Portfolio Reflection Blog

The first project I feel the most proud of is my Pen project. I liked this project because it shows how I've improved in Maya over the semester. I learned a lot about 3d modeling this semester and I feel this project shows what I have learned. I f I had to change it, I would make the edges smoother, but other than that I think it turned out pretty well. I feel my strength in this project is making it look realistic by the textures added on. My weakness was making the bumps in the grip, which I didn't exactly know how to do. I didn't learn this project because it was a test of my skills, but knowing that I think I did pretty well on it. I feel like I did really well on this one because I really tried on the lighting and overall object. I'm also really proud that I actually got it done in time and turned it in on time. Overall, I'm just really proud of how I improved over the semester in Maya.




The second project my favorite is is my hammer project. In this project, we learned how to bevel objects and a bit about spotlight lighting. To improve this one I would definitely make it brighter when rendered, but we had just introduced lighting at this point and I was gone when we were working on the project. So, for missing some things, I feel like I did pretty well. The materials on the hammer aren't as good as the pen project(which I see as my best work thus far), but considering it was an earlier project, it's not that bad. I like this project because it taught me more about the extrude tool, and I used that a lot on my pen project so it was really helpful. I like that the hammer actually looks like a hammer, I don't know but it kinda looks cute. If it wasn't so dark. In conclusion, this project was more like a basis to my final and I'm pretty proud of that. It taught me a lot as well.

My next project is my Ice Cream Model. This project was important because it taught me how to animate in Maya. While it isn't my best modeling, as I was rushed to animate it, I still think it's a valuable project that needs to be included. I did like how I animated it and the texturing isn't that bad. However, I could definitely have improved in the lighting and the realism in the project. Some of the ice cream is sticking out of the bowl and the ice cream scoop is in the table a little bit. But other than that I think I did pretty good on my project and the animation was done fairly well. The animation itself was pretty simple once I got the hang of it. Even if I did need some help with it at first, I think that that was definitely my strength in this project. My weaknesses were definitely the lighting and proportional modeling, even if the modeling itself was pretty simple. I hope to be able to apply the animations to different works in Maya in future projects in this course.



This next project definitely isn't my best project, but it had important aspects in the making of the project that helped me with my final. I'm proud of the transparency I did at the bottom and the texturing on the cap. The lighting definitely could be improved and I would change that if I could, I think the problem was that I was behind on the project and was in a rush to turn it in so that I could start on my final. There needs to be more lighting on the background so that it doesn't look like its floating in space. However, even if the background is way too dark and bland, the lighting on the cap really shows of the texture and realism of the object. I have greatly improved in my lighting skills, as you can tell in my pen project. However the shape and lofting was a critical part of this project and the steps taken to make this project will be needed in future projects to come.




My walk cycle in animation is my final project I'm most proud of. This is my best work that I made in After Effects. It was really simple to animate in after effects and I think my animation was my best part in this project. I think I would want to improve the background and make it match my character  more. My strength is the animation and the weakness is the quality of the background. I learnt how to make a walk cycle and how to scan my drawings in, which is how I made the dog. The background is made in photoshop, which is why it doesn't match. All in all, I think this animation was fairly decent and probably my best and most essential animation in After Effects.