Coded Movement

Everything, minus user control:

DANCE MAX, DANCE!

Look at that. Wow. Why didn't I only make one start toggle? 

Have a nice day.

Bicyclist 7: J.J. Abrams

I hope by now the Star Wars titles are blatantly apparent.

One thing with my project that still plagues me is his legs. Yes, they worked, and looked good doing it, but eventually they always came undone. To an extent, it's to be expected. Something that moves that much, especially when it hits the other direction at twice the speed, it's going to eventually loosen up. I've gotten it to work a little better by applying some tape to the opposite ends of the joint tacks.

Since I've made the addition, the legs, nor the feet have fallen off. Not that pretty though. eh, it works.

Bicyclist 6: Return of the Sketch

Well, I did it. After watching repeated attempts of this character lose his legs, his wheel, and in turn, my sanity, I got an idea as to how to solve all of my headaches in one quick stroke. Make this man one legged. Or one and a half I guess is more appropriate. I chopped off the lower half of his back leg so the wheel could be directly attached to the servo, and that half leg would just move on the same axis as the outer leg still attached to the wheel. Yep.

It seemed to have worked just fine; I dare say even better than if I had gotten him rigged with two legs. After I solved that issue, everything else fell into place pretty easily (The head servo could utilize the exact same code as the wheel, and the limited rotation of it matched perfectly the rotation I needed for the two heads). Here the bad boy is in action!

As it stands right now, I'm really happy with it. I had to make some changes and consolidations  but it turned out great. Simple, charming, and effective. It also matches almost exactly what I had detailed in my original sketches. The only real change in my drawings of the character are the colors. I originally intended on coloring the character and his bike, but halfway through his suit I realized a black and white color scheme fit the character much better.


If I had more time, or chose to take it further, I have a few ideas to improve the piece. For starters, I would rig that back little wheel to move much like the front (either by moving with, or just hooked up to a third servo. Another thought I had was to create a moving "ground" that would cycle at the same rate as the wheel to appear as though he is actually moving. We'll see if I really want to take it that far.

Bicyclist 5: The Physics Strikes Back

Fucking legs. They've come back to haunt me at the LEAST opportune time (full disclosure, I failed to get any real work done on this most of Spring Break. It's kinda last minute).

I've cut, re-cut, taped, poked, stabbed, bent, and ripped up multiple sets of legs and wheels, all of which were just not getting the job done. Once that servo starts spinning his legs quickly move the wheel off of its axis, and everything goes to shit.

I've since redesigned my wheel so this it itself is a tad sturdier, and the material it's made of is not as flimsy. I've also tried to conceptualize designs with less joints so there are less points where it can fail, but the overall character then started to look stiff and unrealistic (I mean, I get that it's heavily stylized, but it still at least represents a human figure). I've also tried connecting one whole leg to the wheel (to replace an axis for the wheel), having the servo only move the legs and have a separate plane for the spinning wheel, and also design a "running track" underneath the wheel to help it spinning in place.

All of the probelms with the legs and wheel have started to make me question the entire piece. There are a lot more calculations of range of motion and physics of the spin I have not taken into account. Could this leg problem really undermine my whole project? A little too late to start a new one...

Bicyclist 4: A Sustained Hope

Well, here the little guy is:

That's the body (secured down with an appropriate space for neck servo as well), the wheel, and his two gangling legs. All that's missing now is the rest of his bike, his heads, and his arm. Until I move on to the rest of these processes, I wold like to hook that servo up, and see him spin. Fingers crossed!

PS. Cyclist wearing a Guy Fawkes mask.

Bicyclist 3: Revenge of the Project

Despite what I think to be a good new leg design, there's still a lot of work to do.

1. Base of the project itself

2. How to secure the body so that it doesn't shake or wobble.

3.Code and rig the 2 heads

4. Design an arm

5. Make the bike itself fit around my character

6. Second wheel(?)

These six things are less important, albeit still important to the overall piece, but I really don't want to underestimate them and run into a wall later. I've clearly got some work to do over Spring Break.