Developing Process

In this project, we were required to produce a 3D model with some animation. We needed to choose a time period and imagine how a device that had not yet been invented during that period of time would look and function.

Time Period

To help us decide which time period to choose, our tutors arranged a brainstorming activity on a Padlet Wall. We were asked to list a time period we were familiar with, along with some information such as the significant ruler(s) of that time and the duration of the time period. I believe this activity was beneficial in helping me to select both a time period and a subject for my project. It provided ample freedom for creative thinking and allowed us to be inspired by the ideas of others.

Mindmap

To decide on my preferred time period, I made a list of the options that interested me and conducted a brief research on each to determine which I was more drawn to. The first one that came to mind was ancient Egypt. I’ve always been fascinated by this culture’s mythology, history, style, and overall concept. I find it mysterious and powerful, and I’m excited at the prospect of delving deeper into this culture and incorporating its elements into my artwork. The second option was ancient China. As a Taiwanese, I grew up immersed in Chinese culture and have always been captivated by its history and aesthetic. I find it elegant and refined, and creating a piece of work inspired by this culture would hold a strong personal connection for me. The last option was ancient Greece. I’ve been intrigued by Greek mythology since I was young and have always admired the vivid and unique style of its architecture and artwork. I believe this would also be a great choice as there is much to research and explore.

The time period I decided on for my project is Ancient Egypt. I chose this period because I am interested in it, but I realized that I don’t have much knowledge about it. Therefore, I thought this was a good opportunity for me to learn more about its history and apply the knowledge I gain to the work I create. Additionally, I feel that Ancient Egypt has a strong and unique culture that can be easily identified by people looking at it, including aspects of people’s lifestyles, architecture, and mythology. All of these elements provide perfect inspiration for my project, and I really want to learn more about them.

Since Ancient Egypt was a long period of time, I need to specify which specific time period I would like to focus on. I have chosen a time period that is more well-known to the audience, as I believe that I will be able to find more information about it and maximize the knowledge that I can gain in this short period of time. Therefore, I am going to focus on the 18th Dynasty, which was around 1549 to 1292 BC. Many well-known pharaohs were from this period, such as the family of Thutmose and Tutankhamun

Devices

To decide which device or object to choose for my project was quite challenging, as I wanted to focus on the ancient Egyptian time period. Given that this era is distant in history, I anticipated that there may be several constraints in terms of the availability of materials and technology. Consequently, I created a mind map to organize my ideas. While some ideas were conventional, I considered options such as video games, PowerPoint presentations, and Amazon, which could provide an opportunity for creative thinking.

After careful consideration and comparison, I ultimately decided to choose the letterpress machine as my object. I believe this device is suitable because it is a unique idea compared to other everyday objects. The hieroglyphs of ancient Egypt are special and beautiful, and I want to include them in my project. The idea of the letterpress machine perfectly aligns with what I hope to achieve. Furthermore, during the ancient Egyptian era, they had an advantage in that they could make papyrus, a type of paper, which means the letterpress machine could have been used during that time since they had this type of paper.

I also considered the story I wanted to convey with my work. Initially, I thought the machine could be for ordinary people since only the higher class or royal family had the right to learn and understand hieroglyphs, and this machine could be used to print newspapers to educate citizens. However, I decided against this story since I wanted to create something more luxurious and fitting for the royal family. I wanted to try creating a model with the texture of gold and beautiful jewelry, so I opted not to go for the original story.

Moodboard

General Moodboard

Tutankhamun

Letterpress Machine

Maya Lego man Exercise

To acquire the necessary skills for the project, we began by creating a simple Lego man model as an exercise. We used the program Maya, which will also be utilized for the project. To ensure our model’s accuracy in terms of shape, scale, and other components, we referred to a photo containing front, side, and back views of the Lego man. However, the exercise proved to be more challenging than anticipated. We had to do more than just block out simple meshes. Our teacher taught us various new skills, including how to properly bevel meshes, clean faces, and cut holes using the difference function. These skills are vital and will undoubtedly enhance the quality of my work on the project.

