Independent study for Animation
​Biggest lessons from the Independent Study:
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Be an idiot in front of the camera, that’s how you learn to express and get into the character of a creature.
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Block out animatic is the best way to start.
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Find the “leader” in the mesh - it’s generally the hips or eyes.
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Never go back to an animation that you feel is wrong. Scrap it out and start fresh.
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Animation is relatively easier when you know the tool better.
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It’s always said in rigging terms “ to simplify” but what actually has to be done is “Simplified controls”.
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Look at the most redundant thing an animator has to do and put your work on eliminating that.
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Don’t animate the same thing for more than two hours and Don’t get lost in details.
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Even the art of animation has limits based on your rigs.
Ball Bounce:
I worked on 3 different ball bounces for this project:
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Ball Bounce in Place
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Ball Bounce with translation
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Ball Bounce with translation and Decay.
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Main Objective of these projects:
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To understand gravity, timing and squash and stretch in animation.
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To understand the key frame spacing with decay in velocity and also to understand relative motion with height and distance as there is a decay in velocity.
Lessons learnt:
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The idea of a basic rig depends on how much you are willing to push your rig.
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Exaggeration plays an important role in animation so leave room for it in your rigs.
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Squash and stretch are important but a good squash with ease-in and a good stretch with ease out are the best ways to go about when it comes to animating a ball.
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Animation is lot easier when you get more comfortable with the graph editor.
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Right bounce is convincing but implementing rotation along with bounce will give credibility to the animation.
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As time increases key frames come closer but always remember to leave room for the ease in and ease out and use it till there is no more bounce.
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Get comfortable with the different types of tangents and curves in the graph editor.
Biped Animation:
I worked on 3 different walk cycles for this project:
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Walk - cycle in place with FK setup.
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Walk - cycle in place with IK setup.
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Forward Walk - cycle with IK setup.
Main Objective of these projects:
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To implement a walk cycle with an IK system to understand the extremes, passing positions, highest and lowest in -betweens, and delay or secondary animation.
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To learn efficient translation and delays in key frames of certain controls and create a believable walk cycle for a Biped character.
Lessons learnt:
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In a normal walk cycle the joints either follow arc or a “figure-8” pattern.
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Always block out animation and starting from the extremes, pass positions and then high and lows.
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Secondary animation and delaying key frames gives life to character.
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The foot roll is important for a walk cycle so setting up a control that can do that with just one key will be a blessing for the animator.
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Infinity curves are the best way to go about when it comes to correcting a cycle.
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There should be a delay between the movement of chest and shoulder. As they come closer the attitude of the character changes.
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Credibility depends on a lot on how you bring back the key frames and delay certain parts of animation.
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Pay attention to the minute parts of animation to give character.
Weight Lifting Sequence using a Biped
I worked on a Biped lifting Atlas stone object for this project ​
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Main Objective of these projects:
To understand the change in pose and walk with the influence of weights
Lessons learnt:
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“Hips lead”
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It is essential to create a rig with attributes that allow you to follow either world, COG or specific parts of the mesh.
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Constraining object to one joint is good but I personally felt comfortable using both the hands.
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Block out shots, create a rough animatic using just poses and stepped tangents and work your way from there.
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Not able to find a good reference or inspiration ? RECORD YOURSELF