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Bracket_teal_small-05.png
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MATCH TO LIFE

2019

Tools: 

Maya | Arnold | Nuke

egg.jpg

About the Project:

Match to Life is a project that challenged me to recreate a CG object as realistically as the original in order to fool the viewer.

 

I chose to do an egg because although it is a simple object, there is little room for error. To challenge myself, I also animated the fake egg to "fly away" by using n-Cloth FX in Maya. 

egg2.jpg

My Contributions:​​

I am responsible for all aspects of this project, including the photography. 

Challenges:​​
Finding the correct texture for the egg proved to be a significant challenge for me. Despite initial attempts with 2D textures in Maya proving unsuccessful, I discovered that utilizing the 3D texture, Brownian, as a procedural texture yielded the most satisfactory results.

In terms of compositing, leveraging render layers and AOVs played a crucial role in achieving the desired outcome. It was imperative for me to render all the essential passes, including shadow, ambient occlusion, and the egg with AOV passes such as specularity direct and indirect, as well as diffuse direct and indirect. Additionally, color-correcting the egg to match the original proved to be a challenging task, but I persisted and ultimately achieved a perfect match.

Working with N-Cloth was a relatively new experience for me during this project. As I aimed to achieve a specific movement for the egg in the scene, I engaged in extensive experimentation with animation techniques. Eventually, I successfully realized the desired inflation/deflation effect and ensured the egg appeared to "fly away" in the scene as intended.

egg4.jpg
egg3.jpg
eggnuke.png

Photography References:

PinkTable_ChromeBall.jpg
PinkTable_Clean.jpg

I did some photography and different shot compositions to get a background plate that works. I took a clean plate, a twin, a reference cube,  a reference sphere, and a chrome ball photo in order to create this project. The chrome ball was used to create an HDR for the environment. This helps create all the necessary reflections needed to recreate the lighting for the egg. I have one spotlight in this scene.

Use the slider to see the reference compared to the render

Final Thoughts:

This project was very challenging and satisfying all at the same time. Troubleshooting different issues and trying to find the best solution to any problems I faced were definitely challenges. I actually enjoyed doing my own photography for this project as well. It is fun to show my family and friends the sequence I made because they are always in disbelief after the egg suddenly flies away. 

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