- This event has passed.
Corgan Media lab
January 24, 2009 @ 10:00 am - 12:00 pm
| In the beginning, Concept is Key!
We’ve heard it a thousand times. Strong concepts are the foundation for achieving great projects, and that’s just how Corgan Medialab, the 2D/3D animation studio of the architectural firm, Corgan Associates, Inc., insists on beginning any job. As a demonstration, the president, executives, and artists of Corgan walk ABOSG through the studio’s recently completed 30 second holiday animation, appropriately titled, Happy Holidays. They begin where all artists begin, with concept.
After Corgan accepts a client, they prepare with brief meetings between the two parties about a project’s concept and objectives. What are the client’s ideas and expectations? How will the Corgan team accommodate their customer’s needs? All of these questions are considered for the formal contract that outlines the budget, timeline, ownership, and other details of the final product. Once the contract is in place, the real creative work begins. Concept.
The results from the initial concept discussions between the client and studio are the animatics, or rough sketches put into a timeline, to show Corgan’s client a general layout of the idea. The goal of the presentation (animatics) is to convey the concept quickly and effectively, but the challenge lies in communicating the story with very little detail. Since animatics just represent the overall idea, the finer points such as extensively developed characters, lavish backgrounds and scenes, or fully orchestrated scores are left out. Animatics represent simple, unanimated images, usually set to a rough soundtrack. In the commercial media world, animatics are essentially the “sales pitch” of the project. They are completed very quickly and represent just enough information to get a client on board, with plenty of room for the studio’s later work and talent to complete the development. When the animatics are presented and agreed on by both the company and the client, the work expands from concept to design.
|
| Sketches and Storyboards. | |
| From concept, the project then moves into sketches and storyboards. Jackson, Corgan’s Concept Designer, is tasked with the responsibility of developing what the client wants. His job title is self explanatory; he takes the concepts and ideas captured in the rough anamatics and fleshes out a complete design.
|
|
| Jackson begins by developing character sheets; three to five of his best character designs for the client to view. In his presentation, he reinforces that a successful character always conveys plenty of emotion. In this stage, he’s free to make decisions about how the characters will be stylized. In this particular demonstration, the characters and their environment are heavily stylized; fun and playful cartoons rather than realistic or lifelike figures. The characters are then submitted back to the client for selection. The client chose a character design reminiscent of the classic 1920s and 1930s cartoons. Much like the original Mickey Mouse, the Happy Holidays’ family of characters are equipped with white four fingered gloves, overalls, and knocked knees. Jackson emphasizes costumes are a way to explain the character, and this particular design was the prefect fit for their vintage holiday themed animation. While the characters are being approved, Jackson turns his focus to finishing the designs for the environment of this holiday world. | |
| He tightens up the environmental design by achieving a unified look between the characters and their surroundings. His inspiration for the environment draws from the world of Dr. Seuss, with teetering houses atop silly hills and gravity defying roads as well as snow-swirled forests patterned like large ornaments on a Christmas tree. Jackson sketches out a candy factory among the clouds that the characters will zoom to in their self sustaining automobile. The entire presentation tells the story that the family of characters will be rocketing in their car from their home, across a snow filled landscape, and up into a sky bound candy factory.
His complete designs include the family of characters, a house, a vehicle, a roller coaster like driveway, forest scenery, and the holiday factory. Several technical drawings with multiple perspectives are prepared to aid the 3D development of the design. Once Jackson completes the overall design, the project moves into modeling and texturing. |
|
| Modeling and Texturing. | |
| Terry, Corgan’s Lead Modeler, takes over Jackson’s designs to build the holiday world and all of its assets in 3D Studio Max for eventual animation. Corgan uses 3D Studio Max because it provides the modeling department, and therefore the company, substantial cost savings. Later, the 3D Studio Max assets are exported to Maya for animation, but first Terry reviews what he’s made. | |
|
Terry starts with an exhibition of the characters’ home, based on Jackson’s preliminary drawings. Petite looking from the outside and oversized from within, the house has a narrow base and broadens as it reaches towards the sky. It is filled with inane goofy treasures such as a cat scratching post, even though this family clearly doesn’t have a cat. The house sits on top of a staggering golden hill; remindful of all of the prairies the Road Runner so cleverly escaped Wile E. Coyote. We see that using reference and inspiration ties the overall style of the project together while it also intellectually appreciates popular culture. From the home, we turn our attention to the little characters that will occupy the residence.
Next Terry presents the modeled characters in gray shade turnables, so the client can view the models from the full 360 degrees. Showing the client a project’s progress is an important contribution to open communication.The client’s constant involvement allows Corgan to make necessary adjustments as they go. Once the main character is approved, his family is developed by using his body mesh as a template. |
|
| The client’s constant involvement allows Corgan to make necessary adjustments as they go. Once the main character is approved, his family is developed by using his body mesh as a template. The artists save time, money, and provide consistency in how the characters look by using character templates. Finally the characters are named, not only to identify files, but also to give each character their own personality. The artists working on the project used their grandfathers’ names as a fun way to keep with the classic character style of the 1920s and 1930s. The next modeling example Terry reviews is the most unique character of all, the family car. | |
| To incorporate some of the holiday themes Corgan brings to life in this animation, the convertible sedan is playfully covered in red and white candy cane swirls. The vehicle has individuality in small details like a sled base rather than a wheel axis. The car also no gas pedal or steering wheel. Such details would make the car completely impractical to drive, but actually these traits imply that the car has enough charisma to drive you wherever you want to go. Terry emphasizes that the car needs to be just as interesting, if not more so, than the main characters, and such affection is achieved through the playful details. Once Terry modeled the car, he moved on to the settings for all of his creations.
|
|
| Finally, Terry discusses the landscape. He’s played with the geometry of the clouds, testing out several styles and shades, searching for the perfect combination of harmonious form and color between the subtle background and the characters. The backdrops of snowy hills are handled with a similar treatment. Terry settles for rolling slopes and trees covered in frost accompanied by oversized Christmas ornaments scattered about as natural landmarks. The results are a wonderland with plenty of holiday cheer; a perfect backdrop for the characters to live out their festive adventure. With all of the assets built and textured, the project is ready for animation. | |
| Animation. | |
| Corgan’s Lead Animator, Ken, takes all of the characters and assets built in 3D Studio Max from Terry, and imports them into Maya for rigging and animation. There’s some discussion over the studio’s choice of working between two programs. The explanation is simple enough; the modelers were trained in 3D Studio Max, and continue to work in the software they are most efficient and effective. 3D Studio Max animators are much more difficult to find, however, since most animators are trained in Maya. They also make note that knowing certain software packages is not as important as being a resourceful artist. The most valuable resource an artist can have is the ability to problem solve. Ken’s problem solving skills are immediately set into action because he needs to install character rigs.
Ken’s first step is to take the main character into Setup Machine 2, a software program that installs high-quality skeletons and proxy and adds a control rig. The tool also applies basic skin weights to any human, animal, or creature models. |
|
| The Setup Machine 2 software saves days of effort in rigging, so Ken can get to work on the final touchups by weight painting the character’s skin. Once the accurate skin weights are on the characters, Ken moves on to adding blend shapes for additional facial expressions. By using morph targets, he captures all of the facial contortions he’ll need. Ken tests every controller he’s created by setting up key frames to examine the character’s entire range of motion. Satisfied with the results, Ken considers the rigs complete and is now ready to animate by key frame.
The project is animated by scene. The majority of a job’s time and budget is usually spent here, simply because the movement of the animation is so critical to the job’s success. After the animation team completes a scene, the piece of animation is then ready to move into lighting and compositing. |
|
| clips here | |
| Lighting & Compositing. | |
|
|
|
| When the scenes are in place and the animation is set, Tony, a Lighter and Compositer, takes over the project to add in the lighting. Without proper lighting, all of the details captured in the models, textures, and animation would be lost. He claims that the artists intended to keep the entire animation simple, and the lighting followed suit. | |
|
|
|
| He reviews that he added a sky light, a key light, a fill light, and a rim light. The sky light provides the natural lighting look, for all of the outdoor scenes. His key light is the brightest main source of lighting in front of the animation. The fill light is a secondary light source to counteract the shadowing effects of the key light, and the rim light functions as an accent light. Once the lights are in place, Tony views the lighting through different passes. | |
| Each pass tells Tony different information about the lighting’s current settings. He discusses the results from the matte pass, the diffuse pass, the shadow pass, and lighting pass. By looking at the information displayed in each pass, he can make appropriate adjustments to correct the lighting of the overall composition. When the lighting is corrected, he then moves on to the remaining visual effects.
|
|
|
|
|
| The effects budget was much smaller that the animation budget, so Tony had to be especially creative and well-organized with his time and resources. But certain effects, such as the smoke from the car exhaust, falling rocks from the vibration of the roadway, and moving clouds, were necessary final touches to complete the short. The outcome is subtle, yet suiting, and ties in very well to the final animation. | |
| It’s a Wrap! | ||||
| The final product is Corgan Medialab’s thirty second animation, Happy Holidays. The project took a total of six weeks of work with two to three people working at any given time. The team is proud of their accomplishment, and rightfully so. Their talent and problem solving skills made this completed animation a hit with its audience, and an excellent example of how a professional studio takes a project from concept to creation.
Also, check out our interview to the speakers HERE.
|
|
|||
Credits:
Article written by Amy Cass.
Article layout and online publishing by Raul Aparicio, Lucia Miron, and Vince Sidwell.
All Artwork by Corgan Medialab.
Photography and image layout by Raul Aparicio, Robert Opel, J. Schuh, Vince Sidwell, and Gene Zelenkov.