an evaluation

with the deadline drawing closer i thought now would be a good time to evaluate my thoughts on this project...be warned..i bet its gonna be epicly long, have no pictures or a decent plot line...if you need the toilet...go now.

character design

Some positive and some negative thoughts about this stage in production. Firstly i feel i require at lot of reassurance with my designs instead of having a gut feeling and going with it. I did lose some time with this particular aspect but Im pleased that when i picked a design, i stuck with it. In terms of my drawing skills, it has become clear to me that limited practice has had an effect on my quick sketching and i can become too precious over drawings that should take seconds, not minutes. I feel this is something i can work on during my easter break so that im a bit quicker at coming up with designs and getting them down on paper. However, i feel i was able to experiment with a number of design ideas therefore producing a good range. 

modelling

i have enjoyed this section of the project and feel my skills have much improved since my last attempt at creating a character back in the summer. Im much more aware of Maya's interface and the techniques used to create a character although admittedly i did make a few mistakes and need to read more into correct facial modelling (nurbs/polys problem). Nevermind, at least these mistakes were made now so i can learn from them. I feel Im creative when it comes to tackling parts of the modeling such as the hair and pleased in my persistance of trying different ways of modeling until it matched the design. I had lost time again after my model came under criticism and my confidence with my design was shattered. This is a definite must to be addressed if any progress is to be made....fear not....it will be. Overall i feel quite confident with this area of Maya which Im sure is down to continual practice especially from the environments project last term. 

texturing

An area completely new to me, and although most of my model was assigning shaders, colours and bumps to the model, im pleased i've begun to experiment with UV mapping. I still do not fully understand this area in terms of size of mapping, sewing and the best method but i intend to utilize the easter holidays to practice this so im more familiar with this area for future projects. I know this is an area i do not wish to specialize in, but i still would like a good grounding in this topic to see me through the course and in industry. I feel i should use the easter break to complete some texturing on other objects such as trying out texturing our environment buildings etc...practice will help.

rigging

I have really enjoyed getting my teeth into this from plotting the rig to creating the controls, testing and adding attributes, its something i've really enjoyed and would like to peruse further for next term. I think i can quote that MEL script off by heart by now! I set aside a couple of days for this task and stuck to this schedule...again a very pleasing factor. Rigging has been a big priority of mine to learn after speaking to those in industry and from the colleges industry day as i want to specialize in animation but also have a set of rigging skills. The blendshapes was a fun process, i can see how easy it is to get carried away creating endless expressions. It felt creative though a lot was trial and error. Its down to how well your characters face is modelled and it certainly highlighted areas where my model was limited...i take note of this when designing my next character. Another area which demonstrated how well your modeling is is skinning the character...man painting weights was a huge confusion for me at first...influence? but...that all looks fine (whilst the ear melted down the face) ooooo influence. So i have restarted this part probably the most BUT everytime ive done it, im quicker and more confident. When i've restarted, its because ive gone back and added some edge loops to break up the geometry which works out much easier than trying to make a crappily weighted model...believe me there were issues with all the crunch points...the elbows....the wrists...that weird old knee and her dungers. However, im here to conquer and i believe i have conquered...*stands there with flag through laptop....o jesus....

animating

haha i originally wrote this part but find myself re-writing it after events of the last oooo errr 48 hrs. After enjoying the other parts such as rigging and blend shapes and painting weights going better than i thought, it was to my horror when it came to animating just how much was wrong with the rig/model. My thoughts are that yes i could have created a simpler rig...had no controls, IKs, Splines, reverse foot control and it might have saved me...but then would that have been pushing myself? no, not in the slightest. Theres a balance between pushing yourself and playing the safe card and if you pick to push yourself...there will be mistakes and i can undenieably admit its happened to me. It was soul crushing especially since some of the problems such as the foot attributes disappering for no apparent reason...however i feel it links to the blend shape issue that i went and added geometry to the body AFTER combining the head with all its blends and its messed up its history along the way. After sending through a copy of my rig for Matt to look at, he said Maya was using the blends as imputs which was causing the entire model to explode. Crushing moment....truely was. The foot problem was down to the loss of the attributes and at the late stage i was in...i would have had to have gone wwwwaaaay back into old files to sort this problem...again this is even further confused because of the added geometry to after combining the head etc. These feel like stupid mistakes...but i guess the good thing is that im making them now and can improve for next time....its spurred me on to go back and correct these issues over the easter holidays since i will have more time, no pressure of a deadline. I feel like i need to do the rigging justice as i spent so long modelling it be a shame for me to just leave it like that. Alas (because we've slipped into medevil times) However, with what i had, i feel i did a pretty good job and by focussing on just the couple of steps, was able to home in on details :) i find some solace in losing the blend shapes in the fact i dont necessarily need them for the walk cycle...

