RANRAN LI

Clothing

Brainstorming

During holiday, I searched many related to my work, from Qin Dynasty to Qing Dynasty, analysed characteristic of Chinese traditional clothes from different dynasty.

Modeling

Cause it is the first time i used MD so i had a model test for learning.

After modeling test, I made different clothes. elements i used are found online which i think is related Chinese traditional culture and costume.

Qin Dynasty

First version

Second version

I modeled two layers to add a sense of heaviness, cause purple and black were royal colours in the Qin Dynasty.

Han Dynasty

First version

Second Version

Han Dynasty

The Han Dynasty was not long after the Qin Dynasty, so the clothes ctyle didn’t change a lot, because low productivity clothes style were still simple. But in order to increase the thickness of the clothes, I added some texture to them.

Tang Dynasty

First Version

Second Version

Because of its strong national strength, the Tang Dynasty had more exchanges with the outside world, so there were various styles of clothes and they also liked more bright colours.

Ming Dynasty

With the increase of productivity and the development of society, the patterns on clothes became more and more abundant, and girls in the Ming Dynasty also liked light pink colors.

Morden Clothes

Building

At first, I download the main chinese traditional building online, an then reorganize the file’s model to made my own work, the following video is about the processing of modeling.

After modeling, I made 4 seasons in UE5 an then import the fbx into UE5, but it comes to lots of problems. Such as the roof lost materials, and changes space.

after weeks finding problem, it turns out it is not problems from UE5, i found out the problem is the normals problem, material turns good after i reverse it.

Inporting animation into MD

after modeling clothes, i downloaded woman model with skeleton, and then downloaded aniamtion on mixamo, then imported it into C4D.

but it imported failed at the first time cause i didn’t add a pose before animation

after adding a pose and changing few details , i rendered woman animation with clothes.

People in China are very excited and looking forward to Black Myth: Wukong release because it is the first 3A game in China, at first i wanna talk about this game but tutor said that i can not write a report because it’s not released yet.

So this lead to culture appropriation topic.

Definition of Cultural Appropriation

Brif idea of cultural appropriation: Cultural appropriation – Wikipedia [accessed 16. Jun. 2024]

Deifination from Cambridge dictionary: CULTURAL APPROPRIATION – Cambridge English Dictionary [accessed 16. Jun. 2024]

Deifination from Oxford dictionary: cultural appropriation noun – Definition, pictures, pronunciation and usage notes | Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary at OxfordLearnersDictionaries.com [accessed 16. Jun. 2024]

4 types cultural appropriation : comt_277 474..503 (nau.edu)

Deifination from Susan S. : Details for: Who owns culture? : appropriation and authenticity in American law / › UAL homepage catalogue (arts.ac.uk)

Cultural Appropriation is a type colonianlism: Cultural appropriation and oppression on JSTOR (oclc.org)

Culture Appropriation in Fashion

Nike Pro Tatto Tech Design

News link: Nike Stops Production of Tattoo Tights. What Happened? (says.com)

Dior Horse-face Skrit (Mamianqun in Chinese)

News link: Dior accused of ‘culturally appropriating’ centuries-old Chinese skirt | CNN

Chinese traditional Horse-face Skirt (Ming Dynasty) in the Congucius Museum:孔博藏珍 | 馆藏明代女性服饰 尽展中国古典风韵-孔子博物馆 (kzbwg.cn)

Chinese netizens and state media outlets accusing the brand of failing to acknowledge the alleged inspiration behind its design. A recent editorial in the Communist Party’s official mouthpiece, People’s Daily, said that Dior had “shamelessly” misrepresented the skirt as an original creation, describing social media outrage as “completely understandable.”

Kim Cardashian’s Kimono

News link: Kim Kardashian Kimono lingerie line sparks Japanese anger | CNN

Kimono is a clothes style in Japanese, but Kardashian use this word for her shapeware brand’s name. Japanese were so angry about this even the mayor of Kyoto wrote an open letter for this said:” We think that the names for ‘Kimono’ are the asset shared with all humanity who love Kimono and its culture therefore they should not be monopolized”

Dior Romanian Jacket from Bihor

News link: Romanian People Noticed That Dior Copied Their Traditional Clothing And Decided To Fight Back In A Genius Way | Bored Panda

In order to boycott Dior’s behavior, local artisans and fashion magazines jointly launched a cultural protection campaign, established their own traditional clothing brand Bihor Couture, invited artisans to shoot videos and put them on the cover of the magazine, aiming to promote the traditional clothing of Bihor.

News link:Newly launched authentic Romanian fashion brand supports local creators | Romania Insider (romania-insider.com)

Gucci Indy Full Turban

News link: Gucci’s ‘Indy Full Turban’ Backlash Explained – Why Gucci is Being Criticized for Cultural Appropriation (esquire.com)

Dear @gucci, the Sikh Turban is not a hot new accessory for white models but an article of faith for practising Sikhs,” wrote Harjinder Singh Kukreja, a Sikh restaurateur and philanthropist with more than 1.6 million Twitter followers. “Your models have used Turbans as ‘hats’ whereas practising Sikhs tie them neatly fold-by-fold. Using fake Sikhs/Turbans is worse than selling fake Gucci products.”

