Animation
Character Animation (Poses, Actions, Lipsync, Timeline/Channels etc.)
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So, it's the Thanksgiving holiday. You've eaten the turkey. You've watched the game. You've been out to see Harry Potter AND Tangled AND Megamind. What to do next? Make a Phenakistoscope with Animation:Master! Even when you know how animation works and how we see it, it's still a bit of magic to hold one of these up, spin it and see the still pictures turn to life. You can make your own with these instructions and this project file. Making_a_Phenakistoscope.pdf Phenakistoscope.prj Feedback on whether these instructions work for you is welcome. Have a Happy thanksgiving!
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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Can someone point me in the right direction on this subject or create a quick video tutorial which explains how to do it?
Last reply by John Bigboote, -
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This is a rough draft of another attempt to explain keyframing details in A:M. KeyingShaggyH264_96kbs.mov I'd be interested in the opinions of new users as to whether it makes sense, is helpful, or if it misses something that ought to be included in such a discussion. My initial feeling after watching it is that it is too slowly paced, so that's something that might be fixed in another go at it.
Last reply by tysono_71, -
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I probably am not suppose to announce this but... errrrgggghhh.... its impossible for me to keep a secret. Alonso Soriano has been working hard to help aspiring animators realize their goals and get to animating. As such he initiated the Animation Bootcamp hosted in the Student Forum. Now he's moved to the next level and compiled a series of tutorials and enhanced his Bootcamp even more. With apologies to Alonso... Experience it here: http://www.hash.com/amtutes/Bootcamp/index.html ...and don't forget to post your Bootcamp results in the Student Forum - Forum #35 on your A:M dial. Rodney
Last reply by Rodney, -
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I usually to do write a tutorial just post projects this will be an attempt to combine the two. To get an interesting material to animate it might take a few steps. In this project I'll start with a basic plane to display the material and prepare a material for hopefully an interesting result. You can start by downloading the 1st project or just jump to the 5th In project 1 I set up the plane in a chor and make a new material right click on the attribute and change it to a combiner \turbulence \sine pick blue and white for colors and choose 3 octave in the sine choices. Then render this rather uninteresting frame
Last reply by vf124, -
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I did this little test of unicycle motion just for fun. I've marked it up with some notes. attachment=46990:unicycleMotionH264.mov attachment=46991:UniCycle.prj Although I mention it in the notes, I'll say it again... the unicycle's "stop" is the least satisfying in appearance because it has been over simplified. A real unicycle stop is a precarious balancing act. Edit: couldn't let that lousy stop be. I added some overshoot to it to make it look better. Revised files. UniCycle2_with_reversestop.prj unicycleMotion2NotesH264.mov Edit 2: Playing with this notion some more, here it is with "cartoon physics". Thi…
Last reply by jason1025, -
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This is to answer a new user's questions. This vid covers making both the usual Pose Slider type of Pose and also the mysterious, rarely sighted "draggable and droppable" Pose. MakingPosesH200.mov
Last reply by dblhelix, -
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Hey guys, I stumbled across this facial animation tutorial today on Victor Navone's blog! Check it out! It's really cool! He analyzes a 10 frame clip of animation he did on Dash in The Incredibles!!! http://www.navone.org/HTML/Tutorial_DashTake.htm
Last reply by Jeetman, -
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I need to animate the edit for a decal. I have tried all of the ways i could think of. Show drivers in the Chor, Key framing the position of the decal, Even tried to use a avi of basicly what i needed but got no where. After i loaded the avi it wouldn't even show up. Even tried "animating" a projection material. If someone could show me how to move a decal from point a to pint b in a chor on a model it would be a huge help.
