Michelangelo’s David in iClone 3 EX Screen Test

Well what I actually WANT to be doing this morning is making “snakes alive” for a Medusa I *imagine* I might be able to make a FRONTAL face for by merging and morphing mirrored profiles with Fantamorph…. I wondered if these hair-bound (if not <hare-brained>) hissers could be created with the “Springy” stuff in iClone 3…. Heh ! So I got as far as stretching the provided yellow ball into an elongated shape… but was then thoroughly distracted by Google 3D Warehouse-sourced “David”. I wanted to see if he could be springificated, 3D blocks also…

…ended up texturing the statue, wondering about lighting (is his back s’posed to be so DIM ?) and keyframing a manual (and wobbly) (down-the-pan) pan…

The original 320×240 film was a hefty 115MB – I reduced it to 4.28MB with Windows Media Encoder.

He loses part(s) of his head when he gets too close to the “Camera”.

Hmm… I wonder if there are any Plants available for iClone that could just be attached to serve as snakes…

I See Icy Eyes

I re-cut the G3 head that appears in my last post because there was a, beneath-beak, drippy-lookin’ shadow.

THIS is the Crazy Talk 2D flat image I am using as a speech-reference guide —>

2D Speech Reference Head in Crazy Talk 5

 Here is a fifteen second film showing how the Crazy Talk 5 script is re-assigned from the 2D flat face (with which it was created) to the destination 3D noggin. This instance has had those directions ramped up to a strength level of 115% –>

These (haven’t had enough kip eyes)

Eye Style 01

have now been replaced with a pair that are better settled into their sockets. I made the change by increasing the BRIGHTNESS of the eye colour, lessening the CONTRAST on the whites and bringing them forward in 3D space. 

Eye Style 02

Trying to Re-Create an iClone G2 Head as a G3 Version

After not giving my December-Last-Year <30 Day Trial Period> enough attention (the dog was having cancerous tumors removed and I ate some REAL food (peanuts ‘n’ chish ‘n’ fips) that bunged me into bed with a rabid, and all too debilitatingly Christmas-obliterating case of pitifully putrid pukedom), I have returned to sniffing (if not snuffing) out Reallusion’s iClone 3 EX.

I was spurred to re-look by the unexpected release of Crazy Talk 6, an application that I have been attached to since version 3.5 – and that, unlike it’s less wieldy big brother, I have an unfaltering, permanent soft-spot for. The upgrade from Version 5 to 6 is about sixty quid, twice what the leap from 4 to 5 was, “thanks”, I suppose, at least partially, to the vagaries of the exchange rate. The slump in the value of the pound has catapulted costs for Brits forced to pay monopolies in dollars (and tax to Germans)……or do without. Gnaff.

Peasantly-pauper whinging (sighed, snide, aside)…. what’ve I done with the demo ?

Many many (if not the REST of the “writing on the wall”)….and I’m certainly $old (apart from the fact that if Crazy Talk 6 is out then it is likely that iClone 4 is due soon – and MAY introduce a THIRD style of avatar head – rendering any preparation with earlier software iterations a COMPLETE WASTE OF EFFORT).

My Crazy Talk 5 scripts don’t work properly with iClone 2/Generation 2 heads. They were a struggle to create the first time around but I’ve made the attempts shown below – and am starting to feel encouraged by the SUBTLETIES achievable with this modified model - although fitting the wig (don’t tell me Generation 2 toupees aren’t compatible with Generation 3 heads  ; and Generation 4 will be superceeding everything else a week next Saturday) is proving to be such a bastard that I may have to ditch it and only shoot my speaker from the front….(after all, I’m not Tony Martin).

TRANSFORMATIONS….SO FAR…

Final Generation 2 Character and Custom G2 Clothing

 This is the finalised Generation 2 character. He isn’t perfect. His right eye is incorrectly cut, the mouth isn’t ideal
and he’s suffering from some kind of (unkind) skin condition that yellows his forehead. I “got around” that fault
previously with lighting and sepia distractions. He falls out of his clothes quite a lot – which is probably less in
keeping with his octogenarianism than it would have been at earlier stages of his life.

The “Pompadour” wig fits this bloke – giving him a neat DA at the back and no gaps at the sides of his skull.

“Mein Kampf” taking him from iClone 2 to iClone 3 —->

First G2 Re-Creation Attempt from Shared Skin Files

“Wide-mouthed frog”, with too much tan and mis-cut eyes
(the static whites from the source still aren’t covered)
that render him unusable.

Splayed False Eyes, Sockets Still Mis-Cut

Splayed False Eyes (in default positions), Sockets still mis-cut, hairpiece removed.

The Worst of the Lot

This was my second attempt to make a G3 variant, working from scratch.
I couldn’t BELIEVE how AWFUL this was. I cut the features, as precisely
as I could using the Zoom facility and yet got this HORROR.

He looks like the sort of thing the “League of Gentlemen” cast afflict
upon their phisiognomies with acres of Sellotape (other brands of
sticky-back plastic are available ; stickel-back plastic is altogetherly
more FISHY). 

Catching the Red Eye

I went back and edited my source front face to create this.
I gouged his eyes out and filled the sockets with a solid
colour picked from the corner…not the cornea
(could any pun be cornier ?).

I think this head style was “Neutral” rather than “Male”.
Apparently iClone “Males” are a “bunch” of “Fatheads”.
I hoped a thinner bonce might need less of a trimmer to get that ruddy wig to fit.

It’s All About the Snout

Using the same source images, I tried to cut a better nose – with proper positioning
and…..NOSTRILS ; I failed ; MONUMENTALLY.

Then I Had Another Go and David Bowie Arrived

Following an, unpictured DISASTER, with blue background seepage -
I had a tiddle with my brace of source images and was graced by
The Thin White Duke.

