Thursday 27 October 2016
Phil Tippett - Stop Motion VR
Stop Motion and VR?
Two things you would not expect to see coexist, put together, I was instantly intrigued.
Ive never had the time or day for Stop Motion, but to see it applied in such an unusual and contrasting way had me interested.
Phil Tippett a famous Stop-Motion VFX artist who has worked on films such as Jurassic Park and Star Wars, is now immersing viewers in a "fully realized dystopian subterranean netherworld" (Wolfe, 2016) using his traditional medium.
VR has great potential within the horror industry because of the immersion heightening such feelings like fear, meaning Phil Tibbetts grotesque characters fit right in and successfully create this sinister aura.
Using photogrammetry to translate physical stop-motion animation into the VR landscape, the Mad God experience includes absolutely zero CG characters or environments, much to Tippetts dislike of 3D animation. I find it hard to get my head around, being so passionate about VR, how Tippett wants to bring his characters to life but isnt really so interested in being immersed within the world he creates.
At first thought, you would think combining these 2 mediums wouldn't look right. However you can argue that Stop-Motion VR improves the immersive experience because of the fact the characters are made from real life objects, they are tangible. Unlike 3D where everything is unlike the real world we live in, plastic smooth and inorganic. “The whole thing was shot stop-motion on tiny sets, so it has a very visceral photographic handmade look as opposed to the cleanliness of so much of the VR content that’s being produced with computers. " (Tippett, 2016) However, you could argue in return that because of the low frame rate for stop motion, you are thrown out of the immersion because your brain recognizes this is not the rate we are used to perceiving bodily movement, unlike 3D where you can achieve a pretty high frame rate. However what this low-frame rate aesthetic does is intensifies the horror element, because our eyes aren't used to seeing organic matter move this way, along with the immersion we are left feeling extremely unsettled at the army steadily heading towards us.
I believe they fit nicely together, and it raises questions on the sustainability of the Stop-Motion industry in accordance with VR.
This article on Animation World Network highlighted some vital information for my practice in VR, something I had never even thought of, something that impacts on VR and narrative.When using VR, you have a visual overload of 360 degrees as you adjust to your new world. So there needs to be a way to direct the spectator to what you want them to look at;
"One of the more significant conversations surrounding narrative storytelling in VR has been about how to direct the audience’s attention. With more freedom and an expanded point of view comes a potential for lack of direction. The preexisting language of cinema -- editing, insert shots, etc. -- doesn’t apply in the 360° environment. It’s a question Tippett found intriguing from the very beginning. “There are a number of things when you are articulating a narrative in film to advance the narrative, and editing is a huge aspect of that,” he said. “You can do that in VR but it can be kind unsettling to do cuts. And when I became aware of what the possibilities were for binaural sound, that opened up a huge door in that it could function in a way like editing.”
Audio can be used to direct the spectators focus. Also if I am incorporating core narrative within VR I need to consider allowing for an 'adjustment period' for when the user first puts on the device, a period for them to settle into their world, waiting for them to become fully immersed before taking them on a journey.
PPP2 Team-Building Study Task Review
Today was a fun day. Being split into groups and being forced to 'mingle' with other creatives was a step out of the comfort zone when it comes to confidence. It was great conversing with Graphic Designers and Illustrators, seeing peoples different creative paradigms and ways of creatively approaching the world.
What was even greater was working with them on a project named Banana Magnet. At the start I was left feeling a little lost because I wanted to join a certain group but apparently we still had to stay with our original set pairs but of course both of us wanted to go into different groups. The organisation of the whole day was a bit off. But the factor of involving with other creatives was brilliant.
We combined at the end of the day to mutually create a campaign of our chosen idea of a Slug Theme Park. We decided on a live action film with cut out components and comedic theme. Our comedic element was the strongest attribute so we played on that massively.
When we got dispersed into doing jobs for the production of our presentation, I wasn't happy to be put in the script-writing team purely based on the fact I was a confident speaker. I felt I could have contributed better to the putting together of the film itself, that's where I felt my skills lied. After writing the script I still remained productive by helping out with compiling the sound with the video together, even playing as one of the birds in the video itself in the end. However we weren't efficient enough as a team and ended up rushing the compiling together of the video, so much so we dragged the wrong .MOV file into the memory stick which was detrimental in the end as we had no sound to our visuals and everyones work went down the pan. Teaching us the importance of organisation within a large collaboration and how efficient it can be when everyone plays to their strengths.
