Here it is, my finished "35 Second Cutscene Animation", hope you like it.
Reflection of My Animation
What did I do?
For my animation I chose to do a cutscene animation for Fallout (The first game, made by Interplay Entertainment). I decided that my animation would be set outside Vault 13 and that it would involve the Vault Dweller walk from the open vault door to the door control panel, using it and then watching the vault close. Then the scene would fade to another scene of the Vault Dweller walking slowly into the distant darkness of the cave.
How did I do it?
The first thing I did was create the vault door. Then using this vault door as a template I was able to create the wall that it goes into and the mechanism that closes it, texturing each object as I created it. Then I set about importing models from the Fallout 3 game files to use for the rest of my scene, the caves, the vault control panel and the corridor behind the door. Then I imported all the necessary objects to create a character, modifying the texture for the vault jumpsuit so it has a number “13” on its back rather than “101”. The final stage before starting on the animation was the lighting, using a mixture of omni lights and spoptlights with volume light I created two ceiling lights, several spotlights on the floor and the spotlight that hangs over the vault control panel. Then I started work on my animation, fully animating the closing of the vault door. Once I’d finished the vault door animation, I then fully rigged the character I had imported from Fallout 3. Then using an image of a walk cycle as a guide I started to animate the character. The first day I only animated the legs of the character walking from the vault door to the control panel, as I had tried and failed earlier on in the day. The second day I completed the animation of him walking to the control panel, and also the animation of him leaning in and operating the controls. On the third and final day of animating I animated him standing back and watching the vault door close and him walking into the darkness of the cave.
Did the final outcome meet my original intentions?
Yes, I actually think it might have come out a little bit better than I expected. There were a few things that I underestimated the difficulty to do, but over all I did underestimate my ability to animate as it had only been my third or fourth time.
How did I manage my time?
Overall, not too well. The reason being is that I didn’t really think about how long it was going to take to create the animation I had thought of, causing me to spend most of my free time at home trying to keep up with the deadline. Although given the fact that I did finish the animation on time I did manage it quite well, once I realised that I wouldn’t be able to finish it in lesson time alone.
