mi5014andrewvane

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Final character. after render I decided to put background to suit a theme.

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Modeling was the hardest part. I think I took too much on myself deffinitely as I couldn’t finish even in extended deadline. I had many issues with like making proper body took several days for me and somewhat nice face was also very difficult. It was mostly try and error. What really helped me was having body reference image I found one that is similar to body shape of my character from sketches so I used it on face, I used my painting. It was challenge. Personally I think that I will focus more on environment in 3D as bodyshape is too complicated. However this course gave me lot. I have learnt how to build an  structure of the body and my Maya skills improved greatly! At the end I think I managed it to get it done as close as possible, but I could have face improved still and hairs are still in odd shape somewhere, but overall I am ok with how it ended.

[mi5014andrewvane]

Here I made little scene to feel the vibe of the place it could be set in.. back alleyway.. it looks creepy.. in my opinion this is the place where punkish mechanic would approach her.

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Painted version of the corpo girl. I like the coloring as black makes her look powerful.

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As second character I have decided to make it male character. I went to the punk-ish vibe as in cyberpunk world they are working as often mechanics and are one of the poorest people in the community making kinda reason why he would try to trick and fool corporate woman in the story. I made two versions one older man and one younger. But I think for the story it would work more with older man as he has much more dangerous and devious vibe.

[mi5014andrewvane]

As a character of judge.. I decided to make her as corporate woman. In my opinion.. In the future, womans will have more positions like as this one as they are decisive. Corporate people in cyberpunk like world have power and sort of ability to rule and this rule suits more to the woman character as men tend to fear powerful women.

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As part of developement I drawed numerous faces from models on the internet and I thought about how these characters would fit the story and theme and how could I enrich the story by including these characters

[mi5014andrewvane]

As part of my excersise I have been doing Baymax model. Following Gary’s tutorial was good it was straightforward. Only thing that I wasn’t happy about is that stroke in middle. I couldnt manage to repair it.

[mi5014andrewvane]

Radical depiction Research

I would like to depict radical version of the story as a dream in the woodman’s head. Where he dreams, about the nice life he could have, if his plan to trick Mercury worked and as the vision goes it turns into nightmare about the sin of greed the woodman made and how bad he ended in the end. My idea of portraying this aproach is to depict the visions very abstract to keep “dream” feel I used watercolor images for that purpose. Another thing I’d like to do is to put more weight to emotions, that are inside the head, by playing with colors for my key emotions I’d like to animate, also I made research, on how color depict emotions in contemporary art and how I could use it in animation. 

[mi5014andrewvane]

For the last moodboard about characters and clothing style. I was very fortunate to get this book into my possesion. Its developer art book also with lore about the world for upcoming game Cyberpunk 2077 with wide range of character designs where I could get my inspiration of it really helped me to define the background of my characters as well as expand my knowledge on cyberpunk theme as a whole. As of writing this post the book is not available in any store yet. So my thanks, belongs to my friend. 

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Disorted Depiction Research

As a disortion element I have chose adaptation in Cyberpunk genre. I think the motive in fable will work well in this dystopian futuristic environment as greed, dishonesty and envy is one of the key motives for cyberpunk dystopia. Large multinational corporations and rich people working in them are ruling the world by preying on less fortunate citizens of the world. “Normal” people are fighting for their rights however is neccesary and when there is chance to make profit most of them take the opportunity to enrich their poor lives by lying or cheating and some of them even by illicit activities and felony. 

In my opinion the background for characters could easily adapt for Mercury and Woodman. I can imagine two woodmans as street kids which one of them is honest and second is willing to do anything to be richer than others. And Mercury could be here Rich corporate person who does bad things in job but is not necessarily bad person, because he is willing to help honest street kid, but has power to make judgments on people who tries to cheat him as the second greedy kid. 

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Faithful depiction Research

My intention for faithful depiction of Mercury and Woodman is to tell the story as it was told more than thousand years ago. I did research in environment and historical context and created these moodboards to get the feel of the story. Quite surprise for me was, that Mercury is a man as from fable it sounded like Mercury is woman. :D But that was off topic. What I like about this fable, is that its story about honesty and envy with greed. I think that current world needs portray stories like this one as current and mainly western world is about greed and consumerism by making this fable, I think I can touch some people by my animation to stop themselves being greedy without boundaries as selfish greed hurts others and sometimes even your beloved ones and you can end worse than the greedy woodman in the fable. If one person will acknowledge that by watching my story it would be great success for me.  

Story: Mercury and Woodman

A Woodman was felling a tree on the bank of a river, when his axe,glancing off the trunk, flew out of his hands and fell into the water.As he stood by the water's edge lamenting his loss, Mercury appearedand asked him the reason for his grief. On learning what had happened,out of pity for his distress, Mercury dived into the river and,bringing up a golden axe, asked him if that was the one he had lost.The Woodman replied that it was not, and Mercury then dived a secondtime, and, bringing up a silver axe, asked if that was his. "No,that is not mine either," said the Woodman. Once more Mercury divedinto the river, and brought up the missing axe. The Woodman wasoverjoyed at recovering his property, and thanked his benefactorwarmly; and the latter was so pleased with his honesty that he madehim a present of the other two axes. When the Woodman told the storyto his companions, one of these was filled with envy of his goodfortune and determined to try his luck for himself. So he went andbegan to fell a tree at the edge of the river, and presently contrivedto let his axe drop into the water. Mercury appeared as before, and,on learning that his axe had fallen in, he dived and brought up agolden axe, as he had done on the previous occasion. Without waitingto be asked whether it was his or not, the fellow cried, "That's mine,that's mine," and stretched out his hand eagerly for the prize: butMercury was so disgusted at his dishonesty that he not only declinedto give him the golden axe, but also refused to recover for him theone he had let fall into the stream.

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Exploring ideas for the fable.

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From Uterus to Mercury and Woodman

I worked very hard on this story, but after numerous consultations with tutors about struggles with this story. We have together suggested that I should change the theme of the story to my Animation Performance Aezop’s fable - Mercury and the Woodman - because I understand it way more than the Uterus story.

I think it is for the best, even though I liked the uterus story and was heavily interested in it. But unfortunately I did not perfectly understanded what author was trying to say even though I kept trying. I am really sorry about that. But I think I took bigger pie than I could eat. What makes me wonder why it was so. If it was the language barrier that I couldn’t understand it or if if I am not that intelectually developed that I couldn’t procede any further. This situation makes me a little bit in doubt of myself.

 However, I think with Mercury and Woodman fable, I will do better and I think that it is change good for my progress in this module.

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Characters

I drew some sketches that would match the story feeling after doing a research. First is Dad from the end of the story and second is our main character - narrator at his birthday.

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Radical Interpretation - notes