August 08 Shamoii's Corner

[shamoii]

No this is not my final entry. I thought I'd upload some progress shots this time:)

http://www.whispersmith.com/images/dt/corner01.jpg

[metryx]

Sweet idea, I've seen actual photos of a planets sitting in some corner with different light streaming in. Great idea.

[DjVoyager]

This is an awesome idea to test lights and shadows, great choice :)

[shamoii]

Thanks a bunch guys. Here's an update.
http://www.whispersmith.com/images/dt/corner02.jpg

[DjVoyager]

Coming along nicely :)

[shamoii]

Now wt raytraced shadows for a little clarity.
This purple thing is an animated guide to help me tell where the main shadow is at any point in time.http://www.whispersmith.com/images/dt/corner03.jpg

[shamoii]

From lttle things, big things grow.
http://www.whispersmith.com/images/dt/corner04.jpg

[DjVoyager]

Ain't it the truth.
I like the dismal setup, and looking forward to seeing big things grow :)

[shamoii]

This is going to take a while isn't it?http://www.whispersmith.com/images/dt/corner05.jpg

[DjVoyager]

The concept is amazing; the plant, even though placed in the dark, is moving/directing towards the sunlight. Btw, what kind of plant is it? Is it supposed to be in such a small pot considering its thick stump :)

[shamoii]

Thanks Dj. The Plant is supposed to be some kind of ficus. And no its definitely does not want to be in such a small pot or in the shade (good thing it has plenty of water). Thats the whole cornered thing I've gone with I guess.
Glad to say I've got the branches sussed now, and only the leaves to go. Although I think animating them should be a lot easier. (if I never see another blend shape in my life I'll be a happy boy) Heres one more render for the road:)
http://www.whispersmith.com/images/dt/corner06.jpg

[shamoii]

For anyone wanting to waste some bandwidth, I heres a link to my lighting test. C&C welcome. The animation is far from complete, though now I know where the "sun" will be, I can finish the job.

Corner04Med.mov (http://www.whispersmith.com/vid/corner04.mov) 11mb
2650*1600 stupid big render (http://www.whispersmith.com/images/dt/cornerwp01.bmp) 12mb

[shamoii]

Who would have guessed a work based entirely on 1 simple light would take so long to light.
Here's what the final should look like.
Only 2999 frames to go.
http://www.whispersmith.com/images/dt/corner07.jpg

[DjVoyager]

Looks wonderful! :)

[shamoii]

Thanks DJ.
This tree was trying to kill me! I guess the whole thing about doing something for DT is it's supposed to be a learning experience, but this thing nearly made me go mental.
Oh well. Thanks for the challenge DJ & DT & good luck to everyone else with their corners:)

Don't know how to post a link within a picture on DT. So I'll just post a link.

Cornered.mov hi 50mb (http://www.whispersmith.com/vid/cornerfin.mov)

Cornered.mov med 22mb (http://www.whispersmith.com/vid/cornerfinsml.mov)

Cornered.mov lo 14mb (http://www.whispersmith.com/vid/cornerfinsmlr.mov) I really wouldn't look at his one cause the quality is so bad. Though it's there if you want it.

[atomic]

Hi Shamoii i watched your movie, looks great :)
allthough i think personally the sound in the beginning is a bit too much, the animation is nice. i wouldn't know how to do that :p
Looks like you put alot of effort into it, good job Shamoii.

greetz atomic

[DjVoyager]

That looks excellent!

Personal take: At first I thought the sounds were overpowering the animation but then it occurred to me the sounds weren't there to provide for background track but rather an audio equivalent of the plant's growth process, i.e. the changes in nature. At least that's my understanding :)

Very good control over the shadows.

I am going to link the animation from your website so be sure to keep it there until the poll is over.

[shamoii]

Thanks Atomic & DJ.

Yeah the intended audio for this thing just didn't come together in time. So I figured instead of making it silent, to give the option of turning it down if it got too much. (although keep it loud at the end)

Ahem...
The tree has always been a metaphor for life I guess. You start out small with opertunity al around. Then as life goes on your choices are narrowed & eventually you fall over, though you grow all along the way. I have tried to distill this to a day, which is distilled into 2 minutes...
The birds are meant to give the feeling that this day is passing. It might be a bit lost on someone out of Australia but the order those birds appear in, is approx the order they come out during the day.
I guess its kind of a slow animation even if the tree is growing a lot faster than real life, so I wanted some acoustic empathy with that. Thats why the birds are pretty pallid to my ear & are meant to get you into that "oh look, I'm watching grass grow" mindset.

The shadows turned out relatively easy to manage. (so long as I remembered to delete anything out of shot that might cast extra ones before rendering 3 times) Though with 50 shadow rays they added a bit to the render time. (26 x longer render with raytracing on)

There's no foreseeable reason to remove the video, so it should be up for a while.