lighting/rendering

this was another aspect i am not particularly familiar with. After completing my initial research into animations such as Pocoyo, i thought it would be best to complete some lighting/render tests of my own trying to emulate their style. I have read about a few methods such as global illuminations and final gathering but really dont feel i have a good understanding of what they exactly are, are used for. It was very helpful to be shown some lighting techniques by someone who understands it more so i was very grateful when Grigsby showed me the create sun and sky lighting technique. I have been playing round with directional lights as well. Lighting is not something i wish to specialize in but i do need to play around with lights more during my easter break so i know how to complete basic lighting set ups for any scenes i complete...especially those which will end up in my show reel. The same goes for rendering really..its not something Im overly interested in but is something i need to read more into. 

working individually

in terms of working on my own on this project...its had its up and downs. I feel very pleased with my progress in understanding Maya and feel this term has seen the most progress/learning for myself. Working by myself has highlighted my strengths including modeling as well as some weaknesses such as texturing and lighting i need to address during the break. It has also allowed me to expand my knowledge in terms of rigging which i aim to continually work on as part of my area of focus for future projects. Im disappointed with the limited time for animation but im feeling positive that with the progression of other areas in the pipeline my workflow will be quicker for next projects. Blogging is good for me...strange sentence I know but it provides evidence of my progression and ticks off the jobs i've completed. Im one to knock down my work but the blogging provides a positive experience for me...even if it is to rant my sometimes frustrating relationship with Maya (were mates really).  I know i need to be more confident/have more self belief in my designs and not necessarily buckle under criticism...decisions must come from myself. I must be more decisive...its one flaw that has cost me and i regret it....well not regret it but i think a change is in order if However, the flip side of working individually is the isolation from the rest of the class...though i have pushed myself to get in contact and ask for help in order to gain that outside support. I feel i would have been pushed to start and finish specific areas of the project much quicker had i have been part of a team as group work generally spurs you and each other on more...theres that direct support network. Its much easier when your working on your on to slip off of shedule where as i think this would have been less of an issue had i have been part of a group. Im really proud of what i've learnt but I think for next term i will definatly consider working as part of a team. 

animation

a.k.a for foot sakes

so its here...the stage i wanted to get to yoooonks ago...and i find myself with as little as a day to animate *thumbs up* ooo i do like a challenge haha.

Anyway, im animating a skip for Poca's walk cycle/rig demonstration....i guess this is the real moment when we find out how good the model/rig is.

So it doesnt help that all my feet attributes (toe roll, toe wiggle, foot roll, heel twist) have all gone missing....ah....no idea when this happened but its waaaayy too far back to recover now at this stage.....ah well. 

O lord...i just tried to add a mere smile and er...big mistake...it destroys the entire model...obviously i have gone and messed the whole thing up somewhere along the line...added too much history, gone back over things and changed and somehow messed the blend shapes up...o lord...if i had the time i would go weeeerrhey back and redo this but time is definitely not on my side...alas...i am without them...at least i have the old files so i can return to them in the future...best put up a playblast on the old blog since i'll now not have them. Must have been to do with the amount of history on the geometry...i dunno.

It also doesn't help that my Maya is not coping with the animation stage...i cant scroll through the frames or playback so its a matter of waiting to see what the results are when creating a playblast...definitely not a good way of working. 

