Serious Time #25 Battle of the Five Armies Crazy CGI

The Lord of the Rings trilogy was famous for it's CGI battles and armies. Now the new Hobbit movie, Battle of the Five Armies, brings some new software and effects to the table that can take CGI to the next level. One new tool that they used in this movie was the Army Manager Production Tool which allowed Peter Jackson to visualize the battles and decide how to film them. They used this tool as a faster preview to bridge gaps, instead of using the much longer and more finalized Massive Software. Another new software that they used was the Manuka, this made it possible for new and more fluid destruction and greater detail in character work. Manuka greatly enhanced the attack on Lake Town with Smaug the dragon. They used it to put even greater detail into Smaug and also gave his fire breathing a new feel, using a water simulation fuel source they gave the fire more of a napalm look. This software also added to the destruction of Lake Town giving it more fluid simulation detail. Overall Battle of the Five Armies had some of the best most recent CGI to date.

I really enjoyed this article. It was really interesting to me seeing all of the different ways the movie was made. The process was a lot more complex then I believed it was. This made me realize why the battle of Lake Town was a little short, seriously that battle alone must have taken forever and it's not even that long compared to the other battles in the movie. I'm actually really curious how much time they put into this scene alone.This article really made me appreciate the movie more with all of the CGI they used and the time they put into that part alone. This was relevant to both aspects of Digital Media. Overall awesome article.

Serious Time #24 BAM! BOOM! EXPLOSIONS!

Michael Bay you either love him or hate him. Michael Bay is widely known for his action movies, and even more known for his explosions. He loves action, maybe too much, and he tries to explain the methods of his madness. Michael for one is determined he will push for something, no matter how impractical, and make it work. An example of this is when he really wants to fly a car into the air and have the front tire hit someone in the face. Usually this would be impossible without hurting the stunt man, but Michael found a way. He put the car on a crane and slowly moved it toward the running crowd who would get hit. He covered all of this up with slow-motion to make it look like the car would be moving at slow-motion if the scene wasn't in slow-motion. He gets a lot of new technology to use in his films, including a robotic camera and a new Imax 3-D camera. He also isn't afraid to push his actors to do things they wouldn't normally do. For example, he had his actors parkour on the top of high apartment buildings even if they were afraid of heights. Last but not least Michael explains that he loves action and making things new each movie.

Okay.... well to be honest I hate Michael Bay a bit more now after watching this video, so without further ado rant time! A lot of people who know me knows that I cannot stand Transformers Age of Extinction, or as I like to call it Garbage Fighting Robot Simulator 2014. For those of you who didn't see the movie please don't, unless you like Michael Bay movies then you will love it. I swear the entire movie is just explosions left and right and nothing else. The problem with Bay is that he doesn't focus at all on the story only on the action, which the video proves. In almost every movie he makes, especially Age of Extinction, he makes a bad story with a lot of action which doesn't work because to have good action you need to have characters you care about, and to have that you need a good story which Bay is terrible at. The only thing that made me hate this video even more is the fact that Michael Bay says that he tries to do new things with each of his movies... REALLY?! If you did that you would actually make good movies, but no instead of changing new things with the story he puts it all into explosions instead, BOOM! Okay now that is all out of my system lets get into what I liked. There was only one thing I really liked in this and that is showing that Michael can use special effects, that's it. The article itself was bearable at least, but only for the fact that they didn't try to get me to like or hate Michael Bay. Before I go I want to explain that I respect everyone's opinion, if you enjoy Michael Bay movies then great that's awesome for you! Not liking Michael Bay is just my opinion, like the article says you either love him or you don't. EXPLOSION!         

Weekly Comments #13

This week has been a pretty straightforward week. Pretty much every day was a work day which was awesome. Really the only thing that stands out about this week was the lockout which was really nothing different from normal. That being said we didn't learn too much. Something that made me happy this week is the fact that I am done with those tutorials and can now move on to the competition, also I am going camping this weekend so yay! 

