modCharSetup version 1
First release of the modCharSetup (short for Modular Character Setup) for Maya is now available for download. Please peruse modCharSetup 101 to learn how to use it.
To download the file click here: modCharSetup v1.
To install, just unzip…
modCharSetup (v1) 101
modCharSetup
is a Maya Character Setup set of scripts that allows a rigger to automate the setting up of characters in a manner that is modular. Parts of the character are divided into multiple different parts that are independent…
I’m Running Home
Why do I run? One of my mentors once asked me, if I had the chance to know the exact time and date I’ll perish from this planet, how would I choose to spend those moments? I thought long and…
Pepsi Refresh Project
Pepsi is doing an amazing campaign! Nope! It’s more than just an AD campaign. It is very altruist. I am very very impressed with them. They just went up in points in my book.
EACH PEPSI REFRESHES THE WORLD!!!…
We All Read
I finished two books this weekend.
Not your typical reading material nowadays as the picture above would show.
Bedok Reservoir Runner’s Heaven
Today, the eve of Chinese New Year, me and my friends planned a 12KM run that became just 8 but it was well worth it. Today is also the birthday of Kuya Ariel, the guy who out runs everyone…
Wave and Buzz’ Potential Over Facebook
Google will make sharing actually seem like sharing.
The problem with Facebook is for a social network that swears its business by the generosity of its members sharing things, Facebook is stingy. If you haven’t read my A Sad Decentralized…
Dear JD, To Go Or Not To Go
Today’s Dear JD comes from an aspiring VFX artist who is seemingly down on his luck, but may very well be approching a career opportunity that he might miss if his eyes are open.
Dear JD,
I don’t know if…
Officially Registered and Training for Sundown Marathon
I am officially registered in the Sundown Marathon 2010. Whheeewwww!!!! Not for a 42 kilometer run. I’m not ready for that. I registered for the half-marathon. And even for that, the 5 months of running I’ve had might not…
CG or Non-CG?
Look at this picture. Look at all the little parts. Answer this question.
Do you think it is:
a) a real photo of a tornado
b) a real photo a volcano
c) traditional painting at it’s finest
d) digital…
Choosing Your Career: Rigging, Animation or Something Else?
Rigging or Animation. Both lovers and haters. They have one goal in the end and as they work hand in hand, they are still world’s apart. Yet, one would not exist without the other. They are kindred souls.
Intelligent Running Calculator
I saw this calculator for runners in McMillanRunning. You start by inputting information: the distance you run on average, your best time, mileage, age and gender. Then it’ll make educated estimates on how you’ll probably fair running other distances.
It’ll…
Ending Sprint
Yesterday’s run was a short one. Just 8 KM for our team’s usual Tuesday night 12+ runs. We decided, to ensure the future of our running endeavors, we needed to first secure another endeavor we have in life, specifically…
Colored Animals
I stumbled upon this book called Chroma: Design, Architecture and Art in Color (Glasner, Barbara; Schmidt, Petra (Eds.)). They talk about color. Nothing but color. To be honest I have yet to open the book. But I like what…
First Colored Shoes
This morning while wearing my socks I saw all the shoes I had. They were all either grey, black, or black and white. The first ever pair I bought since I’ve been staying here in Singapore that has color are…
The Long Road Home
I just finished John Grogan’s second best-seller, The Longest Trip Home. It was no Marley and Me but the book had similar bio-rhythms. I read for 2 weeks, laughing most of the time, and only in the last two…
January’s Ending Note
This will probably be my last run for January. I’ve a total of 88.24 kilometers of running logged in runkeeper. I have a student who used to do 40km a week. My golly! Will I ever be able to…
Why Do I Run?
On the last kilometer of my first 13k run, my vision began to dim, the tips of my fingers were numb and prickly. I was dragging my feet like dogs who want to take a leak on a fire…
What’s Wrong With This Bear?
What is wrong with this picture? Is it too the number of motion capture markers on the bear? Is it the pose of the bear? Is it because the top mocap point that should have been an apple? Is…
Quickly Batch Mocap Conversion
In my thrill in the discovery of the mother load of free motioncapture data, I downloaded all the animations, which were made up of ASF files (skeleton setups) and matching AMC files (motion captured animation). The total download was more than 2 gigabytes.
Motion Capture
I discovered a wealth of motion capture data from Carnegie Mellon University’s website that is free to use (commercial or noncommercial), convert and redistribute with no need for permissions.
Wait a minute… Carnegie Mellon… Why does that sound so familiar?…
Slow Running, Sure Running
I had a slow and painful run today. The cross-training I did last Friday did more harm than good. Because the basketball court was filled with people by the time we got there, I did neither stretchings nor warm…
Russian Go All Heaty to Combat Colds
I was reading europeantrotter, a European travel blog and found something incredibly interesting. The Russian remedy to colds is something the Chinese (well at least in my understanding) would consider completely stupid. Now, I’m not trying to start a war…
Stitches
I was invited to basketball by some students. Since basketball could be a chance for me to crosstrain, I said yes. True enough, not ten minutes in the court I felt like giving up. My breathing was worse than…
VFX Students Batch 14
Another quarter in the life of a 3dsense lecturer. I’m advising another set of students who want to specialize in Visual Effects. I asked them to blog all their updates (a discipline I, myself, am trying to learn) and to…
Snickers For Energy
How’s that for a short 30 seconds!! This is soo cool!!! I’ll be running with snickers in my pockets next time!!!
