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    ② Week 4


    Trail  Mix
                


    Feedback from Mentors and Professors  (Class 7 )

    1.  For the impact, aim for a cleaner effect with less dirt, quicker smoke dissipation, minimal debris, and reduced bounce on particle debris. Adjust the debris velocity to match the impact direction.

    2. For meteors, since they are far away, create a hero meteor with a trail at the origin and use it as a particle texture (sprite/ribbon), offsetting the texture sequence to make them unique.

    3. For the product and orbiting ingredients, try experimenting with different camera angles to better frame the ring and package.

    4. For shot 1,  the trail mix ball didn’t look very appetizing and its recognizability isn’t as strong as the product packaging.



    Changes made:

    1. For shot 1,   we’ll stick with the previous packaging drop idea.

    2.   Cleaning up the effect by reducing dirt, debris, and bounce, speeding up smoke dissipation, and adjusting debris velocity to match the impact direction.

    3.  Deciding hero shot 




    Week 4 Task - Package Falling Fx  improve

    - clean up the impact effect:  reducing the amount of dirt and debris;  speeding up the smoke dissipation and minimizing the debris particles
    - reduce the bounce on the debris particles and adjust their velocity to match the impact direction for more realism
    -  Adjusted the falling direction of the meteor to right-to-left.
    - Test nuts falling debris
    - lighting test (hdri)



    Landing Fx reference
    source: Film ‘Iron Man 1’
    source: Film ‘Big Hero 6’
    source: Film ‘Wreck-It Ralph’ 1





    1.  Falling simulation


    These are a few tests I exported after many simulations. The last one is what I'm currently satisfied with. (no keyframe)


    WIP detail of constraint (For more information on the falling FX process, please see week2 blog)
    ovrall nodes (falling fx)
    detail of RBD constraint properties
    constraint in RBD Bullet Solver




    2. Dust and debris effect 

    Since the current shot combines live action and virtual, we want to use dust (impact and cover the lens) to transition between virtual and reality. The following three videos show tests for impacted dust and debris, as well as tests that also incorporate some nut elements. Based on these three tests and feedback from professors and mentors, the speed of smoke dissipation and the amount of dirt and debris all need to be modified.

    Test 1 (no impact dust to camera)
    Tets 2 (with impact dust to camera)
    Test 3 (with nuts)


    To achieve dust that covers the shot without obscuring the entire scene, I increased the smoke's  dissipation speed and redesigned the smoke impact path using particles. The debris velocity was also adjusted based on the new particle-driven impact path. For the dust impact, I divided it into two parts: one focused on the camera for the live-action transition, and the other for the normal dust impact from the object falling.

    Impact dust 1
    Impact dust 2 (to camera)
    Combine 1 and 2

    Please slide the image below to view the process
    Impact dust 1
    Impact dust 2
    Impact dust 2



    Adding debris and dirt ( based on impact dust 1)



    Dirts
    Debris



    Lighting and camera test


    1. camera matching (unreal and Houdini)

    Imported Houdini from unreal with a still camera. Based on the falling fx, I adjusted the position and size of the two stones in front of the lens.

    Fx in Houdini
    Unreal Engine Environment by  Wyatt Clark  


    2. Shot 1 - lighting test in Houdini (redshift)

    assets (credit)
    rocks (Quixel Bridge)
    https://quixel.com/assets/xdxhffp

    Groudn (Quixel Bridge)
    https://quixel.com/assets/uk4rabe
    Package modeling by Duck Sandy


    Lighting HDRI (credit)
    Night HDRI by Wyatt Clark 





    Lighting reference

    source: https://www.discovermoab.com/moab-night-skies/





    Rough Lighting test in Houdini (Redshift)

    I've added roughly the ground and the stone texture maps, the packaging texture is not available yet. To make the package a visual focus, I added some interesting ambient light based on the HDRI (like the starry sky), but since I felt that the overall ambient light was dark and lacked some ambient light other than the starry sky, I added an orange light on one side of the package (maybe a campfire, or the portable light in the background that the astronomer has around him while he's observing the sky).

    WIP in redshift 
    Test3 with back warm light
    Test1 
    Test2
    Diagarm of Test 3






    Yilin Zhao / SANM560 / SCAD x The Mill