my first ever walk cycle :o
ngon master
i've dabbled in animation before, but only so far as sword swings, or gun recoil, that kind of thing. never a full cycle animation.
so i had a crack at it today, this was my reference:
[ame]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E59XrLqqI0c[/ame]
and here's my results!
as you can probably see, there's a "snap" between the last and first frames... the bones are all rotated to the same positions, but there's something weird happening with the x/y/z coordinates of the hand bones (which is affecting the arm bones through it's IK solvers, i guess). trying to iron that out but i'm learning as i go, so any help there would be greatly appreciated!
and of course any other criticism is welcome
so i had a crack at it today, this was my reference:
[ame]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E59XrLqqI0c[/ame]and here's my results!
as you can probably see, there's a "snap" between the last and first frames... the bones are all rotated to the same positions, but there's something weird happening with the x/y/z coordinates of the hand bones (which is affecting the arm bones through it's IK solvers, i guess). trying to iron that out but i'm learning as i go, so any help there would be greatly appreciated!
and of course any other criticism is welcome
Replies
clean out all frames between the main poses, and just snap between them until it strikes a good rythm. Then do the same with the halfway points till it looks good but is jerky and then start working the curves.
Also pay attention to how motions travels through the limbs at a offset, stuff like swinging the hand "out" when the arm starts moving "in" helps sell the motion a lot better.
As for solving the loop jerk, I find that copying out two more segments of the animation, gabbing the middle and deleting the start and end segments solves it.
I'll cook up an example of what I mean by the different points tomorrow to illustrate it better. So hard to explain it in text XD
http://www.referencereference.com/dvdwomen/walkbackvS.html
There are many more.
And my favorite:
http://www.referencereference.com/dvdwomen/walkturnS.html
if max bones, you want to adjust your bias handles in curve editor so the 1st and last frames have the same in/out curves. there is also a button along the top of the curve editor that automatically loops the animation so you can get quick looping previews.
if biped, you can use the curve editor, but not as visual as what you get with max bones. one way I hack it is copy all the keys 3 times on the timeline, over lap the 1st/last frames. Loop the middle segment when you render. that way you have same in/out curves for 1st and last frame of the cycle.
also with biped, you can copy your poses and paste them flipped, saves you the time to try to match the flipped poses by hand. You will have to manually copy the keys for the Bip/COM node inside the pelvis. Usually it only gets key in the Z and X directions so it's not very hard, just copy and paste the negative X values for the hip sway.
You certainly improved the walk cycle, but it feels like you're focusing too much on making a "sexy hip walk" than getting a nice motion.
Archs, archs, archs. Make sure there is a fluid a clean movement in her archs, the pendulum movement of her arms and hips / shoulders.
Good improvment, but getting proper reference will go a long way!
Good Luck
also, after 3 steps she steps forward and moves the whole body forward. Its a nice little variation for sure, but I think I would focus on getting the vanilla cycle down before trying to make it vary. keep the main node for the body going up and down, side to side. not front to back.
Heres a thread ive been working on lately over at 11secondclub. ive been doing a walk through / tutorial type thread on how to do a walk cycle. its not finished yet, but who knows. maybe i`ll mention something that will help.
I plan on making the same thread here once its complete. redo the explanations and stuff
And then it's just a matter of creating the inbetween movements, like follow through and arcs in motion. I would also work my way up from the legs first so that you get the legs and hips right before moving on to the upper body.
These images show how one step would look like with the poses and getting another step is just a matter of mirroring the keys but in the opposite way. That's the approach I took with this.
I also highly recommend getting the Animators Survival Kit
I hope that helps any!
Something minor that I also think could help you a lot - if you could put the hands in a more relaxed position (primarily not have that thumb sticking out, but maybe curl a few of the smaller fingers), I think it would make the whole thing instantly look a lot more natural.
As others have pointed out there are often very different ways to fix an animation problem. not knowing leads people to do one of the following:
1) Waste their time writing up all the different ways you can fix what is wrong.
2) Only post what they see is wrong and leave you to figure out how to fix it.
3) Decide its too much effort and not post anything.
Drop the gifs...
They take forever to load and you can never be sure if they're playing at the right speed. You can't scrub them back and forth which is critical in diagnosing what is wrong. Without some kind of frame counter its hard to critique animation. You end up writing a giant brick of text just to get people to understand which part you're looking at. You're stuck trying to use the animation itself as a visual time marker which just makes the critique long, rambling and confusing. Instead it's easier to say: With all that said...
You've got a weird jump in the upper torso.
I'm not sure if its at the beginning of the cycle at the end or in the middle. It's a looping gif so I have no idea... But it's this sudden jolt forward and twist that isn't natural.
Get a better hand pose.
Yea there are a lot of joints in the hands and they're a bitch to pose but its kind of distracting seeing her carry two giant invisible flag poles. Hands have so much information about the character and it really shows when people pay zero attention to them. Even 3min to come up with a more relaxed pose will help.
There really isn't any up and down motion.
You really do need to bring the root node down when the foot comes forward and makes contact (down). People talk about the head height but they don't mean squash/stretch the neck, its the whole torso that sinks down.
And yea I agree with Slip about the hips they're rolling oddly.