Zx Spectrum Next - Game study

A new project started following Jim Bagley's live sessions.
It is a jump back in the past programming on Spectrum some simple games-like stuff.
The above is an example written in ZXBasic that is full of great features for making simple games.
Let see if we will port some of this in machine code, at least this is what Jim is trying to do....

Merry Christmas !!

Ok I'm a Garfield fan so, a loooooong time ago (... really I thought this work was lost but I found it by chance last week so...), I asked him help to wish you all:

MERRY CHRISTMAS !!

Warrior animation 1

 

Some more frames: a new frame for the heavy blow, a lateral jump  with sword and a forward with sword (a short skidding step) are added.
And everything put togheter in a new sequence.

Jump

And now another basic action: jumping.
As usual a short sequence for a small jump, using a low number of frames.

Running

Another basic action added to the list available for our warrior: the run.
 It could not seem but there are a lot of actions that have to be considered for giving an acceptable degree of interactivity to a game character.
Running is quite common in games, usually mor than walking, so how can I miss an attempt of drawing some frames for my fantasy warrior ? No way of avoiding that.
Having already done a walking sequence, I have had to match the two in some way, but a 4 frames sequence seemed not a so good result, so I went for an adjustment and added two frames to the runnig sequence, increasing the distance travelled. In this way I tried to minimize the diference ni time length of the two animations.
Obviously both the sequences are much under the clasical number of frames suggested for them, but thinking of a game context being at a low frames count could be very useful, and the result is stil acceptable, at least to me ;).

Warrior animation

Still drawing fantasy warriors: added two more frames and decided to put all togheter ... as in a game environment ... to test some basic actions: walk, stand, draw, light blow, heavy blow, sheat sword ... to check if all the action can be played separately or as a sequence.
It could be time to find an opponent to this barbarian :)

Strike a Blow !

Another action for our warrior: now that the sword is in his hand,  he can even try to strike a blow !
So nothing seriuos, as usual, and still stuck on this silly mood of drawing sketches for an animation placing the frames one next to the others instead of one over the other, models or reference images and not tracing guide lines. Why doing things in this wayy really I don't know but I'm quite enjoying the process.
Now I've managed an high blow ... but ... I think that adding one or two frames it can be expanded to a full body swing and blow.

Draw your sword !

Ok still some drawings: now let the warrior prepare for the fight!
Same idea as the precedetn post: draw the kyeframes one next to the other on a sheet of paper. This time I've to add two more poses after testing the first group of four keyframes: four were not enough for all the action, so I've to draw two ointermediate poses on a different sheet. Doing so I ended with a series of six poses, the first and the last not strictly tied to the action but good for thinking of transitions to other animations.

Still walking

 

Still making some experimentation with the walk cycle of the last post ... just added some details ... and thinking of some other possible improvements and, why not, some other animation ... and then ... ok one step at a time :)
Really, in this weeks, I'm enjoying more doing some pencil drawing than firing up the pc and starting something, so ... let see if can draw something more.

Walk Cycle sketch

A quick sketch of a 4 key-frames walk cycle, and the resulting animation.
Just an exercise ... or not ? As usual more ideas are coming with every scketch and drawing ...
If having enough time do to something ... we will see ... as usual :)

Unity 1 - Black Knight

After having create the main structure of a simple game in Blender Game Engine, I tried some simple experiments in a different 3D engine: Unity.
I think I'm going to try some more ... :) but for now simply the import of an animated model, created in Blender, and the use of scripts for testing the animations.
For the Black Knight you can use the following keys:

- Right Arrow, starts ccw rotation.
- Left Arrow, starts cw rotation.
- W, walk.
- R, run.
- Space Bar, attack.
- I, idle.

The small game project (more details on that in a future post) is waiting for the new Blender release to see if, at the least, the use of a game controller is correctly enabled as in older versions of the software.

