Progress Report Week 18

We've got more updated textures for this shot which is super exciting! After getting feedback  from the class, I don't think the stabilization I was trying last week was working well for an audience so I stepped back a bit and refocused and took the notes from our professor and director. Because the sequence is over a course of time, our director suggested that it could be like a time lapse where a 'picture' is recorded at the same time every day, which means that the lighting can stay steady for this shot, solving the issues without adding on a lot of frames for a shot without a lot of complex animation. I think this is a good decision so that the shot is visually appealing while also being logical. I spent time fine tuning the lighting so that we got a subtle rim light on the chess pieces. 

After a lot of look development this quarter, we are finally able to start lighting in the chess world! It's super fun to see the bright and fun colors of this environment. We had plans to use 'god rays' for our lighting, but based on the two shots I lit this week, we've agreed that for some shots, rays of light are very cool to guide the viewers eyes to where we want them to be looking, as seen in the first shot. We feel that they are a very good graphic element, however there is a point were we feel that they aren't necessary. 

For the second shot, there is a lot of fine tuning the rays as they are created as geometry in Maya with emission on them, Since they are cones, it's very easy for them to catch shadows which doesn't make them look like a ray of light anymore. This second shot I spent time trying to get that fixed, and I did on the right side, but we also feel like not every single shot in the chess world has to have the rays of light. We feel like this second shot is a good example of one where we don't really need the rays.

Another shot I worked on is of Harold setting up the chess piece for another game. There were some weird shadows going on the left leg when I cast a light right on the hand from the unseen arm and torso, so there was a lot of finessing done to get his hand illuminated without casting weird shades onto other areas. Although that part is worked out, the textures for the environment aren't yet updated, so the eye view is focusing on the couch in the background more than the hand. Because the couch is now a dark grey, I believe that'll really help which keeping the hand at the focus, but the lighting for this shot will definitely be updated with the newest textures next week.