Code before ACTION in filmmaking today
You have to be your own TD now- though our $20/month PA helps a lot
Just a little scrawl about what I was working on last night-
So for M doll and Nightmare Puppeteer I use a simple lip sync script that analyzes audio and remaps the amplitude to the rigs jaw rotation- its a very simple solution-
Now on the new film I choose to use some new models that do not have jaws- they instead use blendshapes to open and close the mouths-
On the far bottom right you can see the “jawOpen” slider set to 100 to open the mouth- so all I have to do is update my lip sync script to remap the audio amplitude to the 0 - 100 value for that blendshape right?
Almost- I did that and noticed the teeth not opening and closing-
Oh the teeth are a separate mesh with its own “jawOpen” blendshape- ok then I’ll remap the audio and apply it to both meshes-
Added on to my lip sync script with an option to remap the audio to blendshape weights-
Ok that works but the cigg is not moving with the mouth like it did with the old actors who had jaw bones wherein I just made the cig a child of the jaw-
So let me get the open and closed position/rotation of the cigg and lerp between those values- I’ll remap the audio amplitude to control the lerp
That works fine- nice-
The above process took maybe 20 minutes as I had the help of my PA(Production assistant) ChatGPT4o
I know how to code myself but for writing editor scripts and little tools for Unity ChatGpt4 and Claude3.5 are amazing assistants-
Since I do my filmmaking in Unity- a realtime game engine that uses C# scripts- I am able to direct my films and be my own highly productive TD with a $20/month production assistant in ChatGPT
Oh yeah I’m also in the process of purchasing a Perception Neuron 3 mocap suit + gloves so I’ll soon be able to record custom choreography and motions for this films-
Excited about this project- filmmaking tools are only getting easier, cheaper and more powerful -