[Riot Creative Contest 2017] - Amanda Ramsey

ajramsey28

Hi everyone! Welcome to my wip thread.  This will be my first animation contest ever! I'm really excited and nervous. Haha but I hope I have a fun learning experience doing this.  I have decided to use Stella from Joe Daniels body mechanics rig pack. http://gumroad.com/l/xhRK  


Animations will be
Character running with a lollipop 
character ultimate attack

ajramsey28

Hey guys, I just spent the past few hours blocking a run. Still have a lot of work to do. Weapon of choice is Kama. They are going to spin in her hands. Let me know what you think so far.

ajramsey28

First ignore the arms!! I havent been working on them as much besides the change. Annnnddd the change. So I changed it up a bit. The kama's were not working out like I would have liked. They didnt fit the character I am going for. So I changed her weapon to a magical lollipop. She is supposed to be perky and girly. Here is some progress this week. 

I am trying to figure out the timing. Does she look to slow? Any other feedback is welcome, the whole thing is still a wip. Like I said earlier, ignore the arms they are very wip. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqnomYUkME8&feature=youtu.be

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwA6iiPQAYY&feature=youtu.be

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHNz-UY6VGc&feature=youtu.be

ajramsey28

Hey guys! I cleaned up the arms. Not much progress this past week, turkey day and having a cold. XD This is pretty much what I am going for. I think I might have her left arm sway back in forth a little faster. I want to add a slight little change up to break the cycle. I also still need to check my arcs and offset some things. Its getting there. haha. Let me know what you think.

ChristianOrellana

Hahaha, its funny.. I havent got much work done for those exact same reasons, Turkey day and a bad cold. Either way, its coming along. Keep at it.

ajramsey28

thanks! Thats good that there is humor in this. Yeah seems like a lot of people ended up sick over the holiday. 

tiagosol

hi @ajramsey28 super cool cycle! I like the way it bounces out of the ground. I think maybe some more overlapping on the fall with the arms and shoulders could sell better the idea of heavy weight!! don't forget about the weight is super important!

ajramsey28

Hey guys, Here is what I have for my run. Thanks @tiagosol for the feedback!  I went a head and offset some things, hopefully the weight feels better. If It needs to be pushed more let me know. The swing on the lolly pop looks a little to fast in one area I think...I need to rest my eyes from it.
So now I am going to move one to the ultimate attack and come back to this.
Feedback is welcome! https://syncsketch.com/sketch/9897291e21da/#302563
I hope that link works.

Here are some gifs

thathenryguy

Looks Great!  Nice bouncy feel to this one.  You may want to check the arc's on the lollipop.  I think there's a part that could be smoothed out.  Other than that it looks suhweet!

ajramsey28

@thathenryguy thanks so much for the feedback! I will be sure to go back and fix that issue.

ajramsey28

It has been a while since I last updated. Hope everyone had a good Holiday.
Here is a wip blocking for my ultimate attack. What she is doing is throwing up a candy orb(imagine cool and sparkling) and hitting is like a tennis ball/ping pong ball. Ill add a simple sphere when the animation is more filled out. Its only key poses right now. I think I need to work on the end a bit more. The little pop at the end/start is because she lands slightly different. i'm thinking about moving it to have to same start and end position or if I should leave it?? 
let me know what you think.

ajramsey28

Hey guys I have been working on my ultimate attack. Started cleaning up and polishing some things, I also added to the jump. Please let me know what you think.
this only has stuff that needs critiquing right now
https://syncsketch.com/sketch/9897291e21da/


this is what is cleaned up so far



this is what the whole animation looks like right now. Everything after the second hit hasnt been cleaned up so it looks werid


I still need to add the little candy ball thing she hits so pretend its there. XD

AnthonyAnimation

You have a really great start! Clean motion that reads from game cam. To help match Riot's style I would recommend ratcheting up the snappiness between attacks. Try taking a few frames out of the in-betweens. To show the weight of the character have more of a settle after you hit the pose.

If you'd like reference of a League character check out Lux or Lulu.

ajramsey28

@AnthonyAnimation Thank so much for the feedback and character suggestions! Do you mean take out frames on the settles after the hit or the frames leading up to the hits? I was worried that it wasnt snappy enough for actual attacks. 

AnthonyAnimation

You'll want to keep the action snappy, so remove frames from the attack and add that to the settle. As long as you're moving body parts and jiggling things on the settle it will help show a transfer of weight.

For example lets say the entire things has even timing and takes 15 frames total. Which means the antic is 5 frames, action is 5 frames, and settle is 5 frames. You'll want to adjust it so it's something closer to antic 3 frames, action 2 frames, settle 10 frames. That's just an example, but hopefully it helps. The action would have a smear to help lead your eye, but maintain a quick motion.

Since it's an ult it may help to have a slightly longer windup, it depends on the timing you're looking for. If you check out Lux's ult there is a large charge time to telegraph something big is coming, then BLAM.  You have multiple hits instead of one large attack, so make sure to hold the action after each attack longer (it acts as an antic) then have the transition to the next attack short.

ajramsey28

@AnthonyAnimation Awesome thanks! I really mean that, this has been so helpful to me! Animating in a style like Riot is pretty different than what I normally have/had to do.  

ajramsey28

Well I finished and submitted. Here are all my views together. I didnt submit this. I just made this for fun.
So some things didnt work out how I wanted them too. I animated a little ball to represent the magic she was hitting but it looked really weird and distracting from the actual animation so I left it off. So imagine glowing sugar magic trailing around and her hitting it back and forth. I just kept the run simple, I didnt like the little variation so I took it out. Overall I am happy I entered this. It was fun and I feel like I learned some things and personally improved on some areas so that is a win for me.
Enjoy and good luck everyone!