July 10: Rock'em Sock'em Robots [Archive]

spam_septic

07-06-2010, 08:35 AM

bianconero90

07-06-2010, 08:53 AM

Nice work!

BTW, is there any way to get more upload space on this forum? 512k just doesn't go very far...

Just upload your image to an image hoster like imageShack (http://imageshack.us/) and post the link here or place the link between the two tags [*img] link [*/img] (without the asterix)

mariofurtado

07-06-2010, 09:16 AM

Finished rigging and applying materials to the Red Rocker model. Here's a quick render. Hope you like it.

BTW, is there any way to get more upload space on this forum? 512k just doesn't go very far...

Very good,
I use to play with this one. But it was a long time ago, lol.
I post my images on flickr. It's easy and free.

spam_septic

07-06-2010, 09:22 AM

Ah... Thanks! In that case... here are a few more:

http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/2621/rrocker6.jpg

http://img815.imageshack.us/img815/247/rrocker1.jpg

http://img339.imageshack.us/img339/3604/rrocker2.jpg

http://img514.imageshack.us/img514/318/rrocker3.jpg

http://img706.imageshack.us/img706/1729/rrocker4.jpg

http://img228.imageshack.us/img228/5339/rrocker5.jpg

bianconero90

07-06-2010, 09:54 AM

That's brilliant!

Keep it up with the good work!

stwert

07-06-2010, 11:18 AM

Looks really nice, keep it up!

spyro

07-07-2010, 03:32 AM

Looks great!!

Dean

07-07-2010, 06:29 AM

yeah real nice model man !

mariofurtado

07-07-2010, 09:15 AM

Great progress man.
I would try some studio lighting for this scene
in case you wanna keep the black background.
Keep it up.

spam_septic

07-08-2010, 08:09 AM

Thanks very much for the kind words.

These were just some quick renders to make sure I got the plastic material's scattering and reflection right. I plan to create a more detailed background... just haven't gotten to it yet ;)

Here are a couple of pics of the ring and the assembled model all rigged up and ready to go.

http://img444.imageshack.us/img444/6475/progressringcopy.jpg

http://img819.imageshack.us/img819/5089/progressassembly.jpg

purplemikey

07-08-2010, 01:17 PM

Awesome! I really like it! keep doing a good job!

spam_septic

07-11-2010, 05:46 PM

What does this alien have to do with Rock'em Sock'em Robots, you say?

This project is just too much fun!

http://img153.imageshack.us/img153/6509/progressalien.jpg

purplemikey

07-13-2010, 12:53 PM

referee!!!!! or maybe the guy in the corner... could be nice to make it like if it was real!

Blodiiks

07-13-2010, 01:38 PM

wow nice models
Finally a user on the xsi
Good job

brandeil

07-14-2010, 10:14 AM

LOl, yup remember those well, love those popping heads.
Nice job ! :)

Fusedgore

07-14-2010, 11:37 AM

I cant wait to see this animated .Are you going to knock his block off.

spam_septic

07-14-2010, 05:15 PM

I certainly hope to do some block knocking. The setup is rigged for it and the controls on the robots work (handgrips, buttons, etc.) I'm currently in the process of rigging the alien. It is my first full humanoid rigging, so it is taking some time.

I would also like to do some sculpting on the alien with Mudbox, but I've not used it before. I just want to make sure I can set get the basic models, textures and animations done first. If I have time, I'll go back and try to refine the skin and clothing on the alien, add background detail etc.

Thanks for all of the kind words!

spam_septic

07-19-2010, 07:29 AM

Worked on the walk cycle for the alien. This is the first walk cycle I've tried to animate. I still have quite a few refinements to make, particularly to the head and upper body.

He's looking a bit frankenstein-ish, but coming along.

http://www.vimeo.com/13447331

purplemikey

07-19-2010, 01:45 PM

I really like your walkcycle. he's looking good!

spam_septic

07-19-2010, 02:27 PM

Thanks. I hope to refine it a bit more tonight. Can't spend too much time though, because I still have a lot to do... textures, background, lighting, rendering. Yikes!