UV Texture Exercise

This is my first time learning about UV mapping for 3D modeling. Before attending college, I watched numerous tutorials on 3D modeling but never understood the concept of UV mapping and how it functioned. However, after attending this class, I now have a basic understanding of how this feature works and why it is necessary for creating models. We were taught how to unwrap the mesh to avoid stretching the texture while using as few pieces as possible to fit all of them onto the texture. I think it’s a useful exercise because I can use it in my future work. Because this project requires the creation of a very realistic object, having a clean and organized uv’s makes the texture more neat and realistic.

ZBrush

I have been looking forward to learning Zbrush because one of the reasons I am interested in 3D was that I would like to try out the sculpting function. I had learned some basic sculpting skills on Blender, but I knew that Zbrush was the software that was being used in the industry and was versatile and could sculpt better. Therefore when I found out that we could learn this software, I was keen to incorporate this skill of sculpting into my work. The fact that my chosen era was Ancient Egypt, where there was a lot of beautiful sculpting from their ruins, reinforced the idea of using Zbrush in my work. However I also found it difficult to use Zbrush for the first time as it has a completely different interface compared to Maya and Blender. So when I was using it to make the Lego man, I actually had to ask for help from teachers or from the online tutorial. But I’m enjoying the process of learning something new and I’m looking forward to using it on my own work.

Substance Painter

This is my first time using Substance Painter and I had never heard of it before this elective. But after using it, I was amazed by the power of it. I think the basics of the software are very clear and I like the baking the mesh feature because I was surprised that I could transfer the details from a high poly mesh to a low poly mesh. I also like the metal edge generator because I think a lot of the texutre becomes more realistic with this effect, and it was really useful while I created my letter press machine. However, I also had a lot of difficulties because my computer doesn’t have enough storage, that I couldn’t use it on my computer and often it would shut down before I could save the file. Therefore this experience has actually made me more aware of the importance of saving at all times to ensure that my work is not lost due to software.

Research

Time Period – Tutankhamun

Tutankhamen reigned as pharaoh of the 18th dynasty of ancient Egypt for about nine years (1333-23BCE). He is relatively unknown as a pharaoh, but he is best known for his complete tomb discovered in 1922 in the Valley of the Kings, which has since been exhibited in many museums and his name is gradually being remembered around the world. (https://egymonuments.gov.eg/monuments/tomb-of-tutankhamun/) The tombs of many great and famous pharaohs have been discovered but have been damaged by tomb raider or other human caused reason. Therefore a tomb as complete as his is useful for archaeological and historical research. During his reign, he restored Egyptian religion and art, which had been put on hold by his father Akhenaten. He was a young king and during his reign he issued a decree to restore the worship of the god Amun-Ra, also the temples and statues of the old gods that had been destroyed during the reign of the previous pharaoh. (https://www.pbs.org/articles/king-tutankhamun-life-death-family/#:~:text=King%20Tutankhamun%2C%20also%20known%20as,%2C%20and%20 20Horemheb%2C%20the%20commander%2D)

Tutankhamun died unexpectedly at the age of 19 and, because of the accident, was not buried in a well-built tomb, but in a hastily converted chamber. But because of its inconspicuous location, it was also accidentally buried during the construction of other pharaoh’s tomb, which was preserved until 1922, when it was discovered by the British archaeologist Howard Carter. His tomb contained countless treasures, from pure gold furniture, chariots and weapons, to many everyday items such as statues and clothes. (https://www.britannica.com/biography/Tutankhamun)

Although he restored the chaos his father had brought to the country through the Reformation, he worked hard to bring peace to Egypt. But because of his untimely death, his name was deliberately erased from history when the next pharaoh, Horemheb took over the place and was forgotten. It is undeniable, however, that at his age and in his short reign he was able to achieve what he did, which is admirable. (https://www.worldhistory.org/Tutankhamun/)

