Project 5: Rube Goldberg Machine

Created By: Sydnee Belcher

Date due: April 2, 2019

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Final Animation

The final animation of my Rube Goldberg Machine.

It has multiple camera views, lighting, and shadows, all edited together in a video editing program called Shotcut.

Sketch Storyboards:

The end animation ended up following my storyboards completely, which for me is strange since I usually make a lot of changes along the way.

Following the storyboards from 1 to 8 below:

A ball falls from a tube and hits a bunch of spinning paddles until the it hits the last paddle which tips the gear
The gear is tipped and pushes the first domino over
As the dominoes fall, they travel up a spiral staircase
Once the dominoes reach the top, the last one pushes another ball off the edge and into a funnel
The balls goes into the hole of the funnel and down, following two guide rails to direct it towards more spinning paddles
The first paddle is bumped by the ball, and then chain reacts with the next two paddles
the last paddle is bumped and in turn it knocks over a lever to a switch next to the end sign
When the switch lever is pushed, it lights up the end sign and this signals the end of the animation

Dynamic moving parts:

I had 7 moving parts in this machine, all of which are listed below using before-and-after images:

Part 1: A small trapdoor that slides from underneath the first marble to begin the machine.

Part 2: Free-rotating paddles that react to the weight of the falling marble and eventually hits a final paddle that triggers the next part of the machine.

Part 3: A free-rotating gear, that reacts to being bumped by the last paddle in the previous part, tilting it forward and pushing the first domino forward.

Part 4: A spiral staircase of dominoes that fall upwards and eventually push a second marble off the platform.

Part 5: A second marble that gets pushed by the last domino and falls into a funnel, which travels down and pushes the first of three more free-spinning paddles.

Part 6: A series of three free-spinning paddles that react to each other after the initial push of the second marble in the previous part, eventually flipping the lever at the end of the machine.

Part 7: A lever that can be pushed back by the last paddle of the previous part, turning on the light of the "The End" sign and ending the machine.

Textures:

All textures were found on Google by searching appropriate keywords. I wanted to go something like a marble-and-wood theme. Any other colors seen in the animation were those included in Maya 2016.

Dark Wood Flooring

I wanted a dark wood flooring to contrast white marble walls. I actually found this texture from homedepot.com!

This texture was used to cover the spinning ovals at the end of the machine and the lever that switches on the light. I wanted a wood grain that looked like something sanded and stained, rather than like floorboards. This was found on experiencerestigouche.com.

Black Marble Texture

I used white marble for the spiral staircase, so I wanted a good contrast for the dominoes. This texture is an image from an artist named Hinata Lexy Lin, whose work is on Redbubble.

White Marble Texture

This texture was used for the spiral stairs, the ceiling (that can't be seen) and the base of the light switch. I liked the organic look and the elegance of it. This texture was found on freepik.com.

Marble Wall Texture

I knew I wanted white marble walls for the background, as it would show shadows really well, but I didn't want something too similar to what I used for the stairs. I picked this one because it went with the rose-gold look of some of the machine parts as well as the marble aesthetic. This texture was found on freepick.com as well.

Glass Marble Texture

The balls in my animation are meant to be glass marbles. I wanted a nice contrast to the other colors of the machine and environment so they would be seen, but not so much that they would look out of place. I decided this swirly-red pattern gave was a good in-between. This texture was found on franklinartglass.com. I edited it a tiny way to remove the borders, as it made the ball look less seamless.

Lighting and shadows:

I only used three light sources for this project. It's been a while since I took the course in stage lighting, so I used what I could vaguely remember and just felt through it the rest of the way.

I wanted semi-realistic lighting, something that would be recognizable to viewers. At the same time, I wanted to use dramatic shadows to help draw the eye and show off the movement of dynamic objects.

I went with a warmer tone, like a dimly-lit room of a hall or a maybe a light bulb about to go out.

I intended for the whole thing to have a sort of antique, but elegant atmosphere.

Spot Light: directly overhead

I wanted to simulate something that looked like an overhead light that might be affixed to the ceiling in a house. I also wanted to make sure I got some focus on the machine itself, since it's the star of the show.

I used a very low intensity, very pale orange-yellow colored light with a low penumbra angle and a medium cone angle. Overhead lights are rarely as strong as stage spotlights. I do love the dramatic shadows you get from this light source. It really helps highlight the movement of the objects.

I changed the color of the shadows this light cast to be a dark grey-pink. Not all shadows are variations of black. The different color gives the scene a little more character and help display the color scheme of the room better.

Area Light: directly overhead

Spot lights only light a specific area up, but typical house lights provide a sort of diffuse lighting that illuminates almost the entire room. To do this, I added an area light centered directly over the previous spot light, but a little bit below the ceiling of the background cube.

I liked the dark shadows this light cast on the walls and ceiling above it. It helps pull the focus more towards the center of the room where the machine is and keeps the background from being too distracting.

I used a medium intensity, off-white/creme color for this light to fill the room and illuminate things without affecting the more dramatic shadows cast by the spot lights. It gives everything a nice, dim, mood.

Spot Light: lower right angle, facing up and towards the machine

The two lights centered over the top of the machine ended up casting very boring shadows that made it hard to see what was going on a times.

To make things a little more interesting, and to bring some light to the darker areas, I added another spot light located at the floor and pointed up towards the machine.

I really love the big shadows it casts of the machine parts, which echo the movement of the moving parts.

I used a super low-intensity creme-colored light with a wider cone angle, a negative penumbra angle, and a little bit of dropoff. I didn't want this light to be overpowering, just enough to cast some cool silhouettes and lighten things up a bit. I also changed the shadow color from black to a light brown so it would better match the whole color scheme of the scene and also so it would be somewhat transparent so we can still see the wall behind it.

Some final notes:

Overall I'm very happy with how this animation turned out. I learned a lot about lighting and rendering, which I think is useful for my continued use of the Maya program
I wanted to add some music and make the transitions less choppy, but I had very little time left and ended up staying up past midnight to finish this project as I usually do.
The "E" in the end sign is super messed up and I don't know how to fix it. I tried messing with the geometry but to no avail.
All in all, I had a lot of fun with this project!

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