Cluck'd Up
This is an animated short film made by Lauren Enriquez, Willis Froetschel, Kathryn King, Gus McClain, Nimi Parmar, Glenn Powell, and Travis Rainford. This project was made in 10 weeks for the Summer Industry Course at Texas A&M University. The programs used are Maya, Substance Painter, Houdini, RenderMan, Nuke, Adobe Premiere, and Adobe Photoshop.
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My roles included Grooming Lead, CFX, Surfacing, Modeling, and Rendering.
Click above to watch the entire short film. Below, I will provide a breakdown of my contributions.
Groom
I was responsible for grooming the fox in Houdini, and surfacing the fox in Substance Painter. For this groom, I created a stylized "shingle" effect that mimics the fur separation of real animals. This was a challenging look to achieve, especially to get the cheek tufts to blend well with the rest of the fur. I really enjoyed surfacing and grooming this character, and learning more about Houdini throughout the process.
The character surfacing was a big part of what brought the fox to life. As a team, we decided we wanted the style of short to be similar to stop motion films. This is what led to the decision to elements of the fox be made out of clay. The goal was for the fox to have a slightly hand-sculpted feel. The chicken hat was also meant to resemble a hand-stitched toy made out of leather.
*the hat is shown with an older version of the groom.
CFX
I was also responsible for simulating the fur on the fox in Houdini. The body and eyebrows are only deforming with the animation, and the cheek tufts are simulated. Working with stylized animation and extreme key poses was a really big challenge, and it involved quite a few blend shapes and adjustments of the groom. Despite the challenges I faced, I really enjoyed learning how to simulate fur, and I feel it made me a stronger grooming artist.
