Lie in the Bed I Made

Okay, here's what I got so far. Just a bed. But soon it will become a full room. It's a process, but that's why you're here anyway, right? I fiddled with the lighting too, because we're going for a somber feel for this scene. I'm sure it will evolve greatly from this point, but this is where it stands now. I'm kinda feeling the greenish cast to it, but I think it needs to be dimmer. Anyway, we'll see... it depends on what it will look like once all the other props are in place.

Opening Sketch

Here's a quick sketch Joe did while we were stuck in a lame meeting at work. Which should be a lesson to all you kids: Don't let the "man" keep ya down. Whether it be school, work, church, a funeral, you gotta make time for YOU. You think Thomas Edison invented the light bulb in his laboratory? Well, he did, but that's an exception to the rule. Most people of obsession find ways to work their passion when they should be doing something else, like paying attention in a meeting. We may never know what it is we were supposed to learn in that meeting, but who cares? We're all going to die of the bird flu anyway. Moot.

Where was I? Ahh yes. The opening shot sketch. This is now taking the place of the birthday scene we were going to do in his apartment. We've come up with what we think is a far more efficient introduction to the movie and bookends the short in a wonderfully symmetrical manner... Hey?! Are you listening to me? Pay attention dammit!

Dancing Shoes

What is the sound of no hands clapping? I'm still working on that. In the mean time, enjoy Morty from all sides. I know, I know, from the back it looks like he's relieving himself. And for all we know, he is. I wouldn't put it past his senility or his incontinence. At least he can get around now, if he needs. I still need to stress that he is mostly un-textured, that's why he looks a little flat at this point.

Out With The Old...

We've been busy, but we're back. It's been almost a year since any real work's been done, and now we are able to resume. The time we took off from the project, gave us a little time to reflect on the movie itself. While we are confident in our abilities, we realized some of the assets we had created thus far, have been found wanting. What does this mean? We're practically starting from scratch. In fact, we re-imagined the opening scene (our introduction to Morty). But this is a good thing. We both want what's best for the movie, and are willing to scrap any hard work we've already put in, and start over with a fresh outlook and an invigorated vibe.

When I use words like "we" and "us" and "our", I really mean "me". Because virtually all of Joe's work still stands. It's really my model work that was lacking (as opposed to Joe's illustrative work). To see what I mean, click on the first thumbnail image below. It'll show you a side-by-side comparison of the old mesh I've been using for Morty, and the fresh, new & improved, maximum strength Morty I built just this last weekend. See the difference? So do we. And now that my modeling skills have improved to a satisfactory degree, we both think it's time to move on. There is also a new rendering of the new Morty head below. He's still virtually un-textured at this point, but I'll be doing all the model building first, then move on to texturing later. Anyway, this new model will allow me more control over his expressions when the time comes to animate him. I also have most of his body built, but I'll save that for another posting. Expect to see some real progress from this point on...

Guess What?

We're ramping up again. Expect to see some new stuff within a week. Is there an echo in here?

A Morty Poem, By Lexi Capizzi

I like Morty.
I wish he was sporty.
His glasses are square, not round.
And he eats chocolate by the pound.
His clothes are cool.
But he goes with them on in the swimming pool!

-"The End," my friend.

(The above poem was written entirely by my incredibly smart, gifted and beautiful 7 year old daughter. Just thought I'd share her insight as to who this mysterious "Morty" is. If anything, it offers me inspiration to get MOVING again. So maybe expect something new before August is through. Heh. it rhymes.)

Wow.

It's been over a month. And a lot has happened in between, unfortunately not on the short. I don't like sounding appologetic, but it has been an unusual time for both Joe and I, and we're both doing our best just to keep up, and in doing so, some things need to take a back seat. This project is one of those things that mean everything to me, and we hope to get back on track shortly, but we might need just a wee bit more time to set all our ducks up in a row. Please believe me when I say we WILL be back... you shouldn't have to wait too much longer either.

peace!

-kev

No, We're Still Here.

Just wanted to duck in and say "Yo".

Joe and I still exist and are still planning on making regular updates. Unfortunately the last half of May got a little sticky for the both of us, thereby having to put the movie on that burner in the back, behind the big pot of simmering spaghetti sauce. Read into that what you will. The point being, there will be at least one update this week. Maybe we'll see some more detail on the fish. Who knows.

