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3D Animation 3D Modeling Motion Graphics Multi-Rotors Project Notes Xpresso Tasks

Micro Drone City Flow

This project was inspired by a lot of the fpv flying I have done recently. I wanted to create something that tried to convey fun playful energetic feel of flying in the air.

I used Cinema 4D as my main tool for creating this project starting with the drone model which was based from my personal favorite one(that currently isn’t working of course).

In addition to modeling the drone I also went the extra step to make the propellers actually spin the way the would in real life. This was just a side personal exercise I wanted to try to see if I could do it via expresso inside of C4D. It took me a while and doesn’t show up in the animation since everything is moving too fast but I posted how it works on my instagram.

 

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The city was a free download from 3docean that was the initial jump off for this project. After building my model I then figured out how to procedurally create the city using mograph in c4d. Allowing me to randomly place and distribute the city buildings. I didn’t use all of them in the pack but the most of the taller ones and few shorts ones. I added in some small parks to break it up a bit and to have some low flying action.

I wanted the whole project to be a bit more stylized and not super realistic so I went with the sort of low poly style which I think worked well and adds a fun feel to it. Also low poly is slightly easier to work with though the end it took decent amount of time to get it feel right.

After getting the look down I proceed to make the path that I wanted to fly the quad. My process for this to start in park and just places instances of the quad though out the city of the path I wanted it to take, pretty much blocking the path out as I came across the next building. Most of the moves are I’ve seen various popular fpv/drone youtubers do.

After laying out the path, I actually typed up an outline of the path so I could remember what moves I actually wanted to do, while labeling them in c4d as well. Then I made a spline path in c4d for the quad to follow.

My first path of animating it was attaching the quad to the spline but it felt too much on rails(which is was, the spline). So I ended up animating the whole thing by hand. I think the end result turned out pretty good though I still notice a few unintended extra moves I could have smoothed out. Some I left in since it seemed a bit more realistic or how I would try to recover from a move.

Before rendering it out I had the idea to add in some 2D effects to spice it up a bit. I have some 2D flash effects and thought I would composite them into the project in post in After Effects. But I didn’t want to have to export extra 3D data or do a lot of masking in AE.

So I rendered out png sequences of the effects and placed them in c4d on planes and other simple shapes and timed them with the quads moves. It came out pretty though I had to remember to turn the effects off after the animating other wise it would show up as black over other parts even if it had alpha at the end.

The final render time was probably around 15 hours between my two machines not included some re-renders of a few shots I messed up on. Also had to fix one shot that I messed up an an effect that a friend noticed.

After doing a bit of compositing in After effects I rendered out the 6 camera shots and the main First person view from the drones perspective and edited it all together in Adobe Primer Pro and added the final look. I did the final sound design in Audition. Overall it took me about 40 – 60 hours to complete over a 2 weeks though most of it was completed in the final week.

Music: Yuriy_Shishlov Future Bass

Some sound effects from freesound.org

Categories
General Inspiration Multi-Rotors

Maker Faire NYC 2014

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This past weekend I was able to attend the Make Faire on Saturday in Queens, NYC. I had heard of this from the NYC Drone User Group email newsletter and the build-In I went to but didn’t really think to much of it in terms of attending. Then I found out that Flitetest would be attending and that got me a bit more interested in attending but I was still on the fence most of the week before and didn’t get my ticket till the day before.

So on Saturday I made the trek out there from NJ to experience the Maker Faire which really was the greatest show and tell. There was so much going on it was kind of hard to focus on anyone thing specifically. I should have used my experience from going to NYCC to really plan out what I wanted to do ahead of time. I did have two main things do plus what I marked as some fav’s in the maker faire app, but when I got there I didn’t look at the app at all.

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The top thing on my list to was to visit the FliteTest Tent and talk to those guys. It was really cool being able to talk to all of them after watching all of their videos on youtube. I had the chance to talk to all of them for a bit including their production/camera man and talk a bit about the production of the show too which was really cool. I took a few pictures of their tent and some of the planes and multi-rotors they brought with them. My favorite from the show that they brought was the toaster plane.

FliteTtest didn’t get to fly much that I saw at this event since for the most part it was not allowed but Peter did get a chance to fly his VTOL in the Game of Drone Cage for a bit with some other multi-rotors.  Check out the footage I recorded. I also have some footage of two drone battles that I may add-on my YouTube channel.

The second thing that I had in mind for the trip was to see the DroneKraft presentation and their racing quad that they where showing off. DroneKraft Image 50pThe overall presentation was nice but a bit boring  if you had some experience in quads at all before. They did do a nice bit on explaining what their goals where and what they do with “drones” vs the military. And I think the crowd liked the videos that they showed. They also took a nice risky flight of their quad in the small area they had to present. I took a video of it you can view below.