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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Animation of a technical 3ds Polygon Model in A:M? No problem with “Prop- Objects” and “Roberts Trick” Look at the video tutorial here A short description how to do it with a car: 1. Separate your favorite 3ds polygon car in a 3D polygon modeller program into moveable (2 front wheels, back wheels, steering wheel ) and unmoveable parts (body/chassis). There are a lot of free polygon modeller on the market. 2. Import all these parts as Prop-Objects into A:M. Drag and drop the parts into a new choreography. 3. Now Roberts Trick: Create an empty model (call it Car Bones). Go into Bone Mode and create a Skeleton for the moveable parts. Use …
Last reply by Robert, -
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I have a figure that needs to enter a room and walk across it diagonally to a lounger. I have used walk cycles and paths before but wanted to try it 'free form'. It is straightforward enough when the direction is perpendicular to the views but how do other people do it when it curves across those axis's ? Using the 2008 rig, would it be a good idea to constrain the body Null to a path and animate the limbs around that or animate it directly, without a path, using the birds eye view option to keep track of the positional and limb placements ? regards simon
Last reply by Simon Edmondson, -
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At a very high level, a timeline is a timeline is a timeline... I'm familiar with using timelines in other programs (Moho, Flash, etc...) however the one in A:M just confuses the holy heck outta me... Anyone know of any good verbose (with lots of illustrations) explanations of making the best out of A:M's timeline features? Thanx
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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Fellow AMers: Question regarding Action vs. Choreography Actions. Which technique is better for something like a character eye-blink. Is it better to define them as part of the Choreography Action, or is it better create them separately, and then repeatedly sprinkle them into the Choreography (What I would assume is better). If it is better to create a non-chorography action then my question expands a little….. The eye lids of my model when I crafted it were set in the completely open position, i.e. the scarred look. This suggest to me that I’ll need to partially close the eye lids in the first frame of the choreography to exactly match the first frame o…
Last reply by largento, -
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This tutorial introduces A:M's basic drag and drop functionality for putting a model on a path and adding a walk cycle Action to it. It also discusses the "ease" parameter of the Path Constraint, the "crop range" settings for an Action, and using the "Measure spline" tool to better match the time your walk takes to the distance it will travel. WalkCycleOnAPathH350.mov
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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Does this sort of thing make sense?
Last reply by williamgaylord, -
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OK, after literally hours of searching specs and the internet I just have to post my problem: What I'm trying to do: I want to do a pretty simple animation, a "walk through" through a virtual building. I have the building modelled already and the camera movement is easy enough to animate (constrain to path, look at...) BUT: the scene is supposed to start outdoors and I'd really like to use a nice landscape created by Terragen 2 as a backdrop. To combine the two outputs I would of course need to replicate the camera movement from A:M inside Terragen. Here's the first problem: A:M has an "export" feature on the camera inside my coreography and it writes a "raw" fi…
Last reply by GruberR, -
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Is there a way to add more Control points to Distortion mode?
Last reply by John Bigboote, -
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Some notes on moving the body from side to side. When the whole upper body moves from side to side as a unit it looks weightless because no flexible body with mass could do that.
Last reply by NancyGormezano, -
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Blocking is the early step in the animation process where you get your essential storytelling poses on camera with minimal attention to the transitions between them. It lets you test out the essential look and timing of your scene before you put a lot of time into refining the motion I prefer to block with "paired keys" because it's easy to edit and experiment with and gives me a bit of automatic transition between my poses and not the sudden pop that strictly"held" poses would have. BlockingPairedKeysH300.mov
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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real pendulum are not floppy, but some animation school somewhere says they are. Here's one way to do it with minimal keyframing and mostly curve-editing...
