More Test Renders

Better test renders! I did some tweaking on the particle debris by copy-stamping some geometry onto them, and did some test renders with the textures, displacements, and lighting. I tried caching out a version of the fracture that had smaller fracture pieces, but Houdini kept crashing... Not sure what I'm going to do about that yet but hopefully I can find a solution to that soon.

Hand Crumble Test Render

First test render of the crumbling hands! I definitely need to make the particle debris larger, since it's very difficult to see here. Also have some kinks to work out with the normals. But given it's a simple test render I put together in about 5 minutes, I'm pretty happy with it. Lots of work left do though.

This is a flipbook of what the FX animation will look like. Thanks to Cat McDonnell for the character animation in this shot! Looks pretty sweet!

Tree Branch Test

Now that my crumble sim works, I've got more time to work on my tree model and rig. Here's a short test I did with a twisty tree branch moving along a flow path in Maya.

Hand Crumble

Finally got my crumbling hand simulation working! Been having trouble getting the fracture to stick with the deforming geometry, but I finally figured that out (after 3 weeks of intense google searches and a lot of fiddling around), and here are the results! Still have some small tweaking to do, and I have to add the debris back in, but it's ready just in time for render tests!

My Character Is Naked No Longer

Hurray for clothes! I'd been waiting for months for SVA to get Marvelous Designer for the computer labs, and two weeks ago they finally did! I spent a half a day playing around to learn the interface, and it's such a great program. Since I already know how to sew and make clothing patterns, it was so easy to make the garments I had imagined! After exporting it from MD, I retopo-ed it using Maya and ZBrush so I can do cloth simulations later on. Next up I have to do sculpt in some clothing details in ZBrush for my normal map and start texturing them. What I have in mind is really cool, I can't wait to show you!

Announcing My New Website, ElanaLederman.com!

So this is unrelated to my thesis, but I just want to plug my new website where you can see all of my work! You can find my demo reel, resume, CG work, fine arts work, and photography all in one great place! Just go to ElanaLederman.com to view my work. Thanks!

Environment Images

So I realized that I never actually posted any images of my environments. The interior models are courtesy of the talented Arnald Andujar, while I have been modeling the outdoors (which is not complete yet and will have a cool overgrown garden). I'm starting the textures this week so pretty soon these will come to life!

Ash Particle Test Render

Just started doing test renders for my ash effect. I think I'm going to copy some geometry on there to add variation, but it's starting to really look like ash. Next I'm going to add volume to my character to make it seem like more than a shell.

Flow Test Render

Here's the first (of many) test renders of my flow effects! I want it to look like a mix between particle fire and liquid gold. I'll definitely have to keep playing around with the colors and the glow, but I think it's pretty cool for the first one!

Adding Wispy Particles

Starting to layer my particle systems! Still a WIP, of course, but getting closer.