I know i keep moaning about my copy of Maya....but it really is struggling and i think this project has possibly killed it.

Back to it...im using the legendary reference from Richard Williams book "the animators survival guide" for my skip cycle:

So i begin AAAANNND already there is a problem....firstly i discover NO BLEND SHAPES...then oh no...no foot attributes...so this means no real toe roll which makes walk cycles look less...well...believable...no idea why this is has happened..all i can think of is that i have overloaded the geometry so much its sort of confused itself along the way (much like myself) Ahem....anyway, its too late to go re rig, re attribute...re....lots of things so i'll just have to make do with what i got (even though it pains me...darn it) but ah well i guess i can highlight the following

IM A STUDENT AND I BLOODY LEARNING DAMIT...

perhaps i expected too much for my first rig to be o so wonderfully amazing...i should have been way more ahead than i am now to be testing and making adjustments...alas, its not to be so i shrug my shoulders (after standing back out by the road screaming at the traffic with my tesco carrier bags) and continue....already by pushing the model around have i learnt what i should and shouldnt have done

• the foot, though wonderfully cartoon looking, restricts the amount of curl that can be placed upon it....thus i have to rotate and change the translation to get a bit of arcs into my animation
• the shoulder...though delightfully lovely with the tshirt...is soooo fat that it restricts the amount of pinch the arms can have into the body
• the dungas....though charming in their own way...have limited the amount of bend in the legs
• the hips....summat....are too low and have also restricted the height the leg can reach...therefore she has limited levels of bend etc and her stride has to be longer to compensate....she therefore looks "special"
• the arms...although reflecting an aardman no indents heres my elbow sort of design...mean there is a great deal of pinching and collated with geometry mean she has limited movement there....i did add more edge loops but by gum i spose she could have done with more...selfish
• the torso....GOOD WORK....pleased that there is some nice twist in this from the IK spline twist attribute i applied....
• blend shapes.....get outta here man

so yeah...just a few pointers for me to note for next time...and when i say next time...i mean the easter holidays when i shall be going back and making these changes...im that ANNOYED by the way its gone....

I CANT EVEN USE MY OWN RIG!? i thought there was major issues happening with it, but ive handed it over to matt to see where the issue lies and he sees no problem with it....ITS......ME?! aaaahhhhh though he did agree the attributes on the foot are gone....gone forever which he thinks is to do with the connections editor. I havent deleted history so theres no reason why these attributes should mess up...so going back weeeerhey in time seems unnessary for no gaurantee of their safe return. Its been a positive point to hand over the rig to someone else and get feedback on its ease of use...your rig should cater to everyone and not just be specialised to you.

shut up sarah

"the job of the rigger is to make the animators life more easy" or in my case more DIFFICULT!

RIG ISSUES (cant remember if i've listed these already but here we go...this is notes for me for the future etc)

• foot attributes disappeared and unrecoverable
• blend shapes disappeared and unrecoverable (at this stage in the project)
• joint orientation on the right shoulder of the rig isn't correct...making the movement rotations more difficult
• hip bone isn't high enough..reducing the height of the upper leg, making the walk less believable
• the feet...those bloody feet

apart from that the model is painted to the best it can be.

im animating with the skeleton...not with the geometry on display...least this way maya can cope going through the different frames without crashing or me having to see what my animation looks like through the means of a playblast...

so im attempting a SIMPLE walk cycle so i can get in there and tweak away....following more legendary reference material from mr r. williams

heres a playblast...

god she looks thin...haha...oooooo merrrcy

its like 1:15am and im getting the JOY of animating y'all :)

its brilliant...and i made this darn tootin thing...me...I MADE IT....so nerr

shame about the feet

but neeeer

im very fortunate to have continual feedback from fellow animator matt...its always good to get someone elses opinion on things (especially the snipers) as they often spot things you dont always see (especially even more so the sniper) This combined with working in the ultimate now dubbed skele mode is working a treat!!

once more...

mmm think the neck movement is a bit too much on this...seems very obvious..making her look like a head banger haha! best change that. its a shame about the legs too...would have liked to get some nice arcs and follow throughs like the arms but i think this is the best the rig will do at the current time.

