Final Trailer and Evaluation

This is the final result of the animation I have produced for the assignment with all of the scenes edited together and sound included.

The trailer is 30 seconds long and features the Zorin Industries airship from the movie A View To A Kill, flying over the Golden Gate Bridge in reference to a particular scene from the film. However, despite this reference, my animation does not show actual scenes from the film and instead is a more abstract trailer advertising the movie, much more similar to the opening credits from James Bond films (for an example, see the opening credits from Quantum of Solace).

In my trailer, there are three bullets flying along the river towards the Golden Gate Bridge as the airship is flying over it. The bullets then slow down and two of them drop into the water below. The third bullet slowly weaves its way around the struts of the bridge before firing up towards the Zorin Industries airship, with the scene cutting just before it hits leaving the trailer on a cliffhanger.

Overall I am quite happy with the way my animation has turned out. In particular, some of the camera angles I have managed to create I am very pleased with. However, there are some elements I would improve next time. One thing I noticed about my trailer is that it seems very short, despite being the specified 30 seconds. I think this is because it lures the viewer in and then suddenly ends and I think a big cause of this is the soundtrack. I have used the title song from the film, although just when the song is beginning with the lyrics coming in, my animation then cuts. This could be a contributory factor that leaves the viewer expecting more.

Another thing that could be improved is the landscaping. Currently it seems a bit bare and, although not a key point of the animation, it would be nice to add a bit more to the landscape to make it a bit more pleasing to the eye.

However, those points aside, I am happy with my trailer. I have definitely enjoyed learning and using the Autodesk 3D Studio Max program this semester. I have learned a lot of very useful techniques about 3D modelling and animation and have thoroughly enjoyed myself. Next time I would probably make use of more of the techniques that I learned this semester, uing some of those that I didn't use for this trailer, in order to create more variety. But for my first experience of 3D modelling and animation, I am pleased with the result.

Assignment - Scene 7

This is the 7th and final scene of my assignment animation. This is where my animation becomes slightly abstract with the last remaining bullet weaving its way around the struts of the Golden Gate Bridge before firing up towards the Zorin Industries airship.

In order to create this I used a carefully constructed path constraint. I created a spline that weaved its way around the struts of the bridge before suddenly going straight and upwards. It was a challenge to get the path to follow around the struts, especially at the end when it goes straight across the bridge and has to go between the struts on the other side too, on the way to the airship. However, I managed to achieve the path I wanted after a long and careful construction process.

Once this was achieved, I attached the bullet to the path using a path constraint and then set the bullet to start about 10% of the way along the path. The reason for this was to get the right camera angle. In order to get the camera to follow, I cloned the spline that the bullet was following and moved it slightly above. This was a technique I had learnt in creating the little race track animation for one of the tutorials. I could then attach the camera to this slightly higher path. Then I attached the camera target to the bullet using an attachment constraint.

The path constraints were set to not have a constant velocity, since the bullet needed to speed up on the straight part of the path at the end. However, in the final render, this effect was perhaps a little bit too much and will therefore need slowing down slightly in Adobe Premiere Pro.

Assignment - Scene 6

This is scene 6 of my final animation. In this scene, the bullets slow down before two of them suddenly drop into the river. The third bullet continues slowly towards the Golden Gate Bridge.

There are a lot of features used in this particular scene. To make the bullets drop into the water I used the reactor physics engine provided in 3DS Max. I had previously used this in one of the tutorials to animate the bowling alley and decided straight away that I'd like to use it in my final animation. This scene allowed me that opportunity. The reactor physics engine ensured that the falling motion is completely realistic.

The camera angle of this scene is also very interesting. To create this I once again used path constraints. Firstly I created an ark shaped spline. I then rotated it so that the ark curved upwards - parallel to the bridge curving up towards the sky. I then used the path constraint tool to attach the camera to the spline. Once this was done, I used an attachment constraint to attach the camera target to the middle bullet.

