For the past month or so I've been getting deeper into quadruped animation and learning so much about this complicated field. Looking back at my very first animation tests I can't help but cringe at how 'horribly abnormal and awkward' they looked. This is in a way positive, as it shows that I know it can be improved even further in order to work better.
Animation in this project could go on forever, but due to its tight deadline we have to keep looking at it from an overall point of view and do the amount of work required to meet the deadline.
So here is my progress so far in animating Hemmy:
This was my initial scrapped run cycle.
And this is my latest one.
At the moment I am working within the final scene and using the pre-viz camera to help me with timing the shots.
These are some of the great dance sequences my group partner Dayle Sanders is working on with Kinnaree.
This is some progress on the environment that I've been working on. At the moment we are discussing the possibility of rendering everything in layers and render passes which will help in gaining control of the different 'chunks' and improve the look of the animated short.
Overall, I am very satisfied with our progress so far. To make make the most of our left time we are going to start rendering as soon as Kinnaree gets her dynamics sorted out and we can keep on animating in the mean time.
Watch this space for more progress on Mango Mercury!
