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Lagoa Rebirth

April 22, 2013 1d / 2d / 3d / News
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Back in 2002 I was doing some programming gigs when I started in 3D by making interactive demos of industrial motors using HTML, Flash and 3D.Screen Shot 2013-03-14 at 11.46.39 PM The job paid badly but it was really fun.

I learned a ton about the creative process and  the demos meant a lot to the client as they could visualize what they were going to make before they decided to make it. It was empowering for everyone.

After that job I drifted into TV, then advertising, motion graphics, movies and games. I think I have seen it all in terms of workflows and the creative process. Then I found myself limited by the tools I was using, so I moved from design to technology development to build new ways for people to create. That is how Lagoa MultiPhysics was born:

Since Lagoa MultiPhysics I’ve learned a few things about the software industry. The good the bad and the ugly. I was fortunate to work with some amazing people and get in contact with some great companies, but after a few years reality hit me in the face: The software industry has changed and the 3d world was left behind!

Before I crossed over to software development, I was only a user. Here is how I qualify us users:

  1. We are demanding of our tools and ourselves.
  2. We are loud when things work the way we expect them to work.
  3. We get angry when things don’t work the way they need to.
  4. We like to create stuff, we do not like to pay for software.

Put it simply – I know how I feel as a user, and as a developer I know how freaking hard it is to satisfy all of the above.

The developer in me not only needed to work on hard problems, but needed to be able to work faster, fix bugs faster, fix user problems faster, get you new features faster… In other words, I need a platform to grow technology that can be used by users. Not be stuck on a chain of desktop software rules.

So I cut a lot of hard-wires and re-thought digital creation from the ground up. I hired a bunch of really smart people and built something new that is thought for our generation.

This is how TeamUP (now Lagoa.com) was re-born.

Can’t wait to see what you can do with it!

-Thiago

Lagoa Training & Artists

September 15, 2011 3d / News
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I often get requests of Lagoa artists available. I know a handful of them and I always pass it around to the people I know. But from time to time someone new appears doing beautiful simulations. See Artemy Craft on Vimeo.

I’m putting together a list of Lagoa users that should go on the website, so if you are a “pro” and want your name to be there just drop me a line.

If you are not a pro – drop me a line too, but it might be good time to become one since there’s now plenty of Lagoa Training out there, and also demand. So to help you get started with the tool I’m listing two places you can start with:

Digital-Tutors has a nice collection of videos that should cover the basics. You can jump right in.

i3D Tutorials has recently published a two volume Lagoa Training series with over 25 charpters that covers a whole lot:

Have a good learning of Lagoa Multiphysics!

Tendril for OpenText

July 28, 2011 3d / News
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Tendril Design+Animation Toronto based studio completed a beautiful piece for Open Text with lot’s and lots of papers simulated in Lagoa Multiphysics for Softimage

“On a technical level, much of the content animation was handled using Lagoa Technologies’powerful multiphysics simulation engine. Over the course of the project we simulated more than half a million ‘pages’ and generated over 45GB of simulation data. Lagoa was also extended in order to create the flocking behavior seen in some shots.”

I’ve participated in this project helping sorting out any kinks related to the paper simulation, as well as developing specific algorithms for stacking up papers and controlling the animations.

Ben Steiger Levine – Sprite Ad (MassMarket)

February 19, 2010 1d / 3d / News
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via Motionographer

Director Ben Steiger Levine (effects done at MassMarket) featuring Drake exploding in Sprite soda.

The Effects were made using my earlier fluid simulator (Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics tool for ICE).

Looks cool, check it out!

Exocortex SlipstreamFX – Smoke Simulator

November 20, 2009 1d / 3d / News
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Ben Houston’s Exocortex approached me to help on the development of a realtime smoke simulator for Softimage ICE. This is the outcome which I just got permission to show.

SlipstreamRT for Softimage is a proprietary real-time smoke simulator developed for Softimage’s ICE system in collaboration with [exocortex.com/ Exocortex Technologies, Inc.] This video is posted with permission from Exocortex Technologies, Inc. For licensing information please contact [email:[email protected]]

 

I’ve worked on most of the components of the solver including boundary conditions (laminar flow, turbulent flow), vortex shedding, the vorticity equation and particle splitting algorithms.

Most of the tests on this video are done by myself, I’ve also implemented all the workflow and controls demoed in the video.

-Thiago

My work on Assassins Creed Lineage

November 15, 2009 1d / 3d / News
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Just finish working on these series of short films for Assassins Creed 2. The game looks amazing as well!

This project was a joint effort between Hybride (Film studio Acquired by Ubisoft) and Ubisoft Digital Arts (Ubisoft’s own Film studio).

