A LOGBOOK OF WHAT I'VE LEARNED IN ALL 5 SEMESTERS

(to be updated as the semesters progress)

Semester 1 - I didn't learn anything 3D Animation related in Semester 1.

Semester 2 - Shophouse

I was asked to produce a 3D Low-poly turntable of a shophouse that I chose, using a 3D software called Autodesk Maya 2015. To better help me understand how to use the program, I was also asked to do a Helmet modelling tutorial from the official Autodesk website alongside going to classes and making my shophouse.

IN A NUTSHELL:

- Maya Interface and hotkeys
- Basic low-poly fundamentals of a geometry
- Texturing, materials, and light properties
- Rendering and exporting a simple scene

Specifics:

• Introduction of the Maya 2015 interface (Viewport, Outliner, Channel Box, Attribute Editor, Shelves)
• Viewport camera navigation
• Definition of a vertex, edge, and face (and the Object Mode, F9-F11 Selection modes)
• Basic manipulation of components (changing their translate (W), rotate (E), and scale (R) values)
• Changing camera views (persp, Orthographic front, side, and top views)
• Importing image planes
• Basic modelling tools (Extrude, Insert Edge Loops, Append to Poly, Bridge, Combine Vertices, polyMirror)
• Moving the pivot point and centering pivot
• Extract, Separate, and Combine mesh
• Duplicate Special
• Grouping and parenting in the outliner (object hierarchy)
• Scene clean-up (Freeze Transformations and Delete History)
• Switch between World and Object transformations
• Troubleshooting (Hidden multiple faces from Extruding, polyMirror messing up the geometry, polyMirror not behaving as I wanted it to)
• Auto UV mapping and unwrap
• Making the albedo base in Photoshop based on the UV map layout
• Applying Bump Map using a greyscale texture .jpg file
• Adjusting the material (lambert, blinn, phong) attributes
• Hypershade basics
• Turntable animation, Lighting using a Spotlight light
• Render set-up using mental ray. Batch render.

Notes and Lessons learned:

It was very overwhelming and frustrating to navigate and use Maya as I've never used it before. It took me around 70-80 hours to do the shophouse because of inefficient techniques (I can only use very basic tools because I don't know other tools or don't understand enough of the ones that they taught me so I can't use it properly/will result in problems later) and the result is... not optimal and messy in a sense.

Granted, to not overwhelm me too much I only need to worry about the shape of the object and not its topology. As an introductory to Maya I feel like it's... overwhelming. There are too much things to learn (overall I think I only absorbed 60% of what was taught, while the rest 40% I didn't understand it enough to utilise it) with the pressure of completing a project in a given time period.

As the semesters progress I learn that the best way to speed up the workflow is the get used using the software by using it everyday, something I wasn't able to do because I have so many other non-3D animation projects in Year 1. The more I use Maya, the more I understand it, I can much easily understand tutorials and so I progress faster and faster. 

Semester 3 - FANNY Robot

I was asked to make a fully functional and animate-able bipedal robot character of my own design. Then, I have to animate that robot displaying various emotions while interacting with an object. 

IN A NUTSHELL:

- Overall faster workflow

- Basic high-poly fundamentals of a geometry

- Efficient poly count (terminating edge loops)
- Different texture maps and passes
- Basic FK rigging
- IK system for arms and legs
- Arnold lighting and rendering

Specifics:

• Making the model exact to the reference images
• The workflow steadily become hotkey dependent
• Introduction to layers
• Hi-poly modelling mindset (must add edge loops and avoid tris and n-gons)
• More modelling tools (Multi-cut, Bevel, Chamfer, Fill hole, Edit Edge Flow)
• Symmetry selection
• A finer understanding of good topology (how to avoid pinching, uneven bumps on the mesh)
• Finer understanding of UV Unwrap (Cut and Sew, seam placement) and mapping
• Specular maps
• Joint basics (correct placement, orientation, and mirror joints)
• Joint hierarchy logic
• FK system understanding
• IK system understanding and pole vectors
• Making controllers for rigging
• Null groups to prevent double transformations
• Constrain types (Parent, Point, Orient, Aim)
• Connection Editor
• Set Driven Keys (SDK)
• Keyframe animation
• Move keyframes in Graph Editor
• Playblast options
• Ambient Occlusion and other render passes (diffuse and specular)
• Match-moving tracking
• Arnold materials (aiStandardSurface) properties
• aiSkyDome Light, Directional Lights, and Point Lights
• Render settings
• After Effects Compositing 