Music of Nature

After a long time there is the animation related to the Leaf screnshot of a precedent post.
This was an idea born a long time ago and in its first version the storyboard included a tall plant (possibly a tree), a small pond, some vegetation and a sunrise. Then the semplification, and the search for what was my focus of interest in all the visualzation.
Now there is a minimal number of elements and the overall atmosphere is different from the first sketch but, really, is more near to what moved me toward this scene in the first time.
The story is about the discovering of the music hide inside the nature, as the drops falling from a leaf. It can be a difficult process and can run slowly at the start, but when its rules are grasped it runs faster as it becomes easier.
The project is completely done in Blender. The Leaf is a  complex model with a minimal depth and lot of details. The drop moving along the leaf surface is the result of a fluid simulation. Sad to say but there are not much instruments n Blender to work on the geometry resulting from a simulation, so, in the end, this was the best I could achieve in a reasonable time.
There is no sound but, if I will find what is needed and some more spare time, it could be that I can try to match the video with a simple sound project: it will start from the sounds of a quiet field, then giving space to the splash of the first drop, and then to the the sound of a single note released when it collides with the water surface. Easy but I think it cold creat a good oveall effect, just have to find the time to test this idea! ;)

Pluto and its bike

A short animation made in Flash. Alex liked the character and said: "it is Pluto on a motor bike" ... so ... that's good and I'm going for it: it will be Pluto! :)

Processing 3

And now for some interactivity !!
A new project MAGIC WEB implements some interaction making the user create its own design.
Read the following instructions to learn what can be modified and how.
As usual here follows the introduction to the project I made for the course:

// Always loved the geometric pictures that can create curves using straight elements...like the picture made
// using nails and threads. So this was my chance, and now I can make the object change its shape while
// doing it, a feature impossible for the real object. For this project my focus is more on the shape than
// on the colors, those I simplified using grey, black and white because I think that
// the 'feel' of this kind of picture is kind of similiar of that of the elegant oriental ideograms. 

// MAGIC WEB

// Keys 1, 2, 3, 4 activate-deactivate elements
// s - S save picture
// Canc - Back Space erase

// Mouse drag along y axis increase-decrease the number of threads
//drag along x axsis modifies the angle of the web's corner

Snake

Just another quick animation for testing deformation tool and Z-order for placing the snake on the branch and let its body crawl ahead or behind the branch using just one drawing.

T-Rex

Another dinosaur, but no 3D :( , still can't save enough spare time...

So another test in animating a drawing, or slice of it, using a 2D deformation tool. This was a text more aimed to understand how the texture of the drawing can be altered by such tools. The result was really interesting: even the legs that are deformed quite a bit from their rest position retain an almost unaltered shading. Definitely a useful instrument for animating.

IK in 2D: a step further

The next step in using IK and skeletons in 2D is something really intrigunig.

The point is that: the user has to be able to define arbitrary points, selected on a drawing (using pixel precision) that become the center points of other levels. The position of each of this point can be animated over the time, in this way you can specify the exact position where a drawing has to be placed. If even bones can be linked to this chosen point you have the following chance: you can define the position of a bone and of the drawing linked.

If you use this technique on character that is turning, then you can mark the places of the limbs in respect of the body during the animation. And you can easily build a character animated with a skeleton that can even turn is back to the camera.

In this example the little pelouche bear is built using this technique.

IK in 2D: tests

Some tests of using skeletons and IK. I've always used skeletons and IK in 3D softwares and it was new for me find and use these tools in a 2d software. To understand better how they work I quickly sketched a posing puppet, every moving section of the body is a different level (object) for the software, and then I built a skeletal stucture for the puppet, parenting and linking all the objects. Then was the the time for animating everything using FK, IK and mixing them.

It seemed to work smoothly, you can even make a clone of the puppet mirror it and all the animations were mirrored in the right way. But then there was to test what could happen if translatig the skeleton and while changing the root of the IK chain while the root of the skeleton was a different join bringing the overall translation data: so another little test with the puppet making a lateral step.

Particles test

The company I'm working for develops a 2D animation software, used world wide for Film and Tv productions. The software has a long history and nowdays is really reach of features and tools, that can give you an aid in creating and realizing your ideas and animations.

One of the most interesting sections of the software is the FX area. Here, among a lots of 'image' effects, you can find the simulations effects and the powerful particles effect.

Particles let you create the 'usual' effects the particles are used for (like fire, rain, flocks, wind and the like) but one thing peculiar to this software is that you can use control images for influencing numerous parameters of the particle effect.

In this example you can see how to use control images for placing the particles in chosen spots (the coloured dots). The purple dots use the color gradient for influencing the particles size creating a distance effect: the small alien slugs are bigger near the viewer and become gradulaly smaller near the door.

The paticles can be animated by the effects parameters (applying forces, rotations, change in size and colours) and/or can be animated drawing the appropriate frames.





Animations 2D/3D

A collection of exercises proposed for a basic CG animation course.