Week 9 - M persona

To give the M a more heavy metal persona I gave him some spiked bracelets which were easily done by creating 2 cylinders and using one to boolean a hole through the other creating a bracelet which was then wrapped around the legs of the M. The spikes for the bracelet were created using cones and liking them to the bracelet as trying to boolean or weld those caused problems when the M was moved. I did try to skin the bracelets so that they would move better with the M but this also caused problems that the bracelet would fold and stretch making it look very unrealistic.

I also began to bone the M and try simple animation. The boning of the M took several attempts as it was quite hard to organise the bone structure to give the M more fluid movement. The boning structure used at the end was 2 sets of bones running done each leg of the M and then skinning the M frame over the bones.

While I started animating the M I decided that with just bracelets and now no hair as I decided to leave the hair out, that the M looked rather bare and not how I imagined a stereotypical heavy metal fan/music player. To add more to the M I created a simple flying V guitar which seemed to be a symbol for heavy metal.

The guitar was made out of simple rectangles and then boolean to make the shape of the guitar. The guitar was then welded together to make easier to animate instead of having several shapes to move. Just having a plank like guitar looked rather dull so I added strings and some decals on it to give it even with its already cartoony look, to make it look more real.