I’ve developed the workflows/tools and lead the Technical Directors ( as well as pipeline development) during the project at Ubisoft.

This was quite an experience and I’m happy with the results, although I wish we had more than 5 months to produce the whole thing… :)
In my opinion (and not because I worked on it) this is the first adaptation of a “game to film” that makes into the form a short film, and doesn’t let me (completely) down. It actually leaves that feeling that we could explore more of this universe in a full length feature film.

YouTube Preview Image

I would be looking forward to work on a full feature film for this brand, with a lot of time to produce it of course :)

More http://www.youtube.com/user/assassinscreed
or  http://www.assassinscreed.com/

Mesher for the SPH

July 14, 2009 3d / News
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There are at least 3 different meshers for ICE particles that can be used with the SPH:

Pwrapper from 3daliens

emPolygonizer

And Guillaume Laforge is doing this pretty cool project that constructs a fast scalar field in ICE and passes to the polygonizer in a grid structure.

The coolest stuff for me is that the distance function on Guillaume’s polygonizer is an ICE compound! So you can play with it right there and manage to change the way the polygonizer will weight the surface.

It’s exciting to see all these people developing these tools and they are all compatible with my SPH solver, have fun!

Mesher by Eric Mootz

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

May 21, 2009 1d / 3d / News
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I had a blast working with the crew of CafeFX on G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.
I think the release date for the film is fixed to August, I will see you in the movie theaters!

My work was mainly as FX Lead/TD working on shots and also providing some tools for the other artists.
I have to say thanks to: David Ebner, Jeff Barnes, Seth Lippman and all the crew at CafeFX!
See the whole crew here: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1046173/fullcredits#cast

cmiVFX introduction to ICE

April 9, 2009 1d / 3d / News
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I’ve finally finished producing 4 hours of training material on Softimage|ICE platform. I explain the math, core workflow and several computer graphics techniques behind creating some amazing tools that can be used in production.

This series is packed with examples and is more of a intermediate/advanced focused. Although if you are a beginner you might find this really exciting get you to dive into ICE right away!

To buy it, visit cmiVFX website

 

Screen Shot 2012-12-30 at 4.06.09 AM

 

 

Have fun!

Microsoft Zune

September 1, 2008 3d
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Package of 6 animations done at Nervo.tv for Zune.
My participation on this project started on RnD, and how we would make the simulation work on the cube shape, then how to animate it. I also did most of the lighting work and the final compositing/color grading.

Few interesting things from this project:
The “Boxes” animation was done simulating rigid bodies in XSI, and a lot of layered animation on top.
The “Liquids” one I had to write a little script to allow me import a sequence of meshes, that came from a standard particle simulation. To then enable people to tweak it later, in a mesh state and apply relax operations etc.
The “Sweets” one was very tricky too, each frame of the animation is a different object. Like a 3d stop motion technique.

This project was fun and challenging at the same time, I’m pretty happy how it turned out.

To see some original sketches/concepts just follow Fabiana’s website

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Credits – project page http://nervo.tv/index.html?sect=5&proj=zune
Creative Director: Nando Costa
3D Artists: Thiago Costa, Jeff Norombaba, Joshua Cox, Catherine Langevin, Gabriel Beauvais
Compositing: Thiago Costa, Jeff Norombaba, Alphonse Swineheart, Robbie Johnstone
Storyboard Artist: Fabiana Fortes
Music: Darrin Wiener

Digital Kitchen “The Company” nominated to Emmy Awards!

August 4, 2008 3d / News
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The Company was nominated in the category Main Title Design for the 60th Primetime Emmy Awards!
I was lucky enough to be on this project with Digital Kitchen – Seattle.

The Company • TNT
Studio: Digital Kitchen
Creative Director: Matt Mulder
Lead Designers: Cody Cobb, Ryan Gagnier, Noah Conopask
Animatiors: Ryan Gagnier, David Holm, Pete Kallstrom, Matt LaVoy, Dayvd Chan
3D: Cody Cobb, Igor Choromanski, Gordana Fersini, Thiago Costa
Editor: Dave Molloy
Producer: Jill Johns, Colin Davis
Executive Producer: Mark Bashore

My participation here was on the last scene, from the transition to the mushroom to the end. The guys at DK and Cody Cobb specially worked really hard to give all the styling on the final frame, with lot’s of render passes and even drawing things by hand over the 3d render.

Runner for Timex

March 21, 2008 3d
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For this Timex spot done at Nervo.tv, I worked mostly in the runner, but also in some background elements.
The runner rig/animation/cloth simulation was pretty fun, I worked with Syflex, used Refmodels to manage the versions of the runner and also developed the look of this guy in 3d.

