Added AI Toon Shader
One of the key parts of the visual success of this shot will be to try to effectively blend the 2D assets with the 3D ones to make a visually convincing and sustains its aesthetic credibility. In order to create a line-drawn effect within 3D space, I researched Arnold toon shaders, which add this exact effect but retain the 3D element of specular texture. Looking into this I found several tutorials that helped me understand that the Arnold render filter needs to be changed to ‘contour’ and line elements can be changed and adapted within the attribute settings, similarly to aistandard surface materials.
Applying the above tutorial to my 3D character model, The line effect works well for the stylisation of my shot, as it blends it into an aesthetic world in which key elements are outlined. Hence why I did not apply the toon shader to background elements such as clouds, as I really wanted to visually accentuate the foreground and key elements to draw the viewer’s eye.
I also added this to modelled elements of the midground and foreground for the same effect. However, where this visual look falls short I believe, is the drastic different line quality between my exported tiff drawings and the 3D models. I think going forward with this project, I will 3D model all of my drawings into 3D space, but apply them to toon shader to get a cleaner, higher quality effect that I was not able to reach its full potential during this premise project’s experimental period. I also think that going forward, I should apply artistic lighting and colouring theory to the rendering, as objects in the front should be more saturated than objects in the background, as this ruins its sense of depth.
Completing the modelling process, due to the specific bit of dialogue which expresses a long car journey, I thought I would directly visually convey the speech within this, creating a more ‘observational’ documentary mode, however, place it in a wildly unconventional world to separate its aesthetic tendencies from the mundane. To upkeep this stylistic direction, I modelled the car assets in a very flat and almost ‘cardboard cut-out’ style to maintain and keep inspiration from the shadow puppetry style Lotte Reiniger researched earlier on in the project. The feel of objects being made from plastic (accentuated object specularity) and ‘ cardboard’ 2d stylisation adds a hyper superficial like aspect to the world that once again stresses a visual landscape that forcefully attempts to push itself into fictional realms while tackling non-fictional subjects.
Animated Facial Performance
In order to be time efficient during the animation process, and also exemplify stylistic independence and reference to computer-generated imagery, I decided to try and test using the audio node within Maya MASH editor to convey speech. This would take place of creating and animating a mouth rig on the character for the time being, and allows me to explore the visual identity of my potential film.
By applying the mash editor node to the mesh, it created a computer-generated audio processing effect which makes my character appear robotic, which I think adds a visual performative element to the mix that forces viewers to acknowledge that the character is fake, in contrast to the voice behind it, which will aid in my thesis survey research into the performative re-creation of subjectivity.
After using the real-life footage of my interviewee, I tried to follow and adapt the expressivity of the eyebrows and eye movements, and apply this to my 3d model adaptation of the concept art below. Due to time constraints, this animation came out very minimal and not overtly accurate due to loss of performance in stylisation. However, this has allowed me space for stylistic considerations going forward with this visual exploration and has led me to decide upon making and adapting more detailed facial rigs for future models that are more reminiscent of the original footage of the interviewees. This will potentially include not using the Mash node editor in future, but creating different ‘square’ mouth shapes that will operate with blend shapes to create the illusion of movement. I am also considering applying 2D draw facial elements to 3D models as a stylistic choice in future, which accentuates ‘paper drawn’ visuals.
After completing the facial animation, I decided that in order to engage audiences with the visual world-building, I wanted to keep the speech as one continuous shot that does not include shots, which also provided the challenge of aesthetic consistency. Going into next week, I will try to merge and asses these aspects to make the aesthetic design work together.