Computer Animation: Bar Model -Post 10-

This is what was turned in...

    I still have a good number of stuff to texture. I stopped because I began to just slap stuff on when I was working on it rather than actually trying. I don't want this model to look like crap, so I'd rather take a hit on my grade than a hit on my model. So enjoy what I have finished. :)

    Okay So i'm going back at it, have so many little details to figure out and get done. Get excited because my next blog post will be my halloween costume, and it's amazing!

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S MESCHER

Sketches -2-

Just some more sketches...

Thanks for reading,

    MELANIE S MESCHER

Computer Animation: Bar Model -Post 9-

Getting mighty close...

     Okay I'm getting close to having most things textured, it's just not forgetting anything. I am getting really excited over this, but I just hope I can finish it. It's almost creepy how much it is looking like the bar.

Thanks for reading,

    MELANIE S MESCHER

Project Yoakam Contribution -Post 4-

Filming has begun...

     The puppet was completed by last Tuesday, and made it's big show. This last week we started actually filming our shots. The first day we shot, some of the videos were over exposed and we needed to reshoot. Actually in the second time we shot the dark room scene I am an extra in the corner, you can barely see me but I'm here. 

      

      The marketing team began brainstorming titles for Project Yoakam, and are having some final ideas by Tuesday. Also Tuesday, we are going to go over different credit information for the end of the short, and any other loose end we need to tie up. 

       As a personal contribution to the project, I again sent out information emails, and I began research on different competitions we could enter Project Yoakam. 

     This week we should finish all our filming and really begin post-editing to all the shots and visual effects, and have a finished piece. We also will being wrapping up the documentary and all the credits and marketing. So, next couple weeks are going to be busy, but we're almost there and we have something great!

Thanks for reading,

    MELANIE S MESCHER

Zombie War -Post 1-

Yes zombies...

    So for my Zombie lit class our final is to create something that summarizes what we've focused on throughout the weeks. I choose to do something about women and zombies. In most movies we've watched the women have been not very central or helpful to the zombie epidemic. They mostly get in the way really.

   My idea was to create some kick ass mo-fo women to battle zombies, and have one cowering man. I have not decided if I wanted to sexy-fy the women, kind of like they do in comic books. I'm thinking about doing this to play with the idea of how women are really only a sex symbol in some movies like the first one we watched White Zombie.

15" x 25"

     This is just a very sketchy composition work out, and i wanted to get the figures flushed out as well. I'm really happy with the middle figure and probably will change the zombies and maybe the left figure as well. Hope you liked it!!

Thanks for reading,
    MELANIE S MESCHER

Sketches

Oh look at that, I do know how to draw...


    I usually never post sketches, but I feel if I did it might motivate me more to sketch, so I collected all the sketches from the last couple weeks and combined them together for your viewing pleasure :).

      There are only a few that I really like. The 2 in the top left corner, which are cartoon portraits of my boyfriend (also the gas mask one is a quick portrait of him preparing for field). I also really like the Dead Space sketch (bottom left corner), which I did to prepare for my next sculpture project which is going to be Benjamin from the video game Dead Space.

     I thought I'd put this one by itself because it is the only one in color. This is a fan-art for the book Cinder by Marissa Meyer. You can click on a link for a description of the book. I really liked the book, so when I finished it I just started sketching and Cinder and Iko appeared.

Thanks for reading,
     MELANIE S MESCHER

Computer Animation: Bar Model -Post 8-

Trucking through...

      I'm getting through this pretty quickly, I'm really happy with it so far and can't wait to see what it looks like at the end.

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Computer Animation: Bar Model -Post 7-

Texturing is fun...?!

    So yes I am having fun with texturing, it is not as bad as I thought it would be when I started. Most of the stuff I am working on now is using different mental ray shaders. Once I get the textures I want to use for the bar and walls I will begin laying out the UVs for the more complex objects.

     Personally super excited for this project! I can't wait until it is all done and I get blow it up! Stay tuned!

Thanks for Reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Project Yoakam Contribution -Post 3-

This are going great...

     This week the puppet got close to completion, we started finalizing the script and plan to shoot our first few scenes Tuesday. Overall things are going along the schedule we made for ourselves.

      We also got a marketing team together from the story crew, Chelsea T. is now the director of marketing. Beth W, Emily C, Taylor H, and Catherine C have also moved to marketing as crew.

       Thursday we finalized who would be the puppet, our script writer, Jake B. We also discussed having everyone able to come in to be extras in the film where they are needed. 

       As a personal contribution to the project, I sent out emails after every meeting and help keep the meetings organized, and so Laurel can post the information on the blog in case people do not see their emails. I also checked in the Shayna M. the director of documentary, to see where they are at in their filming. 

      Overall I'm really excited for this project, and I'm excited to start filming and seeing this puppet in action!


Don't forget to look at our project blog for more detailed updates! Project Yoakam

Updated my Digication Check it out here!

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Computer Animation: Bar Model -Post 6-

First Neon Sign...

     I really didn't work on this too much this weekend, but I did get a neon sign finished. It was tough figuring out how to get the text to look like the Budweiser text.

    I think it looks really cool with the glow and looks like its the real neon sign. It just needs the reds logo where the red circle is. 