Letter Press Printing

Letterpress printing is a very important and ancient printing technique, which originally involved typesetting the desired text word by word and printing it on paper.(https://www.britannica.com/technology/letterpress-printing) Until Johannes Gutenberg invented the first mechanical movable type, before then, people ustilized the technique of wooden movable type which originally came from China. (https://letterpressplay.com/blogs/blog/history-of-the-letterpress#:~:text=The%20Birth%20of%20the%20Letterpress,back%20to%20China% 20175%20AD.) The purpose of his invention was to make writing and books available for ordinary people to read and learn from. Before his invention, they used woodblock printing, which was also good for photocopying, but it took a lot of time was not efficient enough. Gutenberg’s invention changed the situation and from then on the printing technology became more and more advanced. Nowadays, although letterpress printing is no longer a mainstream printing technique, it has become an art form, a craft. Many people want to use it on their cards, artwork or meaningful items such as wedding invitations. It’s another way of passing on the culture, and it’s also very meaningful. (https://medium.com/@mecoberbo/the-history-of-letterpress-printing-2d6e6c670fc3) The newer version of letterpress printing uses a model made by a calligrapher or typeface creator and then injects metal to create a letter. This type is less likely to deform than wood or clay and will last longer. The height and width of the characters can be controlled to ensure that the edges of each character fit together, making it easier to type. (https://www.machineryeurope.com/letterpress-printing)

Movable Type

The idea of the movable type that I use in my work originated from the Chinese alchemist Bi Sheng. It is a relatively simple method of production, where clay and glue are mixed and printed with the symbols or characters for printing, and then either dried or baked over a fire like Chinese porcelain. (https://www.historyofinformation.com/detail.php?id=19) I think that although this idea and my choosen time period is not the same era, however such a simple process and materials could have been used in ancient Egypt, and it is true that in ancient Egyptian times they also used to dry clay in the sun to make pots.

Pigment

The pigment will be very important for my project because I have chosen a letterpress machine as my device, and I need to know what kind of ink or pigment I can use that is suitable for this time period in order to print the words onto the paper. Moreover, this research will help me to choose a reasonable but beautiful color palette for my project.

According to research, during ancient Egypt, people used different colors to highlight messages on paper, demonstrating the importance of color. The most common colors used for text were red for highlighting messages and black for the normal body of text (source: https://www.thesciencebreaker.org/breaks/maths-physics-chemistry/unveiling-the-secrets-of-ancient-egyptian-ink). The pigments were derived from various materials, often minerals and dirt, and were mixed with binders. (source: https://www3.metmuseum.org/blogs/metkids/2020/paint-like-an-egyptian#:~:text=In%20ancient%20Egypt%2C%20pigments—the,together)%20such%20as%20gum%20Arabic.).

The color that is most commonly seen in Ancient Egyptian artwork is a special kind of blue known as Egyptian blue. Unlike other pigments, this type cannot be found in nature. Instead, it was created by combining several natural ingredients, including sand, lime, sodium carbonate, and copper compounds, which were mixed together and fired.

Idea Development

This is a draft of my design and as I have chosen the era of Tutankhamen, my inspiration are mainly from the treasures of Tutankhamen. My favourite is Tutankhamen’s throne, which I think conveys a strong sense of kingship, especially with the design of the lion’s head and feet, so I have incorporated this into my work. For statue on the side, I chose the figure of the god Thoth. In Egyptian mythology, Thoth was the creator of hieroglyphics and the guardian of knowledge and writing. So for my choice of object, he was the most appropriate. During the time of Tutankhamen’s era, he brought the belief in religion and gods back to Egypt. Therefore, I think it is appropriate to emphasise the concept of ‘god’ in my work.

Because of the context of the period, I didn’t think there would be too much complexity in the mechanical design, so I took the basic functions of the letter press machine and limited the materials to what would have been possible in that period, most of which would have been made of wood, as a pure gold machine would have been too expensive and heavy to move around. Stone and wood were also common materials in those days, and Tutankhamen’s throne was also made of wood but with a layer of gold. I wanted to use this idea in my work, and I will use wood and stone to make this machine.

The machine is operated by placing the movable type in the middle of the machine and laying it out. Use a brush to apply the paint evenly to the movable type. Pull out the papyrus from the bottom roll and cover the machine with it. Run the stone roller over the paper and cut it off with the blade at the front of the machine to preserve the print.

