Assignment #9: Final Project Storyboard

The ninth assignment was to create the storyboard for the final project. My final project is more of a procedural assembly of a stage-4 Menger Sponge. For this reason, there is not much of a story to convey through the storyboard. Instead, I showed exactly how the animation will progress (from flat primitive shapes to a complex multi-stage Menger Sponge). Below is my storyboard.

Assignment #8: Pre-Rigged Character Animation

The sixth assignment was to create a simple animation using a pre-rigged character. In class, we were taught how to control and manipulate the classic Lowman rig. However, I have much more experience using the SimpleMan (pre-rigged character), so I decided to create an animation using this rig instead. Originally, I was going to create a karate kick animation. However, the way the inverse kinematics are set up with the SimpleMan rigs made this very challenging. So instead, I created a short animation where the character takes a bow then punches towards the camera. Below are some screenshots from the animation process.

Screenshot of the character preparing for punch

Screenshot of character during punch

Assignment #7: Simple Animation

The seventh assignment involved creating a simple animation using the techniques covered throughout the course up to this point. I decided to get started on my final project and animate the assembly of basic cubes (to use later in my final Menger Sponge animation). The cubes started out as a net, which is basically the shape you would get if you unfolded all sides of a cube. This shape then begins to animate and the initial cubes take shape from the original nets. These cubes then duplicate and assemble themselves to create a stage-1 Menger Sponge. This is the basic concept behind my final project. The goal would then be to use the stage-1 Menger Sponges as building blocks for the next Menger Sponge (showing the fractal nature of this design). This process will ultimately repeat until a Stage-4 or 5 Menger Sponge is created. However here is the basic animation that I have up to this point:

Step 1: The flattened cube (net)

Step 2: Cube assembly in progress

Step 3: Completed cubes

Step 4: Cubes duplicate

Step 5: Stage-1 Menger starts to take shape

Step 6: Completed Stage-1 Menger Sponge.

Assignment #6: Shaders/Lighting Exercise

The sixth assignment was to create a model and experiment with materials, shaders, and lighting. Continuing with the fractal theme, I created a 3D version of the Sierpinski Triangle using the reference image below. I used polygonal geometry to create this model, as using NURBS would introduce unnecessary complexity. I created my own shaders and edited properties to make the model semi-transparent so that all iterations of the fractal can be viewed at once. I also experimented with various light sources to get the effect that I was looking for. Overall, this exercise helped me get more comfortable with shaders and lighting as a whole.

2-dimensional Sierpinski Triangle
(image: https://www.zeuscat.com/andrew/chaos/sierpinski.clear.gif)

Another view of the completed model.

A render of the completed model.