September 1, 2020 Workshop 2 Notes

Lighting and NURBS Surfaces

PART I: LIGHTING

  1.  SIMPLE THREE POINT LIGHTING

Create a simple Nurbs sphere from the "Surfaces" shelf tool.

Add spot light

Go into lighting mode by hitting #7 key

With the spot light selected, to the top of the screen menu item "Modify/Transformation Tools/Show Manipulator Tool"

Move the source of the spot light above and to the right of the sphere, and move the target of the spot light to an area just below the sphere.

With the spot light selected, open the attributes editor (third icon from upper right-hand corner of Maya window) and resize the "cone angle" until it visibly impacts sphere

Within the attributes editor, turn on ray-trace shadows for the spot light.

Add two point source lights without shadows for fill and back-fill light


Use Show manipulator tool to reposition the point lights (target and source)

PART II: NURBS SURFACES

1. SURFACE OF REVOLUTION

Goto Front View

Create/CP Curve tool

Goto Perspective View

Surfaces/Revolve  – select control box, pick “Y” axis, and # degrees.

CV Curve-Tool (control vertex NURBS curve) – perhaps more replicable due to less idiosyncratic control points. (higher degree is smoother --- largest exponent in polynomial equation used to represent the curve)

EP Curve Tool (free-hand pencil NURBS curve – 1 degree creates polygon straight lines)

2. LOFTING A SURFACE

Go to elevation view

Create two CV Curves in elelvation

Goto Perspective view

Move one curve along Y axis.

            Pre-select both curves

            Surfaces/loft – select control box – increase section spans to 5 – apply to curves

            De-select geometry

            Select curve

            Move curve (transforms surface associated with it)

            Right-click on curve and select control vertex

            Isolate control vertex with selection tool [note gravitational pull on curves]

            Move curve vertex with mouse and surface automatically updates.

3. MODIFYING A PLANAR SURFACE

Create/Nurbs Primitives/Plane

Stretch the plane.

Change the number of divisions in the channels box (30 x 30)

Right-click on plan and select control-vertex

Use selection tool to select a control-vertex or several of them.

Use the move tool to move them thereby reshaping surface

[Optional: Key frame Control Vertices directly in two locations at two frame numbers for animation]

4. PROJECTING CURVE ON A SURFACE

Create a surface of revolution (or use one from part 1 above)

Goto Front View Create a straight edge (EP Curve from two points)

Edit Nurbs/Project Curve on Surface (- select control box, use View direction –

Edit Nurbs/Trim Tool  - select surface, select part to delete

 

5. SCULPTING A FLAT SURFACE [SKIPPED THIS EXAMPLE IN WORKSHOP]

Create/NURBS PRIMITIVES/Plane

Select Edit NURBS Sculpt tools with box.

Hit “reset” button to set all parameters to standard default values.

Draw on Surface

Hold “b” key to reset size

Change maximum displacement option

6. SETUP FOR SCULPTING A NURBS SPHERE

Create/NURBS PRIMITIVES/Sphere

Select #3 to increase density of mesh

INCREASE DENSITY OF SURFACE

Technique 1.

Select channels box for sphere.

Increase “sections” and “spans” to increase number of CVs (under MakeNurbSphere1)

Technique 2

Select Edit NURBS – Rebuild Surfaces []

            Set number of spans u – 30

            Set number of spans v – 30

Click rebuild

From left side of application window, open hypershade/perspective view of model (creates two view windows side by side).

Select blinn1 shader, change color to pink

Apply pink color to sphere

Set eccentricity to 0 to create strong highlight

Space-bar on perspective window to revert back to single perspective view.

7. BEGIN SCULPTING NURBS SPHERE

Select Edit NURBS Sculpt tools with box.

Hit “reset” button.

Under stamp profile: Set Radius(U) to 0.3

Under Sculpt variables: Set  Max Displacement to 0.8

Mouse over surface, arrow indicates magnitude of displacement

Click and drag mouse on surface to begin sculpting it.

CHANGE DISPLAY TO SHADER (#5 KEY)

Do a second sculpting stroke and note simplicity of seeing result.

SCULPTING TOOLS

 Select pull tool: pull on other side of ball

Select smooth tool; chance Radius (U) to 0.6 : smooth areas of ball

Select erase tool; erase some areas on ball

Hit flood button: erases all changes

Under stamp profile: Set Radius(U) to 0.5

Under Sculpt variables: Set  Max Displacement to 0.5

Make two strokes over one another: each enhances effect until Maximum displacement is reached.

PART III: MOVIE EXPORT OPTIONS

Go to Setup in Render Globals

In Common Tab

Establish file type and extension (name#.jpg)

Determine numerical frame sequence to render.

Image Size (default is 640 x 480 pixels).

In Maya Software Tab

Control Quality.

Turn on Raytracing

Edit project folder and note name of Image Folder (render)

PART IV_A: COMPILE IMAGES TO MOVIE FILE WITH OPENSHOT VIDEO EDITOR

There are a number of altermative for compiling the frames into a single movie sequence. The first of these options is the open source program OpenShot available as a download at https://www.openshot.org.

