Lights, Layout, Frame-by-frame action!

Hello Everyone!

Just wanted to touch base and show you some behind-the-scenes work in progress stuff from the Space Cadet project. Please excuse the skew-y low res photos I took on my phone of the actual screen monitors... That's kind of like the OG version of a screenshot! LOL.

The image above is an early lighting test we have of the robot in the charging station. FYI, his eyes are closed, and right now many of the characters are in this default T pose when they are placed in the set. 

Everywhere in the process, a kajillion tiny decisions are being made to make this animated world and the characters come to life! The process of building the characters and props, choosing colors/textures and designing lighting are all in this earlier phase of the project. The set dress stage is where you decide the placement of every prop... for example this drink carton!

Below is the an example of the "mesh" of one of the sets. The space ship control room. 

Here's a close up mesh of some Space Cadet's space boots!

Here, the head of our Layout Department, Kara Lawrence is working on the layout for the birthday party scene. In the layout phase, all the decisions about camera moves, lenses, set dressing, and character's basic blocking is established. The resolution of the characters and props in layout is kept pretty minimal to keep the render time lower. All the really detailed texture in lighting comes a few steps later. But the layout is a very important step to work out the overall feel/timing of each shot and making sure the storytelling is intact!

Here is what it looks like working on the layout for the robot sitting in the living room. There are so many controls available to try to get the character posed!

And here is a lighting test of the birthday cake scene.  Again apologies for these scrappy pixelated handheld screen shots, you can actually see the office light and dust reflecting off of the monitor screen surface! LOL. But I wanted to give you a peek at how things are coming along with Space Cadet. 

It's truly a dream to be working with such a rad crew of amazing artists and seeing these characters come to life. I'm learning a lot and having tons of fun working on it! 

More updates to come! 

Thank you for your support! 

E