What was even greater was working with them on a project named Banana Magnet. At the start I was left feeling a little lost because I wanted to join a certain group but apparently we still had to stay with our original set pairs but of course both of us wanted to go into different groups. The organisation of the whole day was a bit off. But the factor of involving with other creatives was brilliant.
We combined at the end of the day to mutually create a campaign of our chosen idea of a Slug Theme Park. We decided on a live action film with cut out components and comedic theme. Our comedic element was the strongest attribute so we played on that massively.
When we got dispersed into doing jobs for the production of our presentation, I wasn't happy to be put in the script-writing team purely based on the fact I was a confident speaker. I felt I could have contributed better to the putting together of the film itself, that's where I felt my skills lied. After writing the script I still remained productive by helping out with compiling the sound with the video together, even playing as one of the birds in the video itself in the end. However we weren't efficient enough as a team and ended up rushing the compiling together of the video, so much so we dragged the wrong .MOV file into the memory stick which was detrimental in the end as we had no sound to our visuals and everyones work went down the pan. Teaching us the importance of organisation within a large collaboration and how efficient it can be when everyone plays to their strengths.
PPP2 Study Task 1 - Who am I?
What have I learnt?
This year I have learnt so much when I compare back a couple years to when I was just finishing my Foundation Diploma. One of these things is software. I remember marvelling at this girl who modelled some assets in maya and made a scene in Unity which she told me about on a Foundation alumni day, and here I am now doing the exact same thing. It shows how much I have learnt from that position in a short space of time. I have also developed my skills on the principles of animation, having employed them in my own animations. Juggling several modules all at the same time has aided my time management skills and organisation in general. Having stood up and presented many crits in-front of the class my presentation skills and confidence has improved dramatically to what it use to be. Also storyboarding ! A very specific animation pipeline process, something I used to think just consisted of drawing squares sequentially I've learnt to be a very vital process in co-ordination with camera angles and timings. I have developed my skills of being able to interpret and develop things sequentially.
What do I want to learn?
I want to learn more about 3D animation, getting my head around being able to use Maya to a sufficient standard. Learning ins and outs of the Maya to Unity process and being able to use Maya assets within the Unity engine. Unity is also something I wish to learn more about, as well as the coding side of things, but this is a long process its like learning another language. I also want to learn about how to construct virtual reality assets and game environments. Further elaborating to the potentially coding a VR game. Non-Software based I want to learn how to cope with becoming a free-lance animator in the period inbetween graduating and finding a career. I also wish to learn vital collaboration skills, seen as my job will mainly consist of working with a collaboration, picking up these skills early whilst studying will be most benefitial.
What am I good at?
Time management, I organise my time effectively to provide modules with the attention they require. I am also a very hard-working individual, I'm good at forcing myself to work for long period of time without breaks or procrastination. I am also a perfectionist, which has its positives and negatives. Positively being a perfectionist means I notice bad movements within my work and am able to amend them in good time to get movements looking solid and convincing.
What am I bad at?
Because of being such a perfectionist, I'm not very experimental. It is a big limitation especially with the emphasis that mistakes are good. I am also extremely critical of myself which hinders me in being able to 'sell' myself. Say what Im good at and my potentials. I'm bad at allowing free time for myself. Having a part-time job too I feel that I then have to work even harder in order to compensate for the fact I am losing time working.
What practitioners am I inspired by?
Practitioners in the animation industry is an odd one, Im usually inspired more by select animations rather than the practitioners themselves. Unlike say a fine artist or illustrator whom you know by name rather than work title. Animations can be so profound to me its mainly the moving image you focus on rather than who made it in contrast to fine artists where your first to look at the artist themselves. However those in the industry I would have to say Glen Keane and Joanna Quinn for their lively drawings, so full of vigor. These guys bring their drawings to life, not just alive. They emit life both through the pencils they draw with and through the movements they re-create. Games-wise im inspired by Nintendo, especially the Zelda series and how Nintendo bring a hand-drawn cel shading element to their 3D games, It makes them more tangible. I have been a Nintendo gamer since I was young and I love the narratives they bring to their games, unlike any other from an animation perspective. Paul Wells has also inspired me through his series of books and taught me a lot of valuable knowledge about the world of animation and its relation to art and industry. From a 3D animation perspective, I love Pixar and I have been inspired by many of their Principles to creating the perfect narrative.
What websites do I use to immerse in the animation industry?
