The lighter received an animated mesh (the ball for example) and could use it to scatter tumbleweeds on it. The animator would animate the simple shape and the tumbleweed would be added at lighting time. We looked at all the shots and decided to split the tumbleweed into different simple rigs (rather than having a single complex one) the main ones were: a ball, a grid and a tube. We ended up with 3 models using each technique, they were virtually identical (when very small in screen space) and with different advantages.Īnimation wise, Louis wanted the tumbleweed ball/wave to have a life of their own, feel like they move with a purpose. We tested renderable curves, fur and traditional modelling. In parallel we started modelling the hero tumbleweed, being aware that we would need to make lots of variations, we wanted to find a non-destructive, easy to iterate system. The grid was then deformed to look like a wave. We modelled a high resolution and low-resolution tumbleweed and instanced it on a grid. We’ve been using Modo for a few years now, and it has a lot of great, simple tools for instancing (what they call “replicators”) so we tailored the design to work with these tools. We did some simple tests during pre-production to check what worked and what didn’t. Quentin Vien/Blinkink: As soon as the Tumbleweed script was picked we were all aware that the film had not 3 but 4 characters.
COOPER CAT TOON BLAST FULL
But we could work in small resolution and low settings and fire the final renders in 2k full settings once we were happy with the lighting.ģDVF: The Tumbleweed ball/wave was, obviously, a key element to this project : how did you handle it? Obviously rendering full furry characters, lit with area light and with all the indirect lighting wasn’t cheap in render times. It was time-consuming but the results were consistent so it scaled up nicely. The animation was done in Maya and rendered in Modo so we used point caches for the mesh and guides (The mesh were cashed in Maya and the guides in Houdini). The main groom was made in Maya using Yeti, from there we got guides exported as Alembic and used them in Modo for the clumping and shading.
COOPER CAT TOON BLAST SOFTWARE
The process was made a bit more complicated due to the software we were using. We didn’t have so many issues during production but mostly because we had so many during pre-production! The way the hair clumped and how graphical the hair spikes are, was pivotal in getting the look right. We used mainly area lights for lighting, to get a soft look. In the end, the hair is a very translucent shader with a bit of self-illumination. Above and below: comparison between the colour board and the CG render. We worked the look dev in a very controlled environment (Our “Template scenes”) so that we knew how the characters would react under any lighting conditions. The process took us a lot of back and forth between groom, texturing and shading to find out what worked. Above and below: comparison between the colour board and the CG render.īlinkink stop motion background helped a lot, we knew that hair could look amazing in stop motion so we were confident we could achieve the look we wanted using physically based shaders.Ĭooper Cat was the first character we RnD, under Dorianne Fibleuil’ supervision (Our CG lead). Something that would not feel like a stuffed toy but would not be flat either in order to achieve cinematographic lighting. We wanted to find a look that would be in between 2D and 3D. Quentin Vien/Blinkink: The grooming process was intense. Can you tell us about the grooming and surfacing process of the characters? Did the hair/fur create any issue afterwards, for example at the lighting & rendering stages? 3DVF: Furry characters can be quite challenging.
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