Other than those two main things I pretty much walked around without much purpose looking at all the cool things.  I took a lot of interest in there 3D printers since I’m looking to get one. There was a lot to look it, it definitely would have been cool to go back for a second day if I could,  I think next year I will. Here are some other pictures I took from the event. I also posted some gifs on my tumblr.

 

 

Categories
General Multi-Rotors

Flying Summer Recap

So it seems I have gone almost more than 2 months without me posting anything to my blog. Well most of my summer has been working and flying/building my multi-rotors. Here is a picture of all four of them as of right now.

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I may go to a “Build-In” near me to repair it with other hobbyist and the like. From when I started drafting this post I went to the NYCDUG Build-In. I didn’t work on fixing my quads at all but I did get to meet a bunch of cool people who are in to multi-rotors/drones and the like. Some of their rigs where pretty cool like the two big hexacopters.

I also got to control the rig for the camera on one of the guy’s hexacopter.

It was really cool being the operator of camera that is just flying the sky. I have some footage of me controlling the camera but it’s mainly just me repeating how cool it is so the pics above will have to suffice. If you look on the MeetUp page you can see the photos that I took at the build-in. I also did a quick edit of all the footage I took at the event to hopefully get across how fun it was.

Back to my quads, the one that I’m the most proud of building so far is my Tricopter since that required a bit work with the servo then all of my other quads. The build log is on the flite test forums.

It still needs a few upgrades like some better motors and ESC’s also a better tail servo wouldn’t hurt either but it flies pretty well.

It also seems to attract a bit more attention as I was flying in a park near me and two young kids and mom came up to me and asked about what I was flying. After flying it around the kids in the air, above their heads, I was able to land it and show them my tricopter and my other quads to them.

It was pretty cool being able to show them and see how interested they where in them. It might have gone over their heads a bit but who knows, like their mom said they may become the scientists or engineers who build/design them in the future.

The other quad that I built this summer is the BLACKOUT quad that finally came in from Australia. This build was the most intensive one I’ve had to do yet just because everything has to fit into the tiny frame. There is almost no extra space for anything non-essential in there and I couldn’t use bullet connectors with the ESC’s so everything is solder directly. You can check out my build log on the flite test forums. Here are a two in progress build gif’s I made.

 

That’s most of my summer minus work and few other personal projects. One of which I will be doing a small post on soon. I have done a few more flight videos since I last posted about my MHQ quad that can all be found on my youtube channel.

Categories
General Multi-Rotors

Hovership Micro H-Quad Review

So a while ago I came across this cool looking 3D printed quad frame from hovership.  When I was looking to do another quad build and after the success of my other 3D printed frame I decided to order it and start my next quad build. I have had it build and have flown it for over or close to a month now and decided to review it for the hovership site. Below is my review of the quad frame so far but before that a few videos of my FPV flights.

These are my two most recent videos. I have a long way to go until I fly at the level as many other flyers on YouTube, but my skill seem to be improving. I have a few more videos on my page as well as some flights from my other quad. My thoughts on the quad are as follows.

3D Printed Foldable Awesomeness

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The MHQ was my second build of a multi-rotor and my second purchase of a 3D printed frame. The quality of the 3D parts are great and with the included accessories it all comes together nicely and feels very sturdy. It has been a great flier for me since I built it a few weeks ago, I do however have two issues with it.

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The first is the legs that are included with the kit are not that strong unless you have perfect landings all the time. As another reviewer has noted they are a bit weak and broke for me on my second set of flights. Since then I have broken all the legs off with the middle section still screwed on. Also the antenna mounting plate broke as well so I just zip tie the antenna to the camera deck now.

IMG_3098My second issue is the vibration dampeners while awesome and a great way to separate parts of the quad, where impossible for me to pull through the flight controller deck. It could be my 12amp T-motor ESC’s are just to thick but I could not push them through. I could get one or two on the edges maybe but the rest where not going through. In the end I just zipped tied the two together with the dampeners in between to keep it all together and it flies well.

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After a few weeks of flying it has survived all the crashes I have put it through. The best thing for me so far has been the fordable arms. I have on many occasions clipped branches and fences and gone down only to find a dirty quad with an arm or two pushed in. They also make it handy for traveling. The only part that has seen any real damage is a small chip on the front arm plate from me going head first into a fence. (I was trying to pull up.)

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Overall I have to say I’m very happy with my quad so far, it’s size and fold-ability has been a real plus for me. The guides help a new builder like me to put it together with no issues at all minus having to use some extra screw to mount the motors. I made a short build log on the flite test forums with videos and some of my fpv flights (new flier alert!) on my YouTube channel G2BPro. I would recommend this frame for any one looking to get good durable frame at a reasonable price.

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My Build:

MHQ Frame
12amp T-motor ESC’s
RCX 1804 Motors
Acro naze 32
JST to XT60 distribution cord
micro spektrum compatible dsm2 receiver
altitude rc transmitter
5.8 GHz SpiroNET Omni Antenna
RMRC-MINI-V2