added: body lean/side to side movement

comments: that left arm seems a little too floopy...it could be becuase your seeing it with the primitive leg movement that makes it more obvious....needs tweaking back a little. Much better neck movement now....seems to flow nicely. Amazing what a bit of side to side movement can add and break up the static quality of the body more. She seems less robotic and more fluid :) that last key to return pose seems to stand out a bit too...

just noticed some dragging on that left hand there (screen right) after tweaking the right side (screen left) funny how you dont notice these things before until you've sorted out another area. 

aaaannd another..(its all in the documenting of progress i tell thee)

not sure what i make of this...i've added the counter shoulders to the hip movement...except im using the top of the spline handle to create this...i see why you would want a clavicle handle now as i dont think this is as strong a movement. That ending position needs to be put back to the middle. Hands still seem a bit floppy. Need to watch the rotations on the arms to....in terms of distance from the body. Perhaps break up the fingers...add a little bend so it doesn't look so rigid...no movement though otherwise it'll look strange....too much.

its looking good, theres just some weird snapping now happening on the right hand (screen left) to sort out, but i think its almost there :) huzzar!

ok so ive matched up the start and beginning for the looping. I could have made 5 seconds worth of animation, but it wouldnt allow me to go into the breakdowns where as this way i get to complete a bit more detailed animation. Looking much better...need a little more drag back from the right hand (screen left) the arms just hanging a bit too much. Not bad for an evenings/early mornings work :)

better...that end frame sees the knee bend a bit inward though so need to adjust that....nice follow through of the hands though the pass position is a little too even...needs to favour one side. Think its almost there though. Head key jumps a bit from end of 34 to 1 so need to go back and look at that. 

back to it...

so its been a while of working on this project (tues onwards) as i've been dedicating my time to completing gareth's project. Its a long old story...well...maybe not that long, but to sum it up it involved an all nighter, getting stuck in sainsburys car park and a £40 fine to lewisham council! The job was done, dusted and handed in with the almighty help from mr grigsby...a massive THANK YOU goes to you my friend, u saved my bacon :)

back to the painting weights and it was a slow start...mainly cos i didn't note down which file i was working on...i have a filing system, but with a lot of corruption's occurring hadn't deleted old files....so i have like poc_model_new_032_new_v2_G and so on and so on....suffice to say i starting working on the weights when i realized this wasnt the one with updated geo...a note for the future and also a good way of keeping space on the mac which is sloooowwwwiiinnng dooooooowwwwwwnnn. 

NB: need to look into for the future...or perhaps if anyone else knows why could answer?:

• why can i not "go to bind pose" i find i have to line up my model with the other side or type in 0s in order to get it back to its original pose. An error message reads: Pose not achieved, see diagnostics in the script editor. 
  

AND NOW! for some hilarity...some of the weird and wonderful things Poca was doing...o we laughed hahahahahahaha

two face!

the head had a mind of its own as you can see from this half and half image...left with full influence to the head...right with too little = warping.
braaaaain explosion! had to push the head to big extremes to get to the head geometry underneath the hair piece and paint influnce to the head.
her false teeth also needed painting separately as well as selecting verts and removing other unnecessary influence.
painting weights is great! its like putting your model through TORTURE! muahahahhaaaaa :)

painting weights is a paaaaaaaaiiin when you accidently delete one of your rig controls...yes put them on a layer i hear you say...layers does not work on my maya...damit

whats been an annoying piece of geometry? THE KNEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE. Those dunga-runga-rees do there best to crunch, squash when i lift her leg up. I think the main issue is down to the design...note for future designs there. 

can you tell im here every now and then updating this post?

i dont remember writing that

Painting weights is a delicate process...its also a balance of looking at the low poly and smoothed version in order to get the real impression of how its looking.

Its already highlighted what i need to do modelling wise and rigging wise for future projects...i guess the only way to learn is to do, and with practice it can only get better. 

