Development Log

Week goals:

• Start and complete Task 1 - Analysis ✔️

• Orient myself with the brief and begin considering different ideas  ✔️

Over the course of this week I had initially begun the project and had become acclimated with the theme for this Final Major Project. As the week had started too, I had begun my brief analysis, this was a vital component in the creation of my project as carrying it out effectively would ensure that the work I produce will satisfy the brief to the best of my ability. During my analysis, I had gone in depth while considering the requirements and themes, as there was a lot to work with there. Additionally, I had provided my own interpretations of the theme and touched upon the potential ideas I have that may stem outwards, namely having the theme of "Next Generation" prominently tie to dystopian themes personally, and I do believe I have a lot to work with there. For inspirations, I had initially listed a variety of media forms and not just videogames, since it's clear that the product we produce could be anything along the games development pipeline. So I had discussed a book series I had very much enjoyed, as well as a videogame, however these were products I was already aware of and had been very familiar with. On the contrary, competitive media consisted of external research, I had come across a game I had not played before, and upon a deeper search, I had realised it was quite thematically similar to my initial concepts, I immediately recognised this as a potential competitor, and as such, it became something I wanted to ensure I set myself apart from.

Ultimately, I had completed the analysis in this week without any issues, and had begun to conceptualize potential proposals in my mind.

Week goals:

• Start and complete Task 2 - Proposals  ✔️

• Ensure I have a clear view of the potential projects I would create  ✔️

• Create my website for my development log and other documentation ✔️

Over this week i had begun the process of composing my 3 distinct proposals. It was vital that I considered the breadth of my ideas since I wanted to ensure that each idea was distinct enough to stand on their own, and to convey my creativity. I hadn't initially decreed it, but over the course of this task my ideas all drew back to AI. The reason for this was that it is a genuine concern of mine, and so I was able to draw from a personal place for my ideas. It's increasingly relevant to this task too and the next generation is going to be the first to ever have grown up along side Artificial Intelligence, the next generation of human being will not know a world without digital consciousness in it. 

The first proposal was deemed "Project Supersede" which dealt with the concept of human replacement, and being outlived by Artificial intelligence. This would be a series of 3d promotional renders that would convey the concept of AI being unaware of it replacement of humanity, and therein finding out they aren't human, their creators being long gone and nothing is left behind. 

This idea was followed by "Project Longing" which was a short walking game that followed the idea of humanity sharing its existence with an artifical humanity. This game would specifically follow a younger brother looking for his sibling who went missing one day, only by the end, to later realise that their sibling never truly existed, they were artificial. This concept existed to make the audience question a lot and consider their own philosophies, namely bringing up the thoughts around, can an AI be truly loved, and can an AI truly love someone back?

The final proposal I had made, and ultimately chose in the end, was "Project Artistry". This project would be a short 3d animation that intended to consider the idea of a future where the arts and all forms of creativity have been superseded and automated due to the increasing relevance of AI. This would be set in a reality very similar to our present, grounding the story and also bringing about more fear that we are barrelling toward this future at an alarming rate. I wanted to ensure this animation would be unique, and so I thought about utilising the colour grading of the animation as a narrative device, using monotone scenes to show a dreary reality, with colours cutting through to represent the vibrancy and wonder that creativity brings.

On top of this, I had also created my website, and so i can now officially upload my development log as the weeks go for this project. It was an easy process and I ran into no issues.

Week goals:

• Start and complete Task 3 - Research 🟡

• Finish off Task 2 - Proposals ✔️

• Lean techniques to aid in providing a high level of research and analysis [Semiotics] ✔️

Over this week i had continued on Task 2, as there was more work to be done for t. After creating my 3 proposals last week, I had been provided advice on how to progress by my tutor, ultimately leaning toward my third and final proposal, "Project Artistry". I had consulted my tutor on the potential avenues I could go with this proposal, and it was deemed that this proposal felt the most relevant and was a very unique take on the theme. As a result of this, I then proceeded to write up this proposal in the UAL provided format, assessing my prior work over the course, and how these skills informed my decision to create a 3d animation specifically. My reasoning was mostly that I had a degree of proficiency with 3D modelling, as well as Blender as a software, and so I thought that it was vital to ensure I don't go too far out of my depth for this project, but still attempt new practises to broaden my horizons. This is what spurred the consideration of a 3D animation, as animation is something I only have a cursory amount of knowledge on, so utilising my experimentation to learn how it functions would seem effective, as there wouldn't be a learning curve with trying to learn new software, I'd only need to learn new principles and basics. 