Culture Appropriation in Enterntainment

Ancient China influence

1. Duan, S., Wang, J., Yang, H. and Su, Q. (2023). Disentangling the cultural evolution of ancient China: a digital humanities perspective. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, 10(1). doi:https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-023-01811-x.
2. Young, J.O. (2008). Cultural appropriation and the arts. Malden, Ma: Wiley-Blackwell Pub.

Music Video by Korean Girl Group

Chinese Cultural Relics source: The Palace Museum (dpm.org.cn)

Chinese culture is easily misappropriated because of China’s influence on other Asian countries for thousands of years. Some cultural elements of Japan, South Korea and some Southeast Asian regions come from China, which also means that when Chinese elements are misappropriated, the misappropriators can claim that they are using local culture instead of Korean culture. Recently, the MV of a new song named HEYA by a Korean girl group has been controversial in China. A large number of Chinese elements are mixed together in the MV, including but not limited to cloud symbols, Chinese knots, pipes, round fans, etc. However, the girl group refuses to admit that these elements come from China, claiming that this MV is based on Korean style.

Round Fan

Cloud Symbols

Chinese Knot

economic cultural appropriation： Cruz, A.G.B., Seo, Y. and Scaraboto, D. (2023). Between Cultural Appreciation and Cultural Appropriation: Self-Authorizing the Consumption of Cultural Difference. Journal of Consumer Research, 50(5), pp.962–984. doi:https://doi.org/10.1093/jcr/ucad022.

K-POP cultural appropriation: [CRITICALLY SPEAKING: K-POP] Cultural appropriation and K-pop’s unbalanced give and take (joins.com)

 

Art design(made by michelle)

The main machine

These drawing are from my gruopmates, we got our own part in this group project, i made model depend on concept art she gave me.

Plants

Model

Plants

in this part I model some of them on iPad APP named Nomad, some of them on C4D, Nomad for me is much more easier than ZBrush cause I can use Apple Pencil to draw instead of mouse.

after modelling concept my group mate gave me, I think plants types not enough, so I made other plants model by myself.

the following plants are downloaded files.

Machines

these are machines I model, details are from concept arts from my groupmate Michelle, also part of Nomad and part of C4D.

Material

Material Part 1

Materials parts for me is the most frustrating part, at first I add material on iPad because i made all my model on iPad, but the last part of our project is on UE5, so i need to import it to computer. but it seems like materials on iPad can’t be imported to computer.

Material Part 2

Then i made all materials on C4D by Octane render cause it look much more better than standard render in C4D, but the uni’s C4D and UE5 doesn’t have octane render. so I found touters and he log in his administrator account so that I can download and install OC plugins for UE.

But it turns out, even I import orbx files (OC version files) into UE, it still don’t contain materials in it.

Material Part 3

I tried lots of ways to import materials into UE5, after I found the octane materials really cannot be imported into UE5, i made new materials from SP, but it is not as great as i made through Octane.

After communicating with my group mate, I decided render UE part and C4D part separately, instead of import C4d part into UE.

Final Material

Material Testing

some materials doesn’t suitable because I drag plat in Nomad then Bevel it to make models. after found out this problem, I reorganised model in nomad, and then import it into C4D, then problem solved.

Render HDR

So if I need to render UE5 and C4D part separately, I need to render HDR from UE5 to make reflections of light looks great.

Adding Cameras

adding camera in UE files.

Render

Render UE files into sequences.

Put Plants and Machines Depend on Environment

Exporting fbx of camera and model from UE file, and adjusting machines and plants model depend on fbx’s position. and then don’t render fbx from UE, only render machines and plants. in this way, the position would be exactly same when my group-mate is compositing.

At first I render png sequence for group mate to compositing, but she wanted exr instead after, so I render this part multiple times in different types (with alpha, non-alpha, exr, png, jpg, etc. )

Tracking

first I transport video into sequence, then import it into C4d as background.

I met many problems during tracking as well, at first the camera in tracking file is not stable enough so my group-mate need to track it again.

I rendered it into png at first as well, but my group-mate wanted exr files so I render it again.

after she tracked again, the fbx she send me only got 17 frames, one of them got around 300 frames, so I thought it was the right file and made my work depend on that, but after I send it to my group-mate, she said it’s few frames left. I thought I need to render it again but she compositing videos by using that version.

Final Video

Project Process (contains all group member)

Final Video

Modeling

Brainstorming part 2

Cause group project takes me lots of time so I don’t have enough time for mt personal project. so i have to make a new idea which is easier for me to do.

Story Line

Gummy Bear is a common snack, i want to create a project about a Gummy Bear’s adventure.