Kotaku
Stash Media
Skwigly
AWN
Youtube
This year I have learnt so much when I compare back a couple years to when I was just finishing my Foundation Diploma. One of these things is software. I remember marvelling at this girl who modelled some assets in maya and made a scene in Unity which she told me about on a Foundation alumni day, and here I am now doing the exact same thing. It shows how much I have learnt from that position in a short space of time. I have also developed my skills on the principles of animation, having employed them in my own animations. Juggling several modules all at the same time has aided my time management skills and organisation in general. Having stood up and presented many crits in-front of the class my presentation skills and confidence has improved dramatically to what it use to be. Also storyboarding ! A very specific animation pipeline process, something I used to think just consisted of drawing squares sequentially I've learnt to be a very vital process in co-ordination with camera angles and timings. I have developed my skills of being able to interpret and develop things sequentially.
What do I want to learn?
I want to learn more about 3D animation, getting my head around being able to use Maya to a sufficient standard. Learning ins and outs of the Maya to Unity process and being able to use Maya assets within the Unity engine. Unity is also something I wish to learn more about, as well as the coding side of things, but this is a long process its like learning another language. I also want to learn about how to construct virtual reality assets and game environments. Further elaborating to the potentially coding a VR game. Non-Software based I want to learn how to cope with becoming a free-lance animator in the period inbetween graduating and finding a career. I also wish to learn vital collaboration skills, seen as my job will mainly consist of working with a collaboration, picking up these skills early whilst studying will be most benefitial.
What am I good at?
Time management, I organise my time effectively to provide modules with the attention they require. I am also a very hard-working individual, I'm good at forcing myself to work for long period of time without breaks or procrastination. I am also a perfectionist, which has its positives and negatives. Positively being a perfectionist means I notice bad movements within my work and am able to amend them in good time to get movements looking solid and convincing.
What am I bad at?
Because of being such a perfectionist, I'm not very experimental. It is a big limitation especially with the emphasis that mistakes are good. I am also extremely critical of myself which hinders me in being able to 'sell' myself. Say what Im good at and my potentials. I'm bad at allowing free time for myself. Having a part-time job too I feel that I then have to work even harder in order to compensate for the fact I am losing time working.
What practitioners am I inspired by?
Practitioners in the animation industry is an odd one, Im usually inspired more by select animations rather than the practitioners themselves. Unlike say a fine artist or illustrator whom you know by name rather than work title. Animations can be so profound to me its mainly the moving image you focus on rather than who made it in contrast to fine artists where your first to look at the artist themselves. However those in the industry I would have to say Glen Keane and Joanna Quinn for their lively drawings, so full of vigor. These guys bring their drawings to life, not just alive. They emit life both through the pencils they draw with and through the movements they re-create. Games-wise im inspired by Nintendo, especially the Zelda series and how Nintendo bring a hand-drawn cel shading element to their 3D games, It makes them more tangible. I have been a Nintendo gamer since I was young and I love the narratives they bring to their games, unlike any other from an animation perspective. Paul Wells has also inspired me through his series of books and taught me a lot of valuable knowledge about the world of animation and its relation to art and industry. From a 3D animation perspective, I love Pixar and I have been inspired by many of their Principles to creating the perfect narrative.
What websites do I use to immerse in the animation industry?
Kotaku
Stash Media
Skwigly
AWN
Youtube
Thursday 20 October 2016
VR Editor Unreal Engine
Obviously my interests in the realm of Virtual Reality lead me to coming across this Twitch stream by Unreal Engine. Obviously the video may have been taken down now for now your reading this, but the stream showed through VR goggle perspective someone creating a game environment whilst in VR.
Effectively meaning you can be immersed in your game whilst making your game. This instantly caught my interests. He moved platforms, painted assets even painted the horizon. Being able to dictate your game on such a personal level makes you feel more involved in its creation, you become a part of it, another asset of the game rather than clicking buttons on a 2D monitor interface. A personal level you wouldn't expect from such a 3D computer dominated area.
Being in your game whilst planting the seeds of its creation also means you can fully visualize from a first person perspective how things will look when rendered. You can witness and organise effectively what the spectator will witness from their level. Moving things, adjusting things as you will till they look right in virtual space.
Effectively meaning you can be immersed in your game whilst making your game. This instantly caught my interests. He moved platforms, painted assets even painted the horizon. Being able to dictate your game on such a personal level makes you feel more involved in its creation, you become a part of it, another asset of the game rather than clicking buttons on a 2D monitor interface. A personal level you wouldn't expect from such a 3D computer dominated area.
