The good news is that we’ve completed scanning the band members of Dappled Cities Fly, and it looks like I’ll be co-directing (and doing the majority of animation for) a music video for their song Holy Chord.
The bad news is the warehouse I was set up in has been sold, and so I have no studio. I have a fair few models scanned however, and have work that can be done on them without the need of more scanning.
I’ve just finished scanning and animating a stuffed toy bear. Making scanned people walk is pretty obvious (though I think pretty great), but there’s a world of fun to be had bringing toys and objects to life! The bear has a slightly uncanny creepiness about it’s fixed expression and tireless walk. You can almost hear it moaning “huuugggss”.
Check out more of the 3d scanning project at http://3d.neonascent.net
and available at http://3d.neonascent.net
The above video show my face recreated for use with the full-body model, using FaceGen software. The geometry of the face includes movable eyes, teeth, and tongue and so can be easily articulated for facial expressions and lip-syncing.
The “SI” on the forehead is an watermark of the software, and would obviously not be present in the finished model.
The last few days I’ve been working with a new capture of myself for the purpose of experimenting with animation. The capture was done in a neutral pose, which makes it much easier to work with in this next stage. Using Milkshape (a lightweight game-mod development tool), I’ve articulated the model using a skeleton from the game Max Payne 2, and have been animating it using pre-recorded actions that come with the game. At this stage the model can be used to import into the game (which is quite fun in itself), where it can be used as an actor for producing Machinima. Alternatively, it can be animated directly from a 3D rendering package.
Interactive model and You tube video of animation in next part of entry… Read the rest of this entry »
I’m posting a rough model created using my 3d photo setup. It is smoother than the final model, as I haven’t finished interpolating the angles and so have averaged out everything to make it look better at this stage. Thought I’d post something just to show I wasn’t slacking off. 
The Java applet allows you to zoom (Shift+Left mouse), move (Ctrl+Left Mouse), and rotate (Alt+Left Mouse). It will slowly spin without your input. It is also quite large - in the region of 400k - so I’ve stuck it in the second half of this post to speed up loading of the blog.
Recently, Boingboing.com has been covering expositions of the similarities between Todd Goldman’s designs, and what is identified as the source of his “inspiration”. (Boingboing recent post) The examples show a striking resemblance that leave little doubt that Goldman copied aspects from the original.
While there is certainly a case to be made against unfairly profiting from someone else’s work, I am uncomfortable with the tone of the coverage. The poster was Boingboing’s Mark Frauenfelder; an illustrator and writer. I tend to make a rather evaluative distinction between “Art”, “Design”, and “Illustration”, though I realise that for most people the domains are growing less distinguishable. I do believe however that they operate with different agendas, and I identify part of my discomfort with the posts as a sense that these different agendas are being glossed over by indiscriminate use of the terms “artist”, and “designer/illustrator”.
Another point of discomfort for me is the language of these posts, that seemingly conflict with with the bulk of Boingboing’s anti-IP posts. For example, in the most recent post the similarity between works is used to categories Goldman’s work as “potentially stolen”. This is in contrast to criticism of such language by RIAA and MPAA that equates piracy to theft.
The following is text from an email to Mark Frauenfelder, which also mentions another post he made earlier in the day:
I’d like to comment on your ongoing coverage of Todd Goldman’s art, and more recently of a guy that “totally lifted” the style of John Kricfalusi. My general impression from Boingboing is that you are against IP protection that stifles innovation. Every release in Creative Commons is hailed, and every large institution attempting to protect a copyright it holds is criticised.
I think it is setting a dangerous precedent to attack artists for copying material from others. Granted, Todd Goldman is an illustrator who makes money off of these designs, but consider the argument against copyright lobbying of Disney i.e. that for every Disney work they are extending protection on, they are condemning “lost works” to limbo. By attacking a few commercially motivated instances of copying, you are placing yourself in a very contentious position of saying what is allowable in art. The John Kricfalusi rip-off might be highly derivative, but it is an original work. Contemporary art is a dialogue between previous works, and those that come after them; there is no such thing as a divinely inspired artwork that is atomic and totally original. Andy Warhol was strongly centred on mass-production of previously available images. One artist commented on artwork ownership by photographing paintings and signing them.
As a contemporary artist - though I’ve never consciously copied another’s work - it stings me to have this didactic voice casting out heavily derivative artwork *without even acknowledging that this a point of contention*. If you are against the laziness and exploitation of other peoples work for the sake of making money, then explicitly say it. Otherwise your position is ambiguous and it appears you are attacking the similarity of material itself. Also ambiguous is how this position is reconciled with the general attitude towards IP law, as stated above. I’d agree that in many instances the artist whose work is being used are not in a position to contemplate legal proceedings against the so-called “infringer”, and that there may be an unfair exploitation of the work to make money, but when the vast majority of legal copyright manoeuvres seem to be abusing the IP laws, and when these artworks are arguably original enough to guard against such law, it does present a confusion of your position.
What are your views regarding “derivative” or “copied” works? Contribute your thoughts in the comments.
I’m currently working on a photo egg and digital camera array to allow me to produce 3D digital models of people (see previous entries).
Progress report: I’ve just completed the wooden framework of the egg. There is now a Flickr photo set tracking the progress of the egg. In other news I’m close to finishing installation of the last few remote trigger mechanisms in the cameras.
As part of my current 3d modelling project I need to trigger an array of 25 cameras reliably. I did a great deal of research looking for a cheaper digital camera that could be triggered either by USB, or similar computer controlled, and came to the conclusion that there were none. Despite how simple it would seem to be, the cheapest point-and-shoot cameras with this feature are all above US$400.
I decided to go for a good, sturdy camera that offered a good layout for hardware modification, and to brew my own trigger system. I’ve posted the results to instructables: a how-to for adding a shutter trigger to the Kodak C653 camera. Hopefully this will help save others the hours of wasted research I spent.
For your viewing pleasure; an interactive version of the results of my test-run. As mentioned earlier, the face and arms are a little distorted due to the process taking a few minutes and the model moving/changing expression. This will not occur in the final system, as all information will be captured in one go.
The model runs as a Java applet, and may take a few moments to load.
Read the rest of this entry »