Phatty's Animation Thread
polycounter lvl 9
So I have recently started animation in 3ds max and wanted to document it here to get hep with my stuff. Here are my first two cycles and they are very basic and very bad to say the least. Any tips and critiques would be awesome.
Cartoon Walk Cycle
Run Cycle
Cartoon Walk Cycle
Run Cycle
Replies
With the run cycle you need to work on making the upper torso bounce with the run. At the moment it looks like his spine has been fused. Remeber that all the parts of the body have weight and a tiny motion on one end can cause motion in the other.
A few things:
.MOV:
If you have a little slice of the web some place (dropbox!) post .mov files instead of viemo or youtube. It will allow you (and other people) to scrub frame by frame back and forth and really dig into the animation. .mov its awesome!
Curves:
The ease in and out of the poses is breaking the cycle. This can be fixed in the workbech and adjustment of the curves. No worries if you haven't cracked it open yet, there's enough to learn already heh. For now until you're ready to tackle the curve editor it might be good to set the default curve to linear. (down in the lower right corner, little red arch, set that to a straight line) this will stop you're animation from slowly easing in and out and keep it flowing in one solid fluid motion. Unless you're ready for workbench, which is bipeds own curve editor with its own unique pluses and negatives. We can cover that stuff when you're ready.
Biped setup:
It can be good to give your biped a full set of fingers and a thumb even if you don't animate them. Also giving him one toe and stretching it to fill the entire toe area is a good idea also. Especially when practicing walk cycles. It makes it tiny bit more complicated but it allows you to make proper contact and well every rig known to man has at least one giant toe.
Walk Cycle:
- Maybe too much arm motion.
- The archs are a bit choppy, partly because of the curves but partly because he seems to have too few poses and shoots from one to another. to view the arch's (trajectories in biped) go Biped menu > Expand Modes and Display > Display > Trajectories.
- For the feet and hands you normally want this to be a smooth flowing motion with more or less evenly spaced dots (dots close together mean its slow in that are, lots of frames) spaced out dots means its fast. This should roughly be in the shape of a kidney bean.
- The shoulder bones (clavicles) are super important in giving the arms realistic motion, just swinging the arms around from the shoulder won't get the job done unless the movement is pretty minimal.
Recommenced reading:
http://www.hippydrome.com/
Shows a lot of great examples, ranges of motion, joint placement, weighting, loop construction, so much good stuff. He works at Pixar, teaches at Pixar University, and posts on CGTalk and is a really really nice guy.
http://www.angryanimator.com/word/test/
Some good tutorials with solid walk cycle ref.
Richard Williams The Animators Survival Kit (this is a must read book, packed full of examples and very light on text) you can check out samples of this crazy guy teaching on his site (yea the dvd's are $1,000 read the book get the same knowledge but not as entertaining.
The Illusion of Life (or The 12 basic Principles of Animation) At least look up the 12 principles if you don't feel like reading the whole thing. There is A LOT to be learned by trying to put most of them in practice. Some of them we as computer animators don't have much control over.
I don't want to bombard you with too much so I'll leave it there. You're off to a good start keep at it
I'd include a frame counter for your videos so critiques can narrow a problem to the frame.
Seems a little uneven.
Make sure your generic walk cycles ends on an odd number like say 25 (what I like to use)
That way there is a exact mid point to the animation which for a generic walk cycle is needed.
Which will be frame 13
1+12 =13
13+12 =25
I know it's pretty basic but I find a lot of the time people tend to use even numbers (24 frames) for cycles which screws up the timing for something like this.
13 will be the frame that will mirror frame 1 and 25 with the opposite side of the body.
Also make sure you cut off that last frame (frame 25 in this case) when checking the cycle as it's not needed. It's only there for getting the timing down.
I think you need to study these poses carefully.
https://cyberdog.wikispaces.com/file/view/WalkCycle_Side.jpg/30505746/WalkCycle_Side.jpg
I think the arms and legs just aren't coordinated in the walk cycle.
If you look at your down position, which is the second key pose you're bringing the arms back already, when as you see by the picture the arms should actually be extended the most by this point.
I'd take a flip book or just a piece of paper and really get down an understanding of the poses to the walk cycle:
contact, down, passing, up, contact
I definitely know how tough these can be, keep at it!
-=EDIT=-
Had a thought after reading through some of the things. When I want to say make the biped crouch in max is there a way I can just move the pelvis down and the feet adjust accordingly? Right now I have been moving the pelvis and then readjusting the legs which I think is why a lot of my stuff is inconsistent.
thanks for that.