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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A video in which the interplay of paths, actions, action "chor range" and action "Crop range" is introduced. Paths_Ease_Chor_Range_Crop_Range.mov
Last reply by Rodney, -
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Last reply by robcat2075, -
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Just found this in my stash - probably got it at a community college class (DeAnza College, Cupertino, CA) on animation (class taken around 1991 - Now those were the days, and of course, I still was probably the oldest person in the class): O'Donnells' Laws of Cartoon Motion I. Any body suspended in space will remain in space until made aware of it's situation. (Think Daffy Duck walking off a cliff, suspended in mid-air until he chances to look down - only at this point does 32 ft per sec squared take over) II. Any body in motion will tend to remain in motion until solid matter intervenes. (Toon characters are so absolute in momentum that only a telephone …
Last reply by brainmuffin, -
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This isn't a substantial tutorial but as it may be helpful I'll share these exchanges I had with several people on the 11Sec club forum who were having trouble doing what is a rather essential body mechanics basic, jumping. They were trying to animate the "Pixar" lamp jumping with results like this: PixoH.mov (NOT done in A:M ) my response was and later, with examples
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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Is there a way to set up the pose slider to be segmented into 9 steps. I am making a locomotive throttle and there are 9 positions (idle plus 8 run). This applies to all the sliders in the new animation I am working on. Also as the slider hits run poisition 3 a three will need to be displayed on the throttle. Just need a little help to get things going Steve
Last reply by brainmuffin, -
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A moderate jog and fast run with various enhancements for study: JogRunComparisonH800.mov Interesting detail i noticed... the arm is more extended when it is pushing back and drawn closer when it is being brought forward.
Last reply by thejobe, -
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I'm still a little lost when it comes to the keyframing terminology. When you "shift+click" the keyframe, it gives you 3 options (1: all keyframes, 2: only pre exist, etc). I'm confused as to what each of those technically mean. The video tut's I watch, show which to check, but don't necessarily give a good description as to WHY check those... Can anyone clarify/clear this up for me please? I'm starting to get the hang of the keyframes, and I think once I get a hang of those options, i'll be doing pretty good. Thanks in advance! Steven
Last reply by Timothy, -
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Hi, I am very new to AM 2004. I would like more information to know what I need to do to model and animate a custom head/face. I am more interested in learning how to animate subtle facial expressions, like focusing on the eyes and expressing emotion through the eyes. Then, after I am successful at that, I would like to insert my 3D animated model into a flash movie, if that is possible. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks jimmie
Last reply by MiddleKid, -
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This was made to address one particular challenge in posing Shaggy in "the Door is Stuck" exercise... putting his feet on the door, leaning him back and yet getting his arms to reach the doorknob. However since there is no complete "Door is Stuck" video yet, it may also give others useful exposure to general Shaggy posing workflow and AM2001 Rig circumstances. PosingShaggy_250.mov the resulting PRJ: The_Door__s_Stuck_ShaggyAtDoor.prj Note that I've posed Shaggy in this pose at frame 0:00. If you were really doing The Door is Stuck, this is not the pose you would start with.
Last reply by mouseman, -
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Control the rig, don't let the rig control you. Sometimes you have to work around the rig to get the pose you need. This example shows how to raise the heel on a rig that doesn't have an independent heel bone. CounterAnimatingAFootAndToe_250.mov
Last reply by jason1025, -
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I was going to have a five minute conversation between two characters interrupted by flashbacks, scenes that illustrate a point being made, etc. Then I was going to put my cameras at three different positions and render. Finally, I was going to cut and edit the whole thing into a conversation with intervening scenes fading in and out. It seems from various experiments that the lip sync part of the program starts breaking down after about two sentences. Phonemes stop appearing on the lips of the speakers. Eventually, the lips of the speakers start tying themselves into knots. Is there a limit on the lip sync part of the program? Is the limit in syllables, phonemes, or what…
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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I made this video to demonstrate some of the operation of A:M to a non-A:M user cubejump.mov MakingOfJumpingCube.mov JumpingCube03b.prj
Last reply by Rodney, -
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Can anyone point me to a tutorial or other instruction on creating animated text in A:M? I know I've seen something about this in the forums before, but I cannot seem to locate it now. Thank you!
Last reply by Rodney, -
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I'm trying to force a keyframe for my character's jaw bone, however nothing appears in the timeline. What is even weirder is that most of the bones for my chactacter work just fine in this manner. Is there an option in the bone settings that I might of changed?
