3D Animation Ideas

ak22

ak22

ak22

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Not sure if this in right forum section but I in my final year of University and starting my dissertation. I have decided to make a using Maya 2011.

I'm really Struggling to find a good idea of what to Animate It can be (Short Film, advert, Trailer) etc I have spoke to my tutor we agreed should be between 50-90 seconds long.

Hoping some of you guys & girls can come up with some creative ideas :D Or some stories that you would like to see animated?
 
no matter how creative your idea you must take into account all the technical aspects,build you idea around how much time you can put into it and around your skill level,in maya your going to have to allocate a lot of time to your lighting and camera placement and model topology aswell as leaving ample time to render(or you could use a render farm at a very high cost:S)
i made the mistake of making very high poly project in my final year at uni,i had to ditch it three quarters of the way in as it was too demanding on my system,and i had left almost no time to render with mentalray,i ended up making a crappy short which in turn earned me an average grade,which helped me miss out on a first on my degree:s,
keep all that in mind and you will save yourself a lot of trouble.
if you need any help with maya just gimme a shout.
 
SulacoSystems said:
no matter how creative your idea you must take into account all the technical aspects,build you idea around how much time you can put into it and around your skill level,in maya your going to have to allocate a lot of time to your lighting and camera placement and model topology aswell as leaving ample time to render(or you could use a render farm at a very high cost:S)
i made the mistake of making very high poly project in my final year at uni,i had to ditch it three quarters of the way in as it was too demanding on my system,and i had left almost no time to render with mentalray,i ended up making a crappy short which in turn earned me an average grade,which helped me miss out on a first on my degree:s,
keep all that in mind and you will save yourself a lot of trouble.
if you need any help with maya just gimme a shout.
Click to expand...

Thank you for the reply I am getting back into my finally year project next week (finally completed my other course work). Atm I am at my planning stage searching for guides / plans never made short film or used maya before so a lot or research. Will be using render farm at uni do you know of any must have books? or websites ? I have purchased learning maya books and using simply maya.com atm.
 
http://www.digitaltutors.com/09/index.php

Really great tutorials
youtube is a goldmine for tutorials aswell
taking into account that you are just learning maya,you might want to look into doing a more mechanical animation by this i mean a animation consisting of vertical horizontal and rotational movement (a good example is animating a pinball machine)as it will be easier to keep track of your timing and will help keep you models simple and easy to texture.
if you want characters you will have a lot of work ahead
modelling characters with good edgeflow
uv mapping and texturing
building a rig for the character
binding the character to that rig
creating a facial rig or a multitude of blendshapes for facial animation
the two main things you should avoid is speach and a busy scene.
 
Thanks for the link used this site before on 3ds max forgot about it lol, Just need to get my head down next few days find good idea I am thinking maybe trailer for short film will be better option or a fake game trailer
 
SulacoSystems Any idea why when I click on anything under the maya help menu nothing come up? I’m using maya 2011 the all the documents are downloaded, I access them manually in the maya folder but not through maya program itself?


Ignore the above I have fixed it lol, was missing simply . in the plugin file lol
 
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ak22 said:
SulacoSystems Any idea why when I click on anything under the maya help menu nothing come up? I’m using maya 2011 the all the documents are downloaded, I access them manually in the maya folder but not through maya program itself?


Ignore the above I have fixed it lol, was missing simply . in the plugin file lol
Click to expand...

^_^
 
I would suggest concentrating on the story telling aspect of a short story, and keep the technical aspect simple. Some of the best short animations I have seen have been really simple in terms of visuals, but they have well thought out stories and characters.

As mentioned above, make sure you don't bite off more than you can chew as it is better to have a polished simple concept than an incomplete complex idea.

Ps. I did a BA Computer Animation in 2001-2005. :)
 
Messiah Khan said:
I would suggest concentrating on the story telling aspect of a short story, and keep the technical aspect simple. Some of the best short animations I have seen have been really simple in terms of visuals, but they have well thought out stories and characters.

As mentioned above, make sure you don't bite off more than you can chew as it is better to have a polished simple concept than an incomplete complex idea.

Ps. I did a BA Computer Animation in 2001-2005. :)
Click to expand...

Thanks for advice still stuck on a solid idea, and time is ticking lol I let you guys know once i come up with one and see what you think.
 
ak22 you should have a look at 3dbuzz.com they do a course called Advanced Digital Production and it covers creating a short from scratch with Maya covering every step. Initially they started with Maya 2008 then later in the course they use 2011.

You need to be a member sponsor now to see it but you could just buy 1 month to see if you like it. I seem to mention them a lot I have no affiliation with them just a happy customer.

Note the prices at the end are the old prices you get everything now as a member sponsor.

 
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Chaos said:
ak22 you should have a look at 3dbuzz.com they do a course called Advanced Digital Production and it covers creating a short from scratch with Maya covering every step. Initially they started with Maya 2008 then later in the course they use 2011.

You need to be a member sponsor now to see it but you could just buy 1 month to see if you like it. I seem to mention them a lot I have no affiliation with them just a happy customer.

Note the prices at the end are the old prices you get everything now as a member sponsor.
Click to expand...

Thanks a lot choas I have signed up for digitaltutors.com will look into 3D buzz the video looked great, have you done much Animation yourself?
 
The interface doesn't really change much from 2008 to 2011 so you should be able to find your way around old tutorials no probs.
 
What is your favourite computer game? Make a story around that?

How about a short advert about a film where we put all the the hollywood action heroes in to a ring and tell them to fight, last man standing!

What happens behind the scenes in the mystery machine?

just pick a random idea and see what you can do with it :)
 
Hey what if you want to make an animated video but have no skills but are willing to pay someone to make it for you? How much would something like a 60 second video cost? Is there a marketplace for that kind of thing?
 
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