I think this looks so much like David Bowie that you could
believe it was MEANT to be him….. not unlike when my
Carl Jung original became Jimmy Greaves.

iClone lets you re-colour eyes SEPARATELY so p’aps
Bowie’s BUILT-IN….the Button is a Bowie-nator.

I think this was the first image that began to look human -
I’d been happier with the cartoony cast of G2 but this
“drew” me in – especially when I witnessed the improved
animation as applied to the face I am currently considering
keeping —>

Is this a “Keeper” or “Keeper’s Keeper” ?

All the alterations between these last two faces were achieved using iClone’s
in-program sliders – WITH WELCOME SIMPLICITY – and even
welcomerer results. I’ve even given him some purple glasses now
as a rose-tinted version of the blue ones that he really earned and owned.

Cool Edit 2.1 Problem (Now Updated)

Something odd is going on with my Syntrillium Cool Edit 2.1. I’m not sure what triggered it off  so I don’t know how to resolve it. I’ll paste a screenshot below to illustrate the strangeness :

The start of the waveform is a recording of silence but you can see there’s some “noise” on the lower channel – whilst both are “off centre” – departing from a red line. It’s this departure that is causing annoying “pop”s at the start and finish.

I wonder if this has anything to do with my having installed Screaming Bee’s MorphVox on this PC.

It is also the machine that I have installed Empire Total War to. That game will not get past its splash screen and I *think* its complaint is to do with audio.

Fishy and frustrating.

UPDATE ! I’ve found that I can’t change the input audio being recorded off-centre – but I can get Cool Edit to reposition it bu choosing Effects –> Channel Mixer –> Average.

Right – so I’ve discovered the wonderful world of panning (for gold) with the Beta Version of CamStudio 2.5 and now I wanna grab more all kinds of everything than you can shake the schtik of Dana at. I think I’ll limit future captures to a maximum of 8 minutes as this lengthier piece exceeded the gigabyte filesize that is YouTube’s upper limit for the massed minions.

This upload was a 32MB WMV 9 conversion and shows me noodling around in my favourite graphics application – Microsoft  Photo Draw 2000 V2.

First Usage of CamStudio 2.5 Beta

After several….hmm – make that “many” ….er “too many”….After too many hours spent (squandered/wasted (I wasn’t ; I don’t drink) trying to find a way to get Adobe Premiere Pro to accept files generated with CamStudio 2.0, I had to admit defeat knowing that the film editor was never likely to be able to chug out visuals as satisfyingly crisp as the raw images generated by the Screen Capture software.

I turned my attention to the most recent CamStudio iteration (the Beta 2.5) and had my first go at grabbing a vocal. Having heard so much about synch’ problems with this software I was delighted to find that my sound and visuals appear to match perfectly without my having to have made any adjustments to the default settings.

I’m posting two YouTube-d versions of my first experiment. Clip One is raw footage from CamStudio created with  its lossless Codec 1.4, the latter is what happens if that is crunched down to an 1/8th of its original size by Windows Media Encoder. I think both versions are acceptable and I’m really happy with the quality of the uncompressed version – it’s (supposedly large) filesize is only 8MB for 45 seconds !

CLIP ONE (Uncompressed)

CLIP TWO (Compressed with Windows Media Encoder)

MS Photo Draw Screen Capture First Attempt

Premiere Pro doesn’t really wanna know about letting me edit footage captured with CamStudio – so this silent, realtime film of me “painting out” an eyeball in Microsoft Photo Draw 2000 V2 is rawer than raw, unstripped of its redundant entry and exit points.

I used a Fixed Region (with enabled panning) sized 640×360 (to suit YouTube’s widescreen presentation) and the Microsoft Video 1 codec. The upload was a 15MB Windows Media Encoder 9 file.

Screenshot of my Tyger Project Snooker Eye Ball Photo Draw Master Board

A screenshot showing the complete freedom afforded by Microsoft Photo Draw 2000 V2. Its “Desktop” is just like a real-world table, letting you plonk all of your assets wherever you please, duplicate, modify, group/ungroup and re-arrange them.

"Tyger" Project Snooker Eyeballs Photo Draw Master Board

The in-yer-face interface  is NOT restrictive and cramping (with crap dials, hidden menus and buried filters) like Photoshop, doesn’t force you to squint at chequerboard backgrounds (a la Fireworks) or trap you into layers. In contrast to Corel’s Painter, you can export transparent gifs very simply with just two or three clicks.

This graphics editor grew from Microsoft Image Composer – and Composer is the KEY description. This is superb software, the first I saw that NAILED web-graphics and freed us all from really shabby (animated) gifs that could only be generated if you prannied around for a dog’s age knocking out colours from a rather limited initial safe selection. Ahhh – the nineties…….

T T T
T T T
T T T

Screenshot of Adobe Premiere Pro Workspace

This is a visual illustrating (top right) how much screen real estate I have for compositing using Adobe Premiere Pro.

Adobe Premiere Workspace View

Abortion and the Soul

I saw “Lake of Fire”,  Tony Kaye’s (18 years in-the-making) documentary about abortion, yesterday and have just reached the section of Simone de Beauvoir’s book “The Second Sex” in which she discusses the same topic.

Curiously, none of Tony’s interviewees (many of them religious extremists) mentioned the souls of the terminated foetuses (although the imagined eternally, infernally blazing destination of their “murderers” was made clear and gave the two and a half hour film its title).

Constrastingly, Simone is STRAIGHT ONTO SPIRITS. The Catholic trauma is that the unborn child will have had no chance to be baptised – the “crime” of abortion is thus not so much that an individual is denied a life, inherent with all the struggles and moral choices of that journey, but that it is hurled into Hell, <sent directly to jail where it cannot collect $200> ; or Salvation.