TowerFan - CGIFest #1, "Splash the Bogey"

[TowerFan]

Hey all! Looking forward to my first CGIFest entry.

Enjoy!

http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i204/TowerFan/F-16_SI/STB_Poster.jpg



Credits

Music & Sounds: Digital Juice

Explosion Footage: Courtesy Detonation Films

Everything Else... Yours Truly


Tools Used

LightWave 3D, Avid Media Composer, After Effects, Audition, Photoshop

[TowerFan]

1/1/2009 - So, this is as far as I got with the time we had. I have a long list of details to get to and problems that need to be fixed. I wrote the script and gave myself a deadline at each major process so it’s currently at a low level of detail.

One thing I did was tons of fun and a really good way to cut a scene like this. May be old hack to some… In LightWave you can export workspace preview footage of the scene with frame numbers watermarked in the corner. So I set up six cameras, animated them all for the whole scene, and exported the previz footage. Then I imported it into Avid and set up a six camera multi-cam sequence. The multi-cam in Avid is like a broadcast booth in that you can switch cameras in real time as the video plays. Then the cut is saved in a timeline for fine tuning. Once the cut is done then you know exactly which frames from each camera need to be rendered. Worked Great!

Anyway, had a great time making it, hope you enjoy it. Thanks to Raptor365, mattykins, dvxuser.com, and of course the dvxusers for putting on the CGIFest.

[Gord.T]

Works for me. Glad you could join.
Should look pretty cool.

[TowerFan]

So here's where I'm at so far. Experimenting with compositing and the look. Textured the plane as a grey-jet, loaded her up with air-to-air weapons, and made a proxy ufo. Ground looks like a watercolor or something at this point, needs some definition. I'm having a tough time getting the environment to look good without too much fog.

http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i204/TowerFan/F-16_SI/SI_003.jpg

[TowerFan]

Been working on the ground. Not sure if this works for me or not. I have access to orthographic imagery at work and exported a few to use as ground textures. Looks alright I guess, better than what I've been able to do with procedurals.

http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i204/TowerFan/F-16_SI/SI_005.jpg

http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i204/TowerFan/F-16_SI/SI_007.jpg

[Gord.T]

I like that. Looks as good as that TV show Dogfights. Maybe check out a few episodes on youtube if your not already familiar with them. They have some good camera moves.

Is that with terrain motion blur on? Maybe a couple focus pulls or something also here and there would take the attention away from the terrain.

[realogist]

TowerFan, just wanted to say your stuff looks amazing. Your planes and ground look photo realistic, and I saw some of your own renders of the cars. Nice job...
Looking forward to watching your film...

I'm just getting into 3d animation, with blender. My stuff is not nearly good as your, but I was able to get off my ass and make my first animated short for scarlet minifest, viewing should be up soon.

[TowerFan]

Happy New Year!!

@ Raptor - Thanks Raptor. DogFights is a really great show. The WIPs didn't have any blur at the time, it's just the resoultion of the source images. The final has MB on the whole scene.

@ realologist - Thanks!! I'm just a hobbyist with a day job but it's a lot of fun. I've heard Blender is tough but it's powerful and you can get great results. Keep at it!!

Sorry I've neglected this thread, and have been quiet in general, but between my day job, the holidays, and this deadline I've been booked! I hope to contribute more in the future and look forward to more upcoming Fests. Also, once the look and feel were as good as I could get for my schedule there wasn't much I could post that wasn't boring. Anyway...

Updated original posts.

[triplej96]

Looking forward to it towerfan!

[triplej96]

Hey Tower nice job! Models looked nice and I like your take on the UFO. I think your land turned out pretty nice too nothing was quite photo real but I don't think you were going for that. I like when the pilot lost the UFO and was looking around.

My only crit is it started to get boring for me I'm not sure if it went on to long and/or needed faster cuts I don't know. It would have been cool to see the UFO explode/crash but with time constraints I can see how that would have been tough to pull off.

Did you model the planes during the fest or already have them because they look sexy :). I also enjoyed the voice overs.

-Josh

[MrFluffy]

Great entry TowerFan.

Nice fighters and reflection effects. It would have been nice to have the shot have some sense of closure though.

[CallaghanFilms]

Flight of the Navigator...Nicely played:thumbsup:

[TowerFan]

Flight of the Navigator...Nicely played:thumbsup:

Yep! Not exact, but definately based upon. Always liked that movie.

@ Josh - I thought the second half was a bit fast actually. But I do think the first half is slow. Had to cut some dialog too. I had pretty much wrapped up the plane as the T-Bird so I just had to create a grey-jet texture and the weapons.

@ MrFluffy - This is just the first part of a longer chase scene that's in my head. The rest will never see the light of day though. Too much work!!

There were lots of stuff I didn't get to, mostly the finer details. Like after burners, the subtle turbulance movement of the planes and the pilot in the plane, properly lit interior, exhaust flames for the sidewinders, some kind of visual propulsion of the UFO, and on and on...

Thanks again all for the comments and interest!

[lawriejaffa]

Beautiful aircraft models - and some great jet animations!

[Horncastle]

Well done, a lot of work obviously went into this. The planes looked great - really nicely modeled, textured and rendered. For one man, given the time frame, I think you did a great job.
Jason

[NoDice]

intense