Benjamin Button...

What was the first thing I noticed about the movie? Brad Pitt's face... all I could think about for the first 30 minutes of the movie was how well the VFX were. Of course I loved the movie, but first and foremost it was the effects. I did not think too much about it after we left the theater because it is hard to talk to people about VFX in movies when they just don't care as much about it as I do. They enjoyed the story over anything and I enjoyed how well they made him look like a really old man!

School in a way ruined me.. I can't go into a theater to enjoy a film like before. When I see a movie that is effects intense I just think about how much time must have went into one shot or another. 3D, oh forget about it... all I think about is, well, EVERYTHING. Rendering.... eee. I look at how the shots are, I listen to the sound effects (whether it worked or if it was just completely off), soundtracks are huge to me because other than visuals, music is my other love (although I can't play an instrument to save my life....), so if the music drags it seems like the film does the same. Oddly though, I can think a movie is just ok but the soundtrack can make me love it. Go figure....

Ok, so I take it back... school hasn't ruined me. It just makes me appreciate a good film when I see one much much more. Now I just know that I need to watch movies more than once to enjoy it like I used to, and thats actually not a bad thing. Its like music, you hear a song and enjoy the beat or the lyrics but until you listen to it a few times you cannot really fully "get" it... but maybe thats just me  =)

The links I came across after my curiousity got the best of me...

http://image-metrics.com/ and http://www.mova.com/ ... This is pretty much the technology behind the facial animation 

Wall E

It is without a doubt my favorite movie right now. This is a film I have seen at least 4 times in the last 4 days. The first time it was on I was half asleep and only remembered the incredible texturing and character interaction. I saw it when I woke up the next day and the lighting and character expressions of Wall-E and Eve amazed me. The next time I saw it I took it in for the story as a whole, the non use of dialogue for most of the movie worked for me better than I expected. I don't know how it would have played out if they were able to speak, a few people I asked actually did not enjoy the fact that there was no dialogue between the main characters other than their names. But the fact that I could feel the emotion of the character just buy the pitch and tone in that ONE word was amazing.

So yes, it is now almost 1am on the 2nd day of 2009 and here I am watching it again. 

On another note, I have been looking into other projects to start and I think I am going to the air this time around. 

Happy New Year Everyone ... 2009, I can't believe it's here already.

Glass

I have been playing around with materials lately. I have a bunch of models started but none are textured (or even lit for that matter). I have been trying to figure out a good way to make a fishbowl actually look like a fishbowl and some fo the tuts out there are great. I think forums are a better way to go though. Its funny to see that the problems I am having with whatever program I am using at the moment has been dealt with many times over.

I ran into this blog while on a forum... this guy has good stuff. http://mentalraytips.blogspot.com/

Crazy

I didnt realize some of the things that can be done with javascripting...

http://maettig.com/code/javascript/

... Funny how YouTube has been helping me with my travels back to childhood. Everything from the Sesame Street scenes that haunt me to the old music videos I used to dance to. Ok, so the quality of a lot the videos on there are pretty horrible... the fact that if I need a reference of an animals movements or a dance from a video I have it right at my fingertips. 

Ever used GoogleDocs?.... http://www.labnol.org/internet/office/google-docs-guide-tutorial/4999/

Can I just say.... Nature is amazing...