2D and 3D styles and shading questions...

[ddrake]

I'm playing around with the 3D capabilities here, and I can't quite decide what direction to go. Any thoughts, preferences or different approaches?

Here's a little clip of a room. (Thrilling, yes, I know.)



Anyway, there are a lot of different styles going on here and I would like to clean things up and try to stick to a specific set of techniques that work well together. I'm probably crazy from looking at it for so long, and they're starting to merge and not look half bad together to me. Need some fresh sets of eyes on it. Or single eyes. Or squinting eyes. (Or hell, stand on your head and look at in the mirror if you want.)

So yeah, the idea is to merge some 2D characters with some 3D environments but have them look ok together. I'm not going to be having a lot of crazy swooping camera movements in final scenes, but I'd like to be able to build some rooms to re-use from different angles, (probably position camera, export background shots and pull those into character sequences.)

If you've seen any of my previous posts, my characters all have a solid black outline, so I've played around with the 3D outlines and edge settings--to very mixed results--but I'd like to find something consistent in keeping with that style.

Here was an earlier test with a character:


(Again, not planning to actually have camera movements like this a lot, just playing around with how it might look if I wanted to)

Um, I guess I could ramble on, but I won't. Just looking for some kind of feedback, or processes from anyone who might have experience using AS in this way.

[3deeguy]

I'm just offering feedback but I would think your character style would have to be consistent with your background whether 2D or 3D. That said, I'm not willing to create a character that can do a 360° turn. I'd rather create 2 or 3 characters. I've also settled down to rigging a character to do only what I actually want it to do. I still try to learn everything I can to give myself choices.
Both versions are good choices. Good work.

[Little Yamori]

Looks really nice, if it's your style, just go with the 2D character with the 3D environment. It has it's own look that's not all that bad. I happen to use camera movements a lot, it gives a bit of a cinematic feel to a project, so why not stick with it if you can get it to work the way you want. My only suggestion for your room (which looks perfectly fine) is to blur the outdoor trees a little more, and maybe use gradients on the color fills of the leaf sections, I think this would give it less of a defined look and more like an unfocused background. Just my initial reaction.

[Danimal]

Wow, this looks phenomenal! The character blends and works well within the environment too. This definitely pushes the software to a new limit!

[ddrake]

Thanks guys. Still trying to make some decisions on it.

I would think your character style would have to be consistent with your background whether 2D or 3D.

I agree. (Unless you mean that 2D characters should only with a 2D background, and 3D with 3D...) I definitely think there's potential for matching styles using a mix of technique, it really comes down to the look and feel of both, and not seeming disjointed. I'm pleased with anime studio's capabilities here, and a lot of it IS just about pushing the envelope to find the limitations, and then reign it back in for the execution.

The frustrating part about the faux 3D of AS is that the only "light source" seems to originate from the camera, so all colors and shading of any objects are affected by the camera movement/position itself. Unless anyone knows differently? That's one of the style merging obstacles for me...

Gradients, toon shade, no shade? Shading and shadow drop? Manual shadow vectors? Shaded Fills for characters?

I think the biggest thing for me though is the inconsistency of "3D" crease and silhouette outlines, which makes it very difficult to match nicely with characters created with a solid black outline.

*EDIT*

I guess for added reference, here's a quick version of the kind of merging. Character overlaid on static single frame background in this instance. Plenty of things I'd tag right off the bat that I want to fix overall, (and note that there are shots of other characters I'd be cutting to in final edits,) but feel free to pick things apart as you see fit.

[3deeguy]

Thanks guys. Still trying to make some decisions on it.

I would think your character style would have to be consistent with your background whether 2D or 3D.

I agree. (Unless you mean that 2D characters should only with a 2D background, and 3D with 3D...) I definitely think there's potential for matching styles using a mix of technique, it really comes down to the look and feel of both, and not seeming disjointed. I'm pleased with anime studio's capabilities here, and a lot of it IS just about pushing the envelope to find the limitations, and then reign it back in for the execution.