And as for crits.. those two have pretty much nailed the important things.. I would def. say learn the principals and live in the graph editor. he is your friend.
You can use them when doing a walk cycle also since it has the ablity to pick the pivot point. When the foot makes contact you set a planted key with the pivot on the heel, then as the toes make contact you set another planted (sometimes sliding) at the base of the toes, as it comes up you set one at the tip of the toes. While its sliding it stays locked to one axis so it avoids having the foot jump up and down while the feet are in contact. This is kind of unique to biped other rigs handle this system a little different.
Walk Cycle 2
This can be fixed in the WorkBench Correct? Do you guys have any tuts for the work bench?
The joints are snapping quite a bit, make sure you don't overextend them, keep a sense of flexibility about them.
That seems to be the big problem I'm noticing for now.
Other things
Remember that the hips are our center of gravity and that the thrust will generally emanate outwards.
Example: The shoulders shouldn't be leading the hips as they are in your animation it should be the other way around.
If you follow this idea then you will see naturally what parts of the body react to what.
Hips > Shoulders > arms > hands >fingers
You're learning two things at once, how to animate (12 principles of animation really 10.5) and the technical side 3dsmax/biped, thats a lot to soak up and you're doing good.
There aren't too many tutorials specifically created for the workbench as its not all that different from the standard curve editor. So a regular curve editor tutorial will get you the basics then we can fill in the gaps where biped is special.
Standard 3dsmax Curve Editor, Video Tutorial (Euler):
http://www.wonderhowto.com/how-to/video/how-to-use-the-curve-editor-in-3ds-max-8-196402/
An important note about biped curves, it defaults to quaternion but you can set it to Euler which will work much more like the standard curve editor.
Quaternion:
Uses values to adjust the curve, you right click a key in workbench and it pops up (the biped keyer I posted earlier in the other thread has some nice presets that help with this, but most people hate these types of curves (I'll deal with them when I have to) and switch biped over to Euler.
Euler:
Euler is what the rest of 3ds max defaults to when animating. It's also what other apps use and its pretty much "standard". It allows you to manipulate the curves a few ways the most common is with bezier curves that give you handles, but there are other curve settings for keys you can use which are fast and flexible.
http://www.guerrillacg.org/home/3d-rigging/the-rotation-problem
The difference between Quaternion and Euler, gimbal lock, the difference between local and world rotation.
[ame="http://www.amazon.com/3ds-Animation-Biped-Michele-Bousquet/dp/0321375726"]3ds Max Animation with Biped[/ame] is another book dealing specifically with biped it covers everything except sub-animation controllers.
More biped specific tutorials:
http://www.guerrillacg.org/software-videos/3dsmax/94 (a GREAT set of tutorials) I wish I had these when I was learning.
PhattyEwok: keep it up dude! just downloadin the second walk cycle ;D!
Vig you're a great teacher if you ever find yourself without a job
I got my copy of the animators survival guide today and have been feasting on it all day. Expect some updates tomorrow. Till then G'night
Pretty great! for starters, Atleast you got the basic posture implimented in your animation.
Crit: It looks like running shaggy in old Scoobydoo cartoon..no offence. It lacks some physics, the one you see in anyone's run cycle / walk cycle from the side while he'z running in real life.
Suggustion: My suggustion to you is to have yourself recorded from the while you are running. Than take the video and go over your RL animation of run cycle. Repeat for the walk cycle.
Or draw comix of it.
Let me know what needs work. Whats a good way to present this stuff? Renders Screen Caps etc
First off Simple Ball Bounce
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3911509/BB%20White%20Studio.mov
A 10 second Logo Animation I had to do for school
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3911509/Nowlan%20Logo%20Movie.mov
Youtube Link For Faster Loading
[ame]
And finally a very work in progress Strut Walk Cycle
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3911509/DWStest.mov
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3911509/Walk%20Cycle%203.mov
Here's Youtube for Faster Viewing
[ame]
Fat Manish Run Cycle
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3911509/Fat%20Man%20Cycle%20on4s.mov
As usual Youtube for faster viewing
[ame]
good idea. but it kinda comes back and bites you in the rump.
if you didnt have that plane there, we would just look at the character animation as a whole, and crit it from there (I'm not going to though)
however, as it is now. we can see the huge amounts of food sliding that you have going on in both of the cyckles. imagine this would be in a actual game, and that the character would move the speed that you are indicating by that plane.
he would plant his foot a brick on the road (for example..), but when he lifts his foot again, it would lift from a totally different brick quite some centimeters away.
you've made lots of progress since those first......animations, you did. great!
keep at it!
the only thing Im going to say about the run you have right before my post is that maybe you shouldnt move his head up and down, but just keep it steady looking forward.
gogogo!