In order to achieve the desired camera effect, I had to ensure that the camera was above the bullets at the point where they dropped. I think I achieved this nicely and I am very happy with the way this scene turned out.

Assignment - Scene 5

This is scene 5 of my final animation. This is a very short scene, only a second in length, in which the three bullets are shown flying above the water past a stationary camera.

The purpose of this scene is just to show the bullets with a bit more speed than a moving camera would. There was no special techniques involved in this scene, only auto-key. This time there are no type of constraints attaching the camera target to anything, nor path constraints for the objects or camera itself. This is a very simple animated scene.

I am quite happy with this scene actually. Despite being very short and very simple, the daylight has once again provided a great effect on the surface of the water.

Assignment - Scene 4

This is scene 4 of my final animation. It features the Zorin Industries airship flying over the Golden Gate Bridge from the perspective of a camera placed on the bridge.

This scene was created in a very similar way to scene 2 in that there was no special techniques used other than auto-key and an attachment constraint that linked the camera target to the airship. The camera was in a fixed position on the bridge.

I am quite happy with this scene, it gives a good view of the bridge and the airship flying overhead. However, as with the first airship scene, I think the airship is moving perhaps a little bit too quickly so this will need slowing down slightly in Premiere Pro.

Assignment - Scene 3

This is scene 3 of my final animation. Here the bullets, around which the animation is focussed, come into play. In this scene the three bullets are flying down the river with the camera swirling around them.

To create this scene I used path constraints. The three bullets followed a straight path. I then created a helix spline, rotating it so that it was circling the path that the bullets would follow. Once the spline was in place and the path was perfect, I attached the camera to the path using a path constraint and the camera target to the middle bullet using an attachment constraint. This created the camera angle I was looking for, to build up tension around the flying bullets. In the final animation I will probably use some tension building sound here too.

I was very happy with how this render turned out. The effect of the daylight on the surface of the water is brilliant and the camera angle is very interesting, especially as it zooms on the bullet at the end of the scene before swiftly cutting. This will work great in the final animation.

Assignment - Scene 2

This is scene 2 of my final animation. It features the Zorin Industries airship flying in over the bumpy landscape. Once again, this is simply an opening scene in order to set the mood of the animation.

This scene did not use any special techniques other than auto-key. The camera is in a fixed position with the target being connected to the airship via an attachment constraint. The airship then simply moves from A to B with the camera recording its movement.

One thing I did notice from the render was that the Zorin Industries logo on the side of the airship isn't particularly visible. This is due to the angle being filmed from as the daylight is falling on top of the airship, meaning the underneath is in the shade. However, I don't think this will affect the quality of the final animation too much.

Also, the airship is moving just a little bit too fast, meaning that when it comes to putting the final animation together in Premiere Pro, I may have to slow this scene down slightly.

Assignment - Scene 1

This is the opening scene of my final animation. It is simply a panning view of the Golden Gate Bridge in order to set the scene.

To do this, I used a path constraint mechanism - attaching the camera to an ark spline which it would then follow, with the camera target fixed to the bridge. This gives the nice panning angle that was intended.

There isn't too much to say about this scene but the render size I have chosen is 720x480 NTSC. I will be keeping to this output for the remainder of the assignment.

Week 10 - Reactor

In this week's tutorial we were introduced to the Reactor physics engine in 3DS Max and rigid body collections. To practice using the techniques, we had to animate a bowling alley so that the ball knocked over the pins at the end as realistically as possible.

The bowling alley model had already been created for this tutorial, so to start with I placed a rigid body collection helper into the scene. I then had to add all of the objects in the scene into the rigid body collection. Once this was done, I could change the properties in the Reactor panel. The lane was given a mass of 0 so that it would not move with gravity. The bowling ball was given a mass of about 0.2 whilst the pins had to be lighter - around 0.1.

