Conclusion

Overall i am happy with the out come of the animation that has been created. The animation was aimed at 4 to 14 year old and i feel i have achieved this by creating an original character in a cartoon like style. The bench feels jealous and sad until he eventually thinks of a way he could attract more people to him.

I feel that i have become very confident with the morther tool, near all my animation was based around using the the morther tool and i feel i have learnt it very well. My first try with it, i made the faces straight away with minimal control over the characters expression. After a rethink i decided to add more control for the expressions by breaking them down into individual pieces.

I also feel i have become more confident using the particle systems and using the particle view panel to modify them.

The improvements that could be made with the animation is the shot could be a little longer, and more shots could be added to explain more of the story to the viewer. The animation could contain people to express the longing for people more, form the bench. More lighting could be added to show time differences and to improve the look of the textures.

I am proud of the animation i have created and i feel it has severed its purpose, there is defiantly room for improvement. I have learnt allot from this animation and i feel my skills have improved.

Finalisation

All clips where rendered as bitmap files, and imported into premier pro using the number stills method. They where ordered and the sound was put over the top. The title was added at the beginning and the end is added at the end.

The Finished animation is exported out at 800x600 and in the format mp4

Audio

Cattails - http://incompetech.com/m/c/royalty-free/index.html?feels

used for the happy background music

Sad Trio - http://incompetech.com/m/c/royalty-free/index.html?keywords=sad&Search=Search

used for the background music during the sad parts

Ding - http://www.freesound.org/samplesViewSingle.php?id=66136

used when the bench has an idea

Rain and Thunder - http://www.freesound.org/samplesViewSingle.php?id=2523

used when the rain starts

Clip 10

Clip 9 is the final scene where the bench has placed plants around itself to make it more appealing for people to sit on, the bench is very happy as he feel his plan will work.

Clip 9

Clip 9 is when the bus stop is watching the actions being made by the bench, the bus stop leans in and out in a state of confusion, whist watching the bench.

The poser in the bus window has changed so the suns are on the left, facing the direction the bench is in. This is meant to symbolise the bus stops eyes.

The bus stop raises one eyebrow and the mouth changes to a worried mouth, the bus stop is in a state of confusion.

Clip 8

Clip 8 starts of with the bench feeling sad, the frame is lowered very slightly

as if he is unhappy but not upset.

The bench then gets an idea, the frame is raised to the maximum, the eyes are widened, the happy mouth and the idea mouth are combined together and the brow is raised. The bench is heightened and the expression is big to make the bench stand out and to make him look like he has had a realisation.

The frame lowers and the brow changes to a dipping brow, this was to give the bench a sinister smile look, as if he has thought of a way of stealing the bus stops people.

Clip 7

Clip 7 is when the bench become very sad and lonely, a lot of different morther targets where used in this clip.

The first 30 frames the bench frame slightly drops and the eye brow is slightly raised. When the first 30 frames are up the frame drops completely down, the eyes open wide, the eye brow is raised to its maximum, both the sad mouth and the worried mouth are combined.

The frame was sunk all the way down to display the bench is feeling very low, the eye brow is raised to increase the focus on the benches widening eyes, both mouths are combines to make the bench seem like he is about to cry.

The eyes are lowered to the base of the eyes to make the bench seem like its focus is on the floor.

A rain particle system starts at frame 30, this is what causes the bench to become very sad as he has no shelter. The particle system was created by following THIS (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTSJyqHrWIo) tutorial.

Clip 6

Clip 6 is the boredom clip, the camera take a side on view to the bench, but still showing the front. This has very small movements, the eyes rotate throughout the clip as if the bench is rolling his eyes in boredem.

While the bench is flicking his eyes his, mouth drips down from side to side, this is to give the effect the bench is twitching his mouth out of boredom.
Toward the end of the clip the frame dips down, making it look a little sad in boredom.

Clip 5

Clip 5 is when the bench gets angry with the bus stop. The bench i jealous that the bus stop is receiving all that attention. This clip is a close up shot of the benches eyes.

The morther on the eyes for this clip is constantly fluctuating, this is done so the eyes express a lot of emotion that the bench is feeling. The dipping brow animation moves up and down gradually to show the anger the bench is feeling.
The eyes turn to face the bus stop, this is so the view knows where the anger is directed to.

Clip 4

Clip 4 comes directly after clip 3, the camera zooms in to the bus stop, and manoeuvres around the bus. This is ment to give the impression that the bench is focusing his sight onto the bus stop.

The camera is panned over from the bench to just above the bus stop, as the camera is moving the bus begins to drive away, this is done using the same animation from clip 1 with the bus.

The bus stop is happy, that he had people waiting with him, the happy mouth and happy shelter morther targets are used in this clip.

Clip 3

The 3rd clip created was where the bench realises there people at the bus stop, but no one is sitting on him. The camera rotates around the back of the bench. This is done by setting the camera target to the bench and setting a key frame and the cameras start and end positions.

The camera will tween from the start to the finish and focus on the bench the whole time.

When the bench see the people get onto the bus the bench gets a little angry. This is done using the right eye brow, the percentage is raised to lift the one eye brow, along with this the mouth goes from the happy/content mouth to the angry mouth.
This clip is not the 3rd clip in the storyboard, it was made first as i was working with the camera movement animations first.

Clip 2

Clip 2 is where the bench wakes up and shows itself to the world, the starts at the position left off in clip one and moves in closer to the bench.

As the camera moves closer the bench moves both of it eyebrows up and down, this was done by increase and decreasing the percentages of each brow whilst having auto key turned on.

As the camera get up close to the bench, the eyes open and the mouth opens, this is done by setting the eyes open morther or each eye to 25 percent. As the happy mouth percentage is increasing the bench eyes will come up out of the back of the bench. This was a simple set key from its first position and setting a key on its final position, over the course of he frame the eyes moved up in time with the smile.

