Whoa!! That's one cool job you've done with that cartoon!

LOL! I love it how the kid-Mike is exactly the same as your big-Mike!

Has he got bones yet for animation?
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

BTW - those glasses are AWESOME!!

LOL! I just had a thought.... you could install a particle system in his ears to use for steam when he gets REALLY angry at minimike.

;) ;)

Thanks, JB! :D

Yes, the characters are all rigged and with facial and body morph targets. Check out my site for some examples of other poses the models are in on my news page. :)

I attached a pic, too.

Also, here's the latest update to the scene. The Challenge ends on the 8th, so it's comin' to the wire! :p

http://www.mtmckinley.net/cg_toon60.jpg

Great idea about the smoke coming out of his ears! :D

Those glasses are actually an old model i did about a year ago... I believe you can find it in my 3D stills page2 at the bottom at my site.

This image shows only nurbs and joints... this might give you an idea of how I mix geometry types, too. Also notice the fairly elaborate foot controls. :)

Here ya go! LOL

http://www.mtmckinley.net/cg_toon61.jpg

GOOD JOB MT

Great work...
If ever animated i'm sure i want to see it!

How many years do you use 3d software?
Doesn't rendering take too much time?
What pc do you use?

P.S Great Great Great Great work.

why do you think rendering would take much time? it is only a couple ten thousand polys at most after smoothing (mike correct me if i am wrong) and some nurbs. if you have a computer that is capable of running maya then you dont have to wait hours til this picture would come out.

hahah.. wicked man.. :D

Thanks, AbsolutelyWhite. :)

I do plan on animating BigToon and LilToon interacting in some fashion eventually. :D

I've been working in Maya for about 3 years or so now. Rendering used to take a little while when I used the GIJoe Global Illumination plugin, but with just the normal lighting I have now, it only takes maybe 4 or 5 minutes.

The total scene came to 300,843 polys, excluding NURBs, which were most of the pots and pans and stuff.

I use a fairly high-end Gateway brand PC.

Specs are: Pentium4 2 Ghz processor, 1 GB RDRAM, 75 Gig hard drive space (2 hard drives), GeForce4 Ti4600 Gphx card.

Thanks!

Here's what I'm going to submit as the final:

http://www.mtmckinley.net/cg_toon63.jpg

and now go for it and win :)

i wish you all luck :beer:

Oh boy!

By looking at some of the W.I.P.s here I get the feeling that I'd be better off collecting empty beer cans instead of butchering away innocent geometry in Maya... :rolleyes:

Awesome work, Mike!

All the best,

Mario ;)

Thanks, fellas! You'll be able to see my entry along with everyone else's at www.cgchallenge.com and you can vote there too. You may need a www.cgtalk.com membership, though, but it's free.

Thanks!

Working on some facial animation poses for actual lip synching... I've got a script ready and hope to do a short 30 sec animation with this guy soon. :)

http://www.mtmckinley.net/expressions1.jpg
http://www.mtmckinley.net/expressions2.jpg

Once I get them all, I'll post a pic of all the blend shapes I'm using. :)

cant wait to see it.....

i have to say it:

this comic char is GREAT :).

i bet the animation would be funny.

C.

Thanks. :D

Great start bud keep it comming!!!!!!!!

nice :)

cool stuff there...
 

Great stuff! Really nice work. I went to try and find the challenge at cgtalk and couldn't. Do you have a direct link to the challenge?

Also looked at your site - very nice! Gives me inspiration to make my site a little more clear.

Great models - nice characters. Super.

Looking forward to animation of the You Dude. Big brawny mop holder and mini dude look like lots of fun.

cheers!

Thanks, guys. :)

Afraid I didn't even place in the top 3 for the CG Talk competition, but that's no biggie... after all, got a really great model out of it for my site presentation. :D

Here's a link to the CGTalk thread: http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=27572

The animation I have in mind doesn't actually take place in the kitchen environment. That was done for the challenge, which was to have a toon of yourself doing something. (Which it seems the winner of the challenge failed to do, but oh well. :p)

My animation I have in mind is more of a general intro for my demo reel that I'm revising... Purely white background and environment (ala the white room in The Matrix) with just the two Mike characters addressing the "audience" with Mini Mike causing general havoc and interrupting Toon Mike's trying to open the show. :D

Hi mike, first up I've been following your progress on this character since you first posted this and think it is absolute awesome, you definately have some major talent, a level of which I know alot of people here aspire to reach! Can't wait to see it animated if you decide to do that!

Also, I noticed you mentioned you had been using Maya for 3 years. I was wondering if that is 3 years simply using the Maya app, or you begun from scratch 3 years ago and have learnt what you know since then? I'm looking to get into this for the long run and would like a rough indication of how long it takes to get competent in Maya!