Fox Horror

September 19, 2007 3d
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I’ve just finished working on the Branding Package for Fox-Horror Japan with director Nando Costa.

My work was to Model, Rig, Animate and Render the hero bird!
The hardest part was the rigging, no question 3D feathers is a pain.

Fox Horror for Nervo from Thiago Costa on Vimeo.

Nike Multiplicity

September 12, 2007 3d
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Little animation for Nike. Did simulation, rendering, everything in XSI.
Compositing and creative direction by Nervo.tv

Simulation was really fun to do, the rigid body solver worked perfectly with a bunch of groups, two environments and animated RB constraints.

CMT – Celebrity Bull Riding Challenge

July 17, 2007 3d
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I was the Lead 3d for this project with Adam Gault and Carlo Vega.
Marcelo Souza helped me a lot to deliver a bunch of animations of the bull.

One thing I can say is that Carlo and Adam are really great people to work with!
If you have the chance, don’t miss it!
They did saved my 3d renders adding a lot of nice colors and style to it.

Discovery Channel – Digital Neurons

June 22, 2007 3d
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Worked with my friends Chris Bahry and Alexandre Torres from Tendril doing texturing, lighting and some animation on this piece.
Texturing done in Photoshop and composition in After Effects, all the 3d work was produced using 3ds Max.
I’ve cut the best shots and previews I did, and worked on this small clip.

H2oh!

June 10, 2007 3d
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H2oh! is a flavored water type of thing that called for animated fishes inside of the aquarium.
At Conspiração Filmes filmes I had the opportunity to work in the modeling, animation and was the lead texturer/shading artist.
Our pipeline was based on Maya, Renderman and Photoshop.

I worked in two spots, the one for the launch of the product and the other for the new flavor Tangerine:

Game model

June 5, 2007 3d
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Low poly game model done as a test for the Amsterdam based game studio Guerrilla Games
I did it using Maya, Zbrush|Mudbox and Photoshop.

Mudbox/Zbrush details, later baked into textures.

XSI Brasil

June 3, 2007 3d / News
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XSI-Brasil, the Brazilian website about the 3d software Softimage|XSI is back online.
There you will find videos showing XSI features and production techniques. Part of my work with tools development is also being posted in there.
(*site is in Portuguese)

Pepsi Lemon

May 15, 2007 3d
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Pepsi campaign in Brazil is marked by these series of spots featuring two talking Lemons.
Here I have two of the spots I had worked on during my experience at Conspira filmes

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Reel 2006/2007 is online!

April 26, 2007 3d
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My reel is online! This is a compilation of my work done between 2006 and 2007.
A shot breakdown is in the end of the reel, enjoy it:

Harpy – Personal Project

April 21, 2007 3d
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This is a study of a 3d creature. Most of the work to finish this project was done in a month in my spare time.

Claro

March 10, 2007 3d
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This project was done at Conspira filmes, I did around 10 shots on this piece. (animation, lighting and rendering).

Fuel TV

January 3, 2007 3d
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Modeling of the character and all assets.
My process started with photo references and basic models in XSI, then I moved parts of the main character to Zbrush to refine and give more details to it.
Animation by Renato Ferro, directed by Nervo.tv

* The treatment on this image is just a preview render.

Zbrush help for Sepultura

December 20, 2006 3d
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This music video for Sepultura was directed by Luis Carone, I helped him with some Zbrush modeling and texturing.
It’s pretty intense!
watch it here: http://www.luiscarone.com/sepu.mov

Bang-Bang

March 12, 2006 3d
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This project is property of Rede Globo television

Bang-Bang is a Brazilian soap opera in a western world. lol

This was lot’s of fun to work on, I did a lot of modeling and shading work. Most of the assets and the work on the characters was split by me and Andre Holzmeister.
I had the opportunity to contribute on the design of the piece.

Early render test…

Bang-Bang © Rede Globo.

Sob Nova Direção

February 23, 2006 2d / 3d
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This project is property of Rede Globo television

“Sob Nova Direção” is a comedy TV show aired in Brazil.

This animation was very fun to work. The most exciting part is that I got to do the art direction of it. One of the most fun things was to make the backgrounds in Photoshop, and the characters in 3d.

Most of the 3d work was divided by me and Andre Holzmeister. Andre did an awesome job animating everything while I painted the backgrounds.

We both modeled/textured/shaded/lighting everything. I got to do the final compositing/color grading.

Fly

December 27, 2005 3d
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Fly is a promo animation done at Nakd.tv
My work on this piece was mostly modeling and animation of some scenes/cameras.