Here are the links of the week:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8ir8rVl2Z4&list=FLP9kzN4xEm346u6a2i64hKA&index=4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVQq-Kt_VtU&list=FLP9kzN4xEm346u6a2i64hKA&index=2

The first link is somewhat related to the Battle of the Five Armies link, and seeing that reminded me about this. This is a link for any Lord of the Rings fans and anyone who likes a good song. The second one is a great example of awesome voice acting. Some of you might know him on youtube as Cryaotic. He reads a story with sound effects, music, and rather great voice acting. Be warned, the story he reads is rather dark so if you are really happy while reading this and want to stay that way or don't like dark tales then don't watch it. But if you like a good interesting story and don't care if it is dark then I encourage you to watch this. I hope you enjoy both of the links!

Serious Time #23 Disney Looking Through The Looking Glass

Eyes are an important part in the anatomy of a animated character. This is because they are all unique and different, but this is a problem for animators. Since they are all unique and different in there own way they are particularly hard to animate especially when there are a lot of characters. This makes some of the characters eyes less detailed and generic. Disney has now made a solution with eye capture. What they do is capture the eye in different shots ant lighting using cameras. Then they use a set of algorithms to sculpt each part of the eye. The result is a totally unique and detailed eye which is great for realistic characters. The eye can do everything a regular eye does, it dilates to different lighting and it has a glare.This has great potential for the future with adding more realism and liveliness to a character.

Wow two short articles in a row, Awesome! This is a pretty good article but just because it's short doesn't make it perfect. This article for example, short and to the point but not very informative at all on how they actually did any of it, instead they say, "using an algorithm we did this, aren't we smart?" well I guess I'll never know not being told anything about the algorithm, but I digress. I do think they did a great job though, the eye looks so lifelike/real. The only other problem I had with this article was that I already thought this existed and now that I know it didn't I'm saying why not? I don't get it, in my head I thought this is how they always did CGI eyes, that being said why didn't this happen sooner? Did it really take them this long to figure out to take pictures of eyes and put them i the computer? I know it is more complex then that with the algorithm and all but that just means they should have actually explained the algorithm! But hey just my opinion. This is more relevant to the animation side of Digital Media. Overall though it was still a decent article.    

Serious Time #22 Manipulating Character Size

Lights... Camera... ACTION! In film making cameras are used in many different ways, one big way they can be used though is making objects bigger or smaller then they seem. They do this using various ways, a big way being angles. By simply making the camera angle lower on a character, the character will seem bigger, but remember the lower the angle the bigger and more dramatic the character will look. Another way they do this is by changing camera lenses to wider ones this is called focal length. Using this technique you can create an exaggerated illusion of depth and character size, making characters in the front of the shot look bigger then the ones in the back of the shot. A good example of this technique is the movie King of Cups which just by the trailer shows many exaggerated shots which changes size of a character. One more way to make a character look smaller or bigger is to change the prop sizes, the bigger the props are the smaller the person looks the smaller the props are the bigger the person looks.

This was a good article to come back to after break. This article was short,sweet, and to the point. It still though packs a lot of information. Now I did already know most of the techniques mentioned in the article, but one that I never thought of using before was a lower angle on a character. Now I understand why people do it but to me it just looks weird and awkward. I would much rather use focal length like the article suggests. This is more relevant to the video side of Digital Media. Overall straight forward article.

Weekly Comments #12

This week was awesome! First of all we got a snow day which was awesome. Also we are now finally done with 2-D, which overall I did like but we just started 3-D animation and I already like it better. I don't know if it is just because it's something new or what but I really like it so far, but that might change. I wish I could have handed in my 2-D short on time for critiquing, but at least I got it done. I am excited to learn how to animate in 3-D.

Here is the link of the link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIP_gtjDtfE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWpWIO_vN9A
Two links this week. First one is a trailer for the movie Whiplash, a movie that I want to see so bad right now, hopefully I can see it next weekend. The second link is a short clip that shows certain scenes from the movie that really tell what it is all about. I can't really say anything else about the movie not seeing it, but I have heard it is great and that J.K. Simmons is amazing in it, so I cannot wait.

Thanks for reading, peace!