This is my second version of the design. When I made the model of out of my first sketch, I thought it was too monotonous. I thought that a machine used by a royal family should be more ornate. Therefore I decided to study more of Tutankhamen’s treasures, such as this golden shield, one of his funerary objects. I thought the carving on it was beautiful, especially the winged sun above it. After researching, I found that in ancient Egyptian culture the winged sun represented divinity, power and rule, which coincided with my idea for the piece, I chose to design it above my machine to represent the power of the pharaoh and his reverence for the gods. The pattern on either side of the statue was also inspired by Tutankhamen’s throne, the beautiful carving on the armrests of the seat that I wanted to add those details to my work to give it an even more ornate look.

As I wanted to incorporate the concept of carving into my work, I also researched many of the carved motifs on ancient Egyptian treasures. These were hand-painted by me and the ideas came from other treasures of Tutankhamen, such as his coffin and his treasure chest.

As my machine is related to writing, I thought it was necessary to add hieroglyphics. It was difficult to find what hieroglyphs to use. Due to the reason that many of the common hieroglyphs on ancient Egyptian treasures are about death and afterlife, I didn’t want to use hieroglyphs that were not relevant to the subject matter. Therefore I decieded to use the translator designed by Google to create my hieroglyphs. It is a machine-learning based online tool for user to translate and create hieroglyphics. I use the ‘Play’ function which allows the user to translate the sentences and words that they want into hieroglyphics. I chose a number of words related to knowledge and words to form this decorative pattern with pictograms to engrave on my machine.

Creative Writing

In ancient Egyptian times, writing was not accessible to the general public. They believed that there was magic among words. The machines that produced them were therefore considered to be ‘sacred’. The whole machine was once gilded, and part of it was made of stone and wood in really high quality. The reason for not build the whole machine in gold is because it will be too heavy and expensive to move around with the pharaoh. The lion’s feet of the machine symbolise the majesty of the royal family, while the Thoth gods on either side are seen as guardians of writing and knowledge. The winged sun decoration above symbolises the protection and authority of the kingdom and the pharaoh, and the wings’ power to carry the pharaoh’s power to all those who believe in Ra.

Pharaoh claimed to be the son of  Ra, and he wanted to use this machine to record his vows to the gods in order to strengthen his grip on divine power. He also used it to print the laws and proclamations of his kingdom, so that the people would have more respect for the words it produced and be more willing to obey them. The size and weight of the machine, which could easily be carried by two men, allowed the Pharaoh to record and preserve the information he needed when he travelled to all the places around his kingdom. More often than not, the machine was placed on a platform and carried by four men to follow the processions of the pharaohs, thus reinforcing the people’s trust in the power of the machine and emphasising the authority behind it.

Working Progress

Blocking Out the Mesh

This is the step where we need to create the basic shape of the piece that we can have a basic idea of what we are going to do later on in the refinement process. I really enjoyed this part, I found it very interesting and rewarding because I could see the shape of my work after this step and it gave me a better understanding of the process that was to follow. I also went through this step and decided that my work was too monotonous and chose to create a second version of the sketch to add more detail. I don’t think this step is too difficult, but it does require some patience to get the basic shapes out. Especially when I was sculpting the Thoth statue, I was using the cube as a basic shape and I had to keep adjusting the verticies and making sure that the two sides were symmetrical. One of my mistakes was that I forgot to is that I did not select all the verticies and the two sides of the statue were out of symmetry, which I needed to redo all the process again.

Sculpting

This step was the one I was most looking forward to, but it was also the one that took up the most of my time. I initially chose to use Zbrush to sculpt, but as I don’t have Zbrush on my own computer, I had to use VMware to access the school computer. My computer is not powerful enough in terms of storage and hardware, when I opened it with VMware, it became very laggy, which made it very difficult for me to sculpt properly. I had a lot of trouble with this and after thinking about it, I decided to use Blender to sculpt. As I had used it before, I didn’t need much time to learn it and I was able to sculpt quickly. Before sculpting I use the remesh function to add more faces so that I can sculpt more details. However, I don’t know if it is because of the computer or my mistakes, but when I try to carve my hieroglyphs, I can’t get them right, which make the sculpting proccess even more difficult.