Anyway, thanks for checking back, you. We'll see ya in a bit.

Painfully Slow Progress

I'm nearing the corner on roughing out the fish character. You can see the sketch that i'm going off of right here. Joe did that beauty back in February. Anyway, this will mark how a model evolves over time as I continue to add more detail, like a potter at the wheel... Think "Ghost". I'm Demi Moore and Joe would take the part of Patrick Swayze, gently guiding my hand over the wet, smooth clay... whooo, is it getting hot in here?!!

Alright, enough kidding around. Get back to work, y'all.

Look Out! I'm Movin' Here!

Alright, kids. I've been a little preoccupied with selling my house, and finding a new one. We all know how tedious that can be, so I won't go into details. Needless to say, the production of the movie has taken a hit because of it, but do not fret: I am about to recommence.

I'll make no promises when I'll actually show something, only because I don't know when this house stuff is going to rear it's ugly head. So you'll just have to keep checking back like you do every day with bated breath. But I wouldn't be surprised if I had something up by tomorrow or Thursday.

ta ta, Teutell...

Mmmmmmm, Worms

Since I don't have any new stuff to show off yet, here's one that goes back to August of twenty-aught-4. Joe and I first came up with the concept back in July of last year, and this was a test to see if we had the chops to bring some of our ideas to life. It's pretty lame actually, but it was cool to see (at least for me... Joe's eyes just sort of crossed, then he went back to watching Fear Factor or something). Anyway, take a gander, it's just Wormy sort of doing a little jig, but it's a very worm-like jig.

I REALLY want to start showing off some of the Fishy stuff, but I haven't even started yet. Maybe this weekend will smileth upon me, and maketh my hand turn steadfastly toward the computer. That way, I'd have some good stuff to show by Monday. Thanks for hanging in there with me, sometimes this stuff doesn't move as fast as I would like. And that goes double for Joe.

More of The Same.

Just another facial animation test... but this time I've simplified his movements somewhat, less erratic eyeblinks, and he's not blowing this time around. What we need the character to do in this movie is act a little bewildered in his old age, so he's not too coherent to begin with. What you see him doing here is a lot like how he might be acting most of the time in his scene. But time will tell. On to more modeling now, the fishbowl awaits...

Bummer!

Man, I was going to have a new render for you today. It would have been more of the same (Morty looking around and doing his thing), but unfortunately, we had a black-out on the computer. So the render quit and I lost all those precious frames. Ahhh well, I've re-started the render. So, we'll all get to see it tomorrow.

Also, I've had to focus a little more energy than normal onto other endeavors this week. Joe and I are also in the process of combining our "design and motion" capabilities under one web site. And as we all know, making something cool takes an extrodinary amount of time and effort. So. for the time being, I have to split my efforts between that and the movie... but it's all good. In no way will this mean Joe & I will stop posting here every week, we will continue to show our progress, but it means just that, we'll ONLY post our progress, which means progress advances only as fast as we do. Man?! What does that even mean? I'm not even making any sense... now I think I'M going senile.




ok. I just pee'd myself. Move over Morty...

Morty Blows

I now have him partially rigged. Enough to do a mediocre test animation anyway. In this little test, he blinks a lot, moves his mouth randomly a lot, and lets out a blow in order to blow out a candle that isn't there yet. To be honest, I wouldn't have posted this had it not been over a week since my last content entry. But, I figured, it's fun to point and laugh at the animator as he painfully works out how he's going to make this guy move.

Over the next few weeks, I might try and do a couple more animation tests... try and narrow down his style... but in reality, I think we all need a break from Morty, and I might move on to other scenes within the film. There is a mountain of work to be done, and we've only just begun to chip away at it. I started with one of the more difficult scenes first, so I might move on to one of the more simpler parts: The Goldfish Scene.

We also want to get going on actual pre-visualization. With the Morty scene nearing completion (maybe 70-80% of the way there) we need to start working out the blocking and pacing of the film. This process is very important to the final result and should make for an efficient work-flow when it comes time to really start the animation process and locking down shots for final rendering.

