Friday 24 September 2010

Maya Experimentation 1

I know it's early (very early) days yet, but since we know that our trailer is going to involve a few specific objects (an invisible blob, and the planet Mars I assume) I thought I'd familiarise myself with Mental Ray and some shaders that could be used in the project. First up is a camouflage / cloak effect for the blob.

The shader is a Mia material connected to a ramp for the refraction index, with a Sampler Info plugged into it for the facing ratio. This makes a nice subtle refraction around the edge of the shape.

EDIT: I've scaled the images' width to 500 pixels to fit the blog width. You can view their real size by right clicking and clicking 'View Image' or alternatively 'Copy Image Location', opening a new tab, and pasting the image's URL into the address bar. This way you can see them in higher resolution. (Firefox only)






I'm going to get Alan's help next time we're in Uni to see if there's a way to simulate the Predator's cloaking effect in Maya. Another alternative (when the time comes) is using render layers in Maya and just adding the 'invisibility' effect in post production using After Effects. But for now, tell me what you think of the pics above and if you've got any suggestions of any sort, tell me :)

11 comments:

  1. This looks sooooooo coooooool Simon man, seriously, this would serve it's purpose well, good going. I would say if it could be improved in anyway, it would be to have less reflection? less of whatever causes the outline cus it's startin to look like water/a clear blob rather than invisible, but I still think it looks like a good enough invisible effect, especially the first one. Well done man.

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  2. Thanks dude! The outline highlight is actually a refraction of the sky, not reflection, but I see what you mean.

    That's actually the reason I want Alan's help. I'm satisfied with the effect to a degree, but it looks like it's made of glass / water like you said and that's not what we want.

    If you look at the Predator camo, it distorts the light really nicely without looking solid, almost as if it's 2D. That's kinda what I want to achieve.

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  3. Oh btw I change the blog a bit as you can see. I thought I'd make it easier on the eye. If anyone else wants to edit it, go for it.

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  4. ahhh okay, would be really cool if Alan could help achieve that effect.

    The blog looks cool, did u use the 'Template Designer' to edit the blog, I'm not completely sure how to get a custom blog design.

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  5. Yeah I did, though this is a crappy background so I might change it later, or you can. Just wanted it nice and simplistic, also when we get the logo sorted we can use it as a header / banner.

    Also, do you know what time our group meeting is on Monday?

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  6. Oh okay cool. No, I only know it's in the morning. We can discuss what time now I guess. I'd be happy to meet up from 10 am onwards? If any1 wants to do earlier I dnt mind either, but 10am is an ideal time for me, hw bout u?

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  7. 10am is pretty early for me, but if everyone else wants to meet at that time then I'm sure I'll manage to pull myself out of bed :)

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  8. Ah k kl, jus that I've gotten into the habit of waking up at 7am for Ninja Warrior (sickkk showwww) then gettin ready for uni for 10am...but I also dnt mind meetin up later, I'm basically free da whole day...but yh 10am's on the table, but like u sed we'll see wht every1 else wants to do.

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  9. 10 and onwards sounds good. I'm not fussed :)

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  10. Also forgot to mentioned that the new blog layout is cool :). And the cloaking effect from predcator sounds like a good idea :D

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  11. Wow i really like this man.. Well done, really good work!!

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