Animation Project 2 Evaluation (Paddington Bear)

I was aimed to relaunch a children's TV programme in this project in the style of 'Lost and Found'.
I chose to re-design the character : Paddington Bear.
And the style I chose was the short animation: Lost and Found.
As I really impressed by the hand drawing style in Lost and Found. I tried to apply this style in my environment. After model simple houses in 3ds max, I tried to paint them in Mudbox by using bright colours and using skylight in the scene. I am pretty satisfied with my final result.

Lost and Found pictures

My Environment scene

The sky background was another issue I faced. Although I know that I can create a sky dome in 3ds max to make the sky, I worried about the rendering time as it used mental ray renderer. That was why I  tried to render the animation out in Targa Image file and tried to add my own sky ( drew in photoshop) in After Effect. I am quite satisfied with the combination of the sky and my houses scene.

 

On the other side, after sketching and modelling my character in 3ds max, it was quite difficult to animate the facial expression well. I also received some comments like the character is quite weird and he is quite evil. I guess I need to pay more attention on the face design of my character next time. The other problem I faced was the coat of my bear. As the blue coat was quite long, when my character walks, the coat would not move (because it was extrude from the body). That was quite an annoying problem. 

 

At last, I tried not to show too much of the lower body when I was animating it. I think I will try to use other methods to make the long clothes next time and try to search for more online tutorials next time.

Besides, the eyes of my bear were just black in colour, so it was quite weird if the scene was dark. Therefore, I added two really small omni right beside his eyes in order to make some reflection and to solve the problem.

After handed in my final work, I think there was one thing that I am not happy with which was the walking scene in my animation. I know that I go t some problems in that walking cycle so I guess I will try to redo that scene later.
Also, although it was my first time to use Mudbox in this project, I am quite interested in this software. I will pay more effort on it in my future projects.
To conclude, there were many problems that I faced in different stage (modeling, painting, animating), I have still tried my best to produce this animation out. I am quite satisfied with my painted environment in the style of Lost and Found, I will pay more effort on Mudbox next time. I also had problems in my character facial expression,  therefore I need to pay more attention on my character facial design. 

Final animation
https://vimeo.com/60241846

Paddington bear Progress 4 :Environment

Environment
At first, I wanted to make a village for the environment. But I changed my mind and tried to make a main house for Paddington plus a few houses for the background.

Reference picture for my main house

 
 

Paddington bear Progress 4

Concerning About the clothes of the bear
I got quite confused with making the coat for the bear.
As the buttons are quite difficult to make in order to attach with the coat.
I think that I will make it more simple and maybe do it in mudbox next time when I have to design an outfit for my character. 

 As my paddington bear will be a detective in the story, I decided to make a flat cap for him.
And I added two ears part on the cap to make it more interesting.

Here was the final image after painted in mudbox.

Paddington bear Progress 3

Start modelling my character

Paddington bear Progress 2

Paddington bear Progress 2: STORYBOARD

After designing my character, I started to draw my storyboard. I decided to make a trailer instead of a story because I think this will be more exciting.
I chose a chapter from the official Paddington Bear website and made some adjustments to it. Following is the story.

Chapter Three - PADDINGTON TURNS DETECTIVE

Inspired by his new disguise outfit, Paddington decides to investigate the mystery of a disappearing vegetable marrow that Mr. Brown had intended to enter in a show. Believing he's tracked down the thief, Paddington mistakenly captures a policeman, only to discover that Mrs. Brown was the culprit after all.

 

Paddington bear Progress 1

Animation 2nd project Progress

After sketching for several days, I finally drew the final character design of the bear.