Minimate Labs

Basic Model Renders

May 27, 2010

The next few posts will be about the 3D Minimate model I created in Blender. This first one has a group of images from my earliest saved renders. By this point the model was basically complete so I wanted to get a good turnaround view. The camera circled the Minimate about three times, slowly moving down over the course of 300 frames.

Being new to Blender I was using most of the default settings. By default, it dumps all renders out to a temporary folder and the filenames are simply the frame numbers. With these settings it is very easy to overwrite old renders. That's why I no longer have the full turnaround.

Of course I could just set up the scene and re-render it, but I've tweaked the model quite a bit since then. During the animating process I found a lot of little things that didn't look quite right. The arms had flicker due to smoothing issues, the hands had shading problems, and the legs had normals flipped in odd ways.

You'll notice the feet are the old pre-C3 style. I knew the first character I was going to animate was the iconic Wave 2 Spider-Man. Sure, there have been other Spideys with holed feet but not this one.

Next up, materials.

Stop Motion 2 - Spidey Dances

May 18, 2010

I guess I have a knack for biting off more than I can chew when learning something new. My first attempt at stop motion animation was rough and undisciplined so I was eager to make the next project more memorable.

Since Spider-Man is arguably the most iconic Minimate figure, it was an easy choice. Check out the full video in the link below.
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Stop Motion Experiment 1 - Red Lift

February 11, 2010

I like to use the descriptor 'experiment' for a lot of the things I do. It really helps to displace responsibility for my actions. You can get away with a lot of crappy stuff if you call it an 'experiment'. You were just messing around, seeing what you could do. You weren't trying to make anything good. If it's good, cool. If it sucks, it doesn't matter.

The perfect cop-out.

I learned some valuable lessons from this initial stop-motion project:

It's very important to lock down your camera's tripod.
It's very important to lock down your subject matter.
Pet's should be isolated for the duration of the shoot.
Crouching is not comfortable for long periods of time.
Make sure subject is in focus.
Pants are optional.
Dancing is forbidden!

I though I had everything fairly secure and there wasn't going to be much jitter. After assembling the frames, I found I was obviously quite wrong. I thought about reshooting or modifiying the frames, but after working with it I realized the subject matter didn't warrant the extra effort. It just wasn't interesting enough to devote more time to. There was no vision.

I intend the next one to be much more interesting.

Stay Puft Wallpaper - Completed

November 30, 2009

Sometimes you just reach a point where you say, "It's not getting any better." I've reached that point. Not in a good way though. I keep trying to tweak things without really improving them.

Time to just call it done and move on to the next project.
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Battlestar Galactica Propaganda

October 26, 2009

I've written previously about my fondness for the propaganda-styled imagery. It was brought back into the public eye with the Obama "Hope" image and its subsequent countless parodies.

The annoucement of more Battlestar Galactica Minimates as Toys'R'Us exclusives gave me a chance to get in on the act.
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Stay Puft Wallpaper - Chestcap Removal

October 22, 2009

These guys look a lot better without the chest caps. The proton packs and belt equipment had to be moved around a bit to maintain all the proportions, but I think it looks good.

I have discovered what I think will be the hardest part of this image for me. Stay Puft's face is really giving me troubles right now. I really want that angry "You shot me!?!" expression, but all my attempts end with poor results. What you see above is the best I've come up with so far.

I think I'll let that part sit for a whlie and work on the background and hairpieces for the guys. I'll probably finish out the proton packs first. That's a solid goal I know I can accomplish.

Translucent Wall Hangings

October 20, 2009

This is going to be another one of those light-on-text-heavy-on-pics type posts. There's really not too much to say about taking photos of Minimates, having them printed at various sizes, surrounding them with frames and suspending them on a wall.

Which is exactly what I did.
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Stay Puft Wallpaper - Color

October 15, 2009

Oooh, progress. I've made the lines smoother and more consistant. Obviously there's color as well. These probably won't end up being the final colors but they're close.

I made the heads turquoise to force me to decide on giving them hair or leaving them as blanks. I'm leaning toward 'hair' even though they'll hardly look like Minimates at that point. The chest caps really detract from the Minimate-ness, I think I'll try an alternate version with standard chest-blocks. That should help.

I'm looking forward to the shading and proton streams. I'm dreading the inevitable facework.

Block Babes

October 12, 2009

We've all heard how bad the economy is. Some people have been hit harder than others. When things get tough, sometimes you have to do things you're not proud of just to get by.

Last spring I needed to make some quick cash so I started up a new Internet venture. As a word of caution, the following post may be Not Safe For Work. Click at your own peril.
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