Constraints Experiment

A vital part of being a good animator is being able to animate constraints, whether it be for handling props or simply just parenting one body part to another. This piece was created specifically so I could properly learn how to do this. I'm still a little uneasy with it...but I'd say this specific experiment was successful, and quite a lot of fun to top it off!

My original set of renders.

A couple of days after I finished the above renders, I decided to play around with Maya's bonus time remapping tool....and of course I realized the opportunity to turn this into a matrix bullet time-esque shot. I, and several people I showed this to, ended up preferring it over my original...so this is what went into my actual reel:

The same animation, now with time-remapping and a moving, spinning camera.

And to add to the fun....

I had volunteered to rotoscope some lightsabers for another member of the VFX community who was participating in the annual Lightsaber Choreography Competition. After spending a solid 4 days roto'ing, I was in a very lightsaber-y mood...so I created an alternate version of the animation for amusement:

The same animation...now with lightsabers!

Also for fun, a contact sheet showing the different render layers I used for this. Pretty straightforward.