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Description

This one has some effects that don't look right in the GIF, so go watch on youtube for the full experience: youtu.be/W5dKa50R3nk

Story:

    Zelda had heard of how bad the lightning storms could be in Hyrule Field, but never truly understood the extent of it until she was out one day and got caught up in one. One minute it was bright and sunny, the next storm clouds rolled in, bringing bright flashes of blue and yellow as lightning and thunder shook the world around her.

Zelda tried to continue as calmly as she could, but when a bolt struck the ground only a short distance from her, turning what was once grass into a crater, she broke into a sprint. She recited the rules of surviving a thunderstorm in her head as she ran.

    “Lightning is attracted to the quickest path to ground. People are tall, and easy paths to ground, so the first order of business is to find some sort of shelter that will block the flow of electricity. Something to insulate you.” Zelda looked around. Unfortunately, she didn’t see anything to separate herself from the massive body of electrons that was the earth. “The other thing that lightning is attracted to is-”

    Zelda’s train of thought was interrupted by a buzzing noise on her back, followed by a bright glow. Oh no. The other thing that lightning was attracted to was metal. Which was what her shield was made out of!

    She tried to take it off her back and throw it away, but it was too late as she was blinded by a bright light and felt a sharp tingling sensation run all through her body before the whole world went dark for a minute.

    When Zelda came too, she noticed she was under some sort of shelter. Maybe someone had found her and taken her inside? She crawled out back into the rain, only to find that the shelter was none other than the shield she had been carrying. What? Had she… shrunken?

    She didn’t have much time to contemplate though, as another bolt of lightning struck her shield again, and she felt the familiar tingling feeling return. This time she was sure of it, she had indeed been shrunken by the lightning, as she watched the world grow around her.

    Once the light faded again she looked up. She was absolutely tiny now. From the looks of it she estimated herself to not even be an inch tall. (She’s actually .66 inches tall here.) Zelda had heard of the effects of shrinking lightning storms before, but had never expected to experience one herself. She had read that the effects were known to fade, but it often took around a week for it to start to wear off. She checked her Sheika Slate but the anti-shrinking rune she and Link had developed after their last little adventure didn’t seem to be working.

    Well, on the bright side she had a nice shelter to hide under from the storm now. And she was sure that once Link found her (he always managed to find her somehow) he would turn this small inconvenience into something they would both enjoy. The last time she had been shrunken for an extended period of time had been rather enjoyable, and Zelda realized that she might actually enjoy herself a bit, as a blush crept over her face.

    Notes:

    I’m so glad that I decided to do this shrinking in phases. The last two shrinking animations I made had some problems where the characters were far too small comparatively, so doing it in two phases let me first establish her new size in the first one, before shrinking her even further in the second. So I get to have my cake and eat it too, which is something that I don’t think would really be possible in a still render.

    I’m also pleased with the “instant” shrinking that I did for this one. Many of my previous animations have the shrinking occur over like 200-400 frames, which is quite a while. It’s really annoying to try and fill in that time that the characters are shrinking with idle stuff, so having it happen all in one go saves me a lot of time, and makes this animation look much nicer overall.

    At first I wasn’t going to do this in two phases, but then I realized that if I wanted Zelda to be as small as I wanted her to be, it was probably the play. At .1x size (about 6 inches) she’s small enough to crawl out from under the shield, but big enough to still have all of her actions read clearly, then at .01x size (about .6 inches) she looks really cute. I’d loved to have made her even smaller, but I was already starting to run into issues with her being half an inch tall. Maybe next time I’ll see if I can work something out to get her even smaller.

    Environmental effects: Yeah, this one has both rain, stormy sky, and lightning effects. The lightning was a must have, and I tried to emulate BOTW’s lightning, how it sort of pulses before striking. I think it looks pretty cool. The sky was a simple HDRI image that looked like a storm, and the rain was a practical emitter with particles that looked clear like liquid. Lots of simple tricks to come together into something cool.