Launch the OpenShot software.

openshot start

Select the import files green cross icon in the upper left-hand side of the OpenShot Window or use the menu sequence "File/Import Files"

import files icon

import files menu command

Select the first frame of the animation sequence.

select first image

In the dialog box that follows, select the first frame and then select the button labelled "Yes" to load the full image sequence (the default is no)..

chose sequence option

The full image sequence now appears in the "Project Files" window.

project files window

Select the image sequence from the Projects window and drag and drop to "Track1" in the TImeline window.

drag and drop image sequence

Playback the image sequence by selecting the green right triangle in the Video Preview Window.

video preview

Select the export video icon.

export video icon

Alternatively, select the menu sequence "File/Export Project//Export" Video.

menu item export video

In the export video dialog box that follows, the settings are set to ensure a relatively better quality file compression format. The file is named "myVideo" and it is placed on the desktop. The format is MP4 (h264) and the resolutoin is HD 720p 24 fps (1280 x 720) where fps means frames per second and where the resolution is the same as the original source material. The compression quality is "High" which results in a larger file size at a higher quality output.

 

export video dialog

 

Note that the specific settings may also be varied to achieve a different playback quality and compression method used. For example, in the dialox box below the target is reset to be "CPU" MP4 (h.264) and the Video provide is reset to afaster playback speed HD 720p 30 fps (1280x720) where fps means frames per second. You may need to test differnt options based upon the playback quality you see and also the computer system you are working with.

video export alternative

To continue to work with the video editig project at a later time, use the "Save Project" icon which is the third icon from the upper left hand corner of the OpenShot window.

save project Icon

Alternatively, use the menu item "File/Save Project".

save project menu sequence

In the dialog box that files, create a project name and then select the "Save" button.

save project dialog

 

 

PART IV_B: ALTERNATIVELY COMPILE IMAGES TO MOVIE FILE WITH FCHECK

To compile the images as a single movie file, the Maya utility named FCheck is used here. FCheck is included in Maya installation. The method illustrated here is based on the Apple Operating System. The same methology does not work on the Windows OS.

1. Go to the Autodesk / Maya Application Folder and select the utility FCheck.

2. Within the FCheck program, use the Menu sequence "File>Open Image Sequence".

3. With the "FCheck Info" dialog box, you may elect to set the "Playback Speed" to 0% so that that the images are not flickering on the screen.

4. Select Off "Every Frame" to reduce the apparent flicker and playback speed.

4. Use the menu sequence "File>Save As Movie" to save the image sequence as a "Quictime Movie".

PART IV_C: COMPILE IMAGES TO MOVIE FILE WITH PHOTOSHOP

1. Launch the Photoshop software. Use the Photoshop menu to Open the first image of the image frame sequence and with the open file diagog box selected the check-box for “Image Sequence”.

import frame sequence

2. Set the frame rate, such as 30 frames per second in the dialog box that follows.

set frame rate

3. Open the timeline tab at the bottom of Photobhop and the video track will appear just below with standard play icons.

video track appears

4. Optionally, continue to import frame sequences in Photoshop as separate image files

second video track

5. Chose “Video Group 1” on the left of the video track, and then the Photoshop the menu item sequence “Select/Select All”, to copy the track.

paste video track

6. Use the Photoshop menu “Edit/Paste” the second video track onto the right side of the first video track used for the first import sequence in order to created the two videos in sequence. Repeat this process for any additional sequences you wish to add to the video track.

paste video track

7. Use the menu item :File/Export/Rendered” to render video to a single file “mp4” video movie format (or alternative format).

export rendered video

8. With the file formatting dialog box that appears, select the export location folder and choose a filename with the “mp4” format extension. The other presets in the “Render Video” below are recommended, including Format “H.264” and the Present “High Quality”. The Document Size of “960 x 540” should be the same resolution as the original renderings. Select the “Render” button in the right hand corner to compile the “mp4” video. A “Progress” window will graphically display the progress towards completing the compilation.

export video format

9. The video can now be viewed within any number of standard video players on Windows or Mac OS, such as the Windows VLC Player.

vlc media player display of video

Note that other video editing options are available. Adobe Premiere is availalble on Adobe Creative Suite widely used within the School of Architecture. Quicktime Pro is also available is availble on Apple Computers in Campbell 105 and 107. These tools are beyond the scope of this tutorial, but may be easier to work with for those already familiar with them.

PART IV_D: QUICKTIME EDITING (LEGACY APPLE AND WINDOW OS), FILE FORMATS, CODECS


These notes are for legacy Mac OS systems. See PART IV_A for a more current Mac OS method.

Go to Quicktime Pro, load individual frames at 30 fps and save to mov format (similar to workshop 1). (May not do this in workshop, depending upon time available.).

Quicktime Editing and Compiling. Workshop is based upon the following password protected * quicktime docs:

1. Import Image Sequence (p. 28)

2. Exporting Movie (p. 43 - 45)

3. Exporting to Mpeg 4 (p. 48)

* You can access these documents from any location on grounds or through VPN access through off grounds.