Sprint 1

In this sprint I started by learning the ropes and all the new programs we are going to be using in this class. I wasn't given any animation project at the first kickoff so I got to work on a UV for a small prop that will be animated soon. I think this was a good project for me to work on since there are no rigs prepared yet, but working on this prop from UV through animation will work out well. The UV for the robotic arm prop was a quick and easy start up project for me. While I was creating the UV, I was thinking about getting myself used to using Maya for things other than animation again. Once I got going the process moved pretty smoothly with only a couple hiccups. I had trouble getting the all of the pieces to stay in the proper UV section which I found out when I started trying to bake the texture in Substance Painter. I easily fixed this problem by going back into maya and being very careful about making sure everything was inside the lines.

When I was finished with the UVs I added vertex colors to the model. I thought this would be the easiest way to get the textures that I wanted and I think it worked out nicely. I separated parts into what I would consider the "inner workings" of the robot versus the outer shell and then added a separate section for the light and the wires on the bottom

I got the model into Substance Painter and started trying out different materials. I knew the majority of the model was going to have a metal texture so I started with that. Once I was happy with all the base metals, I started adding layers of weathering. It took more layers than I thought it would but to fit the theme of the game I went more grungy. 

The last thing I did during this sprint was a reference for the light body walk cycle. To start with I searched YouTube for videos of dogs walking and robots walking. I wanted to reference a dog because their hind legs are similar to our light body robot. I also found some reference for a run cycle that I will be able to use later on. I made this rough 2D animation to give the modelers and riggers an idea of how the robot could move, as well as to make it easier and faster for me to animate in the future.