Embedded Files
Final Animation:
Final Animation:
The final animation for the cannonball, using playblast.
Storyboards and Description
Storyboards and Description
These are my original storyboards. The animation ended up being slightly different by the end.
The cannonball starts at the top of the steps. It rolls back first, as a wind up, before rolling down them one at a time (anticipation). As the cannonball rolls, it hits each step with a small bounce to help show its weight. The camera will follow the ball as it rolls, shaking hard when the cannonball hits each step to more exaggerate its weight (exaggeration, staging).
In the original storyboards, the cannonball then rolled down the slope of a loop, gaining speed. Eventually it would slow down near the top, then drop like a stone into the bottom of the loop. However, I couldn't get the timing right on it. It looked unnatural. So I chopped the loop off and had the dead drop right at the end of the shallow ramp.
The ball teeters at the edge (anticipation) and then I use squash and stretch to show its fast decent into the sand below.
Images:
Images:
Anticipation
Anticipation
I had a very slow roll over the edges to add anticipation.
Squash and Stretch
Squash and Stretch
At the end, I stretched the cannonball for one frame and squished it for one frame to show its velocity from a higher point.
Staging and Exaggeration:
Staging and Exaggeration:
These are hard to capture in still images. But I had the camera follow the cannonball in close, to show that the ball is the center object of attention. I also added a few jerky frames of animation to the camera every time the cannonball hit a surface to exaggerate how much it weighed.
Other Models:
Other Models:
The model of the boat was a free one I found from free3d.com. It was mainly just added for setting. It's supposed to be a DaVinci Paddle boat. I thought it looked pretty cool.
Some final notes :
- I am very unhappy with the quality of this animation, however, I just didn't have as much time to dedicate to it because of the crazy workload due for all my classes right before spring break.
- For some reason, I could not get any textures whatsoever to display, no matter what I tried. I do not understand what the issue is, but hopefully I can fix it for the next project. Hence the ugly colored result with no shading or lights. I hate the colors...
- I couldn't come up with much inspiration for a cannonball, so I just tried to put it through motions that would emphasize its weight and physics, since that was the main goal of this project. I thought stairs and a small ramp would do well to show this.
- It is 3:24 a.m. as I write the end of this. Please have mercy on me...
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