Evolution of Tommy

I’ve started this project about a year ago – Spring Sem of my Freshman Year at CIA. We had to create a short film of any story. Me, being too ambitious decided to create a 3D short film involving one character, no dialogue and a story that deals with present day children’s imaginations. This story came to mind while hearing my mom’s rants about how children these days are so dependent on their toys to have fun. “In the old days,” she recalls, “we used to play with mud, sticks and rocks to have fun!” She was, obviously, right. Kids these days don’t realize that to have fun, “you just need a little imagination!” – as I recall from the old Barney series. This work-in-progress is currently in the modelling and story-refining stage. I’ve altered Tommy’s look to make him cute and kid-like as possible. Here is the Evolution of Tommy:

This was the my very first attempt to create Tommy. I introduce, Tommy 1.0

As I [barely] finished the short story for the short two-week slot our teacher gave us, I was able to create a partially finished short story together with the animatic and some parts in 3D. Here’s the shindig:

As you can see, it’s a rough cut. I’ve only been able to do minor keyframes to create the animation. It’s sloppy and the story’s a bit unclear.

Anyway, like what I wrote i while ago, I’m still on the process of refining the story. In the mean time, here are the later Tommy changes:

This was the second Tommy. I used Blender's subsurface scattering to create the skin texture but it didn't work right. Plus the hair was just taking too much render time.

I didn’t finish Tommy 2.0′s hands because I was having problems matching the poly count from one end to the other. Also, as I tried to add the bones, the whole thing just went haywire. I wanted a smooth character but also one that deforms right. I had to remodel so I did!

And now, I present my final Tommy:

Created to suit my cravings for optimal deformation.

Because I was satisfied with the character’s deformation quality, I’ve started texturing him and had a couple test renders just to see what he looks like under the lights. The hair will be added later.  It has to be created using polys not particles since particles take such a long time to render and I don’t have a render farm to render the whole thing!

The first Tommy was just plain creepy. The second was too realistic. The last one’s just right and I’ve always wanted to make it look Pixar-like. 

Here are the details of Tommy 3.0:

Spiffy!

Tommy 3.0 Sweater

Full Body Shot

I hope this inspires future animators and modellers.

Anyway, leave me your comments and I’ll appreciate it!