The next step was to make the bowling ball move towards the pins as if somebody had thrown it. To achieve this, I added a keyframe on frame 5 and moved the bowling ball a bit further forward and slightly left and also rotating it a little. The ball will now move forwards and fall onto the alley due to the gravity from Reactor. The spin caused from the rotation makes it look more realistic.

The only thing left to do now in order to make the animation look as realistic as possible was to add materials - a wooden material for the alley, a glossy red for the ball and white for the pins. When it came to creating the animation in the Reactor panel, I set the starting frame to 2. This is necessary so that the ball doesn't just drop straight down and moves towards the pins.

Upon rendering, I could see how realistic the animation looked and I am very pleased with the results from this tutorial. This is one technique that will definitely be very useful in my final assignment animation. And what's more - my throw in the bowling alley animation scored me a STRIKE!

Week 9 - Morpher

In this week's tutorial we had to create an animation using the morpher modifier. This is another technique which provides the answer for another animation problem - that of facial expressions and movements.

Although I played around with the morpher modifier, I have only created a basic animation of a face seemingly eating, just to familiarise myself with the technique. This is because I will not be requiring this technique in my final assignment animation as, firstly I have no people involved in the trailer and therefore will not be needing any human movement and secondly I cannot see a part of my animation where the morpher modifier could in fact be used.

The face model was supplied in the tutorial and to make my animation was very simple. Firstly, I converted the model to an editable poly. I then cloned the model so there was two faces. I renamed the orignal model to "closed mouth" and the cloned model to "open mouth" - just so it was clear when it came to the morphing which model was which.

The next step was to edit the open mouth model. This was simply a case of selecting some of the polygons below the mouth and dragging them downwards in order to open the mouth. Once this was done, I could apply the morpher modifier. The morpher modifier literally morphs one model into the other. Since both models were the same, with the only difference being the mouth, this meant that when the morpher modifier was applied to the closed mouth model, the mouth opened. Once the morpher had been applied to the closed mouth model, I hid the open mouth model.

To capture this opening mouth movement in an animation, I added a keyframe at the beginning and set the value of the open mouth in the morpher modifier to 0. This meant the mouth started closed. On frame 15, I added another keyframe and set the value of the open mouth in the morpher modifier to 100. This meant the mouth was fully open at this point. I repeated this process for every 15 frames up to frame 60, in order to create a 2 second animation of a face seemingly eating.

Week 8 - Path Constraints

In this week's tutorial we had to create an animation where an object follows a path. This was a step-up from last weeks introduction to 3D animation and is a good technique to use in order to specify exactly where an object should travel during the animation without using lots of keyframes.

The original task was to create a path which a teapot shape could then follow. To do this, I began by using the line tool and making a curvy path. The path had to be as smoothly curved as possible to avoid jerky movements when it came to the animation. I then created a teapot from the standard primitives menu.

Once the teapot was created I had to link it to the path. To do this, I used the Path Constraint option from the Animation menu - clicking on the line I had just created to link the object to the path. Once this was done I could choose from several options to customise the constraint, such as whether the object banked around corners and whether it kept a constant velocity along the path.

After learning the basics of the path constraint technique I then decided to take the concept one step further and create a race track which a car could follow. To do this I still used the line tool, but created a closed spline, although I had to pay particular attention to the Z-axis here as sudden drops or inclines would be completely inappropriate in the animation. I then cloned the spline and put the second one a little way below. Once this was done, I extruded the second spline to make the track.

Once this was done, I applied a smooth concrete material to the track and made a basic landscape around it using a plane and the noise modifier, creating a few trees and applying a grass bitmap material.

I used a pre-created model of a Ford GT40 taken from http://artist-3d.com/free_3d_models/dnm/model_disp.php?uid=1042&count=count for the car. I could make this follow the track by creating a path constraint, linked to the top spline. I set the car to not have a constant velocity, so that it looked more realistic - slowing down for corners and speeding up on the straights. The banking was also turned off as the corners on the track were not banked.