Some more images:

before: the neck influence is too great here as its pulling on the tshirt geometry. 

demonstration of the rigs capabilities...looking much better with the painted weights on the body.
the knee has been one of the more difficult areas to weight due to the turn up on the dungarees...her hip joint also should have been a bit higher so to compensate ive painted the hip joint to give a bit more so the leg can be raised up for the walk cycle. 
head lean, arm down, left to right comparison...ive worked on weighting the left side (screen right)
closer look at the arm down...again a note for the future to not allow the clothing such as the dungarees or tshirt sleeves to be too big as it limits how much the arms can be pulled into the body. 

skkiiiiiiiinnneeeeeer!

onto the process of skinning, and when it came to cleaning up my scene file...my spline IK handle clusters had disappeared...probably accidently selected and deleted whilst i wasn't working on X-ray mode...this was easily recreated and sorted but something to note for the next project. 

after matt had kindly gone through the process of painting weights as well as few tips i was off...however the first mutilation occured

DUM DUM

iiiiiiiiiiii think she looks better :)

KIDDING! she looks dreadful, and its down to me not realising my vertices weren't merged, merging them, which in turn ruined the bind on the model....restart. I then discovered i required more edge loops around the shoulder geometry as it was not deforming entirely how i liked...again you could add in edge loops, which i did, but Maya does not remember the painted weights you then put on the model and sets it back....restart. Ah well...little problems, least im getting into the swing of it...the components editor is also a big help for removing unwanted influence the computer happens to put on certain verts (however DO NOT depend solely on this...i removed a lot of verts influence and then found i couldn't go back and paint certain areas). Its fine to use straight away to remove extremely unnecessary influence...such as my models ears were being pulled by the shoulder..i know i wont need to go paint back over an influence for shoulder to ear so can remove this vert influence via the components editor.  As Stuart said to me "its all trial and error really" and he'st most certainly right. 

Progress!! after going back and adding much much many more edge loops, were on the way...heres a left to right comparison of how things are looking....im working on her left side (only on the shoulder and arm at this point) (screen right) and right is the terrible bind situation with no work on it....conclusion: ITS RUDDY WORKING :D

this is merely the beginning my friends...i feel much more confident about painting weights! hora! soon i will be able to tick it off my list of to learns...progress has been saved but for now i must devote my time to Gareths project which unfortunately took a back seat whilst i picked up the pace with this...never do that again sarah you num nuts. Cant believe were into the last week maaaaaann

tbc

blend me shape me...

meet the team!

took me a few attempts to get into the swing of it but i was then well away with creating the expressions for my model. Like anything in Maya, i find the more you do it, the more you become quicker and clever about how to make something. Im trying not to overcomplicate the expressions but to allow me to have a mixture so i can blend a few together to create even more expressions.

During this stage, I think its now when you start to realise the limitations and the positive factors about your characters facial design. For example, im very pleased with the brow section of my model, it offers a lot of opportunity for extreme as well as subtle expression...there's a lot of give which i think shows from looking even at the screen print. However if i were to note a limitation i would say the mouth has its restrictions especially around the very inner edges..it feels quite flat at times. Another area that has caused issues are the eyelids in which to raise and make them disappear i had to alter the size of my characters eye so they disappeared smoothly, this is a design fault though so i have to make do with what i have on these concerns. It would have been easier to create if the eye geometry had sat behind the face however i was reflecting the style of claymation. I guess i shall have to see the outcome whilst smoothed, its not a disaster by any means, its just given me something to think about when designing my next character. 

Blend shapes has been a fun process, i've literally been staring and pulling weird faces in the mirror and simplifying those shapes to get the expressions for my model. It feels very creative, like crafting clay, its just annoying (as i was warned by Matt) about highlighting all the vertices of the teeth....teeth are a pain and i would like to do some further reading into this for next time. 

More issues with Maya...nothing new and exciting, just further notes that prove my concerns over my copy of Maya...after creating blend shapes...they no longer worked...ive had to keep saving so many versions of files 01....01newest...01newestA....so on and so on. i need me a new copy of Maya FAST!

