Occlusion Setup

The Occlusion process for me was very stressful. First I downloaded the video file but the audio was not working for me at all - I had to piece my way together from what I remembered from the day before as the teacher was recording it. I also had a LOT of help from my classmate.

The problem fixed itself when I changed what program I was viewing it in though so that was good. I managed to create an accurate copy of what the teacher did in no time with the voice included.

To export the file I did all of the setting required and everything turned out great. This was the result of my Occlusion:

As shown I was pretty pleased with how it turned out - the quality and shadow placements were perfect! It took a while to render but when I was done I just went ahead and rendered the coloured version which took a lot less time to render - in fact I did it about 2 times because I messed up the first time T.T

This was the maya view versus the preview render. At first while I was setting up things werent going so great. My character was far too shiny and I had a lot of lights, I had to play around in the original file to get the shine levels down to a (personal) acceptable rate. I may have overdone it though because the places where I wanted shine (the eyes and bow) seem to have lost it but thats alright with me because the end result is quite nice and the matte texture almost makes the character look like he is made out of coloured chocolate and put on a cake! (a classmate pointed that out to me)