I have begin working with 3D animation software and modeling programs to create animations and movies. My interest in this started in high school where I tinkered with (then) Alias Maya and some of the simple animation techniques. I let it go for a few years, and picked it up again with a class in (now) Autodesk Maya. We had a couple big projects, and a few smaller ones to teach us more advanced animation methods such as rigging (using skeletons and kinematics) and some more advanced modeling. Below are some of the videos I created hosted on YouTube.
iPod Animation
This was a quick video to demonstrate some of the basics of using skeletons and inverse kinematic (IK) handles to move a figure in a scene.
Rocket Animation
This was a tutorial we did at the beginning of the term to teach us the very basics of how to use Maya and how keyframe and physics-based animation works.
Midterm Animation
This was the final cut of the video I submitted as my midterm project for my 3D animation class. It differs in that the soundtrack has been added, and some of the other sounds have been changed.
Final Animation
Below is the animation my partner and I submitted as our final project for 3D animation. We decided to use Maya’s toon shaders to see how they work, as well as to do something different from the rest of the class. It looks like traditional 2d animation, but in fact is based on 3d models with specific shaders applied to them.