I'm also starting to wonder how strict the rules are with respect to the "turntable" requirement... I plan to have the robots and ring do a 360 degree turn in my animation, but the turntable is only going to be a few seconds out of the entire video. Oh well... too late to turn back at this point. Hope it doesn't disqualify me!

stwert

07-19-2010, 04:39 PM

The way I understand it, the 360 turntable is the min requirement, any animation above that is a big plus.
The walk looks pretty good so far; the feet look a bit "stompy" maybe, hard to say exactly. I like that you've got a decent length of the cycle in the video, often these test videos are only a few seconds long, so it's really hard to get a good critical look at it. Keep up the good work!

spam_septic

07-20-2010, 10:34 AM

That's what I was hoping for... I'm trying to work the turntable in in a very subtle way.

On the walk, I was trying for a bit of a stompy look, but might have over-cooked it a bit. It might make sense once it is in context.... or it might just be too "stompy." Hehe!

Thanks for the feedback!

spam_septic

07-22-2010, 08:40 AM

At long last (after XSI's UV Unfold projection failed miserably) I set up the UV's and made first pass at texturing one of my alien characters. Here are a few 2am renders... (sorry they're so dark).

I had been wracking my brain about how to texture the skin while was having a bit of dinner and had a "eureka moment." The solution was sitting right under my nose! Or, more specifically, right under my caprese salad.

After finishing my meal and rinsing away the remnants, I took a couple photographs of my dinner plate. A little bit of photoshop magic and... voila! alien skin!

http://img413.imageshack.us/img413/534/alien3g.jpg (http://img413.imageshack.us/i/alien3g.jpg/)

http://img442.imageshack.us/img442/5810/alien2.jpg (http://img442.imageshack.us/i/alien2.jpg/)

http://img294.imageshack.us/img294/695/alien1w.jpg (http://img294.imageshack.us/i/alien1w.jpg/)

chrisg

07-22-2010, 09:55 AM

After finishing my meal and rinsing away the remnants, I took a couple photographs of my dinner plate. A little bit of photoshop magic and... voila! alien skin!

Ah, that's great! You never know when or where you'll find the perfect piece of reference or texture.

spam_septic

07-23-2010, 07:13 AM

Here is a short teaser. This guy is getting there... just a bit more refinement, I think, and he'll be good to go.

http://vimeo.com/13566800

purplemikey

07-23-2010, 07:13 PM

I really like his eyes
can't wait to see the full short!

spam_septic

07-26-2010, 08:26 AM

Had a very busy weekend. I got most of the "turntable" done. Here are a few progress shots. I still need to add a few more textures and materials and then add proper lighting.

Cheers!

http://img121.imageshack.us/img121/3141/progressarena.jpg

http://img842.imageshack.us/img842/8608/progressarena5.jpg

http://img804.imageshack.us/img804/6632/progressarena6.jpg

http://img832.imageshack.us/img832/1552/progressarena4.jpg

http://img710.imageshack.us/img710/7629/progressarena2.jpg

Dean

07-26-2010, 08:36 AM

awesome work !!! cant wait to see your finished work !

chrisg

07-26-2010, 09:48 AM

Took the words right out of my mouth, Dean! Nice job so far spam_septic

stwert

07-26-2010, 11:17 AM

Looking really cool. Nice job!

spam_septic

07-27-2010, 09:05 AM

I put together the turntable mechanism animation last night. It fits inside the center platform that you can see in the images above.

It would prefer it to move more slowly, but I'm having trouble getting my segment down to 30 seconds. I fear my final entry will look a bit more like a movie preview than a complete segment. So much to say, so little time to say it! ;)

I will clearly be doing a longer version of this animation after the contest.

http://www.vimeo.com/13673846

spam_septic

07-28-2010, 08:47 AM

As Wedge Antillies famously said, "Almost there.... almost there...."

http://a.imageshack.us/img838/5899/progressscenec.jpg (http://img838.imageshack.us/i/progressscenec.jpg/)

http://a.imageshack.us/img180/5251/progresssceneb.jpg (http://img180.imageshack.us/i/progresssceneb.jpg/)

http://a.imageshack.us/img716/8989/progressscenea.jpg (http://img716.imageshack.us/i/progressscenea.jpg/)

http://a.imageshack.us/img822/7523/progressscenef.jpg (http://img822.imageshack.us/i/progressscenef.jpg/)

http://a.imageshack.us/img810/4089/progressscenee.jpg (http://img810.imageshack.us/i/progressscenee.jpg/)

http://a.imageshack.us/img835/7447/progressscened.jpg (http://img835.imageshack.us/i/progressscened.jpg/)

Dean

07-28-2010, 09:26 AM

Looks really nice man !

