Animator- The Right Track? Anim progress log
Fellow animators, I'm looking for your help here on conformation that I'm going down the right track to becoming, hopefully, a sucsessful animator.
I've been researching animation for about 4 weeks now and I've really got involved with the very essence of animation. I've took the time to read most of Richard Williams Animators survival kit, look up plenty of refrence on youtube and even buy a character animation fundementals dvd from the gnomon workshop which is great.
I've recently took a step back after I went overboard with letting the computer do everything for me and I've learned more about blocking in animation with stepped tangents which is extremley fun and adventageous.
I can only show a couple of first tests I did which are pictures to do with posing and mood with the Moom Rig for Maya.
I will use this thread as a place for animation progress and updates.
I know this posing and mood picture isn't the best but it starts it off.
Thanks.
I've been researching animation for about 4 weeks now and I've really got involved with the very essence of animation. I've took the time to read most of Richard Williams Animators survival kit, look up plenty of refrence on youtube and even buy a character animation fundementals dvd from the gnomon workshop which is great.
I've recently took a step back after I went overboard with letting the computer do everything for me and I've learned more about blocking in animation with stepped tangents which is extremley fun and adventageous.
I can only show a couple of first tests I did which are pictures to do with posing and mood with the Moom Rig for Maya.
I will use this thread as a place for animation progress and updates.
I know this posing and mood picture isn't the best but it starts it off.
Thanks.
Replies
I feel like I'm in a similar boat; after rushing in with a somewhat cocky attitude, I have stepped back, humbled myself, and am trying to really steep myself in the essence of animation. I've been reading through the entire Richard Williams book as well, and if that book won't put you in the right mindset, I don't know what will.
Sounds like you're in a good spot to really work your way up. I wish you great luck on this adventure into the world of animation! :P
Those little poses are looking good so far. Can't wait to see the guy up and moving!! Good luck with all this!
Great to recieve a reply like that. Very heartening.
Indeed, Rich Williamns work is just awesome.
Good luck to you too : D
Edit :
I've found a great use for Windows 7 Sticky Notes!
Animation To Do List
Videos and research-Active
Bouncing Ball-Curve Editor-Practicing-Not Completed but understand fundementals
Walk Cycle- Started with Animation Fundementals DvD
Pose Practice-Studying AndPracticing-
emotion and poses with Moom.
Practice weighting -
Lip Sync-
To Do List
Ball, Walk, Poses study, Simple weight, understand curve editor more.
Here is a walk cycle I have started using the blocking technique. I'm following the Animation Fundementals DVD set but I hate how he skips over stuff sometimes leaving me to figure it out when it's not really clear.
Thanks for the crits. That's all that has been covered by the person doing the tutorial so far and I'm sure he will cover it. If not, I'll definitley add your points in. And yeah, this is the very starting block so there is not much to crit
That page is awesome. Thanks.
Alternatively (and if you cant open them in quicktime) open the video in a program like Sony Vegas or some otehr video editing software, and again you will be able to scrub through frame by frame and see the frame count.
I would also advise trying to get a hold of Edward Muybridge's books for references, go google him and you'll see why.
Just remember to not be scared to have keys everywhere!! its ok....
So get that timing right and poses looking nice before u go crazy with in betweens...
James, are you the guy with the awesome demo reel with arthas vs dwarf? Love your stuff.
Just wanted to post a picture of my desktop and my new fav wallpaper which may inspire others as it has greatly insipired me.
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Feel free to crit away, that's why I'm posting these.
My first real walk cycle remember. I know there is not much weight and there is probably 100 technical problems but I'm here to improve.
Do you think it's a decent first try?
I think the part that sticks out at me most that needs improvement is what you lead with. Similar to what Blenderhead was saying, since he's depressed, he would probably move a bit differently. What I see is his hands leading--as in, they're the first part of the action leading. If he was sad, I think it would more likely be his head, maybe even his shoulders, leading the action.
On that note, since you're trying to evoke an emotion, something else to think about is the up-and-down movement of his steps. I would imagine he would have a lower 'down' position, and not a very high 'up' position.
A lot of these things can be figured out by standing up and walking this out for yourself.
Having gotten up and trying to do a depressed walk just now, I found I was naturally inclined to lead with my feet, actaully. Also interestingly, my arms barely moved from my side. But, this is just how I acted it out--there's no wrong or right, just what feels good for your acting style.
Hope this is useful, I'm no pro at this myself, this is all stuff I'm trying to figure out too! Keep going with some walk cycles. Once you get the formula down, they can be a lot of fun!
You can check out "power center". If he's sad it is usully in front of him pulling him down, if his curious it could be in front of him at his nose, proud, strong it's in the chest and so on. He do look sad so I think you succeeded.
Bend the torso in z more it's a bit rigid and he got a bit to much sway imo. It should bend oppose to the hips. Also you can try tilting his hips backwards to give him more balance.
I found a neat little game rig. I was playing with the controls in Maya and then I decided to animate a walk cycle with no video tutorial, just with what I had learned so far with my two previous attempts. An improvment from my Sad Robot attempt, perhaphs?
peace
thanks : ) Lock the legs so that more time is spent on them? Do you mean the legs at contact or the passing position?
What he said.
I like the movement you've given him, but right now it looks like everything is moving exactly together. You need to chose a part to lead with (hips usually works best). After that, everything moves and flows from there.
This is for everything overall, but also more focused. Like in the arms--as he brings his arm forward, his spear should stay back. Once the spear has come forward, take your time dragging it slowly back after the arm. This kinda stuff adds interest
Good job though!!
I'll upload to youtube
I'll add weight later on as I'm still getting to grips with the curves.
Please compare the two.
I realise know never to make my actions so extreme
im very curious where you found that rig though. got a link?
The person that I'm following on the GnomonWorkshop tutorial dvd uses Stepped tangents and I agree that this is the better method but I have yet seen how he makes it from stepped to spline for the walk cycle.
I just decided to try it in spline and it came out not too bad. My main problem right now is I don't fully understand how to make changes to a bunch of curves to give weight to a characters limbs and such.
The rig I found is a cool rig from http://www.creativecrash.com/maya/downloads/character-rigs/c/?per_page=100 'Tribal Warrior 1.1.0'
I usually use "pixar" like rigs because I am actually focussing on film but I thot that this rig was easy to use so I just went ahead with it.
Put that on a sticky note for inspiration
I'll be updating soon
Look at the ball, it has a red line going through it with green lines for spacing.
Can anyone tell me exactly how to get that to display (I think it is related to Maya as it's used in the webinar)
It's similar to motion trails in Maya but that one looks alot more simple. Also, using that would allow me to understand the effect off moving around the curves. Is it some sort of plugin?
However, I will say that if you're still having this much trouble figuring out how to work with curves and other areas of animating in Maya, you should spend more time doing simple anims while you better understand the program, IMO. When I was first learning Max, I was animating ball bounces and pendulums swinigng back and forth.
It's important to get the technical parts of the program down, because if you're struggling with that WHILE trying to make a kick-ass anim, you're just being distracted by too many things at once. It is the same back when everyone used to just draw animations--you couldn't(shouldn't) be an animator until drawing wasn't a problem whatsoever.
As for your animation, I like the improvements to the arm swing, but I can't really continue to crit until you fix it so it's not going through the floor. :P
heh, yeah just tear the whole animations menu appart.
The main body is hiding behind that thing, and maybe thats even why your focus is more on limbs, but it looks like the torso/spine/pelvic is quite static/firm.
But it is hard to see, i need to push a damn button every 3 seconds and get distracted. Longer videos would help a lot, atleast double, or rather triple it.
// another thing that i cant really tell from the video, does he place his feet on a more straight line, or are they just going forward?
to help you fix things
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I've made some changes and will be updating soon.
