11 Second Club - June

LloydHallam

https://syncsketch.com/sketch/150635#198321

Hey everyone!

I'm entering the 11 Second Club competition this month so that I can practice acting and lip sync animation. I've already gotten part ways in with my submission, but before I continue with it any further, I was hoping you guys could provide some feedback.

My next goal is to push these poses a little further and to work on the secondary animation (the fox character's swinging limbs/tail/earrings etc) before getting started with the lip sync.

I'm aiming to get my submission into the Top 20 and any feedback you can provide would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you!   

AnthonyAnimation

Cool idea! Everyone has their own workflow, but I would recommend starting with stepped keys. That way things don't look so floaty early on and you can focus on strong poses without being distracted.

The arm gesture that happens at f73 also happens two other times in the scene, perhaps try a different gesture to accentuate the words later on.

The guy's arms on the throw are a little distracting. I think it's because his left hand gets lost behind the fox's head and his right hand is jumping super far f188-190

Stepped keys can also help with timing. Some of the gestures are happening too early or late on the words I expect them to happen on.

The left quarter of the screen is empty for the entirety of the shot. I think it's fine for where you end up, but the majority of the scene is taking place on the right side and seems off balance.

Also watch out for blocking the main character's face.

LloydHallam

Thanks for your feedback! Although I DID start this in stepped, I'm trying to adapt that into my workflow, but I'm still new when it comes to blocking out and such. I struggle to figure out breakdowns and inbetweens in my head when the keys are stepped so I'm practicing to try and visualise them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRLztSzF7WE

I imagine the floatyness is due to me switching to spline too early here. Is there a way I can fix that now? It seems to be one of the biggest problems in my animations.

As for your other comments, poor staging and camera position is to blame here, I'll adjust the camera and try and get a better angle.

Thanks again for your comments!

Arturow

Like Anthony said, everyone one has his own workflow, do what you think you are better with I actually started working in stepped keys but I didn't visualize the animation in it like you. To me, it was very strange and hard to see like 1 keyframe every 10-5 frames. Sometimes that accelerated/confuse the feeling I had for the animation and when I moved to splines I was like wtf is thissssssss.

Then I just went to have a different workflow, in wich I first thought of the idea then place the different key pose I wanted ( Almost everytime I changed the keypose I had, because of overlap and such things) After I "blockout" the entire shot I just go straight ahead for the animation or pick different chunks of the shot if the shot is hard or consist in like 3 characters touching each other.

Lip sync is my relaxing point but sometimes I hate it because I can't listen to music hahaha , but I usually do 2 passes on it. I first do the entire lipsync for the character and see how it match with the audio ( I do this all in spline since I think they look like robots if you don't have constant keys) When I feel the lipsync is correct I just go back to the body ( this being another day) and when I ever feel to just relax again I go back to the lipsync and add the S&S in the head, asymmetry in eyes, cheeks, lips and I add overlaps to the lips too according to the spacing of the movement of the jaw. I also overshoot the lips when the jaw open/close and I connect them with the entire face.

I have a friend who loves Animation Layers but I can't deal with them hjahaha I cannot have my animation information in layers but he uses the layer to add shakes, accents, etc just to keep the character alive. That's his workflow and a lot of people uses them but I can't haha.

I see what are you going for with the camera, I see it like you are following the 3rds rule and usually use it a lot hahah , it can be fixed if you add some models in there since now is a little empty. Also for film animation try to keep the final camera from the start since you will hate to lose those arcs if you move the camera later :P ( I lose my shit when that happens lol)

Just keep the character alive to avoid floatiness don't move the entire body at the same time like if you have 1 movement of the hand , try to lead with one. Or if you have a body movement see if you can lead it with the head or the torso

Hope it helps! and is just matter of practice, I mean you already animate very good!