Re-rigging Anna!

March 28, 2012
So I'm re-rigging Anna !
Using abAutoRig 3.3 and also doing facial rigs.

And so Ian helped me to go about the rigging in 3D2 on the annav2 - and that is made up of the meshes that I exported from anna.mb as objs. But alas, I realize that I should have used the original anna.mb, as I still want to keep the blendshapes. I should have simply detach the skin(s) from the original skeleton, and go from there, thereby retaining the blendshapes.

So what I do now is:
Import anna.mb into annav2, detach anna from the old skeleton, then copy weights from annav2 to anna. This is my annav3, :-) In this way, I will have the blendshapes of anna, and the painted weights WIP from Ian's 3D2 session.

0. annav3 - is annav2 with anna.mb imported.

1. detach skin, char, eyes, dress from the anna.mb skeleton - now the mesh shift back to the original unbounded pose (which is the same as the meshes duplicated for the Blendshapes)

2. now bind to the new skeleton (which is from annav3)
    (i leave annav3 bounded as well to the new skeleton)

3. also i need to add influence on the 7 joints that had been bounded on v2 (so that the when copied will be the same as annav2). <-- do this first before copy weights since the weights were also based on these influences.

The seven joints are:
LUpperEyeLids_1_joint
LLowerEyeLids_1_joint
L_Cheek_Bone_2_joint
L_Cheek_Bone3_joint
UpperLips_5_joint
LowerLips_2_joint
LowerLips_1_joint

4. now I copy skin weights - i tried the default copy (by spatial) but it isn't ideal -checked the jaw control deformation is not OK; so should copy skin weights by UV (also Bashir said on 26/3/12 during the rigging workshop that since mesh has moved should copy by UV) and it works - tried in class. phew!





As I'm rigging there are various things I find useful to record here:

1. paint weight - select the joint by right clicking on the joint, then "select influence"

2. copy weights - select the mesh to copy from then shift select the target mesh, and Skin>Edit Smooth Skin>Copy Skin Weights. I find the information from [1] to be really useful - see pp. 421, 455.



Useful References:
1. Learning Autodesk Maya 2008 The Modeling and Animation Handbook

 

The Man who Planted Trees

June 11, 2010
I was so excited when I got the DVDs of The Man Who Planted Trees from inter library loan. Despite having a pressing assignment deadline, I just have to watch it.

It is so so so incredibly beautiful - Frederick Back's work is just so beautiful that I was so mesmerized, and so inspired. The story - is also so beautiful only Frederick Back could have been able to produce the animation for it....

I really love hand drawn animation ... it has such charm and beauty that i find kind of missing in 3D...
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Cutout !

March 20, 2010
So here's my first cutout, all ready to animate.



And this afternoon, I've finally gotten a taste of cutout animation (putting it under the Oxberry camera).
No mean feat, but loads of fun.

Strange for one having relied so much on a computer, but now, a refreshing change of using scissors, pencil, paper and loads of imagination. I love it!

Hmmm....
Starting from frame 130
Frames 130-177 for Title (24 frames) and first shot (24 frames) - EWS that shows the tree, girl on swing (Anna?), butterfly.
Fr...
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Sleeping Child

January 1, 2010
This is the first pose of Anna that I did - so serene, a sleeping child.
It reminds me of this song - Sleeping Child. My all time favorite! :-)

So serene, a sleeping pose

Sleeping Child -- Michael Learns to Rock

The Milky Way upon the heaven is twinkling just for you
And Mr. Moon he came by to say goodnight to you
I'll sing for you, I'll sing for mother, we're praying for the world
And for the people everywhere gonna show them all we care

Chorus:
Oh my sleeping child, the world's so wild but you'v...
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It's Beautiful, It's Magic!

December 3, 2009
Frantically and flustered, I rushed to COFA. Will my white hard disk with all my precious backups of my various work and sound resources still be at general access lab F104? It was the afternoon of Saturday 28 Nov, and COFA Annual was coming to a close on Sunday. I didn't plan to go to COFA.

"Hi, excuse me, I err, had my hard disk on this Mac", I said to a lady who was working on the Mac which I left my hard disk plugged in the day before. She smiled and pointed to a hard disk on the desk. "O...
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The Art of Doing Nothing

November 22, 2009

stand animation....
.. to do...

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SVN on Mac OS X (Using SCPlugin)

November 22, 2009
Just thought of putting this which I posted on iCinema wiki on Oct 25 for my reference ...

Tortoise SVN on Windows is a breeze, but with Mac, it is not that easy.

I spent the thu before AVIE trying to get SVN client - SCPlugin, to work on my Mac Pro (Mac OS X 1.5x), and it kept showing it is an outdated version 1.4.x.
I decided today to give it a go again - and hmm, ok, perhaps I should download the i386 one that is a later version 1.6.2.


And now I spent the whole afternoon trying to SCPlugin...
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It's the Shots!

November 19, 2009
I really love to do the animation. And playing with interesting camera angles is fun!

"I'll add one where we shoot from underneath the spinning magical papers!" so I said to Simon excitedly, "a low angle shot." That became shot 34b - and with 37, 38, 39, I was done with key poses. 4 shots in one day on October 16 - the Friday of week 12!

So here, I've Anna looking bewildered by the spinning paper - one of my favorite shots.


Anna and Jaws looking at Spinning Papers


Jaws Jumps up excitedly towards...
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For Sarah

November 17, 2009
"Dear Shu, I hope you can finish Anna well." --  little Sarah, who just turned five on the second voice recording.

"Sarah asked to write this message and she recited it, Joy is not wrong about her texting" -- text sent by Esther on 31 Oct.

"I want to see the movie!", said Sarah excitedly in CG09 on the first recording on 13 Oct. "You gotta text her!" Joy urged Sarah.

So I guess, how could I disappoint Sarah? And seven-year old Daniel too! "Anna World" is their movie!

"How did Jaws get up the tr...
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Anna's World

November 15, 2009
Anna's World is a whimsical world of magic!

In my mind's eye, I could almost see it even as we were building it. It's not just the environment, it's also the sound, sights and experience that we wanted to build. Yes, the sound. Little Sarah and Daniel will be thrilled to hear their voices!

"I'll be putting in a lens flare!" so said Simon over the phone. "Cool!"


Anna's World - a whimsical world of magic!

"It's going to be really so beautiful and magical!" so I said to Simon, happily seeing the dai...
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