Mezz- I often go back to the bouncing ball test. I understand how curves on a ball work because it's simple but when animation arms and such the curves then look like a bunch of random squiggles and I don't see how they relate. That's made me want to re-look at what I'm doing because I keep telling my self "Don't get ahead of yourself!" and I think I have... Maybe I should go back to simple things? I should get a ball with two legs or something and not a guy with a tribal mask and spear
Rens - Hell yeah man
Aside from the spear clipping into the ground I think it has a little too much action for a held object. People tend to steady objects they hold so his spear hand isn't going to move like his other, free hand will. It also takes a bit more of their concentration, which with small simple objects is pretty low almost unconscious like a pencil or a small rock. But not so with bigger more unwieldy items. A spear isn't as extreme as something like a boiling tea cup full of acid but he would steady it a bit.
Also I don't know if you have some web space somewhere like a dropbox, but .mov files with a frame counter are great for these sort of animations. It makes scrubbing and critiquing much much easier.
And yeah, I plan to make all the things that you guys noticed about my stuff.
Thanks again.
The latest version. I've actually been talking to Brad Marques aka ArtofBrad on Polycount (great guy) and he's telling me alot of the stuff. He told me to make the spear like this and apparently it's much better.
What do you guys think?
Contact > Down> Passing > Up > Contact
Whereas I had
Contact on 1 > Passing on 6> contact on 12> passing on 17 > contact on 24
for two steps on a 24 frame cycle.
Interestingly, I haven't noticed this Proffesional Animator from the Gnomon Workshop DVD do a down and up position.
I'm having a hard time with what method to use.
The tribal walk used Contact on 1 > Passing on 6> contact on 12> passing on 17 > contact on 24
but if you read my above post you'll see that Richard Williams book says you need Contact, Down, Passing, UP, Contact.
I've been trying to follow the Gnomon Workshop DVD but it's to complicated as he just skips out all the poses he made while he wasn't recording and goes over them in like 5 seconds so it's really hard to understand.
I'm really stuck right now on how to do a REAL walk.
Edit : I done my tribal walk with Spline tangents.
Richard Williams examples a walk on 13 frames
Frame 1 on contact
Frame 4 Down position
Frame 7 Passing Pos
Frame 10 up pos
13 Contact
I tried doing this but it looked horrible.
I R CONFUSE.
So, establish how the contact positions will look. Then make the passing position. Fit the down and and up positions in after that.
There REALLY is no right way to do these things, just suggestions and guidelines.
I think the way I first learned how to do a walk cycle was:
Contact position frame 1
Down position frame 4
Passing position frame 8
Up position frame 12
Back to the contact position frame 16
This is a slower walk, but should be a good base. IMO, for learning to do a walk cycle, you should try doing a very basic walk--nothing too exciting YET. Just stick with the very basic guidelines for each position of a walk. Once you understand that, changing it up to your style is fun and eas(ier).
I'm not writing all this to say I think you've done a bad job. Your walk cycle is looking pretty good. But since you apparently have confused yourself, I'm just trying to lay it out as simply as I was taught.
My favourite games of all time are by valve, so I just opened up their animation cycles and looked frame by frame from every angle how they constructed them.
I think (if you wanna make games) decompiling and opening up great game animation in your 3d tool of choice is a good way.
If you want to see team fortress, half life etc walk cycles let me know and I can give you the relevant files/information.
@ James -I'm actually looking to get in to Film as Pixar is my ultimate inspiration but I'm obviously a gamer and I enjoy a hell of a lot of TF2 =] So I can imagine what kind of info you get from viewing such source files. I assume you're using Max aswell?
I can't share the files since that would be infringing some digital citizenship somewhere, but if you're interested you should check out their website and download the free version, it might be in there.
As far as your walk cycle goes, it's looking pretty good, much improved since the first one.
Is your spear parented to your hand, or your hand parented to the spear?