3D Animation Logo Project

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13RE5XsUdFw

Facial Expressions in 3D Animation

In storytelling, a certain emotion must be raised, within the character and/ or within the audience. This emotion can be portrayed through body language and expression. Within the realm of animation, one must recognise that exaggeration of these expressions must be used to further emphasize the character’s feelings and to bring that character to life- this is part of acting. (Roberts, 160) Most emotions are involuntary but some can be voluntary, to hide something, like a fake smile to hide disdain or sadness. This is even more difficult to portray on a character in animation but if done well, the character can become a deep rounded character and may ask more of the audience to interpret (Roberts, 187).

Although characters convey certain emotions through their expressions, the amount of emotions and expressions seem endless, but there are six expressions that form the basis of emotion namely: happy, sad, anger, surprise, fear and disgust/contempt (Maestri, 196). These six can be mixed and altered for most of the other expressions. These expressions are imperative to storytelling as character analysis and understanding comes through the emotions and helps the audience connect with the feelings of these emotions. Humans also are able to understand each other through emotions and expressions as most expressions are universal.

In 3D software, one must make an easy access point for a character’s expressions, as expressions are continuously changing with each action, not drastically, but they are not static as emotions are not static. This easy access point not only allows for quick animation but a range of expression as each expression is done either by a button or slider.

Body language can tell much of a character and his mood, but the eyes are the most expressive feature of a character. The eyes lead the face and emotion and maybe the unexpressed emotion. A clear example of this is Modern Family (2009) where Claire, the most active character does not find her husband’s jokes funny and in the interview insert she reiterates her view: “…I laugh at all of his jokes, w-with my mouth. Not with my eyes.” (Lloyd ; Levitan, ep 4). After her speech a cut to her laughing and her eyes remaining untouched by humour is a clear indication of what she just said.

I have decided to review Despicable Me (2010) and the main character Gru as he seems quite similar to my current character with regards to his features (long nose, his eyes). I decided to follow the broad categories that most emotions follow, outlined by George Maestri.

Happy:

The first expression I decided to find was happy. This came in the beginning of the film as Gru walks down the street and looks around. He is not only happy but content, a prolonged happiness. His eyebrows are lifted, and relaxed, no tension rests there. His eyes are wide but the lids are relaxed and the bottom lids are up, further emphasizing the happiness. His smile is wide and more to the right of his face, giving his character an asymmetrical look, therefore portraying realism and character. Just underneath this picture is that of a fake smile. The eyebrows reveal a more curious and scared look and the nose is pulled up a bit to reveal apprehension and the mouth is awkwardly to the side and open at the end. It also differs from his natural smile in that the sides have changed from right to left (slant of smile) and his face is more asymmetrical in the fake smile showing more awkwardness in the expression.

 Sad:

Here sadness is portrayed after he misses the girls’ dance recital. The sadness is in full force, the eyebrows lift up in the middle of his forehead and down at the sides, squashing the skin in the middle leaving a sad frown. The eyes are wide but the bottom lids are up, usually an indication of sadness or that he is about to tear up. They are also fixed on something indicating a real problem that has arisen. The mouth is small but angled down at the corners indicating an unhappiness of some sort.

Anger:

The next emotion is anger. Here Gru’s eyebrows are dipped down towards the middle of his face by his nose, making a prominent crease to frown whilst the ends of his eyebrows curve up and then down. This is a common indication of anger. His eyes are wide and fixed. His nostrils are flared indication a rush of air and therefore and anger building up. His mouth is tightly sealed revealing high anger and unhappiness. 

Surprise! 

Surprise is the next emotion, conveyed by wide eyes, almost rounded, showing shock. The eyebrows are lifted up pulled from the middle where the sides are down a little bit. The mouth is open usually rounded at the top and the teeth are apart. These are all indicators of shock and surprise, most attributes are open and left exposed (mouth, teeth, eyes, eyebrows). There can be fear as surprise does have some of fear’s attributes and vice versa.

Fear:

Fear is represented in a less open way. The eyes are wide, the eyebrows are up, (a little less than surprise, the nose is retracted and the mouth is open but more teeth are revealed (the teeth chatter image may follow). The mouth also distorts in shape a little to reveal the loss of control and fear.

Disgust:

Disgust/ contempt are two expressions and emotions that are very closely associated. Disgust is represented by close eyebrows that filter down the forehead (similar to anger’s but not as prominent. The eyes are skewed to middle, giving the face a confused yet disbelieving look. The nostrils are pulled up, similar to the stereotype of ‘snobbishness’ and the mouth are open slightly. All these contribute to the overwhelming idea of disgust a mixture of expressions from anger, surprise and disgust.

As an angry villain character, it was quite interesting to investigate a range of emotions and my findings were that when sifting through various scenes and taking screen shots, there were about three expressions or more, displayed during speech, interaction and reaction, all mixed but only one mood or emotion was conveyed. This means that the character had a range of expressions but only one emotion. This was interesting as it further emphasized the complexity of emotions and facial portrayal of these emotions. It also emphasized the importance of exaggeration and that emotion must be portrayed in various ways especially in animation, in order to created an authentic representation or convey the message clearly to the audience.