A gummy bear in a candy bottle realise that its gonna be eaten by human, so it try to escape, then falling down to the ground, being chasing by pigeons.

it keeps running then falling in to a hole, then it find another place to travel

Part 1

Taking videos

Video 1

Video 2

Video 3

Final

I took videos in Battersea Park, taking videos about pigeons eating food and somewhere for gummy bear to run.

and then compositing three videos into one, using it as background for C4D files to animate gummy bear.

Modelling

Gummy bear

Gummy Bear Material

I downloaded materials online for gummy’s, tried few of them, at last I choose the green material cause I think the brightest colour would be the best.

Bottle

modelling bottle in C4D to contain gummy bear, also made a label for it.

Render test

Final Render

Animating gummy bear depend on videos

Basic animation

Animation that Depend on Videos

About the gummy bear animation, I import video’s sequences as background to help me animate the exact right positions.

In this part, I found out some difficulties from videos.

1. I realised that the first part is not long enough cause I wanted to add lots of gummy bears animation. at first I want it get up, and then climb out of the bottle, but it’s all be difficult cause I didn’t shoot enough time for this scene. so my solution is using the first frame as still frame.
2. video quality is not good enough, so after I combine model and video together, it doesn’t fit.
3. video is shaking, which would influence final video quality as well.

After render both model and shadows into png, I used AE to setting times of each frame, and then combine it as part 2 final.

Tracking_Nuke

I tracked the ground and added a hole on it to match gummy bear’s animation.

Compositing_AE

Part1_Final Render

Video_V01

Video_Final

Part 2

I think justing modelling is not interesting enough, also drawing is the easiest way to show gummy bear’s fear, so I decided to draw it.

Screenshot in PDF page 4.

Process_iPad Drawing

Drawing_Final

Pre-intro of this scene

At first, I just started my project with content in Part1, but after this part, I started to animated the scene before this by same process, which is about gummy bear stand up, aim to adding a pre introduction of following footage.

In this process video, I animate the gummy bear climbing and jumping outside of the bottle to escape, then use the drawing part as follow video. But I lost this file somehow, due to time limited, I just did easy animation for this part as final video which can see as followed.

C4D_Final

Part 3

When gummy bear fall in to an underground place,  it saw a house with great view. 

The following process’s photos would be in PDF I uploaded at Moodle assessment.

Modelling

Screenshot in PDF page 1.

Adding materials

During modelling process, I combined models together to make it convenient for me to adjusting position, but it cause more works during add materials. While using OC Render, I can get live viewer which it convenient for me to have a preview. The hole project materials use Morandi colour scheme. 

Screenshot in PDF page 2.

Animation

adding gummy bear’s animation, jumping, running, climbing, etc.

The screenshot is from the last render part cause I forgot to screen recording when I adding key frames. 

This part I made the gummy bear slipping down the slide and then have a quick view of the whole scene. 

Screenshot in PDF page 3.

Editing physical sky’s time

At first I set the time late cause I want it dark, but I found out some details would be miss if it’s dark, so I change the time around 7-9 p.m.

Dark Preview

Screenshot in PDF page 3.

Lighter Preview

Screenshot in PDF page 3.

Final Preview

Screenshot in PDF page 4.

Part3_Final Video

After render it in C4D, I used PR to render it into MP4 as final version of part3.

Final video composition

AE

Final Video

12th Jan — Storyteller

basic story, help rememberable

Three Act Structure:

1. introduction(beginning), set up – characters (background – where who, desire) .context. thesis
2. middle: confrontation. anti-thesis (5 act structure: 3middle)
3. end: resolution. synthesis.

Story & Theme

story carry theme

Text & Subtext

beneath water

Character

Character arc

Character flaw

showing problems at the beginning, causing problems to others and themselves

becoming better through the story

Inciting Incident (things happened in middle of act1 and 2 ), forcing character to facing problems

Climax (middle of 2 &3 ), can no longer avoid problems.

Plot Points(move story forward),

PART 1 — Preparation

BRAINSTORMING

1. Project Purpose

• Objective: Building a haven for wild cats to play and thrive.

• Motivation: Focused on creating a safe, engaging environment for cats which contains both human and cat.

2. Inspiration

3. Mind Map

4. Concept Art

PART 2 — 1st Term Work

C4D Modeling

• V01

• V02

• Materials of Buildings

First try in UE5

Datasmith Input

After modeling, I adjusted axis at the middle bottom of model, and named it in English in order to input from C4D to UE5 through Datasmith.

PART 3 — Follow-up Work During Holidays

UE5 Input

• Input First Try (Without Materials)

• Input Second Try (With Materials)

Adding Materials & Elements

• Interior Environment

• Foliage & Environment

• Animations

UV Editing for Cats

Butterfly

After downloading butterfly’s skeleton animation online, I edit texture to make different kinds of butterflys.

Adding Cinema

• Pre-render

Rendering

• Environment Overview of UE5 Project

• Final Project_1st Version (Only Render in UE5)

PART 4 _ Final Version

• Final Project_2nd Version (After Editing in Nuke)

• Final Project_3rd Version (Editing sounds)