Gun Barrel nearly complete

I have nearly completed my gun barrel scene now for my animation. I have adjusted the bullet so it is larger so it covers the whole camera as it fires past.

I solved the problem of the bullet being in shot too long by using the mini curve editor in the bottom left hand corner of the timeline. I selected the bullet and then added a visibility track. I was then presented with a graph that represents the timeline of the animation. After inserting a keyframe, I was able to select whether the bullet could be seen at certain points. So in this case, the bullet appears when the graph starts to change its position. Using this technique, I also added a plain white plane over the front of the gun barrel. This means you cannot see the silhouette of Bond until the camera zooms in close. Again, to do this I selected the plane, and added a visibility track, moving the graph to show where the object becomes visible.




The other problem I mentioned in the previous post was the blood. I came to the conclusion the best technique was to use a simple plane and edit the vertices. After some experimentation I finally achieved a realistic effect. I placed a meshsmooth modifier on the plane which makes the points of the plane less rigid. The material for the blood was blinn with a red specular colour. I added raytrace to the refraction map which adds a nice effect when rendered. The final thing to edit with this material was how see through it was. To do this I changed the specular level, settling on 100. When rendered, the gun barrel is still visible through the blood, perfect!



After that it was time to coordinate all of different features of the scene together. The camera was complete of course from previous renders. The bullet was adapted, but now with its new visibility track it made the firing more easy. I dragged the keyframes to change when the bullet is fired. It was a little bit tricky timing the blood drop but I got there eventually. I may fiddle with the timing of the scene again before I decide it is final; as this scene lasts ten seconds, where as it is meant to be only eight according to my timing plan! After a long time rendering, I got my near final gun barrel sequence!