3D characters need set expressions for a range of emotions and these emotions are a great storytelling device. It is imperative that one sets up their character’s facial expressions as it is a quick access point to change the mood and expression of the character- which as I witnessed in the film Despicable Me- these changes should occur often.

Works Cited:

• ·         Coffin, P; C, Renaud. Despicable Me. USA, Universal Pictures. Film. 2010.
• ·         Lloyd, C; S Levitan. Modern Family. 20^th Century Fox. Television Series. 2010.
• ·         Maestri, G. Digital Character Animation 3. USA, New Riders, Peachpit. Print 2006.
• ·         Roberts, S. Character Animation In 3D.Great Britain. Focal Press. Print. 2004.

Character Modelling and Edge Loops

Why is it so important to construct sound models? Edge loops are particularly important under a humanoid character’s arms and on their face- why is this?

The most essential lesson to learn in modelling a character is too make sure not only that your model and geometry are neat but that there are less triangles and five sided polygons as these tend to cause problems when manipulating the mesh for animation purposes. Triangles (although all polygons are ultimately triangles) are the worst for deformation of the character, they act like spear heads and points jut out when deforming and therefore the operatic ability of the triangle is limited (Ratner, 40). The best solution is to form quads instead of other polygon types as they allow for maximum control and deformation. Low geometry is also good for a character as it allows for high definition smoothing whereas a high polygon count will allow for little smoothing capacity and will slow down the animation and render process (Unknown, 1)

Character modelling is quite a complex task consisting of a variety of formulas and methods that will produce the required results. There are two types of modelling techniques, namely polygon modelling and patch modelling. Polygon modelling refers to a subdivision surface type of modelling whereby one can choose from an existing shape or polygon and begin modelling there. Patch modelling is a more detailed and intricate process that deals with NURBS and spline-based surfaces. It is seen as building from scratch and is used for organic modelling which can allow for amazing results in facial modelling (Murdoch; Allen 37). Now with these techniques come sub-techniques/ methods that can be used with for modelling but here we shall pull focus to edge loops.

Edge loops are defined as a series of polygons connected by edges in a loop, end-to-end format. Therefore where the loop begins is where it ends and so the edge loop is a recurring flow of polygons (Murdoch; Allen, 44).  Edge loops act and are defined similarly to the muscles of the human body. When creating a character the edge loops must run in the same fashion as the muscles of the face and body as this will create a natural and real deformation for animation.

 “Edge loops will make deformation, motion and even texturing quite a bit easier” (Osipa, 80)

Edge loops are essential for expressions as there is a natural flow of motion in the loop, giving a natural effect of movement and deformation.  Murdoch and Allen describe a couple of advantages of edge loops- edge loops allow for easy movement, and changing the position of an edge loop is quick and easy. They segregate different major features of the body and allow for even greater definition such as wrinkles. Heavily deformed/ animated areas need edge loops to stop the mesh from distorting and pulling unnaturally. The polygon count is quite low in edge looped characters as the need for definition is lower as the edge loops provide maximum definition. (Murdoch; Allen, 45-46)

Here are some examples of edge loops and the key areas in which they should be created:

Facial topology:

 

The eyes and the mouth are the main areas and then the nose cheeks and forehead should be connected to the adjacent areas as seems natural. (Cryrid, 1)

Limb and connection topology:

The shoulder’s movement must be diverse and fluid, and must be able to handle any stress the arm deals it. It must therefore allow strain in the chest area, the shoulder area and arm area, which in turn becomes edge loops connecting these areas. This is one method; another one is to take many edge loops to the shoulder allowing for much slack to deform and animation. ( Chadwick, 1)

The knee and elbow areas of the character must have edge loops like that of the mouth dedicated to handling the strain of a bend. Weight painting may become redundant if the loops in the areas are limited. (Chadwick, 1)

Edge loops are a clean and safe way to model, texture, rig and animate. They have many advantages and whether one uses the patch or the polygon method, the edge loops should be there making 3D character animation an easy and quick process. By using edge loops, one not only prevents problems, but creates a greater outcome.

Works Cited:

•  Chadwick; Cryrid. Polycount Wiki. 2010-09-17.Web. 06 May 2011.

• Murdoch, K. L. and E. M. Allen Edgeloop Character Modeling: For 3D Professionals Only. Indiana, Wiley Publishing, Inc. 2006. Print. 
•        Osipa, J. Stop Staring: Facial Modeling and Animation Done Right. 3^rd Ed. Indiana, Wiley Publishing, Inc. 2010.
•        Ratner, P. Mastering 3D Animation. 2^nd Ed. New York. Allworth press. 2006. Print. 
•     Unknown. Modeling With Edge Loops. 2008-04-02. Web. 01 May 2011.