Still breaking the law? Yeah. I came here to sing a song about revolution. But I decided that it doesn't mean anything without love first. So this song goes out to the girl I love. ...
Today's lesson is that of the importance of roots. Anime is my root and this picture shows how I succeed, fail, add, subtract, and change it. You can see that the large eyes of anime is copied, but changed. I don't think that there is an anime out there wit these type eyes. Of course, there's an very large finite number of eye configurations. The face is not striving to be realistic, nor is it deformed. It's not too anime, but it's got features that I say are anime. Indeed, I have created a whole new artform, that of 3D Anime/Manga. That is nothing new for me, I invented and produced the first two recorded duct tape murals. But what I would like to get across here is the willingness of the format to constrain itself to it's derivative while breaking through to a whole new level of art. The low-poly anime lighting gradients seen here are not found anywhere else. Some may criticize my work as amateur or even too simplistic, but it is a style and I make the case that this is the only real-time 3d anime ever made. Being able to actively move around an anime scene is certainly one of the coolest things I've ever seen myself. When twenty actors are all moving in sync in a real-time rendered urban metropolis, my dream will come to reality. That is why I am working myself half to death to graduate college and work on JF as well as AS3D (the Anime Director Engine).
Tonight, we learn about fog. Fog is a useful effect that makes things that are farther away greyed. Of course, you could make green fog with 3d graphics since they don't differ between green fog and grey fog, but green fog is not fog, it's toxic gas. The use of fog is to soften an image. Certain types of Range Fog can leave foreground images sharp while they make make further things fade. In fact, some fog is so dense that it can make things look like they aren't even there. It's amazing, but let's look at the actual usage. Here we see the further road looking greyish. But what else, the dome fades to grey. At the left, it looks like it's not there. On the right, you can see the lines. But notice a few bad things. It doesn't do much. Notice how this image is not saved by it's fog alone. In fact, it sucks. Without buildings, characters, and/or more terrain, this picture is worth a yawn and a half for wasting your time. But it's not about the picture, it's about what can happen after this picture. Once I put in buildings, this becomes a sprawling techno-future cityscape. When I add people, it becomes a bustling city center. When I add motion to those people and take numerous pictures, it becomes an epic 3d comic/movie. What a thought?! This is the start of something big. The fog has a specific purpose. It destroys that which is far away while preserving that which is close. Thus, we have focus and reality distinction. That is very good. Adding the list of things that I need will create something amazing. But remember that things are only as good as what holds them together. I believe that the fog will hold the focus together. Plot, characters, etc will also need to hold things together, but we got the focus problem half solved. Why only half? Well, pointing the camera in the right direction is often helpful. Focusing the camera's attention correctly is just as important. Remember field of view also. FoV in real life is set by the lens and the setting of the lens. For example, wide angle lenses make great wide FoV shots, but bad zoom shots. Whereas telephoto lenses can really zoom in. 3D has the best of all worlds as usual. FoV is controlled by a number. Aspect ratio is also controllable by a number. You can say, "I want wide angle," and it'll give it to you with less than 1% CPU usage. In fact, it's the same amount of CPU usage for turning the camera. Then you can have it zoom in from a mile away while moving in a curvy accelerated path to end it zoomed in on a mole on someone's nose. Not that you'd want to do that, but it'd be no problem to do it if you did want to.
If you're here to learn something about three-dimensional design, read on. If not, go down a paragraph. All the latest is right there. This picture is of Javantea jump-kicking. 3D is cool because you can do this type of stuff with drag-and-drop ease. You don't have to worry about if one leg will look longer than the other or if the face will look right. Not that it's much easier, but it relieves common drawing pains. I like it because it is simple, effective, and reusable. The more that a person can reuse, the more they can produce. If you can produce a lot, you'll end up with a much greater product. Tonight's lesson is, keep those body parts in check. You might see that Jav's non-kicking leg is bent at the knee. Not only is that common in martial arts, but it's vital to attacking. If a limb goes unchecked, it'll likely get broken or bruised. Boxers leave their arms unchecked because they know what is behind their arms: their face and body. In my experience with martial arts, you want your enemy to miss even your arms. You must flow around your enemy so that they cannot cause any damage. If you are a street boxer (no gloves), you want your arms to be in pristine condition, not bruised and broken. A well landed punch can easy break an arm in half. I well blocked punch can break the attacker's wrist. How do I know? My brother blocked my punch back when I was 11 or so. He used his entire body weight (he was hefty back then) at great speed and blocked with his bicep and elbow with is body behind it. It crushed my wrist and I had to wear a cast for six weeks. My wrist still hurts from time to time. How did a simple block break my wrist? He used my velocity and his velocity combined to raise the energy to very large amount and then turned the energy into a huge force: his arm backed by his whole body weight. In the end, my fifteen pound punch turned into a two hundred and fifty pound force all on my wrist. Did I deserve a broken wrist? Duh. It taught me well the physics of collisions.
Here, Jav is doing the same thing he's backing his attacking foot with his useless foot to create a normal that cannot be turned away. That foot will keep going forcing whatever is in front of it to give way. If the thing that is hit is stronger than Jav's attack, Jav will stop in mid air and possibly bend at the knee to absorb the shock. We'll see something cool like that in Scene 5.
