Free Martian

I have posted the current Blender 2.49 Martian Blend file for you to download on the Manga Gothic Media website. You can get it here Martian Blend file. Enjoy

March of the tripods part one

There is no natural reference from which to create a walking tripod, at least not on this world, so reference is a difficult thing. It's all in the mind and every adaption of this story has it's own way of walking. I personally am looking at a fluid, natural motion, almost graceful and animal like in it's movements, and the only way to achieve this is by trial and error. Rigging was the easy part, as really the tripod is the simplest of all the models for this production, animation however, well the next post will show the trial and error and you can judge for yourself

Blender 2.5 alpha is out, and cripes does it deliver!!

I'm not kidding. It's full of more pleasant surprises than I even thought possible. IK bones for splines (see right) improved bump mapping, smoke, fire, improved particles, modeling tool, faster and improved rendering, lighting, shadows... the list goes on and on.

It's an exciting time for this project, and my first order of business is the IK bones for Splines. Finally an improvement on the Tentacles for the martians. No more of this elaborate guess work or over stretching of the joints. Some might consider it an overhalu of work, for me I see it is a step forward to bringning you the best experience possible and I promise to do my best to be as every bit as good as the tools I am using.

Three Disks? Maybe even Four

Let me make no beef about it, The War of the Worlds is BIG project. I mean really big! You may think it's a long walk down to the corner shop, but that's just PEANUTS to this project, listen...

Okay Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy references aside, let me remind you that The War of the Worlds is a big project. But that in no way means your going to miss out on any of it. I have slated 3 disks for this project orginally, but the project has taken on such a life of it's own it's likely to take up 4 disks, and maybe even an extra CD for the soundtrack. So what will you get in these disks? Well bear in mind this is just the early planning stages, but here is a rough guide to what you will be paying for.

• Disk 1: "The War of the Worlds" The main movie, logging in a perhaps 2 hours long in two parts and with as many extras and Easter eggs as I can cram into one disk.
• Disk 2: "The Crystal Egg" The short 30 minute prequel to the the "War of the Worlds" including story boards and extras
• Disk 3: "The Making of The War of the Worlds and Behind the Scenes" This disk will cover the entire process behind the project as well as tutorials as to how the project was achieved, with special effects, texturing, modeling and animation techniques. It will also include an interview with the creator and hopefully the Blend Institute and the Soundtrack composer
• Disk 4: "Extras and files" From here you can access all the files used to create The War of the Worlds, including models, textures, animation files, as well as the Open Source Software used to create the film, including Blender 2.5 and GimpShop
• CD Soundtrack: The Official Soundtrack to the War of The Worlds
  

As you can see a lot of treats in store and we've only just begun, so watch this space for more information on the upcoming release.

Developer Meeting Notes: First official Blender 2.5 test build today?

Everyone is getting ready for the first official Blender 2.5 release. All indications are that this will be later today, or maybe tomorrow. Stay tuned!

Ton Roosendaal writes:

Hi all,

Most of meeting was about getting ready for the first official 2.5 test build, which should be released monday or tuesday.

Test build todos

• Special request from user: put back "emulate numpad" option. (Suprise at end of meeting, Brecht committed it!)
• Blender game player: is being patched with a 'stubs' C file, to solve all unresolved symbols because RNA API is using Editor and Windowmanager code. Needs solid solution. For after release.
• Meeting discussed open bugs. No showstoppers, but still enough work!
• Note: Campbell proposes to improve Python UI API names, they currently use too much of legacy C code conventions.
• First test build name: 2.5 alpha 0. After long debate! But there's a wide consensis to call it alpha, which is important too. :) Technically the release code is 2.50, next will be 2.51, hence the '0' or '1' behind the names.
• Builds are made by:
  Windows 32 and 64 bits: Nathan Letwory
  Linux 32 and 64 bits: Ken Hughes
  OS X 10.5 PPC 32 bits: Jan Devera (devroo):
  OS X 10.5 Intel 32 and 64 bits: Jens Verwiebe

Pending todos:

• Splash code (Campbell tries, Matt monday if needed)
• Splash design: A durian gfx is underway, will be last commit as usual
• Matt finished release notes

Other projects

• Brecht will commit tomorrow a new multires system, dumping levels as external files to the disk, freeing up a lot of memory. (And yes, bmesh future proof!