Notes and Lessons learned:

When I was doing the shophouse, I remember being very frustrated about knowing how an object should look, but not knowing how to manipulate the components to arrive into the shape that I wanted. Under the stress of time and other subjects demanding attention, I used functions as told and pressed buttons without knowing exactly what I did.

This haze of confusion and doubt continued into this semester's project. I had absolutely no concept of how to model more advanced shapes, making holes into smooth, curved surfaces was an astounding challenge, and with the added challenge of it being high-poly (I must add edge loops to make hard edges), it was a difficult struggle. I had the faintest idea of what "good" topology means. I had to get a lot of help from friends and my lecturer for modelling. If not, then I wouldn't be able to finish this semester's project in time.

I thought modelling was the worst of it. I was wrong. Rigging got me absolutely lost. At this stage I still did not completely understand parenting hierarchies, null groups, and freeze transformations. For rigging, we were given a step-by-step, what to click rigging manual for each body part. I basically had no understanding of any logic behind the rigging system at all. I just followed the manual verbatim. I could not troubleshoot anything at all.

The least troubling part of this project is texturing and adjusting material properties. I already had a prior understanding of how different materials should look under different light conditions, and re-learning the jargon for material attributes was not difficult at all.

Overall, this is the darkest period in my college for me. I had no understanding of the logic behind anything at all. Under the project's deadline, I understand now that they couldn't fit the time to go in-depth and explain the inner logic of Maya (DAG Shapes, World Space and Object Space, null groups, node history, etc) and I was sure I couldn't understand the nuances either way, so I guess this semester was a necessary struggle.  

SEMESTER 4 - Celeste the Light Goddess

I was asked to make a fully functional and animate-able human character of my own design. Then, I have to animate that character displaying various emotions while interacting with an object in a 30 second animation, match-moved with a live-footage plate.

IN A NUTSHELL:

- The workflow is mostly hotkey dependent
- Organic hi-poly modelling (100% quads for better deformations)
- Achieving a specific topology for different body parts (for better blendshapes and skinning results)
- UV Unwrapping and Mapping done in one tile for everything
- IK Spline
- Blendshapes using the Shape Editor
- Skinning. Skinning. SKINNING.

Specifics:

• Better and intuitive understanding of what good topology is
• Sculpt Tools (Smooth and Relax)
• Quad Draw, abstract retopology for the hair
• Polygon Text
• Soft Selection (Area vs Volume-based calculation)
• Using very basic lattices and deformers to model
• Blendshapes (Create new Blendshape and Add Targets)
• In-between targets, Combination Targets
• Blend-weighted Bind Skin
• Paint Weights. Lock influences.
• Component Editor for Skin weights influences in individual vertices
• IK Spline for the spine
• Wrist-Arm Twist (multiplyDivide node)
• Adjust keyframes and animation curves in the Graph Editor
• Copy and paste keyframes
• Ghosting in MAYA

Notes and Lessons learned:

After doing the robot, I fully know every aspect of the workflow, so I planned my character accordingly to have maximum aesthetic appeal, with the littlest amount of effort put. I know how to pace myself in each step of the workflow. I know not to spend too long in modelling. Blendshapes was a tedious challenge, and in hindsight I could have pushed the expressions further. I was scared to push the vertices more extremely.

Skinning blindsided me completely. I wasn't expecting how tedious, repetitive, and utterly impossible it is to control and manipulate. Rigging is easier to manage (strangely, that was how I feel). It wasn't so mystical like when I did my robot rigging. Some parts start to make sense.

This is the point where I really start thinking about furthering my lighting/material skills, since out of everything I feel like lighting characters and scenes are the easiest for me to do, and I can produce quite appealing results.

Overall, I was quite comfortable working on Celeste at this semester. Blendshapes and skinning is the only thing completely new, and the rest I could predict. I still couldn't do match-moving for shit, though.


