INTRODUCTION
November 28th, 2021
At this point I would like to document in which areas I am currently researching, which tools I would like to acquire and finally: what artistic work it will amount to this semester and what the development process behind it is. Basically, it's important to me to have fun and to have a nice sense of achievement on a regular basis. My overall goal is at least to acquire a good workflow in Unreal Engine 4 and ideally also basics in 3D modeling in Blender and / or procedural 3D modeling in Houdini. The background is that I am currently in the founding phase of an unusual studio for striking game design and interaction in Weimar with good friends. The studio also asks questions about the common good and critically reflects on (digital) society. As a first step, we were already able to receive the fellowship of the Gründerwerkstatt neudeli in Weimar in the summer of 2021.
It is essential for me to understand said software to a certain degree in order to be able to work even better with my team and create prototypes quickly. Nevertheless, I don't want to simply learn tools, but also develop artistic works this semester that reflect my current thematic interests in general. It's important to me for my work to be fun, to encourage interaction, and ideally to draw attention to issues that I feel are very important but don't get enough attention.
The last thing I want this semester is to achieve a fixed result based on a fixed concept. I will be working very dynamically, in small rather than large steps and probably always modifying, revising ideas and prototypes and also sometimes looking at ideas from the past with a new perspective. It will be about creating many prototypes quickly in a space I have already roughly marked out, which will begin to manifest itself more and more precisely for outsiders in the course of this documentation.
Starting Point
Like many people on the internet, I was very impressed by the trailer of the cloud application "MetaHuman Creator" from Feb. 10, 2021, which can already be tested in an early access version. As seen in the video above, highly realistic 3D models of humans can be created, and fully rigged to boot. With various performance capture solutions, facial expressions can be transferred live to the 3D faces (result around minute 6: