CSS 105 – Project #3

Rendering

Time and Quality Trade-Off

Assigning Date: April 24, 2007

Project Due Time: 11:15 AM May 8, 2007

1. Project e-submission

2. Hardcopy Report

** Remember**: No late assignments will be accepted!

Purpose:

In this project we will practice the technical details involved in generating images that we have studied in lectures. The main goal of this project is to help us relate the technical details to appearances of objects and general quality of images. Our two major goals are:

1. How to control the trade off of quality vs. image generation time.
2. How to approximate (even if very roughly) real world object appearance based on computer graphics tools.

In Project-2, we have spent some time investigating the details of how to model objects based on NURBS surfaces. In this project, we will learn how to approach creating images that approximate the material/shading of the objects we have created. Once again, think about the story you want to tell in your final project, think about what kinds of objects/characters would be involved and their appearance. You want to try creating the appearance of those objects in this project.

Be careful though: I know I am repeating myself, but it never hurts to reiterate: start out simple! You want to create simple shaders and simple light sources and generate decent looking images. Once you have the basics mastered, then you can worry about the details of how to create nice or realistic looking images. Once again, creating a highly realistic image is very difficult! Our goal is understand the process, and not necessarily knowing how to create realistic looking objects.

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Tutorials:

Before you begin working on this project, you should read through the followings. In lectures, we have learned the technical models and the reasons for the illumination models (e.g. Blinn shading model approximates specular reflection). The main goals of the following tutorials are for us to learn the how-to (e.g. associate a Blinn Shader with a geometry). Because of the complexity of the Maya system, the tutorial can get tedious at times. We want to approach the tutorials with the understanding that, “we understand the concepts behind the techniques; we want to learn sufficient such that we can achieve our goal”. In this case, our goals are to accomplish the specified project to demonstrate our understanding of the subject. We want to approach the tutorials using the criteria: “have I obtained enough to work on my project”?

1. Maya->Help->Tutorials: Tutorials->Getting Started with Maya->Rendering (all three lessons)
1. Lesson One:
1. Creating and assigning simple shaders
2. Maya Software Rendering (how to invoke RenderView)
3. Working with IPR as a tool
2. Lesson Two:
1. Texture: creation and modifications
2. HyperShade: as a tool for editing shaders
3. What is a Bump map.
3. Lesson Three:
1. Working with different kinds of lights
2. Shadow
3. Adding extra cameras

2. LMF: Lessons 5&6. For time efficiency, I recommend reading these two lessons (rather than following through the tutorial step-by-step). The important lessons we want to learn from here are the Maya User Interface, the many different windows, and where are the important buttons, editors, etc.
1. Lesson 5: Important how to
1. Maya UI Layouts, preferences settings, menus, shelf
2. Hot box
3. Display smoothness
4. Selection Mode and Selection in Maya
5. Manipulator tools (Translation/Scale/Rotate)
6. Channel Box
2. Lesson 6: Important how to
1. Dependency Graph: relationship of this graph to the scene we are creating
2. Idea that we can make/break connections with the connection window (just knowing we can do this is sufficient)
3. Scene Hierarchy (group/ungroup operation), how that is reflected in the dependency graph
3. LMF: Lessons 11 (and finish Lessons 12 & 13): combining the above three lessons in creating an interesting image.

Once again, remember, we are not here to learn how to create nice looking images, rather, we are here to learn the process of creation. Follow through these tutorials remembering that you are learning how to use the tools and not how to create the exact same objects/images as in the tutorials.

Here is one approach you may consider:

1. Read through the tutorials (do not follow the steps).
2. When you are reading, take down notes on the interesting capabilities of the software (I have listed some of the major, and more interesting ones above).
3. Read the Project specification requirement carefully.
4. Compare to your notes on the capability of Maya, notice what is important to complete this project.
5. Create simple scene that is sufficient for you to follow/practice what is described in the tutorials.

With this approach, you can practice using the software, re-affirm concepts discussed in the lectures, and complete the project all at the same time! J

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Statement of Work:

Create a new project, name it: Project3_YourName (where YourName is your name).

Remember, we want to demonstrate two main learning goals:

1. We understand the shading models and how the different parameters control the appearance of objects in images.
2. We understand the many different rendering parameters and how these parameters relate to image quality and rendering time.