Finally, I had to create a camera to follow the car around the track and add a daylight system. I created the following camera by cloning the spline which the car follows and placing it slightly above, so that the camera view would be looking down upon the car from behind. Once again, a path constraint meant I could link the camera to the path. The option of not having constant velocity on created a nice effect where the car gets further away from us on the straights before we close up in the corners.

There are a few mistakes in the final video render. In places, the car appears to slow down or speed up randomly - particularly just before the last corner. There is also a mistake a few corners from the end where the grass landscape cuts through the concrete track. However, overall I am pleased with the result.

I took this tutorial and created it into a mini project for myself in order to practice for the assignment task. By doing this, not only have I further practiced landscaping techniques already used when creating the bridge model, I have also gained more of an understanding of animation techniques. One major thing I have learnt in doing this is just how long videos take to render with 3DS Max and I can now take this into consideration for my final assignment animation.

Week 7 - Bouncing Balls Animation

This is my first animation created in 3DS Max during one of the tutorials. It is a very simple animation of some bouncing balls.

During this tutorial I was introduced to the auto key and set key features. I found the animation side of 3DS Max much easier than the modelling side, since I already have some basic animation experience using Adobe Flash. Hopefully it will continue this way so that I can create a very good final project.

Golden Gate Bridge Model

After many hours of work, here is the final version of my Golden Gate bridge model. I created this using the mental ray daylight system and made a whole environment around the bridge, including the river, in order to make it look as realistic as possible. I am extremely happy with how this model has turned out and this is by far my best work to date.

Using the mental ray system allowed me to apply lots of different materials to different areas of the environment - using a stream/river water material for the river, a metal material for the bridge structure and a rough concrete material for the road. The use of these different materials is another thing which helps my scene to look so realistic.

The grass texture was achieved differently. For this I created an image file in Adobe Photoshop and imported it into 3DS Max as a material, which I then applied using the UVW Map modifier - a similar technique to how I created the airship skin. The bumpy terrain was created by using a noise modifier, and rotating the planes a little. I then had to convert these planes to modifiable polys in order to create a deep recess for the river to run through.

The daylight system is set to around 16:00 on an April date I believe, in order to achieve an optimum lighting setting for my animation.

Now all of the models have been created it is time to start looking at the animation. I am very pleased with how I am progressing so far.

Golden Gate Bridge Research Board

Here is the research board I created for the Golden Gate bridge model. This features several different pictures of the Golden Gate bridge in San Francisco, crucially taken from different angles in order to give me a full perspective of the bridge. I know this model is going to be very difficult to create and I hope I can use the pictures on this research board to truly do it justice. This is the main model for my animation, the whole setting for the animation. Therefore, this needs to be good.

Airship Model

This is the airship model I have created for my animation. As with the bullet model, I created this by using Adobe Illustrator and importing the file into 3DS Max. However, this time there were two different parts of the airship that I had to create in Illustrator first - the balloon part and the room underneath. As with the bullet model, I used the lathe tool to make these outlines 3D.

The skin for the airship was created in Adobe Photoshop and then imported into 3DS Max as a material and applied using the UVW Map modifier. This technique was originally taught to us as a way of creating reference planes but I have made use of it here in order to make the airship look more like the one in the film.

I am quite happy with this model, except I still find that it looks a bit basic. The Golden Gate bridge is sure to be more of a challenge than the models created so far and hopefully I can pull it off.

Airship Research Board

Here is the research board I created for the airship model. This features several pictures of airships in order to help me create the Zorin Industries airship from the film. This will be a key model in my animation.

Bullet Model

After further thought and to avoid overcomplicating things, I have decided to create a bullet model instead of a gun. The reason behind this is that the bullet will feature far more in my final animation and the animation would still work well without a gun model at all. This golden bullet will still be flying towards the airship over the Golden Gate bridge as originally planned, I have just dropped the excess model.

