Are you making a movie? Maybe I could convert the sleigh sample model that came with Ray Dream Studio. Let me know if you’re interested. Are his hands supposed to be black? I agree with Jeepster about his suggestion about his fatness but his legs look ok.
Thanks for the replies.
Jeepster: Thanks. Hopefully this update looks a little better.
captainkirk: Yes, if all goes according to plan, I will be making a movie. I probably wont want that model, because I like to do everything myself, and I probably wont use a whole sleigh, but I’ll let you know. Thanks for the offer. And those shiny black hands with no fingers are supposed to be gloves(or mittons or whatever). I like Santa with black shiny mittons, plus it saves me the trouble of rigging his hands, which I will probably still have to do for the little child.
Here’s my short-term agenda. Rig Santa, set up RVKs for facial and fat animation. Set up the scene on the rooftop and do that scene(animation), then make the girl and make the indoor scene, then use the sequence editor to edit parts of the outdoor scene into parts of the indoor scene. Ok, that’s all. Here’s the update:
Thanks for all the replies so far.
That looks better. What’s the movie about? We’ve got several movies and things we want to do.
Still looking good, cant wait for animation(tho I realize thats a ways away)
Thanks for showing the particle settings! The model is looking really good so far.
I swear I replied to this a while ago, but I guess I didn’t click the submit button. Anyway, the movie is just a short one, probably less than a minute.
captainkirk: Thanks. Santa grabs his sack and hops down the chimney, gets stuck, wakes up the little girl whos inside. He finally makes it down and the little girl is standing there with cookies. Santa says, “No thanks. Santa’s on a diet”(he says diet like when an adult is stressing a word to teach a kid what it means). The little girl laughs like she knows what he’s talking about.
free_ality: Thanks. I’ll be working on the first part of the animation shortyl. I still have to make the girl before I can do the second part of the animation.
Alden: Thanks.
I’m happy with Santa, but when I make the little girl, I’m not going to be able to put as many imperfections and discoloration on her face, so I’m going to have to rely on something eles to make her look good. Does anybody know any good tutorials or methods for faking SSS?
Here’s the basic roof scene. I realize that the moon is in one place and the light is coming from another. I’ll move the moon. I just wanted it to be in this render. Here it is:
Feel free to critique what I have so far. Thanks.
Looks nice! I know there are a few fake SSS tests running in the blender tests forums…
For the snow, I’d try doing what I did in my “Snowblender” peice. For the snow on the branches I took a bunch of meta balls and placed them on there, then I decimated the mesh and then added a subsurf modifier and the I applied a snow material I’d been messing around with. It’s amazing what you can do with those ramp shaders and displacment maping 
Do you vector paint your heads when you create them?
Thanks for the replies.
free_ality: Thanks. I’ll take a look at them and see where it gets me.
jackblack: That’s a good idea. From just the right distance my snow looks ok, but it’s worthless from close up or too far away. Like in the next test animation I’ll post after I answer this question. I don’t vector paint them. I do all the color and texture and bump map work in Photopaint, and UV map the texture to the head. Thanks for the reply.
Here’s the video. The snow looks very bad:
http://www1.webng.com/voltzart/wip/bagtest3.avi
I’m hosting this on my website now because SaveFile.com isn’t working properly, but to save bandwidth, as soon as savefile is up, I’ll edit this post with a new link.
I haven’t done too much work on this lately, but I’ve done some. This is basically the first scene:
http://www.savefile.com/files/324127
Now I will start working on the girl. The camera will cut back and forth between santa stuck on the roof and the girl.
Hey, actually, that’s pretty good. A couple things I noticed there, though, the arc santa jumps in is too regular in speed. When he pushes off, he’ll be going fast, but when he reaches the top of his jump, he’ll slow down in the up and down motion because his upward movement will be fighting gravity’s pull. Then gravity will catch up, and he’ll go down fast again. The animation timing is good, too, but it’s like he doesn’t have any weight. Shake your hand back and forth, you’ll see that it wobbles a little, no matter how tightly you tense your muscles. Think weight.
Anyway, it’s looking pretty decent so far. Keep going.
Thanks BlackBoe. I know, all the animation looks a little stiff. On the whole jumping into the chimney thing, I wanted him to look like he was floating a little, but if I can’t make it look less stiff without fixing that, then I’ll fix that. But for now, I’m working on the little girl character. Once I finish her, I’ll be all set. Here’s what I have so far:
It has some problems, but it kinda looks like at least a young child, not necessarily a girl. Comments and crits would be very appreciated. Thanks
well, the smile looks unnatural and forced, sort of like a smile in a school picture, but I guess that will be fixed in animation
good luck!
Thanks for the reply Jeepster. Yeah, I will fix that. Here’s an update:
Looks great! Is there any way you can make him look older? Wrinkles or something? I really don’t know I’m a noob =P.
Thanks FadieZ. If you’re talking about the last picture, it’s the little girl, not Santa. Santa has some wrinkles.
I haven’t worked on this for a while. I did a little work on the textures and the mesh.
Feel free to comment and crit. Thanks.
Well, I think I’m gonna scrap the little kid idea, for now at least. Right now I’m focused on Santa. I considered scraping the whole project due to lack of interest, but I wanted to do something for Christmas, and now that I have the basic fall animation, I’m back on track:
http://www.savefile.com/files/339840
It isn’t perfect yet. It will have motion blur. Feel free to crit. Thanks.
Hey, if you’re going to scrap the little kid idea… mind if I offer some story suggestions?
You could make it all about Santa getting stuck in the chiminey. Your first scene runs just like you’ve made it. The second scene shows the fireplace, and we can hear grunting as Santa tries to get through the chiminey (this could go on for several seconds–it adds to the story, but you don’t have to animate anything). We hear Santa dislodge and come sliding painfully down the chiminey. Just as his legs come into view, he gets stuck, and his legs swing limply until he realizes what has happened. Then he tries stretching his legs out a couple times trying to get loose, when that fails he kicks and swings his legs wildly, then in despiration stretches them to the ground, and POP! He falls just like you have him fall in the last post. You could end it there, or have Santa say something about needing to go on a diet.
The benefit is that you don’t have to model the child, or anything new for that matter. And it’s fairly quick animate (you’re basically animating just his legs), while adding to the time and story of the piece.