Heres my control sliders set up for Poca. Each slider is labelled and split up into mouth, brow and eye controls as well as according to left or right side. These are then parented to head control so that they will follow the model when she moves. I couldn't necessarily depend on the -1 to 1 limits to give me the opposite of the expression as it generally didn't pull on the vertices correct, however i had made enough expressions to cover this factor. Each slider is locked so there's no worry of accidental keying and the sliders themselves are locked apart from the translate y which is required. 

Rigging

Lower Body:

I've created IKs for the leg as well as a reverse foot setup to aid the animation process. Ive also added a few more attributes to the foot including a heel roll, pivot and lean, ball roll, toe roll and pivot, all of which are checked. Since i will be completing a walk cycle i think these are sufficient enough attributes for the animation. Whilst I have been rigging i have been checking that the joints would bind correctly via smooth skin to the model.

IK demonstration on the leg showing the pole vector contraints parented to the foot control so they follow the rig and geometry. 

demonstration of the reverse foot setup, very helpful for animation.

checking the joint orientations for IK set up. X should always be pointing towards the child. 

Upper Body:

For the Upper body i have created an IK spline handle for fluid movement of the spine during animation, was quite simple to make and parent controls to the cluster handles. Since i like working with FK on the arms i've gone for that. Its common practice in the industry to create both and provide a switch so the rig can be used for any animators preference, however with time running out at least the FKs are in and working. As i haven't created a separate set of bones for the clavicle i have no IK control for this, however there is no need for it. Neck and head FKs have been added. Whilst i have been rigging these sections, i have been checking how they would bind to the model via smooth bind. Its becoming increasingly frustrating working on Maya on my laptop as the darn thing just crashes left right and centre...especially during the making of the hands. 

Correct working practice: even though my model isn't being handed over to another animator, im still pushing myself to complete correct working methods such as naming all my joints.

creating attributes for set driven keys for the fingers. To be honest i could spend days adding endless amounts of attributes but this will be sufficient for my animation...i can always go back add/tweak after the project if i wish.
Set driven keys really is the best method for good finger/thumb control without cramming your screen with controls...ease for the animator, a key goal of the rigger which i think i have demonstrated here. All the attributes can be found on a smaller control parented to the wrist:

demonstration of the set driven keys including individual finger and thumb flex, finger and thumb spread and grab.

I also played around with the jiggle deformer on Poco's hair and decided it was not needed for this project...although it does generate some nice secondary animation...i feel it would be reflecting too much realism instead of the plasticine stuck on look im going for...apologies there is no test to put on here, i did play around with the weighting for a while then made a gut decision and moved on...

Texturing

another section of the list is complete weeeerrrhey and am i glad to be through this section...dont get me wrong, im glad ive started to tackle the topic that is texturing but my lord its offputting when maya keeps crashing and not saving what you had saved...the amount of times i had to repeat actions was just annoying. 

Anywaaaaaays so heres the break down:

The hair and body of the model is actual colour applied to selected faces along with layered textures including a brownian as well as finger prints (though i found this a very tight line between it looking complete naff or invisible). I think it has some sort of reflection of plasticine though. The face i originally applied colour to but it looked very odd as there was no definition around the eye sockets....so i decided to UV map it and had all sorts of fun with gaps emerging etc. It was good fun creating layered textures in photoshop, it felt more creative than simply applying colour, however the process was a fine art of tweak tweak tweaking until correct...perhaps if i wasn't so pushed for time, this element wouldn't annoy me so much...however i think the result is looking ok...im not a texture genius but its looking good for my first ever attempt (times about 20 versions) You can see some odd patches emerging round the leg and on her dungarees though and i dont know why that is? I may have to ask the expert mr grigsby see what he says. Another issue, although i thought Jamie had helped sort it for me, was the colour bleeding slightly onto the different areas...this doesn't happen if you keep the parts combined and vertices NOT merged...however...after reading dave's blog it seems the verts need to be merged for painting weights so i guess i'll have to sacrifice the texturing this time. Its not a huge problem...more another annoyance to add to the list....along with crashing computers....o....dont freeze *heart stops*.....no.....no were ok....save save save (anyone else feel their life is a near on heart attack?)

pictures innit lad

Tadeo Jones

whilst reading through my rigging book, it recommended the animation Tadeo Jones for its character creation and advanced rigging created in 3ds max.

 worth a watch anyways...

there's summat wrong with your face!

i ventured on in to hunt down the techno wizard that is jamie and i must say a giganormous THANKS for all his help.

