This is a reference sheet I used to make Horstmann. There are some other lamps on here for a variety of reasons. The chap on the right is George Carwardine, the inventor of the anglepoise lamp. The chap on the left is Charles Terry, son of the founder of Herbert Terry Ltd.
Another concept image of Horstmann within his environment. This one is made up of twenty or so other images that have been sliced up, masked, transformed and merged into one image. I have also worked into the image with Photoshops painting tools. I think this image is lacking some detail around the periphery but overall it’s beginning to take shape. The coloured tendrils stand out really well despite the deep blue saturation within the shadows and darker areas.
Click for larger image.
This is a concept image of what all the different elements in the film might look like together. The butterfly/colour tendrils element is a little weak but the overall effect is quite nice. Making these images is a quick way of seeing how a final shot may look and aid lots of decisions that might save time at this stage of the production. I can see from this image that the grimey look to the large flat areas will help fill the awkward spaces visible in the previs renders and detract from the peripheral objects as focal points within a composition. I want to be able to flatten the room as a vignette to the main focal points of the butterfly and the lamp so a constant level of detail throughout the frame will help control the movement of the eye throughout the frame.
This is the starting point for the image above. It’s a still shot from the previs environment. All the objects are simple proxy versions and only have basic colours applied. The lighting is basic yet is close to the way I want the lighting to work within most of the shots. The key lighting will be from Horstmann, it will be the main shadow caster and will vary slightly in colour depending on the mood but generally will be a warmer tungsten to give warmth to his character against the colder blue ambient lighting. I think each scene will be treated slightly different depending on the composition but generally this will be the starting point. I also want to have strange incedental lighting throughout, perhaps as oddly lit areas in places where there will be no logical source, almost as reflected light bouncing from objects out of sight. I’m thinking of building up the scenes with more glass objects to enforce this idea of light moving around the scene in a strange and unsettling way.
The following images are a selection of the main reference images used to build up the concept image above. They are all found off the internet at different times throughout the pre production phase, mostly google search results. The Lamp is from the first time I think I saw a Horstmann and Hadrill lamp, I found it on Ebay and instantly fell in love. I bid on it but soon realised that these lamps don’t sell cheaply.
As well as compositing parts of reference imagery together there is also a good amount of digital painting involved, mainly adding highlights in the correct places and working into the image to make it believable. Because i’m using my old PC at the moment I’ve not created any special brushes, so all the paint and clone work was done using Photoshop’s simple brush presets.
Okay, Horstmann is now mapped and shaded… He’ll continue to change but not by huge amounts. I might change his colour but for now I feel that a hugely desaturated finish will build more contrast between him and the colourful butterfly trails. Well anyway… Here’s Horstmann:
A little Friday night texture work for the animation gods:
That should keep them fed til Monday.
This is the finished model of Horstmann… It’s not a particularly complex model and the UVW mapping is also pretty straight forward. This is rendered with a very standard HDRI reflecting background and one-click lighting solution just for demonstrating the model without any special materials applied to it.
Well, as lovely as he looks with his polished glossy surface, it isn’t really the right look for the lamp in the story. Horstmann is old, he’s alone and he needs to look weathered by time.
I have a large collection of reference imagery of the Horstmann and Hadrill lamp and a good amount in battered and bruised condition, which is helpful to get achieve a certain amount of realism when making the textures. I’ve also got a good library of sourced imagery of metals either found on the internet from places like Mayangs free textures or photographed by myself.
Here you can see the texture map for the diffuse colour being built using a number of different source images and a good image of an old lamp to refer to. The UV template is used along with some added notes to guide where to place scatches or built-up dirt and I try to keep the layers seperate to help with the building of specular and bump maps.
Here’s some progress test renders of the diffuse colour map. I have a simple bump map on here as well but this will be worked on properly once the diffuse colour map is looking how I want it, as will the specular and gloss maps.
Well for the past few days me and Biff have been pulling shapes at the Futuresonic 2009 festival in Manchester. Now in its 14th year, Futuresonic is the UK’s leading festival for digital culture. Art, music, collaboration and ideas are all in the mixing bowl and a whole host of visionary thinkers wielding the spoons of debate… I’m not sure if that makes sense but it sounds like something off a television show and that feels good right now. Anyway…
Amidst all the grand ideas buzzing around the festival it was actually something very small that immediately grabbed our attention… A little chap known as Bob the Lamp.
Bob is a wooden lamp with a personality. You can chat to Bob using a keyboard and he responds just like any other lamp… He’s interested in what you’re wearing, he’s not keen on guns, he likes movies about robots and tells some pretty bad jokes. A typical lamp of his age I feel. As well as resonding with text Bob displays his emotions through his movements. If he is feeling down he slowly slumps over towards his feet and if he’s feeling good he lifts his head high and proud, illuminating all those around him… He’s ace.
The great thing is that when you’re not in his presence, you can still chat to him online and see his emotional responses through a live webcam:
Seriously… He’s very sweet and extremely funny… Go and check him out!
Here are a few other wonderful things present at Futuresonic that are definitely worth a world wide wander:
Isophone – Immersive telephonic space
Aaron Koblin – Uber data visualization
Johann Johannsson – Beautiful strings
Murcof – Electronic soundscapes
Philip Glass – Beautiful classic piano
Today I went on an adventure to find a shop with a rocket for a logo… The shop was ‘Luna‘ in Nottingham. I discovered this wonderful shop through Ebay after looking for a filing cabinet for haberdashery and the such. I had a look at the other things in their store and found my good friend Horstman, albeit in a fancy new suit of silver, and a whole managerie of wild characters from the past… Anyway… Today I went to meet Horstmann and get a feel for his movement and look at the finer details of his design. It felt like quite a moment, I can’t believe it’s taken this long for my to experience this lamp firsthand, I felt like it was seeing a dream in reality… like he didn’t really exist until that point… It sounds a bit over the top but that is how I honestly felt.
Meet Horstmann… This wistful chap is the main character in ‘A Siege of Colour’. His design is directly based on a Horstmann & Hadrill counterpoise lamp from the 1950’s. I love this lamp. I love how Bauhaus it is… It makes me feel all Berlin. I’ve been not winning this item on eBay for the past 3 or 4 years now. Anyway… Here are some early sketches I made of lamps with notes and ideas on how to build certain elements in the film.
Ink sketch with some digital colour added.
Horstmann encompassed by the gloom. He looks a bit sad but really he’s just lonely. Doo doo doo, de de de… dum dum. I think that’s a Phillip Glass piece.
An alternative Horstmann & Hadrill lamp that was considered due to its animatable magnifying lens that unfolds from the head. Could have been an interesting element… From an animation point of view and for the lighting effect possibilities… Not sure why I didn’t go with this one actually. Perhaps it’s a bit too squared?
I think I wrote this during the month I was learning how to sleep standing up.
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