There were many details that could not be sculpted on Blender and there was a time limitation. Therefore I chose to use Nomad, a sculpting software for the Ipad, to do some of the detailing, such as the floral pattern next to the statue, the hieroglyphs and other detailed patterns. This is because on the tablet I can control the strength and shape better. The software is very easy to use and I can easily convert the files to .obj files and then import them into computer software such as Maya or Blender for modification. However I understand that I need to practice more of my sculpting skill on the computer. Therefore I hope for the next project I would able to do all the sculpting processes on the computer instead of Ipad.

However, because the sculpted object has so many vertices that it may crush the Maya software, I had to do the baking process in Substance Painter before I could import it into Maya properly. I tried Quad Draw tool in Maya to do the retopology. However, during the baking process I found that the two meshes did not baked well together and Substance Painter did not recognize the low poly mesh. I tried to import it into Zbrush and use its Zremesher function to try to simplify the number of faces in the mesh, but it was too dense with verticies so that even Zbrush could not run it. In the end, I had to use Nomad’s built-in simplification function, leaving out some of the sculpting details, in order to successfully UV unwrap and baking.

This is how it looks after I’ve imported all the elements into Maya and I think it’s not too far off from what I had in mind. But I think I should have done more to the plate where the paint is placed and the decoration above it, because when I look back at this piece later it looks a bit weird.

UV Unwrapping

I found this part to be a relatively easy but time-consuming process. As my machine doesn’t require a lot of detailed texturing, I often just cut the UVs in half and ensure the texture will not be strech. One of the challenges was that most of my meshes are sculpted and remeshed. Which after the process my low poly mesh will still contain a lot of faces, edges and vertices, so I have to select them one by one to cut the UVs, which means I spend a lot of time on this part. I have learnt the importance of a neat mesh and I should practice tools like Quad draw more often so that I don’t have to spend too much time on such areas.

Baking

I did the baking process in Substance Painter and I really enjoyed it because I found it very satisfying to see the high poly mesh and low poly mesh come together. However I also encountered a lot of difficulties while doing it. For example, as I mentioned earlier, the low poly mesh that was used was not the original one, so there was a mismatch between the two. The problem I had with the Thoth statue was that I didn’t pay much attention to the mesh size when I exported it to Blender, after I finished sculpting it, I realised that it was much smaller than the original mesh. I thought it would work if I resized it to the same size, but the high poly mesh had been altered too much that it could not be baked onto the low poly mesh. I solved this problem with Zbrush’s Zremesher, but as there were still a lot of faces, I needed to spend more time on UV unwrapping.

Texturing

I made my textures on Substance Painter and I like this part because it makes my work look more complete. But as I wanted to have more practice, I decided to make most of the texture myself instead of using the texture downloaded from online or originally from the software. Most of my texture on my machines are in gold. To do this texture, I used a Fill layer and then toned it down to a light yellow, and then got the gold effect by turning up the metalness and turning down the roughness value. As I wanted to give it an aged look, I deliberately did not make the gold completely reflective that it would look worn. I also use a deep red colour with a greyscale such as dust or cloud to create dust and stains, and I use the metal edge generator to make my carvings more visible, and the red colour can often be seen on Egyptian treasures and has an oxidised look to it, so the overall look is not out of place. I have also added some blue-green dust to the gold to make this effect more visible, as I can see it in the treasures I have studied. I think that although I am now able to produce basic textures, there are some other function and skills that I am not familiar with, so I think that after this project I will need more time to practice the software to become more familiar with it.

Import the Texture

This step required me to import all my textures into Maya. I thought this would be a complicated step at first, but it turned out to be relatively simple. All I had to do was select the AI Standard Surface through the export the texture function and import it into the Source Image folder of my Maya file so that I could find the image I needed on Maya without any problems when changing the devices.

In Maya I first added an AI standard surface to my mesh and selected the file and imported the corresponding texture into the colour, metalness, roughness and colour bump options. For the hight of the texture, I originally want to include it into my texture, however later on I found out that I was not familiar with the process and did not have much time. I did not choose to use it as it was not too important a detail.

However, I did encounter some problems with the import. I forgot to adjust the colour space to raw and clicked on Alpha is Luminance, so it came out oddly, but after changing the settings it looked much better. Another thing was my normal map was showing strange spots after applying it. I needed to adjust the colour bump to the tengent space normal by using the nodes in display hypershadow windows to make the overall texture look more realistic.