Is it just me or does everybody notice the lack of shadows on the dust particles generated by…
A Dragon For Me
My good friend and colleague, Alvin, agreed to build a body for this dragon so that I would have a model to rig. I’ve been looking for a monster that I could rig and proffer up to the creative…
A Sad Decentralized Social Network
A guy named Loic le Meur wrote an article and drew a graph about the pros and cons of decentralized social maps and how we could reclaim everything. The drawing, albeit its simplicity, opened the eyes of a lot…
Thoughts On My Sister’s Dream
I love my sister’s dream. She has been my new confidant for the last couple of months. Her dream gives me new hope. It tells me there is strength and solidity behind the frailty of paper thin things. It is…
Confirmed! Apple Tablet
Confirmed!! Apple’s new Tablet Computer and here is a picture.
I couldn’t resist not doing this. I must apologize. It was a prank that I myself fell for from a digg’d page. But just so that you didn’t end up…
Ujin Lee’s Dust
I love these photos. They are so humbling. I don’t know why, something about the subject and the way the photo was taken. They are gorgeous. Especially the first one above with its Rose Vale/Cordovan sky.
Blogged with the…
Reach Out
I love this picture. It communicates how I feel right now. I sent two packages over to the Philippines and both of them got halted by the customs. These are two gifts. One of them was supposed to be…
Ten Days Left This January
There’s still 10 days left for 2010’s January and already I ran close to 60 kilometers. Today will be a rest day. I know I earned it because I’ve been running 4 straight days. In fact, my joints are beginning…
How Much I Could Save If I Ran
Click on the picture. Those pink markers are all the MRT stops from City Hall to Pasir Ris. If you look at the lower left part of the picture you’ll see that the total distance from the two train…
Addicted to Running
I am now addicted to running. In between classes (and sometimes during classes), my mind drifts off to the last run or the next run. I love the feeling that comes after a good (and even a bad) run.…
Google Docs
I just love the way Google shows off their products. They came up with all these cool tools and gadget “as a hobby.” Their mainstay business is still their search engine; their main means of making money, ad placements.…
2010 The Year of The Flock
It is 2010. We all grow older and supposedly wiser. Often, we move in one direction not knowing parts of our bodies are left behind. Important relationships are disregarded. For some, there is no alternative. For others, there is no…
The Librarian
* FK-IK blend
* Stretch
* Ribbon Controls
* Facial Controls
* Smears
* Proxy, Low, High Display Modes
Managing Social Networks
Aaargh!! I’m not really sure what prompted me, but I found myself last week looking for ways to combine all my social network profiles into one single, easily managed, profile/app/website. If you ever find yourself in a similar predicament, I…
Bad Dreams
I’ve been having vivid dreams this last week that unnerve me for days after waking up. The first dream ended with me dying. The second, with someone else’s death. I will narrate both dreams here, not to entertain readers, but…
More Precious Than Silver
This is my nephew. On the right side edge of the picture is my sister humming “Lord.. you are.. more precious.. than silver..”
In His Time
I am a huge fan of songs like Voice of Truth (Casting Crowns), More (Matthew West) and similar songs. These bands are, in my opinion, forging a new stage for the same message that has touched billions of lives in…
Flying-Fox v1
An animators best friend is not a dog. Flying Fox is an animator friendly rig that allows you to squash and stretch according to a direction and a position that you choose. It will also allow you to shape the rig according to how you would prefer to draw it with the use of “super-controls”. Any pose is possible! It also has a tail and ears that work with the rest of the rig nicely. Watch the video to see how to use the controls.
Fast, Easy, Flexible UI
User Interfaces has been around for decades. For a while we had been using text input UI’s. There was a huge following for the voice-activated UI’s. But the most prevalent and most used UI is the graphic UI. People have been reinventing it ever since it’s first conception.
Little Warrior Rig
Here’s my first try at rigging characters. I think it’s perfect for first-time animators. It’s a knight with his head hammered with a huge mallet forcing his entire body to fit inside his helmet. Haha! It’s actually a rig with just the legs. A bit of flexed added to the hair to add more dynamism to the overall rig. It’s good if you want to practice your walk cycles. I included mine as a video example.
A Sedentary….. but non-Lethargic Life
I was in the Philippines last week. I garnered a total of 9 people who commented on the present status of my mid-section’s girth. Method of communication varied. But they were mostly comic. There was one I knew working in…
CGTextures.com: Texture Fetish!
If you live by the quote ‘the devil is into the details’ and yet still believe in shops like ‘forests and trees’ (goto their site or a blog about them to get an idea); if you like grunge textures, earthy…
BIT
robot_bitHow would you like to have a rig that you could manipulate to your heart’s desire? Something with limbs that react like an accordion. In production, I believe, they call this ribbon spline control. It allows an animator to control a rig and make it bend to his wishes–almost as easy as drawing out the pose. BIT, the bending and stretching robot rig, can do this. It is fitted with with ribbon splines on each limb, body and neck (practically everywhere) allowing his accordion-like limbs to stretch and bend to your wishes.
Moon by Duncan Jones
I just saw Moon and I was surprised. I was waiting for some images to finish rendering before I could continue my work on a Saturday when I decided to look for something to watch. I’ve seen everything in the…
Welcome!!
redesigndavid.me was created to offer CG artists guidance. I had been teaching Rigging and Visual Effects full-time for some time now and the stuff I’ve learned has been so rewarding, I have no other recourse but to share.In this site, I offer scripts, rigs and tutorials, all products of my own pair of hands–unless specified otherwise. I'll try to share as much as I could of things that I think would make a well rounded CG artist complete.
