avatar and environment - getting close to fin

Right, I've not posted that much of the latter stages of making my avatar and enviro. I've been quite busy, fiddling, fixing, altering small things. At this stage in time, I've more less completed it all, the camera paths are in there, but I've a few days left before rendering the definitive edition.

For my avatar, I couldn't decide on the layout for the video screens.

-Should I have two screens that show the same thing, i.e. one for each eye?

-Should it just be one large screen?

-Should it be more than one video playing, i.e. a different video for each eye? - obviously this wouldn't work practically, but for the purpose of the project, it would showcase my TV likes quicker

(What's noticeable here is that the two screen effect requires stretching seperate planes and so the actual video images has become jagged.)

I've decided on the one screen layout, it's how we see things - we don't percieve seperate images from each eye when watching/looking at something. Also, the one screen layout is larger, meaning the video images are easier to see, showing off more of their glory.

I added the turbosmooth mod on the loft, so all the small imperfections are nicely blended over, and it looks a very nice package altogther. Of everything I've made, this is what I'm most pleased of aesthetically, it is my favourite creation so far - the reflection of the lense coupled with it's slightly metallic feel, the metal arms, the plastic nub things that sit on the end of the arms are slightly opaque as they are in reality. Lastly, the video screen looks really good, they haven't degraded the quality of the video. Although technically speaking, this is all only the size of a pair of glasses, I've used the largest layout possible, and as with TVs and so on, the bigger, the better! So overall, I'm very happy with my 'video specs'!!

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Meanwhile, when I've been making this environment, I've only been looking at it from a certain angle. Obviously the camera moves through and sees what I have been seeing. It's when the camera then turns back on itself and you see the black workspace of 3D Max that I've realised I now need to stick in another wall and add some more clouds!

For now though, here's the storyboarding that I've roughly drafted, just to put down on paper where I wish for the camera to pan through. Then also below is the actual first render I made. It's not compete, as there are two parts to my movie. The first walks you through and finishes at the coin box. The second will have the video glasses appearing and spinning round, for a close up look.

What I plan to do is use my mp3 player to capture the jingles and sound effects (for example, collecting a coin, or jumping) and then I will overlay these sounds for the final piece. It should add to the character, it's all very lively, jingly and fits in with Mario, but then also with me, and my identity!

So a little more tweaking and then I'll let you guys see the final product.

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