Production News–11/10/2011:
Well, it's been a long haul, but Aurora is now complete! Thanks to everyone who helped with the production, primarily my wife Jeannette–who in addition to her great voice work and mocap acting for Kara and T'ling–also gave me great advice about the story; lent me support, encouragement, and sympathy when things were not going well; and put up with my long disappearances into my office to work on Aurora for entire weekends and into the night. In many ways, I couldn't have done it without her.
Thanks also to the many friends who contributed their voices to the production, particularly the Saur family, (and, yes, that is "the boys" both as their young and adult alter egos–that's how long I've been working on this!), who gave Kara a home, and who thought they were done after Part 1; Tim, Ely, Johnny, Susan and Eddie for their help on a pivotal scene; and Mike, who I think still remains the only Down East Mainer in Star Trek. Further thanks to volunteers like David Ault, who really made Mr. Trang's technobabble sound convincing; Eric Busby's crusty Doctor; John Whiting's even crustier Stationmaster; Laura Post's short but sweet turn as Nurse; and Sean Lantry's business-like Security Officer.
Still more thanks to the many generous 3D graphics professionals and hobbyists who have made their work available online for others to use in their own work in the form of Star Trek and science fiction starship models, sets, equipment and textures, and even useful software tools, bits of code, and technical advice–I name many in the credits, and I apologize for any I have missed, but I will add Phil Cooke, an unsung hero of Aurora who provided me with absolutely crucial python scripts and advice, and great products for Poser.
Extra special thanks must go to John Catney, music composer for Aurora, who came to me out of the blue to volunteer his work. I think that he really "gets" the feel and purpose of the story, and through his work, has very much enhanced the emotions of the scenes as I envisioned them.
Lastly, I must thank the many fans of Aurora who have taken the time to drop me a note to let me know how much they have enjoyed Aurora–your support really helped to sustain me through the years of work, stray hurricanes, lightning strikes, freak snowstorms, seemingly intractable technical problems, and my own frustration with the limitations of the software and my own homegrown skills, and who also served to "keep me honest" to the original vision of Aurora, since you let me know that you cared about the characters and what happened to them.
To all of you, once again: thank you. I hope you enjoy the conclusion of the story.
–Tim
Aurora's Production Process:
Star Trek: Aurora is produced using a variety of software programs and techniques. Until just a few years ago, these necessary tools for creating a full animated production were far out of the reach of the ordinary consumer, or even of small companies, but the technology has advance rapidly to the point where one person can create an entire animated production on their own. Except for voice work–and not counting 3D models I have purchased or downloaded–Aurora has been produced by one person on a single Mac computer.
My main tools are Smith Micro's Poser , Maxon Cinema 4D, and NaturalPoint Optitrack motion capture system. Kuroyume's Interposer Pro is instrumental in importing Daz/Poser content into Cinema 4D. In any case, my basic workflow for animating characters (Daz V4 and M4) is:
1. Record voice using a decent microphone (M-Audio Nova mic, Mobile Pre preamp, Apple Soundtrack)
2. Record motion capture movements with Optitrack motion capture system.
3. Import mocap data into Daz Studio via Arena plugin; export bvh.
4. Import bvh file into Poser; edit/refine animation, add hand movements.
5. Create mouth moves in Daz Mimic
6. Apply Mimic file to character in Poser; save pose
7. Apply pose to character in Cinema 4D environment and render to TIFF files
6. Create .mov file from TIFFs (using Quicktime Pro)
7. Import .mov file into Apple Final Cut Pro, edit into animation
8. Add voice file/sound effects
Other programs used: Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator.
There are a number of software/hardware quirks and workarounds necessary throughout the process, but that's the basics. (Note that this is my current workflow: Parts 1, 2 and 3 were animated largely by hand.)
General and Specific 3D Animation Advice–a Top 5:
1. Create a storyboard (in conjunction with finalizing your script) for all your shots–it can be stick figures, but a storyboard will save you a lot of trouble--and re-rendering–since it will allow you to work out the setup of your characters, framing, camera angles, and moves in advance rather than flailing around when you're trying to animate. This is probably the least appreciated and most important single thing you can do if you're doing a longer work with multiple shots (even 2 minutes of animation can have dozens of shots).
2. Pay attention to lighting–lighting is the one thing that 3D animation does better than any other method, and can make a huge difference in the look and feel of a scene. It takes a little longer to render, but if your stuff doesn't look good, why bother? And don't be afraid to "cheat" with your lights: when filming movies/TV, there are all kinds of subtle lights just outside the camera frame lighting the characters and scenes from angles that would never happen in the real world–the trick is to balance lighting your character well with making the lighting look natural.
3. Don't be a 3D purist: concentrate on what is in the shot, and don't worry about things that aren't. This is where a good storyboard really helps, since, for example, if you were shooting a street scene and your storyboard doesn't include the other side of the street, then you know you only need to build and light the buildings on one side, and if your character is just walking down the street, then the "buildings" in the background can just be the lower fronts, no need to build the backs or roofs of buildings you'll never see.
4. Eyes are the first place people look at a character, so get them right. This is kind of specific advice, but I always have "Point At" on my character's eyes, and have them looking at a ball prop (made invisible). People's eyes are almost always fixed on a particular place, so when they walk, gesture, etc. their eyes don't just stare ahead move with their head like a robot. Also, people almost always blink when they move their head to look in a new direction (try it!), so make sure you add that (you move the invisible "look at" ball during the blink). Mimic will give you an idea of how the blinks work.
5. If you're using Poser, use the Graph Editor to do almost all your animating and editing. The Animation Window is virtually useless. The graph editor allows you control over the character movements, so you can make slow graceful moves (long slow curves) or more abrupt moves (short linear curves)–people move with both, at the same time, and having only slow graceful moves makes the character look like a motorized store mannequin, and only sharp moves looks like a clanking robot or bad stop-motion animation.
Daz 3D–home of the most popular human models used for Poser; lots of accessories (like clothing, hair, etc.): http://www.daz3d.com/
Renderosity–tons more content for Poser; very active Poser community; a good place for advice: http://www.renderosity.com/
CGSociety–active community for Cinema 4D; also, lots of high-end professional work, good inspiration: http://www.cgsociety.org/
Kuroyme's Development Zone–home of Interposer Pro plugin for Cinema 4D/Poser; excellent customer support: http://www.kuroyumes-developmentzone.com/
Phil C Designs–many useful plugins for Poser (Wardrobe Wizard is a must); excellent customer support: http://www.philc.net/
I hope some of this is useful to anyone interested in 3D animation. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to contact me.
–Tim
