PRECEDENT IMAGES

So my initial ideas were some kinds of creatures with lots of legs. And then I ended up looking for some images of crabs and spiders.

PRECEDENT ARTIST - RESEARCH

I would love to see Theo Jansen's works. I knew him 2 or 3 years ago while surfing on youtube for some inspirations. His creatures are made from hard work, from a real artistic heart. They always inspired me a lot. In a very complicated hierarchy system of lots of pipe and joints, the creature formed beautifully and lively.
One style I could recognized that the creatures have lots of legs and big body, somehow I felt they look like a spider or some kinds of crab.

FINAL SUBMISSION PROJECT 1

Well, we got extension there which I didn't know, that's why I pushed myself to hell to finish the project up (2 nights...). To be honest, when I knew that we got extension I did appreciate my works so much, and I was like "Yes, finally, we got some more time, I will definitely polish the final up"... So I took one more day to fix the audio, lights, effects and so on... Also fixing the material on melted substance. Here is the final outcome
(upload in full, high-quality)

PLEASE WATCH IN HD

3 Render images & explanation paragraph :

FIRST-ATTEMPT HAND-IN

So after fixing the shattering effect, my final scene is completely ready... So I rendered it then put in After Effects to finish and tune up... (some lights, particles and sound effects)
Audio used : VideoCopilot SoundFX package
Flare effect applied in After Effect : Plug-in called Trapcode Optical Flares
Just for referencing purpose, so I uploaded this in draft quality video (will take lots of time for the high quality, I will spare for the final submission)

Comment : I was little bit rush to put it into the final but it is still my pleasure... Somehow, the synchronization between the visual and audio is not really good, maybe if I had had time there I would fix it definitely. So I did want to make it on time. Also another problem was the melted rubber was not good, too much bump-map effect, a little too reddish there...  

FAILURE ON THE SHATTERING EFFECT & REWORK!

Like last time, for the shattering glass ball scene I used the Maya 2012 built-in tool called "DMM" (Digital Molecular Matter - I need to turn it on in plug-in manager). I had some trials and it turned out well but at the very end, when combining with the other elements (cameras, lights and whole scene) it didn't work properly, I did look up for solutions but still had no idea how to fix....
Fail! 

Comment : The impact is fine but the after effect is so so bad, the glass pieces are too big and fill the camera lens, no way we can see through and even too dark... I need to find another solution


So after 1-2 hours searching for solutions, I ended up looking at the website : creativecrash.com which is the home of thousands of 3D program plugin...
Words, terms did use to search : shatter, shatter glass, destruct, explode... and also tried DMM
And very interesting I found one (it's very new - in 2012) the "DMM Baker" plug-in. It is an extra plug-in which helps the DMM in Maya more useful. Quick description : Author : Arthur Graff, it will finalize the effect when two DMM objects come to impact (kind of re-rendering), also controlling the DMM settings in more ways then the usual plug-in can provide...

Link DMMBaker : DMMBaker

Also I consulted the tutorial for this plug-in : http://vimeo.com/groups/ati/videos/37973773


So I need to allow the DMM Geometry Cache to save the shattering scene, the combined it with the whole final scene more properly.... Also I did some experiments with layers to create the final effect, because the DMM cache didn't show up while rendering so need to duplicate and apply layers.

Here the trials with DMM Baker, the outcome is magnificent and so much better than the last one

It was very near to the final one already.

DEVELOPE WORKING ON CAMERA! ... ALSO THE MATERIALS

Once again, I tried to play around with cameras, also animate them... But after some trials, I just realised that I just need 1 camera for the whole scene and animate it...

Here the camera work

Comment : Almost my final, but still need some fix because I need to work more on the shattering scene.

Next step will be very very near to final, the playblast is still very rough though, but try to provide a visualization what I did work on... MATERIAL and COLOURS change through time, the camera is fixed properly...

 Comment : The playblast was in high-quality mode, so the material shows some details and all colours, but the final must be different because the rendering will be with more better better settings... playblast is still draft clip.

APPLY LIGHTS INTO SCENES

Applying lights is easy but making them work well and fit perfectly on the scene is way too hard. I focus on the ambiance and angle of lights. (The video file is too large to upload, but doesn't matter there are just fixed lights, not much movements)

Screenshots :