Yeoman742

07-28-2010, 10:18 AM

Remember your camera angles.. If you show one guy on the left side of the screen, show the other on the right side.. It gets confusing if your camera angle switches..

spam_septic

07-28-2010, 10:58 AM

You are absolutely right, Yeoman. I won't be breaking the 180 degree rule in the final sequence. The bad guy will be on the one side and the good one will be on the other at all times in the clip. Here I was just swinging around the user camera and doing some test renders -- at 3am, mind you ;) -- to see how the various materials looked and to make sure the overhead lights were glowing properly. You probably also noticed how the subsurface scattering on the robots is too "glowy"... particularly in the second and third images and that the yellow base is a bit too translucent, resulting in weird shadows and splotchiness in the fifth. I hope to work that all out tonight. Thanks so much for the good advice!

art-uhr

07-28-2010, 11:32 AM

can't wait!!! all guys here at ethe forum are either amazing and inspiring!!

DjVoyager

07-31-2010, 08:08 AM

spam_septic, can you post the final 360 turntable video as soon as possible? Thanks!

spam_septic

07-31-2010, 10:24 PM

I've got some bad news.... ran into some serious trouble rendering out my video. I got about 3 seconds into it and things just all went haywire.

I'm rendering off the turntable now. The sad thing is that it is only about 5 seconds out of the whole 30 second video. That and I had to render it at miniscule resolution, without composited passes to get it done in time. So sad.

I'll post it shorty.

DjVoyager

07-31-2010, 10:32 PM

No worries, hope you'll get it done end of the weekend. Better late than never :)

spam_septic

07-31-2010, 10:52 PM

Here is the small bit that I was able to squeeze out of softimage w/o crashing:

http://www.vimeo.com/13794421

stwert

07-31-2010, 10:58 PM

Shoot, sorry to hear that. I know what it's like when renders don't go according to plan. Hope things get sorted out. I was really looking forward to this scene, so hope to see it sooner or later :)

spam_septic

08-01-2010, 12:11 AM

Yeah. Here is the flipbook I made as a guide for rendering everything out. I will definitely finish this off and post it up here later.

http://www.vimeo.com/13795259

Sadly, I'll have to say that the video in the post above was my entry... (not sure why all the compression artifacting, it was clearer before vimeo).

I did this in Softimage with Photoshop for texturing.
I've been doing CGI for about 18 months.

spam_septic

08-04-2010, 01:45 PM

So was finally able to squeeze a high resolution rendering out of my poor, overworked PC. This is about 5 seconds of the full animation, which should come out to about 30 seconds in total. I'll keep posting updates as I render out each scene. Better late than never! ;)

http://www.vimeo.com/13870805

stwert

08-04-2010, 01:50 PM

That's so great, I love the playblast, way to take this beyond just the toy. Hope you get the full thing eventually! You think this is a RAM thing or CPU? Overheating?

DjVoyager

08-04-2010, 01:52 PM

Great job, your entry has been updated.

spam_septic

08-04-2010, 07:05 PM

Stwert: I'm not sure. I suspect that it was the MB chipset. But, just in case, I replaced the MB, processor and videocard. Seems to be working great now. ;)

Renders are still taking really long, but that is just the scene itself at this point. I can get about 3-5 seconds of video each night. I'll add another 5 seconds or so tomorrow and every other day or so until the whole thing is there.

DjVoyager: Thanks so much!

spam_septic

08-07-2010, 10:08 AM

Still rendering out this animation. I've got 4 of the 9 scenes done. Here is the current version. The last bit at the end needs to be re-timed, so I'll try to fix that in the next go around.

Hope you like it.

e.

http://www.vimeo.com/13965510