3DRandom Animation...

Howard Day

I've recently been inspired by the StarCraft 2 cinematics to do a little single shot animation...nothing too special, but just something to get my mind clear. It's not 100% finished, so I thought I'd share it here. Enjoy!
http://www.hedfiles.net/BFighter7.mov - 55MB, 1080p .H264 Quicktime.

It's a new fighter I've put together, inspired by Sovereign Replica's McQuarrie X-Wing...http://sovereignreplicas.com/blog/2010/05/05/124-scale-ralph-mcquarrie-art-concept-x-wing/
And the explosion is my attempt to create a volumetric-looking explosion using only facing particles and proceedural textures and materials. Fairly successful, I think.

Any interest in seeing that explosion source?

IRML

I love it, I like the design of the ships and how bright they are in particular, a lot of people seem to do really dark animations, the explosion works great too, only thing I would change is to vary the size of the debris more, and have some much larger pieces in there

how long did it take to render? it looks like it's got proper bounce radiosity to me

Howard Day

Thanks! On the render times...Not really sure. I rendered this is a lot of passes, so I'd guess about 3 days of total render time, spread out over a couple of weeks. The base pass for the fighter in the center frame took 8 hours to render. The explosion pass took 12 hours. The laser lighting and bolt pass took just 2 hours. The background star pass took like 15 minutes. Bigger debris is a great idea. I'll see what I can come up with if I ever pick this back up.

somacruz145

Whoah that looks mind-blowing, probably the best Star Wars animation I have ever seen ! The ship is great as well, always nice to see an alternate take on the old trilogy :thumb:

Howard Day

Thanks. It's not actually supposed to be a star wars animation. The ship was inspired by the original X-Wing concept art, not copied from it. For various historical reasons, I've refused to do any more Star Wars work of any kind. Long story.

somacruz145

Ah allright then, it's one of the best animations I have seen lately And about the Star Wars work, did it have anything related to mesh/image theft ? That seems to be pretty common in that department - even I saw my SW bomber appear somewhere in a different form but it was so ugly (the "remake") I didn't even bother

Armondikov

Amazing quality work, as always. The sort of standard we mere mortals can only dream of!

Although, speaking of rendering times. Are you doing all the passes in the same program or have you considered using something like After Effects to comp in the lasers and explosions? From what I've seen, AE might be able to do that sort of thing faster and easier.

Sanderlee

As always, wow. Just plain wow. Industrial strength wow in wow sauce with a side of whoa!

markmassey

i'm not going to say wow... i think there have been enough wows..... but great video..

Hundred

Great clip. Which VFX app are you using if any?

Melak

That looks really awesome!
I love the white-orange theme you've had going on since that sidescroller game thing, particularly because orange is like my favourite colour these days, but its also much underrated IMO :thumb:

The bright lighting works great with the colours, and the explosion is just mind blowing! (teehee)

Oh also..

Howard Day wrote: »

Any interest in seeing that explosion source?

Are you kidding?

Howard Day

somacruz145: Heh, yeah, you could say that. Only it was theft by Lucasfilm, or Agents hired by Lucasfilm...I just also got tired of playing in other people's universes. Too constricting. :P
Armondikov: Uh, well...the render passes are made in Max2011 64bit, and comp'd together in AE CS5...so I'm already doing what I think you're asking. I render out to individual PNG sequences, then comp'em in After Effects.
Sanderlee: Wow.
markmassey: Thanks!
Hundred:...VFX app? It's all rendered in Max, then comped in After Effects. I assume you mean AE?
Melak: Heh, thanks. I just can't get away from the orange.
For those interested in the explosion... http://www.hedfiles.net/biggertweakedsuperawesomefireballexplosion.zip It requires Max2011 to open, and uses only one image file. ENJOY!

Melak

Wow, I haven't really started to figure it out yet - it's not even a PFlow, just a superstray, so I'm guessing it's all in the materials?
The levels of cellulars have my head spinning already

I'm curious why you used an image for the gradient thing - looks easy enough to do with a gradient ramp?

Anyway, you are brilliant with materials - probably don't need me telling you that either - do you do this for a living? If you don't, you should!

Armondikov

Howard Day wrote: »

Armondikov: Uh, well...the render passes are made in Max2011 64bit, and comp'd together in AE CS5...so I'm already doing what I think you're asking. I render out to individual PNG sequences, then comp'em in After Effects.

I meant to use AE itself to generate the laser blasts. But I assume if you can get that effect from Max anyway, there might not be much point. I suppose you know what you're doing, obviously , and just wanted to know if you used different stuff for the FX compared to the modelling.

Melak

Heh also, funny thing...in mental ray, as soon as it starts on the first block with the explosion...it insta crashes max

Howard Day

It's designed as a strictly Scanline effect. I highly doubt that mentalray has all the needed material support to render it properly. I could probably jury-rig it to work in mental ray...but it would probably look waay different.

Tovette

Did you ever finish that other animation with the ships attacking the planet city?

[Deleted User]

Looking great, however you officially suck for making me want to drop my current projects in favour of explosions, bad Mr. Day, BAD! In future I expect your explosion technique to be rediculously complicated leaving my little brain in the dark and well outside the influence of inspiration, thanyou very much! :devil:

Really though, it's looking fantastic and all in scanline? That's madness right there I'm itching to have a go now, what did happen to your planetary siege animation?

L2K

you should have put that engine to fire when that laser blast shoot it.
laser pass through and do nothing.


somebody wants to do a camtasia with that fancy explosion system ? we dont work with 2011 here

fractalsponge

That looks great! I don't suppose you'd be willing to share how you did the laser bolts?

Melak

Howard Day wrote: »

It's designed as a strictly Scanline effect. I highly doubt that mentalray has all the needed material support to render it properly. I could probably jury-rig it to work in mental ray...but it would probably look waay different.

Heh, I haven't had a really thorough look yet but I didn't see any maps in the materials that mental ray doesn't support?

Anyway I'll keep poking it til I see what everything does, thanks for sharing

L2K: Camtasia? What max version do you use?

L2K

2008...
new boss, new rules

Melak

well, the material could be saved in a mat library file, but you would lose all the animated properties

Howard: I rebuilt the material map for map, and now it doesn't crash MR anymore...it just renders black.
What part is not mental ray compatible?