Ultimately I wished to start and complete task 3, however due to how long the UAL brief took to compile and understand, I didn't get to complete the task this week. This isn't too consequential, as I was able to begin the task, and have determined a few potential directions/sources for my research to take. Additionally however, I had also learnt about a useful principle in graphic design, which has transferable concepts that are applicable to games analysis, called "Semiotics". This is the study of signs and how they are utislised to convey meaning to audiences, videogames adhere to these principles too, with iconography, and relaying information to players. Despite this taking place of time I had initially dedicated to research, learning this will greatly enhance the analysis I can provide when attaining my research, and better allow me to gauge how I can tranfer these designs and what they want to convey into my own work, as my animation intends to portray a large portion of its story/concept via subtle storytelling in the environment and movements of characters.

As a result of this, I intend to finish task 3 next week, and begin task 4

Week goals:

• Finish off Task 3 - Research  ✔️

During the 4th week of the Final Major Project, I had finished off my research for Task 3. This included the searching of sources and the analysis of them to see how they can aid my idea generation. The research covered a few avenues that would assist in grounding my concepts for my animation is real examples, and techniques. I covered the thematic research, which essentially allowed me to do a deeper dive on the general public opinion on Generative AI. This consisted of my own form surveyed by my peers, which gave a smaller, but more personal swath of results. Additionally, I considered my secondary research as an interview carried out by the BBC on opinions of Generative AI. These both really aided me in determining how too portray the hypothetical future of Generative AI in society within my animation. As a result of researching these two, I had determined that I would need to show a more unique story that doesn't have one blanket approach to how Generative AI will affect humanity. Instead, I can show how people of many different backgrounds will feel both positive and negative about a future with AI, but still keep my message the same about how it's not a sustainable way of life.

As well as theme, I analysed my inspiration for visual style, as it is vital to establish my visual principles early on. As I work throughout my project, I can now be certain in my design choices. I analysed Disney's "Paperman", a 2d/3d animated short that covers a small story about a man looking for someone. The unique aspect here however, is the choice to have everything in black and white, but then using colour very sparingly to portray a message. The overall black and white visuals conveys the tone of dreariness that a dead-end office worker would encapsulate, while a striking red is used to cut through the boredom of the main character's life. I've learnt that being careful with the volume of colour used can really help emphasise the message you wish to portray.

Thirdly, I had analysed the hypothetical markets that my work could be applicable to. It's important to gauge how my medium will fare in the general markets, and as such I had analysed the 3d animation space. It's overtly positive, and from this I had learnt that the 3D animation market is relatively profitable right now with a few drivers that focus on the connection to an audience only animation can provide, this has imparted on me, the understanding that an emotive story that connects to viewers will be vital in ensuring the success of my animation as a whole.

Finally I had researched the various applications of sound in animation, as well as the role it plays in creation an impactful experience. For my own work, I wish to provide a unique take to the importance of animation by showing a world that has none of it. My findings have shown me how vital sound is to cultivating audience emotion, and I am certain that I wish to urge my audiences to feel isolation, and desolation when viewing my animation.

Week goals:

• Begin Task 5 - Pre Production ✔️

• Create plans to carry out Task 4 - Experimentation in the coming week ✔️

• Create Production Plan ✔️

Over this week, I carried out a few preparations for the upcoming holidays, ensuring that my tasks are fully complete, and that I can carry out some work over the next two weeks. Initially, I had proofed and checked over my research once more, as that task took longer than expected, but was still in line with the production plan I had made within the UAL Proposal format. This plan was rudimentary and over this week I refined it into a larger production plan that spanned all the weeks, allotting some contingency time and directly breaking down my tasks into their respective processes. This therefore, gave me a much clearer view of how my project was going to be carried out over time, while also quelling any concerns for lack of time. The plan was created in Excel as that allowed me to give a clearer breakdown of tasks, with easier adjustment over the project's duration.