Thanks and once again, awesome work, I can see by looking your website why companies and gaming developers wanted your expertise (from yer resume) :)

Hey, Thanks, Silva. :)

I only wish that were true. lol Work has been tough to get lately, but I think that has more to do with my location than anything.

As for the time frame, 3 years is from day 1 in my Maya 101 class with absolutely no knowledge of Maya whatsoever. :D

Good luck!

are you going to make a cartoon model of yourself without a hairy face?? :D

I suppose I may eventually, but it'll stay for now. Mine's about grown back. :p

Hey, if you guys don't mind, I'd like some feedback regarding a walk cycle I did for ToonMike here: www.mtmckinley.net/toon_walk1.zip - 870 kb.

Thanks. :) He's obviously a big guy, so a little waddle in his walk wouldn't be all that terrible. I'm wondering if his arms are swinging too wide, though... hmmmm... I wish I could look at myself for guidence, but to be honest... I'm not near that large. :p

Thanks!

hahaha.. i put it on loop and just watched it for a minute. that walk is amazing. I think the arms do seem a little bit to far out... but then again, it is a cartoon. i like how your fore arms are gigantic... and they just sort of mold into a huge hand

Thanks, dbirider! :) I'll see if I can tweak his arms a little in more.

It wasn't the arms I noticed first. It was his "stiffness". I can't describe exactly what I mean but it's like he has a bad back or something :) Anyway, very good indeed... Keep it up!

hey, here's an animation test I did for the facial expressions. I didn't have a sound clip or anything to try to match, but I was trying to get him to say "Oh, Hey, how are you?" and then grin at the end. It's probably a bit too fast, but for the final project, I'll have a recording to match to help with that.

EDIT: New one below >>

Thanks again! :D

i think you need make his head move a little more seams a little stiff. and try to add some jiggle to the lower sections, just a idea. haha damn good mike.

Thanks, guys! :)

I got rid of my incessant posting and put it all into one. :D

I retooled the walk cycle. Let me know whatcha think!

www.mtmckinley.net/toon_walk2.zip - 744 kb

Also, I re-rendered the facial animation avi with a sound clip of me trying to match the model. lol When I do this for real, I'll pre-record of course. :D I think this one came out pretty good, though.

www.mtmckinley.net/toon_face1.zip - 550 kb

Interested in comments! :) Thanks!

Hi Mike,

nice work so far!

But for the walk cycle: you move arms and legs paralel on either side, yet I believe that they move in opposite directions - left leg/right arm, right leg/left arm.

The way it looks now reminds me of some kind of evil, overweighted robot: terminate! terminate! terminate!

The head looks a bit stiff and the way the pants fold doesn't look to convincong to me.

And try to do something with the belly.

But for the rest: all thumbs up! :D

Renderizer

yeah, jiggle and all that will come eventually. I'm just trying to get the walk right now. You really think the head looks stiff? It's swinging pretty crazily at the moment... I had thought it was TOO loose. lol

I think it's the way the head sits on the body - like being glued to it.

But what I think is very important is that in reality the arms do not move paralel to the legs on the same side.

You can observe this kind of movement when little children are trying to make their first steps. Or think of Frankenstein's cute creature.

There are some adults who move in that same way, but usualy these are people who show some severe deficits with their physical coordination, or the awareness of their body movements (my girlfiend is an occupational therapist, so she's supposed to know such things).

Anyway: the left leg moves with the right arm and vice versa.

There needs to be more movement in the hip/belly area (that's what the afore mentioned therapist call 'rotation').

Anyway - can't wait to see the final clip.

Go on!

Renderizer

the way he says "oh hey how are you?" reminds me of somebody that doesnt really care how the person really is.. but just says it because of loss of words. Its pretty funny


haha.. im weird:sleep:

Renderizer - Yeah, I did that on purpose at first... guess it just looks too off. :p I've got it going right now.

I'm wondering if the head seems stiff like you say because of the extreme proportions and elongated face... hmmm

Dbirider - lol, yeah, my voice acting at work. :p

A new clip is rendering. :) Thanks for your comments!

Ok, latest walk up:

www.mtmckinley.net/toon_walk3.zip - 850 k

Thanks! :D

Looks good, could you list what you changed from walk2.avi because I'm flicking back & forth between the 2 and can't find any difference, must be subtle and hard to pick up by the untrained eye :) But it looks sweet dude

in 2nd walk both the right leg and arm went forward at the same time, then the left leg and arm went forward at the same time. in the 3rd walk, the character learned that he would gain better balence if heput his right leg forward and his left arm forward, then his left leg forward and his left arm forward.

It's looking brilliant. Great modelling and the walk matches the model very well.

thanks, guys! :D