Jarrell 3D Modeling and Animation: Project 3: Shading, Lighting, Texturing, Rendering, and Animation due Monday, 11-05-2012

Description of Assignment:

For this assignment, we were supposed to create an animation lasting 10-20 seconds that shows
an object following a path. Using a A motor scooter or unicycle to animate we were to create a final movie comprised of rendered frames. The scene needed to have must contain at least three different shaders or textures, adequate lighting, and try to incorporate as many of the Disney 12 animation principles as possible.

Concept:
I wanted my animation to tell a story, for it to have a clear beginning, middle, and end, and for my unicycle to have a certain amount of humanity. So I came up with the idea that my animation would be about a unicycle struggling to achieve something, initially failing, and then succeeding, but going a bit too far and getting hurt.

My Process:

I began by creating groupings for various levels of animation, the path the scooter would follow, the swaying of the scooter as it moved, the rotations of the wheels etc. Here are some playblasts of the scooter after each animation was added.

PATH ANIMATION:

SWAYING ANIMATION:

WHEEL ROTATION ANIMATION:

SEAT SQUASH AND STRETCH ANIMATION:

LATTICE ANIMATION:

SEAT SWAY ANIMATION:

Animation Principles:

Squash and Stretch:
There are several obvious examples during the unicyicles initial failed attemps and during the end of its success. But the head and neck of the unicycle are constantly making small squashes and stretches throughout the animation.

Anticipation:
The unicycle will constantly pull back from the direction it intends to run off to before moving forward. During its first try it makes several back and forth motions to make it appear as though it was building up momentum.

Straight ahead action and pose to pose:
My project utilized pose to pose animation, I mapped out the key places and orientations I knew the unicycle had to be in and then made minor corrections to clean up the in-between action. For example, to animate the super fast pull back and final leap I first put key frames at the beginning and end of the action, then in order to make sure the seat head was quickly snapping down due to the force of the motion I added an in-between frame.

Follow through and overlapping:
The head and wheel of the unicycle will arrive at areas at different times; see the initial swings back and forth as an example.

Slow in and Slow out:
When the unicycle makes it's initial forward and backward movements it will slowly fall forward at the beginning of its movement and then slowly recover at the end.

Arcs:
There is a big one during the final jump, but whenever the unicycle moves forward or backward it dips down and comes back up in an arc.

Secondary action:
There are several smaller actions that occur as the unicycle moves beyond the structure going back and forth, the petals and wheel rotate, the neck moves up and down, the seat swings back-n-forth, all these actions combine to create the illusion of movement grounded in physics.

Timing:
In order to make certain actions appear to take more or less time to occur a shorter or longer amount of frames were spaced between actions. When the unicycle appears to move very fast there are only a few frames (2-5) used with it moving a great distance inbetween. To make the unicycle appear to fly across in slow motion it was moved only a few places over a great number of frames (10-20).

Exaggeration:
Seen anytime the unicycle behaves in a way a true unicycle would not, the way the seat moves during a it's passes, the stretching of the neck, the fact that the unicycle smashes into the wall instead of bouncing off of it.

Appeal:
I made my unicycle red because I thought it was a more engaging color and because most people equate red and red objects with speed.

Rendered Video: