It Pulled Me Back In!!!

Had to do a bit more on the concept scene tonight! After Drew successfully imported the camera move I animated of the feet taking off, he suggested that I do the camera animation for the two other all-CG shots, rather than try to describe to him what I was after and having him do the animation. So this evening I suited up in XSI and... did... that. One of the shots was the very first shot of the Woodman. I'm going to go ahead and NOT talk about that one. Because we need to have SOME secrets, here. However minor.

The other shot was the sort of "reveal" shot of the Woodman, the first time in the film we get a really good look at our boy. I'd done an animatic of that shot along with the rest of the sequence way back in August. A few weeks ago, I realized that the shot I had animatic'ed up actually broke the 180 degree rule based on the shots on either side of it, and thus threw off the whole scene. I'd always felt something was off about that piece of the animatic, but for whatever reason it took me seven months to pin-point the issue...

At that point, though, I was posing the Woodman, and I realized that with his new pose, a new type of camera move was needed anyhow. So I did up a rough animatic version of the shot, now using the final model with textures and lighting and everything. I used a mask to fake the sort of rack focus I want on the shot. Then tonight, as I said, after Drew's earlier success importing animated camera data, I did up the final. I wanted it to still feel handheld, but also tried to achieve a smoothness that had eluded me in the two animatic versions.

So here's a video with all three sandwiched together. The first, roughest animatic, the second, non-line-breaking attempt on the final model, and finally the final move. You will note that while that is the final camera and Woodman in the last shot, there is no lighting, shadows, environment, or rack focus. So what you're seeing is still ridiculously far from final.