Week1. Research Board

It is possible to assume that everyone who live in a country with developed media, technology and television sections have at least heard about a secret agent James Bonds or even seen at least one movie with this fictional character. In order to create a trailer for one of the James Bond movies it is essential to indentify the characteristics of the James Bond personality and the content of the James Bond movies. These are the first things that come to the mind when thinking about James Bond:

• Secret/intelligence agent 007
• British
• Mature
• Classic clothes
• Drinking
• Charming
• Good guy
• Fights for the good
• Doesn’t follow the orders or instructions
• Does anything in order to get/kill the bad guy
• Comfortable with death and killing
• Capable to control all kind of equipment
• Muscular
• Doesn’t talk too much
• Handle pleasure along the work and/or vice versa
• Wit mind
• Impossible to kill
• Sense of humour
• Single man who can save a day

What is expected to see in a James Bond movie:

• Luxury
• Fast cars
• Guns
• High-tech fictional gadgets
• Beautiful wicked women
• Pure evil villains
• Chase and run
• Explosion/demolition of anything around
• Excitement
• Danger
• Love story
• Fast paced action
• Last minute get outs
• A lot of death and killing
• Trans-continental locations

All of these were found in the movies I managed to watch during couple last days. First movie was “Casino Royale” the 1967 version. One of the early James bond movies were humour takes most of the action. The action seemed to jump from scene to scene making it hard to understand what had eventually happened to the characters later on and how they managed to end up in the present scene. However, the movie itself is very cartoony and includes a lot of jokes which are there only for a laugh. It is not one of the serious Bond movies with tense action scenes and understandable plot like the latest Bond movies. It seems to be a good movie for transfer to 2D cartoon animation, but film randomness and old humour appears to be challenging task for 3D concept. The other two movies were “Casino Royale” the 2006 version starring Daniel Craig and “Die Another Day” starring Pierce Brosnan. It is not easy to compare these movies both include of a lot of action and adventure. They are well produced big screen pieces. The events and scenes are logical and believable as it can be in a movie world. The plot and events seem to be hardly possible in real life, but they definitely look real on screen. It appears possible to deliver a short trailer of key componets for both movies. The final decision was to make a trailer for “Die Another Day”. Pierce Brosnan managed to perfectly deliver all of James Bond features which created overall harmony between different scenes whether he was with a girl or confronting the villain. The movie appear sto be an ultimate Bond presentation. The most extraordinary part of the film which made it easier to choose was ice palace in the second half which would be perfect for modeling. Finally, here is the research board:

Week1. Second Task: Modelling fruits

The first fruit to be modelled was an apple. I started by creating a sphere from standard primitive object panel. The sphere was used a base for an apple.

The sphere surface had to be reshaped with uneven bumps in order to make a sphere look more like an apple. To achieve this I converted sphere to a editable poly using right mouse click. Then using a soft selection sub-menu I edited the position of random vertexes and polygons.

The next step to insert a stalk. This one was done by creating standard primitive cone. Then it was converted to editable poly and cone was bended and curved by soft selecting top cone polygon and repositioning it with move and rotation tools.

In the final step I used meshsmooth from modifier list to get rid of sharp looking edges and to make a more organic look of an apple.
The next fruit is banana. I used standard primitive cylinder. Decided to use similar technique for banana bending as for an apple stalk. To create the thinnering end of a banana I used bevel tool for the polygons. After acquiring a satisfying shape meshsmooth was used to smoothen the edges. Here are the final models. Also I created a small composition using my models.

Week1. First Task: Modelling a building

The task was to create a building using standart primitive shapes. The building consist of boxes and spheres which where alligned,copied, rotated and scaled to create the symetry. Below is the result of my first try:

Brief of 3D modelling and animation

This blog is going to mark my progress of the 3D Modelling and Animation module in Anglia Ruskin University. As ongoing process I will need to make a blog post every week covering all work that would have been done up-to-date. The main assignment is to produce a 30s length trailer for the chosen James Bond film. Assignment is divided to two parts. First part will cover first six weeks in which I will need to produce a relevant research(mood board, research board), storyboard and three assets for the trailer. Second part will be the assets incorporation to the actual animation sequence.

Looking forward to learning modelling and animation techniques in 3D MAX studio. The most challenging bit appears to be modelling in 3D Max as i have never done anything with it before. Planning to get all the research and board parts out of the way as soon as possible as I have already had to make them for some of the modules. Try to concentrate more on 3D visual models and learning to animate with 3D Max.
I can not remember seeing any of the James Bond movies so this assignment will call for some viewing sessions to get the clear image of James Bond character and movies.
Not so much excited about the usage of Blogger as report-education tool. This is mainly because I do not feel comfortable and confident about my writing skills and putting thoughts in understandable manner.