Working with the models you have created in Project 2, you must generate images with the following requirements:

1. Materials:
1. Types: Your scene must have at least two different materials (e.g. Blinn, Lambert).
2. Highlights: Your rendered image(s) must show at least two different highlights from two different objects with different highlight colors.
2. Textures:
1. File Textures: Your materials must use at least two different file textures. The file textures must be stored in your project 3 folder structure and be submitted as part of your project.
2. Procedure Textures: Your materials must use at least two non-file textures. Your non-file textures must make some-kind of sense in the real world. Random applying textures on surfaces will result in loosing credits.
3. Bump Map: At least one of your objects must be bump mapped. Once again, your bump map must make sense in the real world.
3. Lights:
1. Types: Your scene must involve at least three different light types.
2. Spot light: At least one of the lights must be a spot light. The spot light illumination boundary must be clearly visible in (some of) the final rendering of your images.
3. Shadow: at least two shadow casting lights. Your final rendering must distinctly show the shadows. At least one of the shadow’s color must be something other than black.
4. Image Quality and Time Trade Off: As part of your project submission, include the following images in your project’s image folder.
1. Image1.iff: preview quality, 320x240, iff format.
2. Image2.jpg: preview quality, 320x240, jpg format.
3. Image3.iff: production quality, 640x480, iff format.
4. Image4.jpg: production quality, 640x480, jpg format.
5. Simple Animation of the camera: animation of a perspective camera, taking your viewer through all the interesting features in your composition. You animation must:
1. Consists of exactly 150 frames: at 30 frames per second, this is exactly 5 seconds worth of animation. You should notice how much time it takes to render the final animation file!
2. Playblast (Windows->Playblast): this creates a preview quality of the animation based on hardware rendering. This movie file created is referred to as the animatics. Your project submission must include a Playblast output of your camera animation in the image folder. You should work with and examine the playbast output until you are happy with the quality of the animation before you continue to create your final animation movie. Use the following parameters for creating your playblast file:
1. Start/End: 1 to 150
2. Viewer: Movieplayer
3. Compression: Microsoft Video 1 (30 fames per second)
4. Display Size: From Render Global
5. Scale: 0.5.
6. Save to File: enter a file name (make sure the location of the file is the image folder).
3. Sample production quality images from final animation:
1. Image Format: jpg
2. Start/End Frame: 1 to 10 (by 1)
3. Resolution: 640x480
4. Production Quality
4. Final animation file: in Render Global window:
1. Image Format: avi (one file containing the entire animation)
2. Start/End Frame: 1 to 150 (By fame is 1)
3. Resolution: 640x480
4. Production Quality
5. All images/files must be located in the image folder of your project.

Words of warning!

1. Camera: do not move your camera too rapidly. Large camera movements over short amount of time makes you dizzy. You will loose credit if I feel like throwing up after viewing your animation.
2. Lighting: do not render your animation without checking your preview rendered images. Images that are too dark or washed out (too bright) will result in significant lost of credit.

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Project Submission:

E-submission:

Copy your entire project folder structure over to \\Hermes\Classes\CSS105\Project3. By default your root project folder will be created in MyDocuments\maya\projects\Project3_YourName. Under this root project folder, you will find all the sub-folders (e.g. clip, data, fur, etc.). Your scene files should be located in the scenes folder, the rendered images should be in the image folder.

Hardcopy report: Submit a report describing your shaders. If you are trying to imitate some real object, please describe what it is, and/or include reference pictures showing what these objects are. If you wish to create some abstract artistic creation, please include a paragraph detailing what you are trying to achieve with your creation and why you believe you are achieving your goals. Included in the report must be:

1. Screen shots of expended hypershade of your shaders, detailing how your shaders are constructed. For each shader, you should describe with illustration and text highlighting the different nodes involved.
2. Choose your favorite rendered image, and highlight with text annotation the shadows cast by the two light sources, and illumination silhouette of your spot light.

Here is an example report showing how my revolved/loft objects satisfy some of the technical requirements.

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Credit Distribution:

Materials Two different materials At least two different highlight colors Artistic: resemblance to some real object/look nice	5%	10%
Textures Two different file textures File textures proper inclusion in project submission Two non-file procedural textures Bump map Artistic: resemblance to some real object/look nice	5% 5% 5% 5% 5%	20%
Lights Three different light types At least one spot light with clearly visible illumination boundary At least two shadow casting lights with clearly visible shadows Artistic: resemblance to some real object/look nice Problem: images too bright/dark	5% 5% 5% 5% -10%	15%
Image Quality and Time Trade Off: Images 1: preview quality, 320x240, iff Images 2: production quality, 640x480, jpg Images 3: preview quality, 320x240, iff Images 4: production quality, 640x480, jpg	3%	5%
Camera Animation + Final Rendering Preview: Playblast animatics Final: Final AVI Animation Proper submission of sample production images (frames 1 to 10) Proper image resolution (jpg) + format (640x480) Problem: chaotic camera movements	5% 10% 5% 5% -15%	25%
Hardcopy Report		20%
Proper Submission Proper project name with recognizable names of group members Maya project folder structure is correct (with _all_ sub-folders)		5%

This project contributes 15% towards your final grade for this course. Be warned, this project is just as time consuming as Project 2. Please do start early and please do let me know how I can help!