Once this had been carried out I made provisions to allow myself to carry out some work over the next two weeks while off, mainly since I want to ensure that I carried out as much work as possible in the time I have allotted for the Final Major Project. In my production plan, I've placed experimentation and pre-production within the two week period coming up, this is possible from home as it will only utilise Blender and word for logging my processes. My experimentation will largely cover Blender processes, around animation as that is what I have less prior expertise in.

This week I also have begun the conceptualisation of my concept art, creating a mood board as well as researching hypothetical designs for my main character.

Week goals:

• Start and Complete Task 4 - Experimentation ✔️

Over these two weeks I had utilised available time within the holidays to get pre-production processes done, for the sake of time keeping and ensuring that my work is on track in line within my production plan. These two weeks were exempt from y production, and as such, any work done will directly aid in providing more time for my Production phase. Over this time I had focused on the experimentation, ensuring that this was completed in its entirety, as it would allow me to begin on my Pre-Production, which is vital to the Production.

My experimentation consisted of 3 experiments, all centred around Blender, where the majority of my production will occur, so establishing new skills here would prove the most effective at aiding my development of the final animation.

Experiment 1 aimed to ascertain the lighting for my animation. This process was enlightening, as I had utilised a tutorial, but then also went beyond that to determine how I can utilise this method of creating a depth buffer, to incorporate it into my lighting, as opposed to the common useage of them in post-processing. The tutorial initially showed me how outright create the buffer, using "Mist" within Blender, and then connecting that to the final render output within the compositing tab. After this, I had changed my viewport settings to portray the mist the the chosen render pass, therefore meaning my scene is rendered in real time as a depth buffer. This provided the exact effect I wished for, thus concluding this experiment as an overt success.

Experiment 2 aimed to establish my skills and understanding of the character rigging process. This one mostly stayed true to the tutorial, however I had tried to experiment with posing and movement once I had rigged the model. The process was simple, and relatively easy to carry out, it just requires a bit more fine-tuned work with naming eah bone in an armature and so on.

Experiment 3 has been the final one that stemmed off of Experiment 2. This was animation, and the process had allowed me to understand a slight bit more than I had prior about inserting keyframes. However, the overall goal was to experiment with interpolating keyframes more. Here I had experimented by creating a simple motion for my rig to follow through, and then tried out different interpolations. Eventually I had determined that Bezier and constant easing will be the most vital to my animation.

Week goals:

• Start Task 5 - Pre Production ✔️

Over this prior week I had started and begun my Pre-Production. This ensured the creation of my Pre-Production documentation, such as concept art and storyboards, all of which will effectively enable me to clearly plan my Production. This week I had created the storyboard and character concept art, as well as started the environment concept art for my animation

My character concept art was relatively simple, as my focus for the story wouldn't be making a unique character, I wanted to portray an average person, but one who appreciates creativity, and has long since seen it. A trench coat and a fedora alludes to an office worker, which is specifically what I wanted. I had also added in a pocket watch chain to bolster the silhouette. The character design didn't take too long to create, acclimating to the tools of Photoshop and drawing tablets took longer, and thus had slowed me down slightly. However, as I begun, I had managed to understand the size of the paint brushes I wished to utilise, and my colouring style.

After this, I had decided to move onto my storyboard as I thought it would allow me to truly understand the scope of my environment, therefore enabling me to purposefully design the layout of my environment more effectively. The storyboard came out really well, I believe I had managed to capture the exact message I wanted to portray. Having longer descriptions allows me to understand the exact beats of story and movement that will be in the animation, and by extension, the exact area the characters will move through. The storyobard covered a short span of time, but still shows the world defaced by AI art over the billboards, I purposely tried to make sure the visuals have the incorrect artefacts of AI Generated iamgery. This week I was able to complete the storyboard, meaning the majority of my Pre-Production is complete now.