Animation

This part of making the animation was interesting and is my first time making an animation on Maya. Although it wasn’t very complicated, I only used keyframes and didn’t use rigging techniques, which I didn’t really need for this piece. The most difficult part, I think, was making the papyrus paper rolls. My original plan was to get the plane to wrap around my original roll mesh, but I think I made a mistake and the roll didn’t work very well, but due to time constraints I had to hide the imperfections in the roll so that the animation didn’t look out of place. But I think the whole process was fun, especially when I was adjusting the camera movements to make the whole thing look more vivid. But one of the problems I encountered was that when I was making the papyrus paper pull-out, there was some part where two mesh will go over each other and I had to adjust some faces and verticies to cover that up. I was quite happy with the final animation, but I was a bit worried that my camera would make the audience dizzy during the 10 seconds.

Lighting

For the lighting, I was hesitant about the need for complex lighting, as my work is mainly gold and therefore light is very important. So in the end I decided to place a yellowish area light above, in front of and to the left and right of the piece to emphasise the reflections of the gold. I also chose a red background to bring out the light and the contrast of the materials, and I used an HDRI to give the overall light a more natural look.

Rendering

I think this was the most worrying part of my project, as I had learned in previous projects that rendering was time-consuming and could be fail. Although we had the opportunity to use the Render Farm technique to speed up our rendering, I still left myself a lot of time to render so that I wouldn’t have to use Deadline Monitor 10. Because I didn’t have enough time to render on my school computer, but I ran into a big problem when I tried it myself. All my settings were correct and the render farm showed that all frames were complete, but I could not see my image sequence in my image folder, therefore I could not export my animation successfully. However, I later found out that the reason for the error was that when I transferred the file to another device, some hidden history was also transferred and the Render Farm was unable to process my work. I then reopened a new scene and copied all the information over and it worked.

Although rendering worked, I found that the background of a few frames had turned black for some reason. I tried to resubmit the task, but it didn’t work. As there are not many, I chose to render directly from Maya, and added into the folder where the PNG sequence is placed.

Rough Rendering

Final Version

Final Animation

Reflection

Overall I really enjoyed the project and process of making my machine. Through this project, not only did I get to learn more about 3D skills, but I was also able to make my work more convincing through the research process. I was delighted to have the opportunity to research one of my favourite eras, Ancient Egypt. Through research, I learned about Tutakhamen and his backstory, as well as his amazing treasures. I feel that the design of these objects has a strong cultural identity and this is also what I wanted to achieve.

After this five weeks elective, I have gained a better understanding of Maya but also the difficult parts of this software. For example, although I got stuck in the animation course, I was able to make a small animation in my final work, which I was kind of proud of myself. I have also learnt two new software, Zbrush and Substance Painter, both are powerful and really help me improve my work. But I also think there are areas where I need to improve. I took too long in the first phase because I was hesitant to do my basic modelling and always thought it was too monotonous. But then I decided that it need to be connected with the period I had chosen and that I should not forget the setting in the pursuit of a complicated model. Therefore I did not make too many exaggerated changes in my final work, instead I decided to add some small details such as the patterns on the machine. Those patterns were also inspired by real ancient Egyptian treasures, which I think it was worth learning this part.
Another thing I think I didn’t do well enough is that I changed software too many times, I used five different software in total, which took up a lot of my time converting and transferring files, and it was easy to lose files. So I think next time I should focus more on one or have a better way of organising my files to make sure I don’t lose them.

I am quite satisfy with the final result of this work, but instead of using a lot of colours in my sketch, I chose to textured my mod in a single shade of gold and brown, because I thought the direct colouring would be a bit off-putting and I couldn’t get the paint effect perfect. Moreover, I was afraid that the overall colour palette would be too monochromatic and would make the audience feel tired, to solve this I chose a less harsh pale yellow as the base colour for the gold, and added details such as oxidation or dust with burgundy or dark brown.

In conclusion, I think I have learned a lot from this elective and it has given me the idea to choose 3D as a specialized pathway for next year. I know it’s going to be difficult, but I think it’s going to make me learn more and have stronger skills and abilities to face the challenges ahead.