-Ton

The importance of Blender 2.5 to War of the Worlds

I cannot put enough emphases on how big a deal Blender 2.5.0 beta is to this project. In many ways the project was designed around the release of 2.5. It has more to do with it's feature list than it's new UI (which I'll admit I am both dreading and looking forward too). I am one of those artists which looks for features more than anything in a product and Blender 2.5 is set to break the roof. The War of the Worlds will eventually become a child dependent purely on the 2.5 release because of these features. Real time editing, new animation features, rumored automatic rigging, volumetric textures (can't underestimate this one) but more importantly an addition that means so much to the character of the story.

The Black Smoke. Yes I am going to admit to being very shallow here. The new smoke feature in Blender 2.5 is going to be one of the key tools required for the War of the Worlds project. In fact the Black Smoke is, perhaps, the weapon more feared than the Heat Ray. Before now, creating realistic smoke was the auspice of fine tuning particle emitters, but Ihave nevr been satisfied with the results of artificially "guessing" the frame work behind real smoke, and this is the core reason for Blender 2.5's imminent release. if anything I hope The War of the Worlds will showcase this feature to it's fullest. With fire, biological wepaons, cannon fire, hydrogen accelerator cannons, martian technology, etc, etc, you're going to see Blender's physics engine pushed well and truly to it limits.

Wallpaper for my followers

I thought is would be nice to give you all a gift from my work, to thank you for all your support. here is some wallpaper for your windows background. I hope you enjoy it

The Heat Ray

The terrible ghostly Heat Ray, definitely needs refining. I was going to go for an invisible heat wave, but that proved more difficult to pull off with any real effect, and yes I will confess I am pandering to a more mainstream audience when I actually make it a Heat Ray. It needs a of of refining, but the good news is I have used the Halo textures as opposed to particles to create the effect and animated the wave modiffer to give a real molting burning effect. Also I opted for a green ghostly color to the ray, more because I thin it's more creepy than a red laser beam.

The Scale of Invasion

The one exciting moment everyone looks forward to in a period production of War of the Worlds is the Invasion of London. And why not, it was the major capital of the world, the economic heart and grand in scale. Even way back then the sheer size of the city was overwhelming, and envision it in flames, the massive population in panic brings epic nightmares to people even now. The Invasion of London is especially poinient when you look at the images of London during the blitz. London in flames is an image that last with every English Student from their early childhoods, with that famous song on the great fire of 1666 to the blitz. The Martian invasion of the City is no small endeavor and certainly not one to play lightly with.

In order to pull it off I am making a scale model of the city as it was during 1901, of course the detail is dependent on the shots used and that in itself takes planning. There is no point in paint every brick in a building if the shot is darkly lit by flames and heave shadow, but detail is extremely important when you consider you are dealing with destruction on a such a massive scale as this. Anyway, it's a new challenge, and once again a learning experience, which in the long haul will prove only to be more beneficial as the project develops.

Dark or bloody?

There is always a controversy when approaching War of the Worlds, how do you handle it? It's a dark, terrifying book, that doesn't hold back on the gore element. Okay maybe the gore element is an over exaggeration, but the visual element is there. The end of the matter is, War of the Worlds is an extremely violent and mentally graphic book. The horrors of war and invasion are not held back in anyway. The problem lies in how to convey this in both story and visual form. I'm not out to make an R rated movie, or a family friendly movie, but also I want don't avoid the obvious graphic tones as portrayed in the book. This is the problem I found with Hine's version. He made a poor movie unnecessarily bloody, not to convey the horror but to save an otherwise failing project, and this is made obvious in the poor effects put into the graphic violence. So this is the impasse I am currently at, where does art end and exploitation begin? Where do I draw the fine line?

Getting started in Blender on an empty budget?

Make no bones about it (Pun intended), learning 3D animation can be as an expensive hobby as it can be an intimidating one, and even if Blender is free, it can still cost to learn even the basic levels of the program. Teachers need their income too you know, and it's always a good idea as well as the height of good appreciation to compensate them for their time and effort. There are plenty of Books on Amazon about Blender for the beginner intermediate and expert users, as well as many DVD and Video tutorials on the market, but these can cost anywhere between $10 and $50. Very affordable to some, but to many of us with next to nothing, a costly venture when every penny counts and all you have to break the monotony is a computer and your internet connection. So where can you go if for now you need a free option?

Well the good news is there are plenty of websites and video tutorials out there to help you get started, or to focus on that one piece you're struggling with and here I will show you the resources I use to get me started or to help me in a bind.

Ira Krakow's channel
Smile Wide's absolute beginner video

If your a beginner, then I recommend these YouTube Channels to familiarize yourself with the aspects of Blender. Yes I know you'll probably want to throw yourself right in there and animate something, but believe me one look at the Blender Interface will give you that "WTF" moment. Trust me, it''s well worth it, and even though it looks complicated, one run through one these videos and you'll relise just how easy it is to get to grips with.

Blender Cookie is my main source of Blender experience, I have always been intermediate in 3D work, but Blender was a whole new experience for me, and here their videos tutorials work well for the beginner familiar with the interface to the intermediate looking to improve their skills. In fact I can recommend no better site for free Video Tutorials on Blender than Blender Cookie, thus it ranks as my number one site. When they throw in the odd freebie here and there, it makes it so much more useful a site to be.

David Allen Ward has created a fantastic YouTube series covering the entire aspects behind character creation, rigging and animation. he's also released the entire series on DVD, which in all honesty is worth paying for in appreciation for his efforts behind the series. This is by no means an easy feat to achieve but in the end many people want to do Character animation, and if your willing to put in the hard work, David Ward has given you all the tools and know how to achieve just that.

Nion's YouTube Channel is a fantastic place to get you started in more complex effects, but made so easy even a child could do it, (trust me, mine does thanks to this channel). Most everything I needed has been covered here, and it's a channel I seriously urge you not to overlook

CGTuts has a fantastic Blender tutorial section, not least of which I think most of you will enjoy particalry, on how to model, UV and Texture a complete manga character.

These are the major sites I have focused on for my work, but none of these could have been possible to know about without two more sources, the wonderful BlenderNation, which will keep as up to date with the latest happenings in the Blender Community as well as it;s own links to extremely useful and quality tutorials and the Blender Artists forum, a fantastic community of Blender artists from the hobbyist to the profesional who are always willing to support and help you with any questions you may have.

What with thhe release of Blender 2.5, the interface change will have you running around in circles for a short time, but with a community as widespread and supportive as the Blender community, I can more or less guarantee that if you keep your eyes open this wont be the case for long. So what are you waiting for? I've given you no excuses now not to throw yourself into the Blender experience. The only thing holding you back now is yourself.

Martian rough test animation

A little test with shape keys and curves, nothing more. Note that I placed the "lung" as it were at the forehead. I emphise this with the rhythmic Breathing. I like how this, though rough, rush and unrefined still gives of a part way beggining to a decent organic feel.

Tripods and animation

I know many of you asked for it, but I still haven't done a final-final Tripod yet. Everytime I come up with an appropriate one, a better idea comes to mind. When doing a film that's a work of passion you really want to do the best you can, and believe me when I say, Blender's opening more and more Easter eggs as the learning process and the development of the software continues. With 2.5 on the horizon, the Fighting Machine wil lno doubt go under more and more evolution. The smoke emitter will definitely be a deciding factor in the final design for the distribution of the black smoke for example. Anyway for the curious amongst you, here you go. No way is the final, and yes I am far from satisfied so far.

As for animation, rigging humans is a pain, but Martians, OMG how easy has it been to animate what I thought would be the most complicated character in the film? The Martian has proved to be less of a challenge and more of an educational experience. As I said before, Blender has so much to offer, and organic fluid animation is one of them. The martian breathes, pulsates, writes... well everything except drool, but hey, it's early days yet. Expect a full teaser of the Martian very very soon

Tooned vs More realism

Whilst Muranu the Vampire inspired, The War of the Worlds is taking me in a hew direction. The more I work on the project, the more I am pushed to create a more realistic vision, though to be honest my approach to animation has been that only the real world should be realistic. Realistic animated productions seem to be pointless. It's the exaggeration of reality and fantasy I admire in animation and comics, so I am near meeting a comfortable middle ground. Subsurface Scattering is a wonderful, if albeit slow, improvement to the look and feel of the living. And in many ways I'm thankful for one thing, now I have no excuse but to learn the one thing I have been trying to avoid all this time, UV Mapping

I have also improved on the Martian considerably and decided that shape Keys and curves are the best way to approach the creature. This allows me to create a more mollusk look to it's movement and gestures. Also making the creature Breath and pulsate to give it that more alien appeal.