Week goals:

• Complete Task 5 - Pre Production ✔️

• Begin Task 6 - Production ✔️

• Begin modelling character ✔️

During this week I completed my Pre-Production that I wasn't able to complete the week prior. All I had left was the creation of my Environmental Concept art. This proved much easier as per the existence of my storyboard, as I now can effectively gauge what areas I will need for the character to walk through. I created a top down view along side on proof of concept visual, with shading that attempts to mimic my aforementioned Blender lighting. The top down blue print also has a copy adjacent that maps the potential route the main character will follow over the course of the animation. This enabled me to make changes as necessary to the layout so that the scenes I want to show will flow better, without having to camera cut very much. I'm happy with the outcome of my environment concept art additionally, since I had also drawn up some likely assets I'll use such as benches, bins and lamp posts, as well as a statue reminiscent of the one actually in Piccadilly Circus, but more dilapidated and damaged showing age, grounding the world a bit more.

Additionally I had just started my Production, I decided to begin modelling my character first as I believe that will help me establish a modelling style for the rest of the environment. All I had so far was the coat and the head, the coat took longer, as I had initially planned for anyways, but came out perfect, the topology is great and can be subdivided easily for higher graphical fidelity if needs be and the silhouette makes the shapes/details evident at a glance.

Week goals:

• Continue Task 6 - Production ✔️

• Finish modelling character  ✔️

• Rig character model ✔️

Over the duration of this week I have continued on my Production as I intended to. This is evidently the longest part of the project, and also will be the most creatively strenuous, I need to ensure my skills can allow me to create a final product that effectively adheres to my vision for the animation. Specifically, I have finished the modelling of my character, which proved a lot easier considering I didn't need to focus on shading or texturing for the model, as per my lighting choices of silhouettes. This however, did prompt me to spend extra time and care on the overall shaping of my model, ensuring that every detail is clear and legible with the solid colour lighting. This meant I focused on the extreuding of various aspects of the coat, such as the flaps for the folds. Once the character model was done I had rigged the model to allow it to be fluidly posed via  painted weights. There were a few issues like incorrect weighting, however this was resolved via painting the weights manually, and now the model moves as I had intended it to. Now that my character was completely ready for use, I intend to move onto my environment next week

Week goals:

• Continue Task 6 - Production ✔️

• Model environment ✔️

Over the duration of this week I had aptly continued the development of my Production, namely the creation of my environment. This progressed relatively smooth, I focused on my concept art, creating an initial base that followed the road blueprint I created, and then smoothed it out, making sure the roads have equal width. With this foundation, I then moved onto the development of office buildings, here I had to experiment with the style, as my lighting would ensure a myriad of details become omitted when rendered fully. Therefore, I deemed that overtly detailed buildings would become a waste of effort and time that I cannot afford to dedicate to work that won't have any payoff. However, I still ensured that buildings have jutting windows, door frames and smoke stacks on the roofs to aid the skyline. I have placed them around, alongside modelling a bench, bin, lamp post and tree so that the area feels fuller. Using array modifiers, I had managed to generate a repeating pattern of street decor, so that their positions are easily editable, therefore allowing me greater control of how full, or empty my scene appears.

With the general area modelled, I moved onto the large advert building, the one similar to the well-known building in Piccadilly Circus. This was the centre piece for my animation, and I wanted to make sure I had executed its appearance right. I began by modelling a large base for the building, the adding a top, however, I chose to completely delete the middle. The reason for this, is that my lighting (mist pass) is entirely dependent on distance for colour, if two objects are too close together, the would be indiscernable as they would appear in the same colour. To combat this, I chose to use an optical illusion, having the sky be the background of the adverts, and the information/visual detail be modelled flat. This proved successful, but had one caveat. When the area is viewed from other angles, the adverts on the opposite that should be hidden are visible, and thus break the illusion. Despite this, I deduced a work around. By modelling them flat, I could take advantage of back face culling. This meant, creating a material for the adverts, then turning "Back Face Culling" on, I managed to hide the adverts that aren't facing the camera. Now my environment is completed and I can begin animation next week.

