Add squash and stretch to your bouncing ball to add appeal. For delivery: The movie of your first bouncing ball, added to this one.

DUE: Week 2, Day 01.

Create a Bouncing Ball with a tail to illustrate follow through, overlapping and secondary motion. For delivery: You should include your first and second bouncing ball with the movie of this one.

DUE: Week 2, Day 02.

Revise your Ball with Tail assignment to better illustrate follow through, overlapping and secondary motion. Address the five points for improvement action plan based on feedback from your group. For delivery: You should include all versions of the ball animation up to this point. Include the QuickTime movie, Max file, AND a Word doc of your points of improvement and ways that you addressed them.

DUE: Week 3, Day 01.

Keeping the Ball and it's tail, add a pair of human-like legs. Using Inverse Kinematics, rig the legs and animate four steps, (left-right-left-right). When using bones, make sure to turn "renderable" on! For delivery: A QT movie and your Max file.

DUE: Week 3, Day 02.

Incorporating the tips and techniques you got in feedback and demos, revise your legs to achieve a more natural gait. For delivery: A QT movie of your previous Ball with Legs and your revised version, and your Max file.

DUE: Week 4, Day 01.

Continuing your work on the Ball with Legs, add hips to your walk. Use the tail as an indicator of the hips motion. Pay particular attention to the tilt, twist and swivel of the hips as well as the relationship to the feet and legs, (for a good reference, look at "The Animator's Survival Kit", pages 146 & 147). For delivery: A QT movie of your previous Ball with Legs, your revised version, the Ball with Hips, and your Max file.

DUE: Week 4, Day 02.

Incorporating the feedback from your peer review group, revise and refine your hips, tail and legs to more effectively convey weight and character.

For delivery: A QT movie of the previous legs and hips exercises, and the "Finished_Ball_Hips_revised" and your Max project file.

DUE: Week 5, Day 01.

Add to and revise your ball-with-tail-with-legs-with-hips-walk by creating and incorporating a spine. Focus on effectively incorporating the movement of the hips upwards through the spine and outwards through the tail.

For delivery: Once again, all previous version of the ball with legs, plus this one, in a QT movie, (h.264), and your Max project file.

DUE: Week 5, Day 02.

Revise your ball walk with spine animation to include more character. Change your character's posture from the beginning of the walk to the end. Demonstrate a change in thoughts and feelings with the spine, tail and legs.

For delivery: As before, include all previous versions of the ball with legs with this one in a QT movie, (h.264), and your Max file.

DUE: Week 6, Day 01.

Create SIMPLE geometry for your "walker", (you may abandon the sphere "Ball" at this point), from the feet up to the shoulders. Add a skin modifier to your character and add all the bones to this.

Incorporate the shoulders into your walk while adjusting the envelopes on your skin for appropriate deformation.

In groups of 3 -- 4, show your work to your peers, and offer tips, tricks and critiques for improving your walk with shoulders and skin.

Turn in a Word document detailing at least three points for improvement in both the smoothness and character of the walk animation and at least three points for improvement in the technical accomplishment of the mesh deformation.

DUE: End of class, Week 6, Day 02.

Address the points of improvement from the original Shoulders walk. Your shoulders should roll, tilt and twist in response to the movements of the rest of the body and imply the weight of the arms.

Your mesh should deform smoothly, twisting, wrinkling and folding appropriately.

For delivery: As before, include all previous versions of the walking ball with legs, spine, shoulders, and body mesh, along with this one in a QT movie, (h.264), and your Max file.

DUE: Week 7, Day 01.

Extend your characters walk to its' arms. Add bones and mesh, and 'skin' the arms, along with the rest of your characters' body, to walk and deform naturally. Clean up any problems with the previous assignment, and make sure that your geometry is deforming appropriately.

After peer critiques, write down and turn in, (in a Word document), 3 points for improvement technically and 3 points for improvement in the animation.

For delivery: As before, include all previous versions of the walking ball with legs, tail, spine, shoulders, arms and body mesh, along with this one in a QT movie, (h.264), and your Max file.

DUE: Week 7, Day 02.

Address and implement the points that you wrote down from peer critique. Be ready to articulate what you changed and how you changed it.

DO NOT add a head, (or if you do, DO NOT give it character), we are after the structure of the walk, the arms in particular, to reveal our character. The head comes later.

For delivery: The previous "Arms" video with this revision as a QT movie, (h.264), and your Max file.

DUE: Week 8, Day 01.

Add a head to your character. You may add a nose, eyes, chin or other indicator of "front", but do not animate the facial features.

Through body language alone, and with a neutral facial expression, animate your character walking on to the scene, observing something it sees, (but we do not), then reacting to it.

Success will be measured by how clearly we understand:

1. who the character is

2. what they are thinking and feeling

3. what they see

4. how it changes their emotions.

For delivery: This scene as a QuickTime movie, (h.264), and your Max file, saved in a folder labeled: "Lastname_Firstname_AHead".

DUE: Week 8, Day 02.

For this exercise, your character enters the scene, examines a box and lifts it.

The box is light weight. Your character picks it up, moves it to a new location, and sets it down.

You will be awarded points based on the following:

• Clear and articulate demonstration of John Lasseters' "Principles of Traditional Animation Applied to 3D Computer Animation". (10 points)
  • You will be awarded up to 1 point for each for the EFFECTIVE use of 10 principles, (excluding "Straight Ahead Action & Pose to Pose Action").
• Mastery of the technology, (3 points)
  • The skeleton, IK and FK systems must move naturally.
  • The skin, (required) must deform appropriately.
  • The link constraint must perform effectively.
• All files turned in according to the requirements, (2 points):
  • A QT movie, (h.264), 800X600, of this assignment only.
  • Your Max file for this assignment.
  • All files should be labeled: "Lastname_Firstname_Lift_Light", and placed in a folder of the same name.

DUE: Week 9, Day 02.

By now you should have revised your character lifting a light weight scene according to your peer feedback.

After turning this in, show it to the same group who reviewed your work last time.

The grading criteria for the previous version will also apply to this one.

Each group will choose one person's work to showcase, based on the improvements suggested in the last class.

For delivery: A QuickTime movie of this revision with a copy of the previous version and your Max scene file.

DUE: Week 10, Day 01.

Using the same 'script' as the previous assignment, change the weight of the box to "heavy".

The previous grading criteria apply.

For delivery: The previous two vesions, (light weight) and this version, (heavy v01), in a QuickTime movie, plus your Max scene file.

DUE: Week 10, Day 02.

Using the feedback from your group, revise and refine your first Heavy Lifting scene.

Again, you must demonstrate all ten of principles of animation, and the mechanics of the rig need to work.

For delivery: The Light Weight movies, the first Heavy Weight movie, and the revised Heavy Weight movie, all QuickTime, h.264.

DUE: Week 11, Class 01.

You may continue from your "Lifting" assignment, or create a new scene.

Your character must either push or pull a heavy weight in your scene.

The character should be "not pushing/pulling", then "pushing/pulling", then "not pushing/pulling".

Show us the transfer of weight, and how they feel about it.

For delivery: A QuickTime movie of this scene only, in a 16X9 (HDTV) aspect ratio, compressed with h.264.

You may use multiple camera angles.