Currently the darlings of the CG Game Trailer world after stealing the title from Blur Studio, Digic Pictures have just released their latest reel.

Although only containing a handful of updates from their 2010 version, this video shows that they owned pretty much every CG Trailer you got excited about in the last few years.

I’ve added a collection of animation/physics-related papers to the Academic Papers section of the links page, courtesy of my esteemed colleague Simon Clavet. I don’t pretend to understand the half of it, but you may wish to share it with the programmer in your life because if you’re not already incorporating procedural physics into your animation system designs, you really should be…

A long video, and relevant only for pre-rendered cinematics due to the high-res nature of many of their challenges, but this cinematics panel from Blizzcon 2011 hammers home the importance of reference gathering for top-level animation.

This trailer passed me by at E3 this year, but knowing Square’s Visual Works of Final Fantasy fame were involved makes it deserving of another look. Nice comparisons between animatics and final comps. Skip to around 1:15 to get past (at least some of) the Irish marketing man.

I took the time this last week to put together a reel of my work on Mass Effect 2, done between late 2008 and early 2010. Look below for a full shot breakdown, and, because you’re gonna ask, the music is Invaders Must Die by The Prodigy.

Shot Breakdown

Below is a breakdown of what I was responsible for in each scene. The terms used are as follows: (more…)

Created by the same enterprising folks behind the homebrew gold-mine The Spriters Resource, The Models Resource is a fantastic place to grab game models ripped from recent(ish) games. So far I’ve managed to reassemble classic characters like Mario, Link, Sonic and Metal Gear Ray below.

For those game animators out there looking for some inspiration or just to add some variety to existing demoreels these should prove invaluable, and if there are any technical guys out there that fancy a quick rig and skin challenge it would be much appreciated…

Game Anim is back online after a one-month hiatus due to being hacked. The timing was especially bad as it came at the same time I discovered Minecraft, but I’ve finally found it possible to tear myself away for an afternoon to get everything cleaned up. Regular service will return in the near future just as soon as I finish building Châteua Cooper.

Update: The castle isn’t finished. It’s never gonna be finished…

2010 was not a good year. I don’t usually write end-of-year reviews, and I’m a wee bit late given that we’re nearly mid-January already, but this is mostly an exercise to exorcise a year fairly consistent in its misery – something I’m extra disappointed in because I was looking forward to 2010 as the first year where in my opinion, much more plausibly than 2001 or 1984, the numbers actually read like the future. Additionally, beyond marking 5 years of this site, it was also the year I celebrated my first decade in the industry.

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Everyone’s talking about it so it would be rude not to post that the new trailer for Rockstar’s (Sydney-based team Bondi’s) L.A. Noir dropped yesterday and the facial performances look fantastic. Using Depth Analysis’ MotionScan technology, they appear to be going all out to capture the performances of apparently over 200 characters.

While the visual benefits are obvious, I can’t help but wonder just how much it cost the production for so many actor contracts when not only voices but likenesses are required. Additionally, the production task must be one of the hardest parts of the game, considering that at the time of writing they’re still hiring senior roles for the cinematics team around 6 months before the planned release date.

That said, I’ve really been keeping an eye on this since E3 so can’t wait for spring to roll around, plus I’m a Noir nut since a Humphrey Bogart stint last summer.

Read more about the MotionScan tech and process here.

UPDATE: They’re not still hiring as the front-page job posting on their site is dated 2008. Makes me feel better about the frequency of my own posts.