The bench wakes up happy as it has been used and is waiting for the next person.

Clip 1

To begin the animation, i decided to place a bus in front of the bench, this was to hide the bench and unveil it once the bus has moved away. The wheel on the bus rotate as the bus moves over to the left.

As the bus moves out the way the camera pans upward, this has been added in so the animation title and sid can be added as the intro.

This clip was achieved by using the auto key on max and moving specific items. The wheels are all rotated and auto key placed key frames to make the rotation. The bus as a whole is moved left at a steady pace. The camera target is raised to give the camera the pan effect.

The scene

The scene was created as a two way street, so one bus can go up one side and the other up the other side. The scene was create with a plane at first, the plane was shaped into one half of the street then the rest was shift clicked out of the side of the street to extend it.

After one section of the street was complete i duplicated the street and moved it to the end, extending the street further.

When the street needed to turn the the bend tool was used to bend the street around the corner.

The paths and curbs where extruded out of the floor, the glass mounds extruding up and changing the vertex's to suit what was needed and extruding the walls out of the ground.

Once the Scene had been shaped the bus stop was added in, the bus stop was placed on the left side of the map, the owners of the other piece of work wanted to move in a separate direction.

Once the bus stop was placed into the scene , the bench was put into the scene. The bench is put onto the opposite side of the street to the bus stop. With the street set up the animation was ready for animating.

The sky background for the animation is assigned in the render settings for the environment, this is so the sky surrounds the entire terrain without the use of a skybox.
http://www.webweaver.nu/clipart/backgrounds-sky.shtml

Bus

The bus was a key element in the animation at it is the first model that will be seen in the animation. When modelling the bus examples where looked at on good of cartoon busses. Once i had a god idea of what one would look like, i began to make this.

The bus began as a cube, the cube was then stretched and rounded off. The window slots where created by selecting where the windows would go on the cube and insetting the area. The Wheel arches at the base of the bus where created by moving the vertexes up and into the arch.

the sign on the side is a rectangle that has been inset and extruded into the shape of the sign, to show the name of the bus.

Bus Stop Morther

Each of the sections are broken up into seperate morth targets, the shelter has its own morther, the seat has a morther and the pictures have a morther for when they are leaning

The Happy shelter, has a raised top, to give the idea the eyebrow is being raised.

The seat, the upper lip has been arced down slightly, the lower lip has a dip to make the bus stop smile.

When the bus stop is leaning to look at what the bench is doing. The shelter, seat and poster morth targets have been moved to the left the top of the bus stop, creating the effect that the bus stop is leaning.

The shelter also has a morth target for use during the watching scene when the bus stop gets worried.

The reason this morth target was added for the mouth, was for when the bus stop is leaning, it is for the bus stop to look confused when it is leaning.

The bus stop gets worried about what the bench is doing by moving and taking plants to surround him.

Bus Stop

The bus stop was started by creating 2 rectangles, 1 triangle bigger than the other. Using the inset too the poser holes where created and pushed into the frame. The legs on the base are extruded down, at an equal height.

The top of the bus stop was created by bevelling out to create the holder for top.

The top of the shelter was extrude out and over the rectangles. The angles of extrudes where rotated using to suit the angle needed. The bar that holds the top up is extrude out of the base of the roof.

Once the outer shape of the bus stop had been made the seat was added in this was added in as 2 panels, one panel for the upper lip and the other for the lower lip. this was created using a rectangle to create the seat with the legs extruded out the base of the seat. The back of the seat was extruded up out of the seat and shaped into the back of the seat.

The textures where applied to the bus stop, using a multi sup object texture.

The eyes where added as suns in the poster, these where made using Unwrap UVW, this was to keep the texture as it is when the bus stop leans and to change the picture of the eyes for the watching scene.

The Bench - Morther - Better attempt

To make the control over the bench a lot better more morth targets where added, a morth target was added for each of the control points that where needed on the bench.

Eyes

The first control point was the eyes, seperating the eyes into two separate targets, and setting them to very wipe eyes. This made it so the eye size could be resized using the percentage in the morther, depending on the desired size.

Eye Brows

Separate morth targets where added for the brow on each side, this was so the bench could lift the individually to aid in giving more expression in the benches face language.

As well as having morth targets for the separate brows, morth targets where created for the whole brow. This brow was made for when the brow is raised, this is used in creating the sad bench animation and its added slightly for the happy expressions.

The dripping brow was created for the angry expression, the brow is lowered and is lowered a great deal in the centre.

Framing

The framing is altered to give the bench more movement when doing the expressions, the high frame was created for use when the bench is happy or when the bench has and idea.

The low frame was created for when the bench need to become smaller, when the bench is sad the frame will sink to the ground. When researching, when most are sad they tend to sink downwards, this morth targets tries to show the same emotion for the bench.

Mouth

The first mouth is angry mouth, when looking at the research image, when the character is angry the mouth raises up. This is replicated in this mouth.
Bored mouth left and right, creating the expression of bored proved to be very difficult. The yawning motion in the research is not look right. I chose to have a twitching of the mouth animation, i feel this still shows the bench is bored very well.

Happy mouth, this mouth was the easiest to create. When someone is happy there mouth tends to arc a great amount.

Idea mouth, this wasn't too difficult. Taking the happy mouth and making it bigger, i was able to find an idea mouth i like and thought suited the animation well.

Sad mouth was created by lowering the sides of the lower lip, and arcing the lip so the centre of the lip is at the top. This was created by following the guide found during the research and copying the shape across.

The worried mouth was created from what I thought the mouth would look like when its worried, lowering and heightening the lip at intervals.