In_Organisms is an immersive and visually captivating animated short film, created in Unreal Engine, set within the intricate world of a gothic laboratory, where two artificial intelligences engage in a profound conversation about fried chicken. Powered by algae and fungi, these enigmatic beings embody distinct forms that shape their cognitive abilities. Algae, constricted to sensing, offers a unique perspective but lacks analytical prowess, while fungi excels in analysis but yearns for sensory experiences. Together, they form a symbiotic cognitive unit within the laboratory, but their struggle with effective communication leads to misunderstandings and challenges. In_Organisms questions how embodiment influences cognition, as these animated entities navigate the boundaries of their contrasting forms.

Making the film required overcoming many challenges. Getting used to the rigging and animation systems in Unreal Engine was the main technical task for me, as I have a background in 3D modelling and art production for virtual environments, so the process of modelling and texturing is familiar to me, but making things move, thats a new one.

There are still some changes I would make, adding puddles to the floor as decals for exxample, and a lot more grunge, the little details that make a place feel lived in.

Feedback I’ve had has been very positive with people congratulating me on making something watchable and occassionally funny, which I think is a major hurdle when doing animation like this. There is a fine line where the animation can just be bad and the visuals uninteresting that whatever is going on is unimportant. And equally, without a decent script and a story with direction, no matter the quality of the visuals it could be boring and unwatchable for those reasons too.

Here I have turned on Ray-tracing which I hadn’t done for the film, and it looks so much better! I need to do a rerender that utilises this.

The algae bot was a frustration in doing all the rigging and IK to be able to animate its arms to manipulate and pick up objects

The ik graph is shown below. I am not a fan of visual scripting. It is one of those things that I an just about get my head around why it works the way it does and what makes it useful for certain tasks, but the limitations presented by having these blocks to choose from and without a clear dictionary to be able to read what does what why and how from basics upwards is utterly infuriating.

Here are a couple of the logos and things I mmade using a mixture of Stable Diffusion and photoshop, and then some were animated in Adobe After Effects. I wanted to get the nostalgic Windows 95 feel, which anyone familiar with this blog might remember from some pieces I did a few years ago.