Contact me by email at: davidkrein3d@gmail.com
Happy Feet Two DS/3DS
Happy Feet Two DS/3DS - Videogame Animations
This is a collection of some of my favorite work done for "Happy Feet Two" for the Nintendo DS and 3DS as an off-site contract animator for WayForward Technologies. The game is a sidescroller, so all animations were created from that perspective.
Fist Full of Wontons
"Fist Full of Wontons" was an unreleased 3D sidescroller that I was a part of after graduating Collins College. I was character animator and character designer, and also character modeler for a few of the characters. The premise was that the main character, Wonton, was a great warrior who was shrunk down to being a teenager and used his wontons as projectiles in combination with Wushu martial arts to go find the scroll to restore him to his former self. Several issues caused the team to need to separate before we got into the project fully.
Wonton — Videogame Animations
Here is the main character, Wonton. He was a very interesting one to animate, since a lot of his moves had to be incredibly fast while also showing impact, I had to make certain I adjusted to this style rather fast. For his loin cloth I devised a method of using bone chains on a CV curve for easier and more dynamic control, and the difference in speed animating rather than FK was astronomical.
Chew Yung Phat — Videogame Animations
Chew Yung Phat was the first boss of the first level. He is a massive guy, with Wonton only managing to stand as tall as his crotch. As such, the method of defeating Chew was to throw a wonton at his crotch and cause him to fall, followed by using his giant legs of meat as a platform to bash on his head while he was disoriented for a few seconds. Straight-forward boss, but entertaining to animate.
Female Vagabond — Videogame Animations
For each villain was a 'Vagabond' thug to accompany them in the various levels. One villain "Noodle" had female vagabonds armed with ladles as bludgeoning weapons. Making her run in heels was a bit comedic, and as a joke we all agreed to make her move overly feminine except when she was bashing you with her attacks to give a false sense of safety.
Male Vagabond — Videogame Animations
Here was a more lethal Vagabond thug for a later villain. This one was designed more like a dangerous enemy considering he was more powerful. He could throw knives, jump from windows into the battle, and could come armed with a butcher knife or a longer sword. Since he was so dangerous and would flood the screen with others like him, we kept him down longer after being knocked to the ground.
Other Personal Projects
This section is for older animations from school work and personal projects that I still am rather happy with for various reasons. They're not representative of my current animation ability, but I still am proud of having accomplished them when I did.
Gaelstrom — Videogame Animations/Scene
Initially done right after gradutating DigiPen Institute of Technology as a videogame animation project, I added the extra bipeds in to have character interaction and come up with fun dance-like sword interaction. He is a character I had written in several stories for years, so I figured it would make sense to bring him into 3D. The cape was animated all in FK as another practice after Chivalry (below).
Lipsync — Animated Scene
This was a lipsync project done for a class at Collins College with a model I had made with subdivision surfaces for some exploration. He was intended to have clothing, but I ran out of time to explore cloth physics and still complete the assignment. The Audio is from the movie PCU and I still consider it pretty amusing (if not viable) advice.
Chivalry — Animated Scene
This was from my 4th and final semester at DigiPen in 2003 using 3dsmax 5. The final project required a single character doing something, so I decided to go a bit further and do 2-character interaction, telling a story without voice, FK animating cloth (first time), and extensive use of morphers. I never managed to finish the set I wanted around them, so just in case it's not obvious based on the name, that blue thing is meant to be a puddle ;)
Born To Be Wild — Animated Scene
Probably strange to include this, but this is my first ever project of any length in 3D during my second semester at DigiPen. I can remember it taking an entire week to get that first step the character takes to look like a saunter while I wasn't comfortable with character studio, and use this project to remind myself where I started. I may have created it, but I still think it's a funny premise. This is the only available version of the video considering all project files were lost to a computer crash unfortunately.