The long awaited moment has come: Project LARP is finished. It's been a long road with many trials and much learning but in the end the finished product is about where I envisioned it. Some of the sound is off (tweaked it and went to rerender but the program was acting up) and some of the video is off (one animation of the slime changes color and some of the videos get out of placement/scale at times) but over all I'm satisfied knowing how much I learned from this project. In all honesty, this was a huge learning experience with particles, blend shapes, nCloth, green screening, etc. Many things had to be rendered multiple times including a few nights ago when I realized I rendered with the wrong extension. The process has taught me to be cautious and begin things quickly. I had started filming very quickly (within the first couple of weeks) and unfortunately the golden rule has limitations. I ended up reshooting all of it week 9 without my original actress. Regardless, with some ingenuity and some patience I have accomplished what I set out to do: create all 3D, 2D and live film assets and compile them together in an entertaining manner symbolic of classic video gaming.
Things I'd do differently? I'd definitely focus more on preproduction early on. I had a lot in mind but not all of it was completed. This included an animatic for the scenes. I had the general idea mapped out on my storyboards but there's still pacing and timing that can only be achieved with animatics. Overlooking that step made After Effects a bit trickier to key frame. I'd also have gotten more feedback sooner to make more changes for the better.
Things I'm glad I did. I asked questions and researched from either other students, tutorials, or simply attending classes that were relevant to my topics. It was a huge help to have resources to make things as I'd never done them before. Knowing someone/thing had all the knowledge was comforting because learning on my own would have taken much longer. In addition, my passion and drive were refreshing. I sought out to do x number of things and I didn't back down from it. I'm proud of my accomplishments and can only hope that in the future I'm able to do more exciting projects like LARP.
Until Next Time,
Tex.
