Schedule

Schedules are a great reality check. This is an example of the many Excel spreadsheets that help me stay organized and on track (in theory).

The Crowd column is probably the most useful because crowd volume is the most important influence on the technical complexity of a shot in my film.

Props

Classmates Thomas Huang and Jake Albers helped me build a bunch of the props and set. Taking a break from animation, I've started texturing and incorporating the models into shots.

In terms of color, I went a little cooler on the train station to help the skin of the characters stand out more. I'll probly warm everything up in post.

• Shot 5: Train station + Luggage model/textures
• Shot 7: Train station model/textures
• Shot 4: Cargo Train textures
• Shot 3: Luggage models/textures

First Cut Part 2

I finally managed to upload the file, so here it is!

Mocap setup

This is an image of an actor, Kevin J. Ryan, that I motion captured performing some fight sequences (with my classmate, John Helton) in the fall semester. At the time, the footage was shot as a test, but I now plan to include it in the final film (it's the fight between Sam and Manoj, my secondary characters).



The markers are very reflective and appear to glow because of the camera flash. Note that the fingers are not mocapped and need to be animated by hand.

(Btw, Kevin's a great actor to work with, and I highly recommend him for both mocap and live-action shoots).

Sam's friend, Manoj

Well, they're not actually friends. Sam and Manoj will scuffle in the beginning of the film (the fight that leads to Maqbool being pushed over and losing his hat).

I tried to make him more blocky as opposed to Sam's angles, and messed with his clothes so it'll be easy to separate the two characters. I think he's my best model yet and it's a pity he's only a cameo.

First Cut

After exactly 7 months of animating, I have my first cut of the film.

Naturally, since this is an important milestone, Blogger won't let me upload the video. But I want to mark the occasion with a post anyway.

While there's still a lot of work to be done on the crowd/animation fixes/lighting/rendering/etc, I'm at a point at which I can get feedback on the film as a whole.