Project 4 : Character Modeling<br>
    Date Assigned: July 11th<br>
    Model Sheet Due:  July 13th in class<br>
    Project Due: July 18th, 11:59am<br>

<p>
    Reading: Chapter 10 and 11<br>
    John Lasseter's SIGGRAPH '87 paper: <a href="Lasseter_1987.pdf">Principles of Traditional Animation Applied to 3D Computer Animation</a><br>
<P>
    In this assignment you will move beyond the still image and into
    the world of animated characters. As a group you will design,
    build and start animating a character. As you start thinking about
    your character and how it should move, use the eye for detail that
    you have been developing to study motion of things, people,
    animals in the real world.
<P>
    Once again, new groups have been created. Unlike the past few
    projects, this project does not build on models from previous
    assignments. It does, however, build on your experience in
    creating and shading models.
<p>
   <h3> Getting started</h3>
<UL>
    An important, early decision you must make is whether or not to
    use skeletons in the construction of your character. The choice
    you make will affect how the character will be animated. Skeletons
    allow you to use inverse kinematics. For more on this, read the
    relevant parts in Maya.
<P>
<!--    The SBD (Scene Block Diagram) window in Alias will become
    increasingly important from here on out. Make sure you are
    comfortable using it to access and manipulate parts of scenes and
    models. -->
</UL>
<h3>    To learn about the tools for building and animating characters in Maya.
 Read the man pages in Maya regarding:</h3>
<UL>
        <LI> Maya: Tutorial: Animation
	<li> Maya: Animation 
</uL>
   <h3> What to do</h3>
<oL>
       <li> As a group, think up an articulated character, i.e., one
       that is built from a collection of rigid pieces. Design and
       plan carefully. Some characters built now may very well figure
       in the final animation. To help organize and record your plans,
       make a model sheet for your character. This document should
       include the following:
<UL>
              <LI> Sketches of the character in a neutral pose (front,
              back, side, and/or 3/4 views as appropriate), in various
              typical poses, and in a few extreme poses.
              
	      <LI> A written description of the personality of the character.
              
	      <LI> Sketches of the construction of the character
	      indicating how pieces are grouped, what pieces and
	      groups are named in Maya's Outliner/Hypergraph windows, and the articulation
	      parameters and constraints that control the model.
</uL>
<P>

          While creating this document may seem like a lot of extra
          work, it will definitely pay off later as people who were
          uninvolved in the modeling of the character attempt to
          animate it. It will also facilitate communication within
          your group as you do the modeling. The model sheet is not an
          optional part of this assignment. Hand in a copy in class on
          Wednesday.

       <li> Build the character. Pose it in the various sketched poses
       of the model sheet. Make a note of the parameter settings used
       to achieve each pose, and add that information to your model
       sheet. This will come in handy next week when you will animate
       the character.
<P>
       <li> Block out a simple action, that shows your character in a
       particular mood or reacting to a particular situation. To do
       this, create a keyframe pose for the beginning and the end of
       the action, and possibly one for the middle if needed. Render
       the resulting animation, letting Alias interpolate the motion
       its own way for now. This default motion will be a standin for
       the real animation, which is next week's project. For now,
       focus on conveying your character's personality through the key
       poses. Make up the story that leads up to the action. If we
       have time in the critique we will look at each action twice:
       first without hearing the story context and then again after.
<UL>
          Cliche example: sitting sad
   <UL>           
	      <li> background context: Character just realized that she
              forgot all about and thus completely missed Friday
              night's showing of Citizen Kane.  
<LI> visual cues: initial
              shock and dismay, followed by profound sadness --
              drooping shoulders, arched spine, elbows bent to help
              support heavy head, etc.
</UL>
          Another example: scoring soccer goal
     <UL>         
	      <LI> background context: Character is kicking ball for the
	      final score in the championship game.
              
	      <LI> visual cues: prepared to kick, intense concentration,
	      maybe anxiety, followed by kick, followed by relief,
	      jubilation, etc.
</UL>
</ol>
  <h3>  What we're looking for</h3>
<ol>
       <li> The key here is coming up with a character that is
       interesting and expressive despite having entirely rigid
       pieces. Be creative! Think carefully about how the character
       moves and what the best way is to control it: what's the
       "root", is it controlled by forward or inverse kinematics,
       etc. All this information should be included in the model
       sheet.
<P>
       <li>Here, the purpose is to implement the design of your
       character. The model should be built and shaded with the
       appropriate degree of detail: that is, as much as is necessary
       to make the character look good. If you can use model pieces
       built for a previous project, that's fine. Be prepared,
       however, to return to the drawing board if the model does not
       animate easily or well.
<p>
       <li> Put yourself in your character's shoes. Act it out. This is
       all about body language. Your goal is to convey personality and
       emotion through the shapes of the key poses themselves. But
       don't worry about fine-tuning the actual motion. That's next
       week's project.
</oL>

<h3>    Turn in</h3>
<uL>

    Bring your model sheet to class on Wednesday. Bring the final,
    annotated model sheet to the critique on Monday. Before the
    critique, create a group directory in the critique/character
    directory and place there the following:
<oL>
       <Li> README file with who-did-what information.

       <li> Rendered images showing neutral, natural, and extreme
       poses. Images should be in .tif format.

       <li> A flipbook animation of an expressive action or reaction.

       <li> Any other interesting or informative animations or images
       you want to turn in. Please explain what they are in the README
       file.

<P>
In summary, you should handin the files listed below to <a href="https://courses.northwestern.edu/webapps/login">Blackboard</a>
<br>
To handin a file (click thru the following menu options):<br>
<UL>  Communication > Group Pages > <B>Project 4: Char. Model FINAL </B> > File Exchange > Add File
<BR><BR> Please include all 3 files in one .zip file.  Remember, you will be marked down if you do not follow the case and name
conventions listed here-no extra underbars or caps please!  Also ensure that this zip contains a folder with your group name (zip
the entire folder, please). Please also ensure you only hand in what is listed here-extra folders/files complicates creating the
critique page.<BR>
<BR> Your .README files will be displayed in .html.  If you want to add .html tags to make these display in a nicer format, feel
free to do so.  
<BR>Any links you include in your .README must be enclosed in anchor tags.<BR><BR>


<OL>
     <UL><LI> GroupName_neutral.tif
             <LI> GroupName_natural.tif
              <LI>GroupName_extreme.tif
	      <li>GroupName_animation  (where the extension of the file depends upon what you create)
       <LI> Create a GroupName_README.txt text file with group members and who-did-what info. 

<PRE>
*** 
 (please use the exact case and 
 names provided below so my 
 scripts will work)
***
</PRE>
</UL>


</ol>

<PRE> 
Groups:
Matt
Teng
AsrifNizar
NizamNurul
Josh
YZ
Alan
DeBorah
Tennile
Rejaie
</PRE>