Jiawei's Blog

During the 16th week, I started the important task of rigging characters. The character was created in last semester before, when we were making Previs, because I wanted to use this character as a supporting character in my graduation design animation. So, I started early on to make an effort to build up the character.

This week, my main goal was to set up the character’s rigging carefully and well, so that the animation process would go smoothly and without problems. This character is different from most others because it shows a unique and different creature. Because of this, the most difficult part was rigging the character’s mouth, which had to move in a very specific way. After giving it a lot of thought, I decided to use skeletal rigging instead of blendshapes because it gave me more control and flexibility over the character’s mouth area, allowing for more nuanced expressions.

here are some character rendering, rigging tests

In the 16th week, we started learning facial animation. Prior to this, I searched the web for a variety of audio clips suitable for animation, and eventually decided to use a line spoken by Jack in Pirates of the Caribbean: “Ladies, will you please shut it!”

I performed a second act to this audio clip and recorded an animation reference. I composited the audio with the reference I shot using Adobe Premiere Pro, and also drew a simple draft to more clearly visualize my character’s expressions and movements.

In week 15, I reached a major milestone when I finished building the whole scene and put on the material textures. At the start of the project, I made a conscious and strategic choice to use solid colours or textures with subtle gradients. My main reason for making this choice was that I wanted to give the scene a cartoony look that would make it look lively and interesting.

Time management was also a very important part of this decision. As a one-person job, this project needed careful planning and efficient work to be finished on time. Solid colours not only fit the style I was going for, but they also turned out to be one of the fastest ways to texture. This method helped me find a good balance between meeting the visual goals and staying on track with the project schedule.

In addition to the material textures, I took the scene to the next level by using lighting techniques to improve the overall atmosphere.

In the 15th week, I completed my body mechanics animation, including revisions to some keyframes of the action, adding more details such as overlapping and follow-through when the arm swings, as well as some necessary deformations of the face in exaggerated types of animations. These additions made the animation more lively. Moreover, I added color to the background.

In the initial animation design, the protagonist would see a person using the toilet next door when knocking down the wall. I made some modifications to this part of the design. When the protagonist knocks down the wall, he won’t see the person next to him, but he can see the toilet paper, toilet bowl, buttons, and then expresses surprise through his body language. This allows the audience to understand that there is someone using the toilet next door.

During the fourth week, I kept working on Scene 01 and making it better. During this week, I worked hard on making and finishing all the models needed for the scene. By making each model with care, I was able to give the environment more depth and detail.

Once the models were done, I put them in the scene in a way that looked good. This step was important to make sure that the arrangement made the landscape look more smooth and put together.

I also set up an opening camera to give my scene a point of reference. This camera setup was a big part of how the scene was seen through the lens.

By the 14th week, all the key frames for basic key actions have been determined. The task at hand is to set their curves as spines, and to add some auxiliary frames to make the character’s movement fluid and natural. On top of this, I’ve also added some key frames for arm swings. This makes the hand rotate based on a circle when waving down, rather than following a strange motion trajectory. Furthermore, I’ve added some buffer frames to make the animation rhythm more comfortable and natural.

In week three, I worked on making the scenes of the animation. The main part of the animation takes place in a graveyard, which gives it a lot of atmosphere. The animation is made up of two different scenes. The first is the evocatively made graveyard, where the visual elements and setting are more detailed to create the ethereal and sad mood that is important to the story.

The second scene, on the other hand, uses a simple style, with a solid colour as the background. This scene is full of fun and movement because it’s mostly about the little blue ghost flying through the sky on his ship. But this happy moment is cut short when he accidentally bumps into his father in the air. What happens next is a touching exchange in which the father gets in the way of the blue ghost’s journey and throws a pile of books at him. Since this scene is all about the characters and the ship, the background is kept simple so that they and the ship can take centre stage.