Being in your game whilst planting the seeds of its creation also means you can fully visualize from a first person perspective how things will look when rendered. You can witness and organise effectively what the spectator will witness from their level. Moving things, adjusting things as you will till they look right in virtual space.
War Zone 360 VR
This video allows you to be fully immersed inside one of the most well known war zones in the world right now, Aleppo.
Its chilling.
To see a land so devastated and destructed. Debris everywhere, ruin and dust from the dismantled brick filling the air. The only thing moving is some fabric hanging out of a ruined building, blowing in the wind.
In this country I feel we are very ignorant to whats going on in the world around us and quite often possess the approach of 'if its not happening to me, its fine'. This experience physically puts you there in their shoes and forces you to witness it near first hand.
The arabic music intensifies the eerie isolation. The sound effects immerse you further, at one point you can hear bombs going off, something we would jump to, but something people there have just got used to.
I felt this scene composition of the screens when in the middle looked like you were in the cockpit of the plane;
Like you are flying the plane to bomb Aleppo, which was quite sinister.
If I was to some up this VR experience in 1 word I would say;
Post-apocalyptic.
It really exposes the destruction these innocent civilians are dealing with everyday of their lives, meanwhile I sit here on a computer typing this with a warm roof over my head in a safe town.
Borrowed Time
"Borrowed Time" is Pixar animated short film, directed by Andrew Coats & Lou Hamou-Lhadj. This animation contrasts with many of Pixars upbeat, child-orientated movies and shorts, and takes a dramatic and emotional direction. Exploring a damaged mentality of a young boy who accidentally shoots his father whilst trying to save him from falling by holding a gun. Damaged to such an extent we see him on the edge of a cliff contemplating suicide.
From a 3D perspective the visuals are stunningly rendered, at the start we find it hard to believe its all 3D because of how realistic it looks. It all feels so real even with the strikingly obvious cartoony character design, his clothes look like real fabric.
But realism is not why I like it so much, thats only an aspect I admire about it. What I love is how they have captured emotion. The use of pathetic fallacy is a physical weather representation to his solemn, dull feelings which further intensifies his sadness. Contrastingly it is bright and sunny when he is back with his dad pronouncing the joy he felt with him until the cliff hanging scene where you can see the storm clouds rolling in to heighten the feeling of tension. But the thing that gets me the most is his eyes. Never in an animation before have I seen eyes convey so many emotions directly to me, they are so focal. They convey so effectively exactly his feelings, from when hes with his dad to when hes on the cliff on his own.
It also takes advantage of effective cut scenes to reflect how much the flashbacks traumatise him as after each flashback he gradually lowers more and more to the earth. The motif of the watch being broken is also a physical metaphor to his fathers tragic death.
One thing that I feel is lacking within this animation is the narrative loss inbetween his fathers death to how he is on the cliff top now, decades later by his physical older appearance. I would of loved to see how he got to that point, what events have passed for him to now start recalling the tragedy. How he obviously has gotten on with his life and why only now does he seek to recall such tragedy and contemplate the ending of his life?
Tuesday 18 October 2016
Game Creation - Finished!
Seen as my game can't be played on my blog, here is a video of it working and being played. My game is by no means perfect what so ever, there are a few bugs and glitches but I am very happy with how it plays.
My partner that I teamed up with for the Unity side also encountered a lot of troubles with getting the collisions and gravity to behave, so the process took a lot longer than expected and has therefore given me a great insight into the process, and the length of the process. In hindsight, a lot more time needed dedicating to the Unity process, I spent far too long focussing on Game assets and character rigging, but I have learnt now.
Overall this process has not run smoothly, I have hit many issues and problems, some of which I have failed to fix independently looking at tutorials. For the project I am working on now, I now (hopefully) have that tutor guidance when I reach a barrier that I can't get over. Many of these were within both Maya and Unity, especially with the rigging process.
I have learnt so much about the Maya rigging process, some vital skills I will carry forward in my new project which I am very excited about.
The visual aesthetic is very simple but I feel it works very effective with the simplicity of the whole game. I love how I have also achieved a visual representation of Boris Johnson, he physically resembles him in a caricature manner which I love. His animation sequences also convey elements of his persona. He jumps slow, adding the illusion that he is very weighty, along with the effort he seems to possess to run.
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