In today's tutorial we recapped how to use Maya as a large majority of us had been out of practice over the summer holidays. Once we had got to grips with the basics, we set up a new project featuring a pre-made rigged model that we could play around with. We did this to get a general idea of how the model was going to work and how they could be positioned.
I found that the model was fairly easy to move, but the character could easily be warped if some of the positions were pushed to the extreme. An example of what I mean is when you push the hips down, because of how the joints and limbs were connected, the legs would bend as they naturally would if you were squatting. However, if you were to continue to push the hips down, the legs would warp and collapse on themselves creating an unnatural stance. This is something that I shall have to look out for when it comes to making my own model, as I will want to avoid these faults in order to make a fluid, natural looking animation.
Positioning the Model
Once we had discovered how the model was going to work we briefly looked at UV mapping, and how we could use the map to colour our characters. Here I coloured over a copy of the map in Photoshop and used the JPEG as a material for the object.
Assigning a Material to the Model
I thoroughly enjoyed the session today. It has made me excited to get started on my own characters, but at the same time really nervous as I have the feeling it's going to be really complicated to recreate.
Bring it on.
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