Also check out my updated Digication here!

Thanks for reading,
    MELANIE S. MESCHER

Computer Animation: Bar Model -Post 5-

Final Progress of Model...

     Okay so after weeks of modeling, I finally have a "finished" piece. I say "finished" because there are still small details I have to work out. For one, all the neon signs are not done, because I ran into some issues with figuring out the lettering. Instead of just fudging my way through the signs, I decided to do them right. As a result it is going to take longer than anticipated. 

Anyway without further ado here are the shots:

      Uncountable hours have gone into the making of this model, and I will soon be working on texturing and lighting. Once the model is complete I am going to do a camera walkthrough, then "destroy" the whole establishment.

If you want to see previous posts for detail shots and progress shots:

-Post 1-

-Post 2-

-Post 3-

-Post 4-

-Post 5-

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Project Yoakam Contribution -Post 2-

Week 2...

     This week we finished the puppet design and finalized the storyboards. We also discussed possible locations in more depth. We also had the fun job of naming the puppet! Chelsea gets credit for the name Murphy!

     Myself I have been keeping everyone organized with an attendance sheet and emails after each meeting going over the meeting and what needs to get done for next meeting.

     I also went with Kevin Harkness to Jo-ann to get some final fabric for the puppet. Even though I'm not part of the puppet crew, I know a lot about fabric and helped Kevin pick out the right fabric. 

     We also created a color pallet by laying fabric on the floor.

     Overall the project is going good, not too many bumps in the road so far. We are going to start filming once the puppet is completed. So excited about this project and cant wait to see the finished product!!

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Computer Animation: Bar Model -Post 5-

Progress... 

Okay so I can't stop long working on this, so I'll just give a quick overview of what i've been working on this weekend. Enjoy.

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Video Self Portrait

It's a Bar kind of Life...

It's a Bar kind of Life from Melanie Mescher on Vimeo.

      For my Video 1 class we had to do a video self portrait, and after much debate I decided on doing a short self documentary on growing up at a bar. I think I'm going to reshoot for this, and get more of me talking to different people at the bar, and maybe some better POV shots as well. 

     I'm really happy on how this turned out though, and now that I have the first version finished I think the second will be even better. 

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Computer Animation: Bar Model -Post 4-

More Progress...

Not much to say just to show pictures to show where I'm at. Enjoy.

Currently Working on this

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

  

Project Yoakam Contribution -Post 1-

Week 1...

    For our second Design for Media project, we had to vote on our favorite proposed ideas and only three would be created. This wonderful idea here, was one of the three that won. Everyone for class was given the opportunity to choose which group they wanted to be in. Our group has the most students the class has ever had on one project with 25 people!

    Thursday was our first meeting and we were all assigned jobs for the project. I was chosen to be the Head of Editorial. I am the person in charge of production documentation and oversee the project's blog, credit list, and the making of movie and research of potential competitions. At least that's how the project outline describes the Head of Editorial role. 

    Anyway for this week I created a customized organization chart that had everyone and their position listed. 

   I also was asked to collect some different choices of fabric to make the puppet out of, since I have a lot of fabric at home.

Mass amount of fabric

Different fabrics

 Personally, I am extremely excited for this project and can't wait to see how it turns out! It has the potential to be an awesome video.

Also here is the projects blog, so you can see the progress of Project Yoakam. 

Thanks for reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Computer Animation: Bar Model -Post 3-

Progress...

     I worked on a few small objects, but haven't put them in the final folder. I don't have much to say just wanted to update on my progress. We got an extra week to work on the modeling portion of our environment which is great for me, because the stress is now off.

Can Crusher

TV, Beer Bottle, and Keno objects

      On a side note, our next project for Design for Media is a group project. There are 25 of us on the project!!! My job is Head of Editorial, so I'll be posting things I do with this project and the link to the project's blog in a future post.

Thanks for reading,
     MELANIE S. MESCHER

Project Pipeline Proposal

Paper Tales...

      For my project proposal, I was thinking a stop motion paper animation. Done the way the first South Parks were done. I've wanted to do a paper stop-motion animation for a long while now, and I finally came up with a concept/story. 

     I want to use 6 different fairy-tales or folktales transitioning into each other. I was thinking animation tricks could be used to transition between them. Using obvious symbols like, red riding's hood to tell what story is being shown. 

    Here are some simplified storyboards for the project. I think their should be a few more storyboards to give the project more life, but I just wanted to get the idea across. Please excuse the poor coloring, I just wanted to demonstrate how I wanted to separate the stories with changing the tree colors. 

        As you can see very rough thumbnails, and I want to explain on each story, give more depth to each story. For the proposal, I just wanted to give everyone a feel for the design of the piece and how the stories would transition to each other. 

       So everyone can understand the jobs needed for this piece, and in my head this would all be done on paper so keep that in mind.

We have 5 weeks to complete this project, so here is a timeline to keep us on track! 

      As a side note, I just wanted to add that I own a Cricut, so this means creating the background will not be so hard. we may be able to have the machine cut out the shapes, if the cartridges I have will work with the design.

Thanks for Reading,

     MELANIE S. MESCHER