to subtly imply weight and flexibility. It may also be that the skeleton is hard bound rather than soft bound. I'll watch those videos for reference and do some experimenting. Thanks
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Nov 22, 2014 00:40
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| # ? Apr 20, 2024 09:08 |
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Yeah, exactly. What he said.  Myself, to me that looks like an IK deal or constraint by curve.  (No Blender emoticon?)
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Nov 22, 2014 04:49
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