Week goals:

• Continue Task 6 - Production ✔️

• Begin/Finish animating ✔️

• Render animation 🟡

• Add sound effects in Premiere Pro ✔️

Over this week I had completed an excess of work towards the production phase of my project. With deadlines coming up, I wanted to ensure that I had don everything possible to create a final product that was reflective of my calibre of work, but also ensuring I adhere to the deadline with time to spare for contingency. This meant I had to do as much of my production as possible this week, as that would leave the next week for proofing of the project, and my evaluation.

This encapsulated finishing my animation. With my environment done and rig ready, all that was left was the actual animation itself. Overall I'd say it went well, for my first true endeavour into 3D animation (and animation as a whole), the result is relatively smooth, I had learnt a lot over this process and believe the work reflects that. 

Animating the initial frames proves easy, as I started with a wide shot that allowed for leg movement to be minimal,  which later proves to be the main difficulty of this animation. Animating walk cycles can be difficult, there are a lot of components to one, with the rise and fall of the legs, while also ensuring you match the walking speed of the character as it covers distance, legs sliding completely undermine the look and gives the animation a slightly lower quality feel. As a result of this struggle, I had pivoted how much walking I'd show, as I recognised not all scenes need to be wide shots that show the full body, closer shots will help the audience gauge the feeling of the main character.

After animating the scenes up to the train station entrance, I realised that I needed to model the two background characters, a mother and child. This was a minor task, but still took time to make sure that they fit the animation. Using the main character as a model base, I edited the coat and sculpted hair for the mother, then gave her a static pose, as she wouldn't need animation besides head movement, which can be done with manual positioning. The child needed  a proper rig, so for that I had used a rig similar to that of the main character, however ever so slightly more rudimentary, with less bones in the arms and removing bones for coat tails.  With this completed, I now add them into the workspace and animate these characters in time with the main character. With that, I complete the animation as I add in more keyframes and camera positions. With the animation completed, I now move onto rendering the final product.

However, upon rendering I had noticed an issue with the animation, there was a model I left unhidden that got rendered in every scene. An umbrella model was hidden in Blender's viewport view, but not the render view. Ultimately I had run out of time for this week to work on the animation, and instead opted to re-render in the next week. Despite this I saved the video to allow myself to apply sound effects, so I can just combine the this sound effect audio track with the re-rendered video next week.

Week goals:

• Resolve issue around re-rendering the final output ✔️

• Start Task 7 - Evaluation ✔️

For this final week I had a few tasks to clean up and proof read to make sure everything is set for submission. The first thing I wanted to ensure I did this week was finalise the animation, and rectify this rendering error. On Monday I had begun re-rendering the animation without the umbrella model in the workspace, to really ensure it doesn't render again. This came out fine and as expected. However, the only other thing I needed to carry out for the production was the rendering of the paper, namely giving it a texture. To do this, I knew I had to carry out a second render, since depth buffers do not render textures in any form, such is their purpose, they only change the visuals through the distance/depth. My idea to do this meant re-rendering the animation, while hiding every other model besides the paper, however it isn't as simple as doing another render, since I knew that simply overlaying these two videos would just mean the paper would overlap with the normal render, and the paper would never be occluded by foreground elements, which completely ruins the animation. To circumvent this, I knew of a rendering setting called "Hold-Out" in Blender. This setting can be turned on, as opposed to simply hiding a model from render view. What this does, is that it hides the model, but not its occlusion properties, so the models can still cover other objects, but do not render themselves. This allows for me to render the paper exactly as it's seen in the animation, where it is covered by a character or environmental object it still will be occluded. After rendering this hold out version with the paper having a texture (as I had turned off the depth buffer for this render too), I overlayed it with the initial render in Premiere Pro and thus created the final product.

After finishing my production, I then moved onto my Final Evaluation which served as a summary document of the work I had carried out, reflecting upon my areas of success and weakness and ratifying what lessons I have learnt over the course of this project. This proved effective, and I do believe I have provided an equal assessment, gauging my weaknesses and strengths to the same degree making sure that I can see what I've learnt from them too. 

With that, I proofed the website and ensured that everything was uploaded then sent it off for feedback.