Introduction:
Multi screens provide an opportunity to experiment with interactions and structures that can’t be attained on the single screen. This brief provides you a platform to create a multi-screen experience and experiment with linear and non-linear structures to communicate ideas. Over this and the next coursework you will be able to further explore abstract film and animation concepts and without the use of audio focus on purely visual aspects
The Brief
The brief is split into two assignments. A pre production presentation on the your idea(CW2). Then the final videa to display on the multi screens(CW3).
Title: Fragmentation and Metamorphosis
From the above theme, this brief asks you to research and develop pre production for a project you will create and execute in Coursework 3
You are asked to develop a pre-production portfolio and present your idea in a pitch for a 60 second sequence for the multi-screen installation in Creative Edge foyer.
From a subject of your choice the sequence should be developed to fit the multi-screen format. In designing the project, you should consider aspects pace and timing, rhythm, transition, metamorphosis, symmetry in communicating your idea.
Initial Idea
For my idea I knew I wanted to follow on from the previous aesthetic from the Projection Mapping Brief (CW1) where I used the technique of water simulation to create dramatic visually appealing sequences. So with that in mind I tried to come up with ideas where I could use the water again.
This was the multi screen template that we were given by the tutors to work with. This gave us the dimensions and ratio to which we would layer animation within its boundaries.
Immediately I noticed the cascading layout of the screens and that in conjunction with a water simulation technique I started thinking about waterfalls and the screens volume getting filled by water which then led me to my idea.
These simple mind puzzles are all over social media and a lot of people are familiar with them. The aim of the puzzle is to figure out which box will fill up first with the understanding that there is a constant flow of water. You have to follow the connecting pipes and figure out the volume and gravitational potential of the water. In the example I have shown, F is the box that fills up first. You have to carefully think about what would happen if this situation was portrayed in reality. The connecting pipe from C to D is blocked so the water can not flow that way, so it must go the other way, to J. From J the gravity doesn’t allow it to go to the left towards I as the pipe is higher than the flow of water. So it must go to L. H also has a blocked pipe so the only place for the water to fill is F.
I can take this idea and manipulate it with the screens representing each box.
Here you can see a rough layout that I sketched up in Photoshop. Each of the screens have been assigned a letter and there are pipes connecting each screen to one another. The flow of water will come in at the top of the screens at box A and sequentially cascade down and fill the rest of the boxes. I will not be able to show the use of connecting pipes as the boxes leaves the bounding area on each screen. The empty space on the template is translated to empty space on a wall. So unless I was using a projector I will not be able to show connecting pipes. And from last brief (CW1) I learnt that there is no space to assign a projector that covers all the specific area. So in order to achieve this effect I would have to model an extruded version of this template with connecting pipes but they will be automatically masked out when displayed on the screens.
After creating a rough draft of the idea, I fine tuned it and created a storyboard so I would know what time to use each visual cue. The water flows from the top and fills up the screens. H is the first screen to be filled.
I loaded the template into Photoshop and added connecting pipes so when exported and extruded it is all one solid object that water can flow freely through rather than 17 individual objects. Similarly to the water puzzle layout, it has one emitter at the start that cascades and fills each box. 
However, a problem I encountered straight away is that there is no equilibrium with the water and the volume of the screens. Some of the screens got filled immediately and some screens never had water flowing into them. I figured this was a problem with the position of the connecting pipes and how thin the pipes are. This restricted the flow of water and caused an unwanted build up in other screens. The way I fixed this was going back into Photoshop and editing the connecting pipes.
With the use of trial and error I eventually got a pipe system that filled all the screens and didn’t cause a build up by restricting the flow of water. Highlighted by a light green rectangle is the changes I made to the template.
In this video it shows the particle simulation and the mesh render. The particle simulation shows how the flow of water looks and which screen gets filled first and the mesh render shows what the water looks like un-textured and un-lit but as an object rather than particles.
Presentation December 1st
This is when I have to present my idea and what I have so far to complete CW2 LO. It is basically a brief summery of all the work I have done so far on this brief. You can download the presentation here. CW2 Water Puzzle Animation
Texturing and lighting the scene I used the same technique from (CW1) The same transparent material and the same lighting setup as I found it the most realistic look.
Here is the scene with the HDRI.
Here is the scene rendered into an animation. It has the overlay template in low opacity so you can see where the bounding box of each screen is. It will not be there in the final animation.
Problem 2
Another big problem I ran into is I didn’t know the output of the TV screens. I wasn’t sure if it was all the 17 screens made up 1 1080p image or if each screen is 1080p therefore when I add my 1080p animation on them it would look very pixelated as it would be stretched to fit the screens. I figured I would either have to render a higher resolution animation such as 3840 x 2160 (4K) or render each screen seperatly to make up 17 animations and stitch them together in post production.
I attempted to render each screen independently but I quickly realised that the animation is 1250 frames long and each frame took about 1 mins and I would have to do that 17 times more. Which is roughly 20 days solid rendering. So instead I opted to do the animation in 4k resolution.
Feedback
I talked to Nigel, the tutor for this brief and he gave a good point saying the water is transparent so when the screen is full it will just be black and look empty as the water is too transparent. He suggested I add effects to show the screen was full by using a glass cracking effect to show the pressure in the screen, or also just change the colour of the water, make it more opaque and a blue tone.
I took what he said into account and adjusted the texture. The way Cinema4D transparency texture works is a bit strange. You can go half and half with transparency. It either has to be fully transparent or non at all. If it was 50% transparent the render times would be 10x that if it was 100% transparent. However when just having the scene 0% transparent/opaque it looks very unrealistic and unprofessional. So a work around I had is render on 0% transparent and render another 100% and overlay them in post production.
Here you can see how it looks with the transparent overlay.
Moving onto post production
Now that the main chunk of the animation is complete it’s time to start editing the text and adding effects in After Effects. Realistic movement in animation requires motion blur. It is possible to achieve motion blur within the 3D scene in Cinema4D however it increased the render time by 200% as it is a massive complex scene which it has to calculate it for each particle. However, in After Effects there is an amazing plugin called RE: Vision Motion Blur which gives an almost identical result with no render time added.
As you can see the result is very clean and there is no warping when rendered.
I now need to add the letters and text that will be overlayed on the animation. The text will be rendered in cinema4d but exported as a alpha .png to overlay on the animation
The text is lit with a common 3 point light set up, consisting of a fill light, key and back light. This gives nice highlights with the use of a reflective glossy material. 
When positioning the text in After effects I used the template given by the tutors to see where the boundaries are of the screen. There is 17 screens so I needed 17 letters, however I chosen not to use the screen that the water fills in first as one of the letters as it almost gets filled just with the flow of water so there will be 16 letters ranging from A to P
The letters and the text have a simple flying in transition, but remain stationary after it.
I lower the opacticty of all the letters but when screen O gets filled I increase the opacity back to 100% to show that it is this screen that gets filled first.
An example of what it would look like on the screens. This was created in Photoshop and not an actual image of the animation on the screen
Final Animation
Reflection
All in all I was greatly happy with the outcome, I thought the idea was very strong as it gave an interactive element so the viewer its more engrossed in the animation and with the fact that the animation takes advantage of its surroundings. Instead of it just being an animation that is just shown on the screens, it actually takes the screens into consideration, making it more of an installation art piece rather than just an animation shown on a TV. However, that’s not to say I would not change anything with the animation. If I planned and time managed better I would of included details such as the water emptying the screens when the animation is finished, or even incorporating a projector to tie in with the last brief (CW1). I feel I have proven a clear research and development from my initial idea and created it into something original and experimental.
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