I agree with your view. "disjointed" nails it. I remember commenting on someone's artwork a while back. Parts of the face were fleshed out with highlights and shadows. Others had just an outline. The light angle was inconsistant. The artist seemed good in some areas, not so good in others. Your work is excellent. You clearly are experienced enough to know what works.
My one point, relating to 'dialing it back', is that if your 3D work is too good then viewers may give the credit for it to your computer.

[lwaxana]

I had this struggle, too. I was trying to follow in the footsteps of futurama, where they have 3D backgrounds/vehicles and then 2D animation over top of it. On futurama they got a seamless match, but I couldn't achieve that with my tools. I ended up creating a 3D background and then tracing it at whichever angle was needed for a given scene. I was actually really happy with the result. But then I couldn't do camera moves or things like that. So I guess it just comes down to how important the camera moves are to creating mood and conveying your story (for example camera move reveals a zombie), as compared with having the visual style exactly how you want it.

[Little Yamori]

I don't know if I'm addressing this exactly as you described it, but I recently tried messing around with animating the gradient itself, and it worked out in a really cool way, so if your working with a light direction or source for your scene, you might want to try animating the gradient. After creating a shape with a gradient color fill, say from highlights to darker shadows, you can hit the select shape tool and adjust the placement of the gradient in the shape by grabbing and moving the "dumbbell" looking things that appear. That will animate on the timeline.

Hope this is useful for something

[Danimal]

It could just be me, but this character works well in this scene. I normally like shading to round out a character but I didn't even notice there was none on this until I went back looking for it. Mostly I was watching how well animated his face and hands in particular are.

[ddrake]

Well, here's another test for your viewing "pleasure." This is a version that incorporates a 2d character animated and imported into a 3d room. A little blur added incrementally to distant objects, shading on foreground objects, but no character shading.

It could just be me, but this character works well in this scene. I normally like shading to round out a character but I didn't even notice there was none on this until I went back looking for it. Mostly I was watching how well animated his face and hands in particular are.

Thank you in regards to my animation. And it could just be you AND me, though maybe you no longer feel this way. (and I sway with each passing render) The THEORY as I'm testing, is that with 3d shaded background and/or foreground objects, keeping the character un-shaded helps the eye focus there (and ideally with decent animation) helps the intended subject sort of pop out? I think that's happening? I just can't decide if it looks "good."

I was trying to follow in the footsteps of futurama, where they have 3D backgrounds/vehicles and then 2D animation over top of it. On futurama they got a seamless match...

Also the kind of style I'm going for. On the one hand, I know "Futurama" has a team of animators working on keeping style intact and consistent, but I will be honest in that attempting to work this way mostly stems from the fact that perspective drawing is not my strong suit. I will definitely consider the "Re-Drawing a perspective pose" concept. Thank you.

My one point, relating to 'dialing it back', is that if your 3D work is too good then viewers may give the credit for it to your computer.

My intention is to dial it back every step of the way. (A lot of this is testing out techniques I can incorporate for the potentially "fancier" parts that would occur later on) Sometimes I am a little too giddy about the way something "could be" that I sort of forget whether or not it "should be." On that note though, I honestly don't care if a viewer thinks I'm doing all the work, or if a computer is doing all the work, if that's what you mean. I just want to tell a story and have it look cool.

[Danimal]

keeping the character un-shaded helps the eye focus there (and ideally with decent animation) helps the intended subject sort of pop out? I think that's happening? I just can't decide if it looks "good."

I'd say it's happening and it looks good.

[Little Yamori]

Blurred shades look great, really makes a difference

[baphomet]

I switched from ToonBoom Harmony to Anime Studio Pro just to make better 3-dimensional scenes in combination with Cinema 4D.

Here are some of the examples made with Anime Studio Pro:





Here are some screenshots as well:

[ddrake]

Um, wow those are some big pictures. Anyway, the second video won't play. But the 3D work looks pretty nice on the first one, and a lot of nice detail that I can make out from the GIANT grainy images