I initially explained what i'd been trying to do with the UV mapping and what i wanted to achieve with the overall look of my character. Although i really wish to learn UV mapping, Jamie suggested it wasn't the best use for it for just achieving block colours and that the look would be just the same as selecting the faces and assigning materials and colours to them. Only problem came to when i then tried to smooth the model and the colours began to bleed across the faces. Jamie then went through a process of separating the dungarees geometry and the torso and deleting unnecessary edges that were causing a few problems...it highlighted a few faces that require a slight tweak on my model but overall he said it was very good which is a big confidence booster. Ive been creating different sets so i can then seperate the elements to stop the colours from bleeding.

Alec showed me how to apply layered textures through his own method of naming the windows "click poland....POLAND" (the hypershade!) but i was very grateful for all his help :)

Finally...i had a problem with the old models face. As i complete part in nurbs and the rest in polys, there was some weird lines emerging where the sections had been joined and merged. This is not the way to model apparently even though i followed a tutorial given to us last year, obviously i need to read more into correct methods. Even applying normals > soften edge as wel as normals > set angle didn't work. Poor Jamie was summoned back and showed me through the display > polygons > face normals why the mesh wasn't working. Then he used normals > conform which then showed the change when turning back on the face normals. He explained that when you model, you want all the face normals to follow the same direction with them pointing out from the geometry. With the nurbs however and the conversion they pointed inwards which was wrong...luckily there was a method to solve this and it has allowed me to now use the soften edge tool. HORAY! i thought i'd have to go back over and remodel parts again! 

Enough jargen...heres some images so you can see what the cotton pickin thing im on about:

Before...this is the state my models face was at. Now all converted to polys, you can see the different sections between the nurbs and original polygons. Apparently i should have used a nurbs sphere instead of poly sphere and used the create polygon tool to fill in the rest of the sections....lesson learnt.

Display > polygons > face normals. Here the origianl poly surface normals are correctly pointing outward from the model...

...whilst those that were nurbs (eye, nose and mouth area) are pointing inward inside the model.

select geometry then click normals > conform

now go back and display your face normals...the conform should have made them swap round
yep yep...all working! horay!
now i can use normals > soften edge and soon she will no longer look like a grey zombie child!

UV

after discussions with Jared and Yaniv and my notes at hand, i've been giving UVing a go using Yaniv's recommended method of selecting faces and creating UVs via camera...it seems to be a careful process of not forgetting faces and stitching together.

IMAGES!

Dunga-ranga-rees. I thought i would start myself off with the biggest shape. I hope from my method to have as few a creases from the layout of the UVs. You can see here im in the mid of arranging the UVs into place to recreate the shape.

Adding in a few extra faces...think were about ready to sew together
Maya then crashed so I lost all this work...helpful NOT! 

Start again...

I tried a smaller section this time to see if the method i was using worked...i created a cylindrical map around the legs and imported the UVs into the texture editor..i then took these over to photoshop, applied the appropriate colour and err....not successful....had white spaces showing.

As ive never done texturing before, i have to admit i dont understand the full process...the reasons WHY you do things...im not sure what size these should match up to so after not getting very far with it, have decided to go seek help from Jamie tomorrow at college and see whats the best route to take. Im still hoping to have the texturing complete by the weekend so i then can move onto the blend shapes. 

Unwrapping of the hair?!?!
Dungarees texture sample...painted by a 4yr old :P
UV snap shot 


New dunagrees test by plannar mapping each of the sides then sewing the edges together...i was following a tutorial by highend but i think its more a technique for faces. 
Relaxing the UVs...interesting....?!

mmm yeah im not really sure whats right etc here...think i'll go find Jamie tomorrow.