Going Live Project Update 26/03/23

 Going Live Project Update                                                                                                                 26/03/23

Figure 1: Broken rails: https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.entrepreneur.com%2Fliving%2F3-ways-youre-derailing-your-employees-productivity%2F227432&psig=AOvVaw3TD2BF9oq-EeFoAYPAa_u8&ust=1679941579596000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA8QjRxqFwoTCOD7gpuc-v0CFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE

The animation phase in my project with Nikko in Maya has hit a bit of a roadblock.  I had found a method of moving the character forward without sliding in Maya, but the problem was that it was a very stop-start flow where it pass through one foot and then stop before proceeding to the next foot.  I know that this can be resolved because I tried a similar approach to the Kayla rig (which was taller and could travel further in a cycle) and I found a way forward that had minimal sliding.  There was some sliding at the mid contact phase but it was minimal.  The problem with the Nikko rig is that his legs are much shorter so they can't travel far.  Unfortunately, during my last session with the double bounce walkcycle on Nikko, everything began to feel like it was falling apart.  The most problematic part of the rigs for both characters seems to be the feet, since they often don't behave as keyframed and Tinny currently has a fault where the toe area of his foot is disjointed for the sole.  The most frustrating part of the session however, came in the afternoon with Nikko's rig where the right leg was out of sync, not performing as keyframed with the foot doing all sorts of unscripted maneuvers, and drawing attention away from the rest of the body.   This was especially irritating for me because I'd spent a great deal of time earlier carefully calculating the exact distance to move the body forward for each increment.  Further complication arose from the fact that the rest of the body had so much animation added that it made redoing the footwork too cumbersome, and so the animation was effectively derailed.  Thankfully I'd managed to do some playblasting of some earlier maneuvers so I had some footage to show Wild Child, but it was still a bit of a trainwreck to behold.  I showed the footage to the tutor to see if it could be resolved, but in the end, I resignedly shrugged my shoulders and decided to start all over again with the updated rig and model, and as of this writing I'm currently at the phase of creating some engaging arm movement.  I also have some feedback from Wild Child to slow the double bounce walk down once the extra down stage has been applied and the graph editor has been modified as necessary.  I am aware that this is not an unheard-of event situation in animation, with stories of entire original animation footage being stolen, but the whole initial animation process in about one day if I stay focused, so I should still be able to produce a decent animation for the pitch scene.  As for Tinny, considering his problems that still need to be ironed out, the best course of action for him going forward would be a simple waving animation, or at the most, a spinning top animation with the head.  I'm going to focus on making Nikko's walkcycle look as good as possible, so I can finish the Wild Child project with pride, and make it a notable CV credit.

Figure 2: Rigged leg in Maya: https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2F3dtotal.com%2Ftutorials%2Ft%2Fintroduction-to-rigging-in-maya-the-legs-jahirul-amin&psig=AOvVaw2JFs3kVGLipdRZ86I0Yps4&ust=1679943174220000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA8QjRxqFwoTCIjugJOi-v0CFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE