Thus far, I’m very happy with it. I like the options and such way better than the Gnome ones presented with the default Ubuntu install. Look and feel fits the way I like to work better, too. In fact, after several days of using Kubuntu on my desktop, I’ve also switched over with my laptop. This isn’t to bust on the Gnome desktop or anything. It was fine for a long time for me. After a suitable acclimation period (like, a day) though, I have KDE working in a way that really suits me.

Having to deal at home with supporting Windows XP, Windows 7 (which ain’t bad) and a Mac makes me appreciate the ease and elegance with which I can administer my two Linux computers. The Mac’s not bad, but trying to get those Windows machines to place nice is really taxing me.

So, you can click on the thumbnail below to get the full sized image of the network.

Film Look node tree

Download a .BLEND file here.

The effect is created from an old tutorial I had found on some kid’s website for adding a film style look to his digital photography in Photoshop. I re-purposed the decently complicated Photoshop layer-based work flow into a nodes-based one for Blender. I went looking for that original one, so I could link and credit, but I’ve been unable to find it since that one lucky strike a couple of years ago. To be fair then, the general theory behind this technique isn’t my own, although I added and adjusted a bit while I was nodifying the process. As a reminder, the results are:

Before

After

You adjust the way that the shadows, highlights and midtones cast by changing the colors in the RGB color node, and in the Color Ramp node. If you’re going to use this, make sure to set the render dimensions to match the dimensions of your input image.

Merry Christmas!

The whole point is that if you want to do some quick camera mapping for 2.5D matte work and don’t want to deal with the UV Project modifier, you can just blast it to UVs from camera view now. The nice part is that you don’t have to do anything special to use it — just jump into edit mode, press the U-key for the Unwrap menu and choose “Project from View.” If you’re in a camera view, it’ll do it.

Now, besides being called the “top recommendation” among all books about short animation production by one reviewer, it is also available for perusal on your Kindle or iPhone with Kindle app.

You can bop over to check it out here.

The other day, Brecht committed an addition to the Cage Deform modifier which performs this same task. I believe it uses the heat weighting algorithm for pinning, followed by the cage deform method of deformation. I haven’t tried it yet, but it sounds like it will do exactly what was needed!

In the end, I had absolutely nothing to do with it. I’m just happy that there’s now a way to pin one entire mesh’s surface to that of another.

I’m working on the surfacing chapter of my book, and needed to use camera projection. Sticky coordinates were not back in Blender 2.5, so I reattached them to an operator. Sticky worked again, but the old grief remained. I’ve tried the UV Project modifier, and did the tutorials, etc., again but still I just didn’t like the work flow. I’ve heard from people who certainly know better that it’s great, works right, yes yes. However, nothing is quite as intuitive to me as lining your objects up in camera view.

So, after some feedback from Brecht and Matt Ebb, I wrote a new UV unwrap type: Project from Camera. Basically, it works the way that Stickies do. Camera view + background image + tweak your objects right there in perspective. Now, instead of adding stickies, you unwrap the mesh using Project from Camera. That’s it! Now you have a UV unwrap that you can tweak if you need to, and we can get rid of stickies forever!

If you’re interested in trying it out before it’s in trunk (hopefully), bop on over to:

http://projects.blender.org/tracker/?func=detail&aid=19862

But really, who am I kidding? I’m going to end up fighting with this all weekend and into next week when I should be writing my book.

Tracker link: Similar Surface modifier patch

Obviously, there are workarounds, but I have a solution that I’m not going to have time to implement myself. I built the modifier structure and basics, but once I realized I’d never coded with the modifier system or dealt with mesh data directly I understood that it would require more time than I had, and would be fairly easily accomplished by someone already familiar with it.

I think a good solution to this problem would be a “Similar Surface” (name for artists) or a “Hook Web” (name for devs) modifier. Simply put, the modifier is a “bind” type one, a la the cage deformer. The user creates a fairly simple structure upon which to run a cloth sim (or any other deform technique, actually). Then, the user creates their “high res” clothing, which includes all the nice things like buttons, epaulets, cuffs, pockets, layering, etc. Clearly that would never survive an actual cloth sim. When the user BINDS the high res clothing to the sim’ed simpler one, the following happens:

1. For each vert in the high res, a virtual hook is created. Within the modifier, it would be an array of hook objects (obHook). The hook data structure is deprecated in favor of the hook modifier, but the DNA is still there.
2. Where does the virtual hook attach? The shrink wrap “nearest point on mesh” procedure is used to identify. Then, the verts that make up the identified face of the underlying mesh become the vertex parents of the virtual hook.

That’s it. This would allow complex, multi-layered clothing to be driven by an underlying cloth simulation.

From reading the DNA and modifier code, it appears that everything is already there. We need someone who is familiar with mesh coding and modifiers to put it together. Unless I miss my guess, the Durian team WILL be asking for something like this in the near future.

It’s a common situation in animation — a character needs to pick something up, carry it around, then sit is down. There are a number of ways to do it, but here’s the most reliable way I’ve come across. There are a lot of steps, each one critical. Follow this recipe and you’ll be able to do it:

Setup
1. Place your object in its starting position.
2. Add a Child Of constraint to the object, targeting the main hand bone of your character.
3. Your object will “jump” when you attach it to the hand with this constraint, so press the Set Offset button on the constraint panel to fix it.
4. Set a LocRot key on the object. This fixes its starting position.
5. On the Constraint panel, set the Influence slider to 0.0 and press the Key button to record it.

The Grab
1. Animate the hand into place around the object
2. Back up one frame
3. On the Object’s Constraint panel, press the Key button to once again record an Influence 0.0 keyframe.
4. Advance one frame
5. Change the Influence slider to 1.0, and set another Key for it
6. The object jumps out of position. First press Clear Offset then Set Offset on the Constraint panel to fix it
7. The hand now has full control of the object. Animate the hand/body/etc. to do whatever you like.

If a pick up is all that is in your shot, you’re done. However, if you need to sit the object down…

The Drop
1. Animate the hand so that the object appears in it’s resting position, i.e. on the desk, shelf, etc.
2. Back up one frame
3. Set another Key for the Constraint Influence at 1.0
4. Set a LocRot key on the object
5. Advance one frame
6. Set a VisualLocRot key on the object
7. Move the Constraint Influence slider to 0.0 and set a Key

At this point, the display screws up. It shows the object moving back to its initial position. This is an animation display bug. Advance and Reverse the frame counter once and you’ll see that it is where it is supposed to be.

The hand and object are now free to move about independently. Congratulations — you can now do something in 3D in nineteens steps that even a one year old can do in real life!

The article makes good points about all three of the books, but I’m particularly proud of the section about Animating with Blender. First, they refer to the production values, down to typography and layout as “superb.” That may not seem like a big deal at first, but spend a number of days with your nose in a book and those little touches can make the difference between an effortless entry of informational into your mind and a fatigue inducing struggle.

Best quote:

What makes this really well-organized book so good is not only the organization of the information presented, but the down-to-earth writing style of Mr. Hess [Dude -- Mr. Hess is my father! -ed.]. Reading the book and going through each section you feel like the author is right next to you helping with mistakes and pointing out ways to save time.

And what the reviewer [Mr. Ricky Grove] does not tell you is that, in fact, I am right next to you. I am sneaky. I already went through your kitchen cupboards looking for pop tarts. By the time you turned around, I was gone. Out and down to the street, with your breakfast pastries in my greedy little mitts, and all because you bought my book. How awesome is that?

I just wanted to remind folks that until Blender 2.6 (the real gold release in the middle of next year) hits the stands, the Blender 2.4x series is still the stable production version to use. If you’re ready to move past making still scenes and just doing new feature test renders and haven’t already picked up Animating with Blender, you should think about it. If you’re interested, click through the ad on the side of the page and read the Amazon reviews. It’s worth it.

Thanks for your time!