Done with the Pond

Haven’t updated for two weeks since I was writing the dissertation and, creating new model & animation assets that don’t really deserve a post..

Now everything in the pond part is finished and I grabbed a video like I did for the circuit here. There’s also one controlled by scripts here and this time it’s an interaction:) Some environmental particle system details as well: sun shafts, falling leaves, some shining “dust”, and bubbles – exist in the painting I think they should be bubbles but who knows….

One Problem of the video is the blur on the right of the screen. I always get this in game mode if I have camera effects (even the build file has this too), and, this was tested to be the problem of my mac because others’ don’t have. No idea how to solve it at the moment..

And the third person controller model is changed now! Made some animations for him cos I thought I use different mesh and rigs with the Unity Ethan but, the fact is that it’s just super easy with no use to make any animation. Just import the humanoid model and do the configuration. Brilliant.

Found an easier way for couple animations, that I can export them in one fbx file, drag into the scene and delete one of them, and give the left one a clip with the original avatar. This would break the prefab but doesn’t really matter and it’s a lot easier to control the position etc.

Very proficient with the modelling and texturing now feel a bit sorry for those made at the very first lol.

Come the gifs!

The interaction is this hugging couple controlled by a boolean. When the player comes into a distance they’ll stop to be as the interrupted  pose in the painting, and when the player goes they’ll continue what they were doing 😛

Less than two weeks left dunno if I could finish everything… Go back to work!!

Animal Modelling – a First Discussion, and the Horse

I started modelling animals after the human meshes done.

Obviously there are numerous species, real or unrecognisable, for me being the second most significant and noticeable part/category of the work. I think it is quite interesting that after some time of reading and observation I found generally what are the animals in the each panels have rules to follow. (Click to see original images)

It seems that, while there are only Adam, Eve and the God in the first panel, the exotic creatures are more eye-catching. But then you will find that most of them appear to be very weird, many with quite horrible eyes at the bottom – yes I do not think they look like good creatures, and there are those with multiple heads, creepy reptiles, a “dog” with only two limbs, birds with strange body, unicorns and a “giraffe” – I remember a statement saying that at that time giraffe had not been imported into Europe. That is to say most of the animals in the heaven panel are the mythological ones.

But they turn quite normal in the central panel. We can see most of the animals there are common ones. Mainly three kinds: birds, fish, and quadrupeds,  looks normal and real, and stay harmonious with the earthly delights. And then in the last panel, there are few animals – and even not like animal anymore but monsters with roles and characters, and seemingly they have the authority above human, or are as the way to punish human.

But anyway, for my own project, I decided to start from the central panel where the title comes from. Actually from the very beginning I was really not sure where I could finally reach and am especially worried after I started make practical things, and thus I have been kind of prepared that I would be only able to finish one or two panels if I want to do the aspects I talked about in my proposal, and then it should be the central one, with most people, looks quite ready for an animation and would be more fun to interact with, and the right panel, which could be a great material for fascinating lightings and atmosphere that I would like to explore. They seems much more narrative after all.

So for the central panel, as why I made human first, the horses around the central pond are of the greatest quantity and similarity so will be the most efficient way to start with. Not all under the riders are horses though; there are also goats, oxen, donkeys, camels, bears, and other strange creatures. But as quadrupeds it would be easy to edit the rig.

I would say that this area is undoubtedly the most lively part of the whole triptych: it is almost animated. A round shape in the centre of the central panel, with the biggest crowd being engaged in this single activity, you can imagine how dominant it would be if the painting is a animated picture.

For the horse modelling and the rigging I mainly followed tutorials below:

blender 2.5 horse modeling PART_1 – YouTube
Animate a Moose in Blender – Part 1 The Rig – YouTube

Having looked at every single animal and the rider’s pose, I found none of them are being in a high speed of run (humans are seated steadily, some lying prone and even birds are standing on them), although several do have their forelegs up high. So I chose a mild one among the searching results of horse running frames. And according to that tutorial, I finally chose the slowest way “walk” for my animation instead of the “trot” I clicked on.

Click the image to see the original page, an incredible tutorial with many illustrations.

 

The two basic sets of poses I have made: walking and prancing for the quadrupeds.

Human Model – Female Hair, and Some Analysis

The hair of females are much more complicated than the one of males, and I have got quite a lot familiarity with the sculpture tool in Blender now. But it was a surprise that when I was looking for reference, I found there are very few females in the painting compared with the males, and especially in the hell panel.

Most of them are in the pond in the centre of the central panel

A rough overview of the sex ratio of the lower half of the central panel, where humans are most crowded. I simply suppose that Bosch distinguished male and female by their hair’s length, since all those females have extremely long hair and there is actually seldom “strange” hairstyle which cannot be told the sex. There could be some controversial ones (blocked by others) though.

Here are models I made and the reference:

The hair is with armature for changing pose and other potentially later use.

I found this woman really special because she is the only one who “are able to” tie her hair up, in a quite strange way (at least seen at today), which obviously means that she is in some ways different to all those other females in this painting. Since almost all the humans are totally nude (except some are connected with wired fruits), it does not make sense that one woman has this simply as kind of decoration. I had a quick search of medieval female hairstyle but did not get the answer immediately. But I hope there would be some explanation of this in the related works of this painting and I will also look up for the question again later. (Hey you have successfully drawn my attention!)