RGCA - Best Character Animation - Port-Seven
polycounter lvl 7
I'm not an animator but this looks like a fun project. 
So here's my very simple character:
Hopefully I'll be able to get him into iClone smoothly after doing some animating in 3DS Max and testing out the pipeline with 3DXchange.
So here's my very simple character:Hopefully I'll be able to get him into iClone smoothly after doing some animating in 3DS Max and testing out the pipeline with 3DXchange.
Replies
Anyways, I will try and have some animation updates shortly.
One drawback I've found from his current design is that it's difficult to make a sad/frowning face when he naturally looks like he's smiling all the time. So, either I find a way to turn down the corners of his mouth or just not have him be angry or depressed!
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Doesn't matter how many times you go over it there's always more to fix!
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It was a fun project.
Direx
Yes, it's all key frame animation.
Thank you
This was not key frame animated in iClone. Ideally you would animate in your preferred program (ie: Max or Maya) and then import into iClone.
For mewbies to animation, I can recommend the canned fart-sneeze and embarrassed motions for fast and easy pre-visualising purposes. I think Truebones also have a freebie version of most of these motions which are also helpful and quite smooth if you need something in a hurry, but not as polished as this entry, obviously.
It certainly is possible to keyframe everything in iClone, and export to other software. iClone's advertising suggests it's faster that way, but it's so hard to tell, as anewbie like me, without knowing which other software I'm comparing to.
I notice from your channel that you use something called Macanim Simplified Unity3D, which looks really interesting, especially if the motions can be exported into iClone.
Is this the software you used? And is it very time-consuming or difficult to get that wonderful amount of flair in his motions?
I'd love to aim for being this good in a year or two, so I'd greatly appreciate any recommendation you may have about the specific software that can achieve this look... I *think* it can be done this well in iClone too, but as a newbie, I can't tell if I'm trying to compare apples with oranges, haha.
I don't know if you can key frame like this in iClone because it wasn't done that way, but I'll assume someone else could. I like 3Ds Max and I do prefer to key frame my animation rather than use pre-existing animations. I spent a few hours in iClone initially using their animation before figuring I could get something better looking if I animated everything myself in a program I was more familiar with using.
Choosing to animate directly in iClone is a preference; it won't make you a better animator. I don't consider myself an animator but I did 3 years of animation in college, so if you put in the time to learn how to animate you should get the look you want regardless of the software.