SEMESTER 5 - Kit the Fox Spirit

I was asked to make a fully rigged bi-pedal character of my own design. Then, I have to animate that character in dialogue with another character in a 30 second animation, match-moved with a live-footage plate.

IN A NUTSHELL:

- ZBrush to MAYA workflow (rough sculpting and then retopologising/changing topology)
- Using Mudbox to make texture maps
- Stretchy Spine, Arm, and Legs rigs
- Facial GUI as a character rig interface
- Getting comfortable with the Node Editor
- Lip-syncing
- Multi-scenes animation + lights matching management

Specifics:

• Introduction to ZBrush and knowing enough to sculpt roughly
• Retopology/changing topology in MAYA
• Using clusters
• Corrective blendshapes
• The gist of making a ribbon spline
• Using a picker
• Heat Map Bind Skin method
• Teeth and Tongue modelling + rigging
• More appealing controllers + more organised scene management
• Node editor to manage different systems
• Step, Linear, Clamp, Spline curves in Graph Editor
• Advanced Graph Editor (Euler filter, Bake Keys, etc)
• Basic hard-body and gravity dynamics 
• Texture controls from the rig
• Textured Layers
• Texturing using nodes in MAYA
• aiMatte and aiShadowMatte 
• Render Layers
• Basic Optix Denoiser in MtoA

Notes and Lessons learned:

The most important lesson I learned in this semester: Good enough is job well-done. The skinning especially was a fast job, and I did not want to do it at all. With Heat Map bind skin method, it speeds up the process, alongside with using Hammer Skin Weights more correctly. I did all my skinning + corrective blendshapes in 4-5 days, vs. during making Celeste, in which I spent 3-4 weeks only doing the skinning. The skinning result wasn't so great but in the final animation, it's not so obvious because of the far camera angle. I've learned to just be done and use it.

The arm stretch got me. I did not do it correctly. That's the only major downside in the final animation. Other things that was a major disappointment: I could not isolate the pattern texture by itself. If I could, I wouldn't have to make an Emission Control because I could've added the glow on post, and it'll look more natural. And it would have saved me so much time textuing for an Emission Map. 

This is the semester where I learned the most animation by far. Miraculously (or maybe not; the four-day extension is really the difference of night and day), I had time to do animation to a somewhat more than blocking stage with overlapping elements in the ears and tail. This semester's is the best final animation so far. My only wish is to pace it more correctly. Some scenes end too abruptly. Minor lighting problems as well. 

By now I am fully familiar with the entire pipeline and I could troubleshoot to a decent degree. I definitely relied a lot less on my lecturer. And because I did not spend so many time on doing and perfecting one thing, I felt more free to explore more advanced stuff, outside what they taught us in LASALLE. I felt like I had a more holistic view of what's the professional standard in the industry, and how people do their work professionally. 

This is the semester where I realised how little I know, and that everything I've learned about doesn't even scratch 10% of what's available, and what's being used in the industry. This motivates me to learn more about how it's done, out there.

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For my next and final semester, this is what I want to learn (in order of priority):

1. Really figure out Sub-Surface Scattering properties
2. Bake Motion Blur and Z-Depth in render outputs
3. Further texturing using nodes in MAYA
4. Understand how to export Normal Maps and Displacement Maps from ZBrush
5. Further understand denoiser options
6. Animation Layers in MAYA
7. Script options for Rendering multiple scenes at once
8. Correct Stretch rigging
9. Really understand Ribbon Spline rigging
10. Learn how to make an FK/IK Solver

Beyond my learning experience in LASALLE, I want to learn these things:

• Making scenes with more unusual/fantasy lighting set-up
• Fully learn Arvid Schneider's MtoA series
• Learning Houdini
• Learning basic Particle and Smoke simulation
• Learning basic Cloth simulation
• Learning basic Hair and Fur simulation
• Learning basic Liquid simulation
• Basic quadruped character rigging
• Different formats (.DAE, .FBX, etc)
• Modelling with tris
• Advanced Skeleton in MAYA
• Micro-controls for facial rigs
• Learning Blender