We are trying to be as organized as possible in our approach, but sometimes it helps to break up the monotony and pull out the shotgun then start firing away to see if you hit anything. Not to mention, the shotgun can be fun. Once everyone's adrenalin is pumped back up, we'll move back to the sniper rifle, and start laying in the detail. But for now... lock and load.

Bone to Pick

There are things I like about this 3D stuff, some things I love. But setting up a character rig has got to be the down side. It can be rather challenging to get it to look and behave right. But alas, I can see the light at the end of the tunnel (apropos for the sort of story we're telling). All of his major bodily movements have been successfully rigged (boned), so now I have to set up morph targets for his face. Setting up the face targets is much more fun and intuitive (for me anyway) than actually rigging a character to move. I WISH I had some stuff to post, but it's just not in a state that's presentable yet. What I might do is a character test and fully render it over the weekend, so you'll have a bright, shiny new movie to watch by Monday. Thanks for hanging in there folks... patience is a virtue.

Post-Weekend Update

Every Monday we'll post stuff here to let you know what we've been doing and what we might have in store. I've been doing small, imperceptible improvements to the Morty model that just isn't worth posting here. We're at that part of the production where it slows down a bit, and there isn't much new stuff worth showing. We don't want to risk becoming repetitive, or boring... So we want to wait until we have something new or worthwhile to show. At the very least, we'll try and post something once a week.

Joe is working on designing a new parent site for the movie. It's main purpose will be a more traditional website. It'll have a Gallery (a more organized repository of images and animation clips), More in-depth content about the movie itself, and... of course... a merchandise store where one might want to get a bon-a-fide official The End t-shirt, or an official The End mouse pad, or an official The End speedo. All procedes will go directly into our pockets, where they will immediately combust upon the iron hull of our movie debt.

SO, we'll let you know when that site is up and running. I'd say expect something in mid-May, but you know how glacial these things can move sometimes.

In the meantime, sit tight and keep an eye on this site.

Details, Details, Details

So what we have here is Morty with some new skin, new glasses, and a little hair. It was Joe's suggestion to make some new glasses, and I think we'll all agree that it's for the better. Joe has the unfortunate ability to always be right... it's unfortunate, because it usually means more work for me.

Anyway, take a nice close look... Morty's really come a LONG way, as you can tell from this early post. It won't be long now until we can finally deem him finished. Then we'll rig him, and it'll be time for some animation tests and some real movement.

And that's HD resolution you'll be looking at, so again, file size will be rather big for you people with smaller monitors.

Counting Bodies Like Cows To The Rhythm Of The War Drums.

Man...this sucked...it might not look like much, but the interior structure was time-consuming. I think this will give Kev a decent jumping off point for his modeling exploits. Speaking of exploits, Kev's been jamming on wrapping up the texture for Morty's skin and let me tell you...it looks sweet. We are super pleased with the results. Maybe he'll have something to show later today.

To our six fans out there, don't comment all at once. You might break the internet.

This Week...

Most people like to have fun, unwind...enjoy life a little. I mostly just get irritated by it. I continually want to push myself to do more, make more progress and get things done. A state of relaxation just doesn't seem to be possible for me. My mind races at light-speed all the time. So, with that being said, let's talk a little about what we want to get done over at 'THE END.' central this week. We want to get Morty's scene fully modeled and get him rigged so that we can start the animation process. That would be a huge step for us and get us feeling better about the process. From the art side of things, I am going to finish up the cow / barn scene artwork this evening and have a post for you later on that. One of my next goals is to start finalizing our storyboards so that Kev and I can start pre-visualizing this thing with rough shapes to get timing and the overall blueprint for the film set in stone.

So, you guys go enjoy your week and check back with us frequently. We'll have stuff to show. I'm the one in the corner getting irritated.

No Rest For The Truly Wicked.

I know how you all like it rough out there in the ether, so, I thought I'd give you an early look at the cow / farm scene. It's super preliminary, so don't get on my ass about perspective this, cow anatomy that...It's a rough kids. Take a deep breath and enjoy life. It's 1:03 am in the east as I write this. I am in the basement, the heavy metal is cranked, I'm in a cloud of toxic marker vapor, the creativity is flowin' and I'm just getting warmed up. No rest for the wicked.