I used Adobe Illustrator to create the outline and then imported the Illustrator file into 3DS Max. From here I used the lathe tool to make the model 3D and then converted it to an editable poly in order to refine some detail around the head of the bullet. I then applied a metal material to the bullet to give the shine effect.

Guns Research Board

Here is the research board I created for the gun model. This features several pictures of different guns in order to help me create my model.

Assignment Plan

For my assignment I have to create a 30 second trailer for a James Bond movie. I have decided that my trailer will be based the film A View to A Kill.

My animation will revolve aound three models. The opening scene will be of the Golden Gate bridge in San Francisco. This is part of a key scene towards the end of the movie and my animation will be set up to point towards that scene.

My animation will then switch to an image of the Zorin Industries airship. Max Zorin is the 'bad guy' of the film, James Bond's enemy. His airship is also part of that key scene in the film.

After this there will be an image of a gun, rotating around before firing a bullet. This bullet will have 007 written on the side. The animation will then follow the bullet as it is fired before switching to a scene of the airship floating over the Golden Gate bridge.

At the end of the animation the bullet will head towards the airship before cutting the scene, leaving the animation on a cliffhanger as to what actually happens.

Therefore the three models I will need to create are as follows:

Golden Gate bridge,
Zorin Industries airship,
A gun and bullet.

Week 4 - Daylight

This is the scene I created by taking some basic shapes, adding different materials to the shapes and using the Mental Ray daylight system. I was very impressed with this technique and very happy with the rendered scene. The long shadows and material effects really make the scene come to life. I believe I used a late February afternoon setting to achieve this type of lighting.

Week 4 - Pumpkin

This is the pumpkin I created following one of the tutorials. The basic object itself was downloaded and I took it from there, creating the landscape and adding the material and lighting. I also added a fog effect to make it look more eerie. Although I'm quite happy with the rendered result, I do feel I could improve this.

Week 4 - Lighting

This is just a few basic shapes that I used to test out lighting settings. By placing light sources either side of the objects, one red and one blue, I was then able to alter the settings so that certain objects would only be affected by certain lights. This picture shows the result.

Mood Board

The film I have chosen to create a trailer for is A View to a Kill. This is the final film of the James Bond series to star Roger Moore. In this film, Bond goes up against villain Max Zorin who plans to destroy Silicon Valley. The film features several famous destinations including Paris, with a chase up the Eiffel Tower and also San Francisco where Bond ends up at the top of the Golden Gate bridge. These two landmarks could potentially be used as models for my project, along with Zorin's airship.

Week 2 - Tank (W.I.P.)

This is my work in progress of the tank from the week 2 tutorial showing how to use planes in order to create more accurate models. I found this technique very useful as it gives a guide where to put the basic shapes and the final object then fits together almost like a puzzle. I will definitely be making use of this technique for the assignment.

Week 2 - Chess Piece

Here is my attempt at creating a chess piece. The path was created in Illustrator and then imported into 3D Studio Max. Using the lathe tool I was able to complete the shape. I'm happy with the bottom of the shape although the neck and top section could be improved next time.

Week 1 - Apple

This is my attempt at creating the apple from one of the first week tutorials. I'm quite happy with the result, although when I tried the banana from the same tutorial I found this really difficult.

Week 1 - House

Here is my first attempt at using 3D Studio Max - just a small house/villa with a few trees surrounding it. I'm quite happy with the result but now understand just how much it will take to learn the software and how complicated 3D modelling actually is.

Reaction to the Brief

Having read the brief for the module, the assignment seems to be a very fascinating but also very challenging task. My initial thoughts are that it will be interesting to learn a new piece of software, especially in an area which I have never come across before - that of 3D modelling and animation. This will also require a lot of work in order to produce a satisfactory final result. However, I'm looking forward to the challenge.

I have an initial idea of which film I'd like to use for this assignment although I think I will have to watch a few different films over the course of the week to decide for sure.