Evaluation

Overall I feel the animation shorts I've created have potential however could be developed further with more time and techniques.

The amount of time spent on developing research and attempting to model a head was, I feel too long, something I'd do differently in the future. 
However, since doing the research my understanding of human anatomy and facial structure has greatly improved and shall benefit future animations.

Now I have the ability to understand and create human expressions, something I would have struggled with at the start of the project.

The development of not just the catalogue but also the character shall be key to the future of my animating.

Head Sequence 04: Blink & Sleep

 

Movement occurs across the face as well as neck and top of head.  Muscles relax causing face to drop, head bobs down slightly as well as ears and nose.

Head Sequence 03: Anger

 

With anger the face contract (opposite to being asleep) tensing muscles and lifting the majority of key features, bar the lowering of the middle sections of the eyebrows and nose.  Adding to character I've included the raising of one side of the lips also implying disgust.

Head Sequence 02: Content & Puzzlement

 

I wanted to look at puzzlement as an expression for an older character because of the potential to create story.  Something new to an older person tends to be greeted with both curiosity and suspicion as is the case with this character.  The bottom image aims to illustrate this.

Head Sequence 01: Joy

 

Though I had originally intended to have a full, beaming smile I believe this, almost forced look works much better.  Here movements uncover bone structure as skin is pulled back (under eyes).

Tired

I find this animation to be most successful of all the shorts.  Movements occurs all over the model with morfing ratios changing constantly.  This has created a much more organic structure.

"Old Man" with Actor - 3D Motion Capture Facial Animation

Example of over animated older character: Though I find this piece of motion capture very good the expressions are too elaborate for the character.  What I think would be more appropriate is to have an actor of the same age as the character, thereby having more realistic examples of expressions.

Though my research and images are taken of a younger actor the thort process of including older features has been recognised. 

Full Smile Demo

While developing the head smile I felt it important not to push to any extreme expression.  I felt this was important as the character itself needed to be considered.  This is an old man, therefore to push out a too larger smile would be out of character.

When animating I feel it important not just to consider the 'average' facial movements but the potential movement of the character on the screen.  For this character smiling is unnatural and repressed.  Hance the eyes not narrowing in corners.

Eyes also appear larger, something that doesn't occur on a 'real' smile.

Smile Demo: One Side Animation

What I like about this animation is that it shows the importance of small movements around the entire face.  Lokking at the contrast between the two sides of the head it's clear suttle movements make alot of difference.

Anger

Using the old face has proved to be an advantagious interms of general movements available.

On an older person skin tends to sag and muscules become smaller due to natural degradation.  What this creates is potentially a much more expressive face.  Move skin is having to move when facial expressions are formed resulting movements such as those I've attempted to imitate.

First attempt at facial animation: Eyebrows

This very short demo wasa merely a test to see the render quality and to show my first attempt at animating the head.  From here I went onto developing the movement.

3D Studio Max Screen Prints: Render

Though time consuming I felt it important to render at a higher quality to ensure I could see any problems with the animation

3D Studio Max Screen Prints

Editing Orginal Head: using soft selection tool

Set Up

Mirror, Computer (3Ds Max), Graphics Tablet and Keyboard

Animation Demo

Over the past few days I've been working on animating an 'old man' head from http://www.turbosquid.com/

Originally I started animating with a younger male head however felt with the older, wrinkled face I could show expressions that are more dramatic.  This has appeared to be the case.  As with the greater amount of 'skin' I could push areas much further and still look possible in the real world.

Model Prototypes

Originally I planned on modelling and constucting my own heads.  These are a couple of screen shots of the prototype I designed in AutoDesks Mudbox.