Set in the Trekverse, Star Trek: Aurora is an original “fully-animated CGI production” from Tim Vining. The series focuses on the exploits of civilian merchanters, rather than Starfleet officers.
Star Trek: Aurora follows the exploits of captain Kara Carpenter and her new (and only) Vulcan first mate T’Ling on their tiny merchanter cargo ship Aurora. This fully CG-animated movie is set just after the original Star Trek series in a lawless sector of space, where Kara and T’Ling engage in their marginal venture while trying to both turn a profit and stay out of trouble. Through a series of sudden dangers and escalating events, secrets are revealed and loyalties tested as our heroines learn dark truths about one another, and themselves, in an ultimate pursuit of justice–or is it revenge?
I was thrilled to find this well-reviewed series as I love independently-created series and I’m a HUGE Star Trek fan. My favourite series is Voyager. That’s apparently a bit unusual, but when it was running I was a senior manager in the Canadian division of a multination web technology firm; in fact, I was running the place, and sometimes I felt exactly like Captain Janeway - lost and alone in the Delta Quadrant surrounded by enemies all determined to cause my ultimate destruction.
I can sum STA up in one sentence: “Brilliant and visually appealing, with a polished and compelling storyline, Star Trek: Aurora is a treat for Star Trek fans and 3D animation enthusiasts alike.”
As I learn more about both machinima and 2D/3D moviemaking, and plan my own productions, I always find myself curious as to how something was done. Tim has a production page about his tools and process. Except for voice work, and not counting 3D models, he does everything himself on a Mac.
My main tools are Smith Micro’s Poser and Maxon Cinema 4D. The original workflow was a little complicated by the fact that I’m working on a Mac and rendering in Cinema 4D, and the only Poser Mac plugin for Cinema 4D for a long time was an old OS9 plugin that has never been updated (most of Aurora was done this way; Poser Pro is supposed to update the plugin, someday!). Now there is Kuroyume’s Interposer Pro, which I am in the process of working into my workflow.
He mentions that he also uses Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator, and then goes on to explain his basic workflow animating characters (Daz V3 and M3):
- Record voice using a decent microphone (M-Audio Nova mic, Mobile Pre preamp, Apple Soundtrack)
- Create mouth/head moves in Daz Mimic
- Apply Mimic file to character in Poser
- Animate character body movements (by hand or import ARENA motion capture), adjust head movements (head turns, blinking, etc.) in Poser
- Open Poser file into Cinema 4D environment and render it to TIFF files
- Create .mov file from TIFFs (using Quicktime Pro)
- Import .mov file into Apple Final Cut Pro, edit into animation
- Add voice file/sound effects
He generously shares a great many more details on the production page. The information is literally a goldmine for anyone wanting to study a working method for creating this sort of film.
Besides being able to watch online at Vimeo, and I’ll be embedding them here on digipendence.com too (p1, p2, p3), Tim has made downloads available in both Quicktime and Windows Media formats. I noticed that the Quicktime files (480×288, approx 40 to 60 megs each) can also be downloaded from Vimeo, and grabbing them from there will help save the bandwidth on his server and keep his costs down. Look in the lower right hand corner of each Vimeo page for the link. If you don’t see it, be sure that you’re signed in.
