Project 1: Status Update #2 — It’s been a while.

Be sure to check out Status Update #1 if you haven’t yet.

Apologies for the very long delay between this status update and the last. October brought a very big (and much needed) change in my career as I took a new position at OGK Creative as Creative Director. Then the holidays came. Then a well earned weekend getaway came. So now that I’ve got the excuses out of the way, I wanted to share a few style frames that I’ve been playing with tonight.

Previously, I had some concern over how I’d show Batman throughout the title sequence. I snagged an open source 3D model that looks to be ripped from the Arkham video game series. The model was pretty rough but it was fully rigged. This allowed me to mess with some poses (something I haven’t done in Cinema 4D yet) and setup some different camera moves.

I also messed with another potential look with shattered glass but quickly abandoned it. I then went back to the previous look that I established in the last project update. I didn’t get as much done as I’d had liked but I figured that it’s more important to share something rather than nothing at all.

Shattered Glass Style Frame using the downloaded model of Batman.

Although the idea of Batman crashing through a glass window, clobbering a group of thugs until they’re unconscious was exciting and admittingly a lot of fun — I decided that continuing down that path would be simply low hanging fruit. I then went back to the previous look that I had developed back in October and experimented with the Batman’s Cowl in some frames. I feel that keeping the shots close, cropped and not too revealing creates a lot more drama and interest than if I were to flat out reveal the entire character in the opening sequence.

Experimenting with the 3D model — plus some new type treatments.

I’m definitely feeling much better about getting Batman into the style frames after getting these few frames out — they of course need some more work but I’m excited to experiment further with the model that I found. Just by having some available 3D assets to play with opens up the process and is allowing me to explore alternative looks. That being said, if you’re an experienced character modeler and are looking to collaborate, shoot me an email!

Quick render without any lights. You can see the quality of the model in this screenshot.

My goal this weekend is to focus strictly on type treatments and gathering some more assets for the frames. I’m definitely going about the entire project completely ass backwards when compared to how I’d do a client project — then again, I guess this is a good thing. I’m taking my time and exploring what works and what doesn’t, at least in regards to the process of creating style frames. Thanks for checking this out. Check back soon for more updates.