Building a Scene in Maya

Third Term Paper

Stop-Motion Character Animation

In this assignment you will create a simple stop-motion animation of a moving character. For your character, use a doll or stuffed animal that's easily poseable; a clay model would also work well.

I don't have any knickknacks or dolls because I'm grown, so thanks to my little brother I had some of his favorite characters be a part of a Harlem shake dance party which quickly turned into a fight. For the most part I just put wedges to prop the bigger characters and I moved the limbs of the rest to fit a Harlem shake/fight party. The whole thing was 127 frames. You can see some fishing string I used for a few jumps. I think clay or other characters would have been much easier to manipulate, but like I said I don't keep kids things and all I have is a little brother to provide me with toys. Next time I'm buying some play-doe.

And to address the believability, please consider the characters jumping (halo dudes) and the lazy ones just rocking (pandas!), and we all know pirates breakdance.

Outline for the Third Term Paper

I will be comparing the visual effects of Surf's Up (2007) and the wave scene from the new Point Break (2015). Where I feel both films were successful in recreating the waves, granted I don't believe some of the movements the surfers did were completely honest.

• Surf's Up
• This wave was completely designed and developed by the creator
• help in where the wave would naturally pinch and speed up was advised by Kelly Slater, the best surfer who has every lived.
• Kelly has 11 world titles to say he is the best surfer
• he has recreated one of the best artificial waves the world has seen.
• below I have a video of one of the shots
• they detailed everything from the lighting and refraction to the water drops and scratches on the lens.
• the speed the camera is at is also a common speed water cinematographers film in.

•  Point Break
• the first Point Break movie was obviously fake, they didn't have the proper cameras to really get into surf cinematography.
• in one scene 10 dudes come up behind Johnny Utah on a wave, which is impossible because you are given the energy and speed from the wave.
• with the new Point Break, they had 3 of the best surfers who have surfed Teahupoo which is the location in Tahiti that they filmed at.
• even with some of the best surfers to get footage of the spot I don't believe 2 people would take off on the same wave.
• the reef at Teahupoo is roughly 1/3 the height of the wave below the water.
• so at 20 feet there is only 6 maybe 7 feet of water
• I have seen so many professional come out of the water with holes in their bodies from hitting the reef.
• below the first video is the movie, the second video is the scariest thing I have seen in my life, real footage from a huge day a few years ago at Teahupoo (turn up the volume and feel small).

•  Conclusion
• using professionals from the industry can give you the best results for a film.
• even somethings that seem impossible can be real, like the wave at Teahupoo.
• any of the waves in these videos will kill a normal person who is not an expert in the ocean, given how shallow the reef is to give the lip of the waves.
• However, both films were successful given the teams they assembled to recreate the surfer's success.