Description

This one has some effects that don't look right in the GIF, so go watch on youtube for the full experience: youtu.be/W5dKa50R3nk

Story:

    Zelda had heard of how bad the lightning storms could be in Hyrule Field, but never truly understood the extent of it until she was out one day and got caught up in one. One minute it was bright and sunny, the next storm clouds rolled in, bringing bright flashes of blue and yellow as lightning and thunder shook the world around her.

Zelda tried to continue as calmly as she could, but when a bolt struck the ground only a short distance from her, turning what was once grass into a crater, she broke into a sprint. She recited the rules of surviving a thunderstorm in her head as she ran.

    “Lightning is attracted to the quickest path to ground. People are tall, and easy paths to ground, so the first order of business is to find some sort of shelter that will block the flow of electricity. Something to insulate you.” Zelda looked around. Unfortunately, she didn’t see anything to separate herself from the massive body of electrons that was the earth. “The other thing that lightning is attracted to is-”

    Zelda’s train of thought was interrupted by a buzzing noise on her back, followed by a bright glow. Oh no. The other thing that lightning was attracted to was metal. Which was what her shield was made out of!

    She tried to take it off her back and throw it away, but it was too late as she was blinded by a bright light and felt a sharp tingling sensation run all through her body before the whole world went dark for a minute.

    When Zelda came too, she noticed she was under some sort of shelter. Maybe someone had found her and taken her inside? She crawled out back into the rain, only to find that the shelter was none other than the shield she had been carrying. What? Had she… shrunken?

    She didn’t have much time to contemplate though, as another bolt of lightning struck her shield again, and she felt the familiar tingling feeling return. This time she was sure of it, she had indeed been shrunken by the lightning, as she watched the world grow around her.

    Once the light faded again she looked up. She was absolutely tiny now. From the looks of it she estimated herself to not even be an inch tall. (She’s actually .66 inches tall here.) Zelda had heard of the effects of shrinking lightning storms before, but had never expected to experience one herself. She had read that the effects were known to fade, but it often took around a week for it to start to wear off. She checked her Sheika Slate but the anti-shrinking rune she and Link had developed after their last little adventure didn’t seem to be working.

    Well, on the bright side she had a nice shelter to hide under from the storm now. And she was sure that once Link found her (he always managed to find her somehow) he would turn this small inconvenience into something they would both enjoy. The last time she had been shrunken for an extended period of time had been rather enjoyable, and Zelda realized that she might actually enjoy herself a bit, as a blush crept over her face.

    Notes:

    I’m so glad that I decided to do this shrinking in phases. The last two shrinking animations I made had some problems where the characters were far too small comparatively, so doing it in two phases let me first establish her new size in the first one, before shrinking her even further in the second. So I get to have my cake and eat it too, which is something that I don’t think would really be possible in a still render.

    I’m also pleased with the “instant” shrinking that I did for this one. Many of my previous animations have the shrinking occur over like 200-400 frames, which is quite a while. It’s really annoying to try and fill in that time that the characters are shrinking with idle stuff, so having it happen all in one go saves me a lot of time, and makes this animation look much nicer overall.

    At first I wasn’t going to do this in two phases, but then I realized that if I wanted Zelda to be as small as I wanted her to be, it was probably the play. At .1x size (about 6 inches) she’s small enough to crawl out from under the shield, but big enough to still have all of her actions read clearly, then at .01x size (about .6 inches) she looks really cute. I’d loved to have made her even smaller, but I was already starting to run into issues with her being half an inch tall. Maybe next time I’ll see if I can work something out to get her even smaller.

    Environmental effects: Yeah, this one has both rain, stormy sky, and lightning effects. The lightning was a must have, and I tried to emulate BOTW’s lightning, how it sort of pulses before striking. I think it looks pretty cool. The sky was a simple HDRI image that looked like a storm, and the rain was a practical emitter with particles that looked clear like liquid. Lots of simple tricks to come together into something cool.