NICE! I really like it. It's harder than it seems isn't it heh.
I'd call this good practice but not really something you should toss in a reel.
- The wheel rotates oddly at some points, there are scripts and math that can help with this kind of rigging. Probably something up on scriptspot.com
- The head movement at the end seems a bit extreme and the body doesn't really seem to help it out, but it bends and twists in the beginning?
I like it! I think it needs a little clean up so the feet don't clip and the pelvis doesn't pop but overall it has some good character. His hands have slightly illregular archs to them. You can turn on trijenctories in the biped menu > Modes and Display > Display > Wavy line. This will allow you to see the archs, typically for arms you want them to make a kidney bean shape, not always but its a good place to start. Right now his bean has some growths...
I would ditch the distracting sliding sidewalk. It points out that they are moving at two different speeds.
- His head bobs up and down a bit too much. Typically people steady their head as they look at something. In Richard Williams book he covers this but its mostly for scaling the neck to move the head around something they do in 2D animation all the time, no one has a locked neck length in 2D. In 3D and specifically biped 3D animators tend to try and animated that in by rotation which throws up flags and makes it look, off. Biped doesn't do scale normally unless you add a sub animation controller but its generally a good idea to reign in the head bob and smooth it out. I use a look at target for the head, and weight it to about 60% that way you get a little but it tends to lock onto something like humans naturally do.
- Also rotate the pelvis as he shifts weight from leg to leg and it can help to swing it sideways a bit too. You exaggerate these things for females.
Yea ahh cool. I really like it. Ditch the sidewalk, like the other one its distracting and highlights the sliding feet.
One more note about the head in animation. Technically the head a child bone of the spine but it drives the animation. Its the thinking center of humans and is always a few frames ahead of the body. When a person turns their head leads, when they go up or down stairs their head is looking 2-3 steps ahead of the body. When it doesn't, when it looks like its going along for the ride, bobble head style, it looses its intelligence, coordination and neck strength. Even the dumbest characters unless they're slap stick funny will steady their heads and focus on the horizon.
When doing Walk Cycles with bipeds (you might do this already but it should be stated for those that don't) create 4 poses,
Explained in more detail here: http://www.idleworm.com/how/anm/02w/walk1.shtml
1Contact
2Recoil
3Passing
4High point
(labeled as such so they order alphabetically)
I do these poses for one side, copy each into the pose library, animate the COM forward and paste the poses 10-15 frames apart (depends on the speed), for the first part of the cycle, then mirror paste the poses 10-15 frames apart for the second half of the cycle.
Then its all about those 4 poses in an 8 pose cycle, the keyframes are easier to manage and things just seem to click faster. If you make a change to one pose, delete it from the library, replace it with the new pose and paste it the other side.
Cool stuff, huge improvements! Keep it up!
Here's an updated version of the Run Cycle(new link)
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3911509/Fat%20Manon4s_4.mov
Fixed the Head Bob, and played with the trajectories of the arms,legs,and clavicles. Hoping it adds to a more natural run. Also Ditched the treadmill. Should I get rid of that blob shadow too?
I'm gonna go back to that walk cycle and should have more later today.
Also some information
The run is animated on 4s starting at 0 so its easier for me to see the contact recoil passing up etc and then I did the walk on 5s
So far reading material wise Ive been studying Preston Blair heavily as well as Richard Williams. That Angry Animator site was also heavily studied as well. Any other suggestions?
Again Thanks soo much
-edit-
realized I didn't fix left side of body after making changes to the right so new render will be up soon
(Unless that's what you meant in your *Edit*)
Its kinda weird to get stuff to loop correctly in Max you have to include it but in photoshop when I compile I have to remove that extra frame
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3911509/Walk%20Cycle%203_3.mov
Sneaky Walk Cycle Heavily influenced by Preston Blair
[ame]
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3911509/Sneak%20Walk%20Cycle.mov
also rev 2 of the sneak cycle
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3911509/Sneak%20Walk%20Cycle%20Rev2.mov
[ame]
Here's my reference btw