Last reply by FMSonic, -
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Here's the classic Eadweard Muybridge run photos. From 1887! It's quite a smooth motion with big arcs, because smooth motion and big arcs take less energy. muybridgeRunNotes.mov Notice that the left and right feet are almost always moving in opposite directions... when one goes up the other goes down, when one goes forward the other goes back. This is not nearly as true in a walk where one foot has to stay on the ground until the other one is planted. The faster motion of the run requires that the body masses balance out more. The foot strikes the ground a bit in front of the body, but leaves the ground a greater distance behind. The foot reaches…
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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Seasons Greetings to one and all! I'm hoping that someone here will be able to help me with transitions, going from one action into another. I've read what I could find on the forum but still not getting it to work. I've uploaded a project with this post, (I hope!) so if anybody feels they have time, so close to Christmas and all, they can have a look and see where I've gone wrong! The problem area is near the beginning, going from a walk cycle to standing and reaching for the door handle. Without blending there's a noticeable jump, which looks even worse when rendered. However with blending, Shaggy turns around in a little circle during the blending process. A…
Last reply by markw, -
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Hi. I need to make animation of tank tracks. Maybe somewhere there is a lesson showing as to make it?
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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Hello, a couple of years ago I stumbled upon a post by someone who had made a tutorial on how to switch decals using bones that he would rotate. So for example, if the bone is pointing up, a smile decal is shown, and if it's pointed down, a sad mouth decal is shown, and then you could have any number of decals inbetween at different angles of the bone. I think the bone was just placed somewhere random, it wasn't necessarily part of an object. The setup may have also included the use of expression sliders. I remember the guy who did the tutorial had an accent, possibly latin american. I thought it was very clever. I know that the always inventive johnl3d did something li…
Last reply by edlundart, -
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Many years ago I noted that my favorite artists all tend to be fairly good at caricature. I've struggled with caricature myself. Everyone has the potential of a caricature artist in them and with A:M they can easily do it themselves. Isn't this a better response to the oft asked question from new users; "How can I animate my images?" Of course they really mean "How can I convert my images to 3D. But perhaps its better to take their question literally? In the end they'll learn not only how to animate their images but how to better ask their questions. Then having learned how to animate their images they'll be better prepared to apply what they've lea…
Last reply by Rodney, -
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I made this because I got tired of hearing people who use other programs claim that Quaternion interpolation (what A:M uses) can't be used for animation because it's "impossible" to edit. They may be right! Their programs probably can't do this.
Last reply by robcat2075, -
- 1 reply
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Here's the process of blocking and inbetweening a basic walk in the chor. Post #20 http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?s=&am...st&p=345732
Last reply by Xtaz, -
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Expression experts Was wondering if its possible to have a statement that says if (Chortime() >.5 and Chortime() I know this works If(ChorTime()>0.5,ChorTime()*1000){,0})) it passes the variable Chortime()*1000 after 15 frames which is .5 of 30 What I was thinking was lets say Thom is wearing a bowtie at frame 15 to 30 a good looking female thom goes by and therefore his bowtie spins I tried a number of combinations but get a syntax err Anyone know ?
Last reply by PlJack, -
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I wanted to animate a title screen with letters that drop from above and land on the ground, but after completing the animation, AM decided to adjust the animation and now my letters drop beyond the surface of the ground before settling in the next key frame. Is there a way to tell it to knock this off? I'm guessing there is just a setting for keyframes which will get it to not "follow-through" with the momentum of prior frames.
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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Have your character stand at the start of your path and start walking after a certain amount of time (150kb) Delayed_Walk.zip
Last reply by KenH, -
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This tutorial describes how to fade from one image to another on the surface of a model. 450kb. Image_transition.zip
Last reply by KenH, -
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This brief demo explains how different actions on the same model in the chor have priority over one another and why they may appear to do nothing at all! Action Precedence (post #7)
Last reply by robcat2075, -
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My art of animation master book is missing page 184 Could someone please discribe how to put objects in a flocking thing. I cant find it in the help file Thanks
Last reply by clonewar12345, -
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So in my Animation class I was supposed to pick a tutorial to follow as an assignment. I found one of supernova-like explosions and decided to do that one, and it was smooth sailing until I hit the wall. When I reached the step where I made the first material, I finally realized that the tutorial I was using was ten years outdated--which wouldn't be a problem if I was more experienced with the program, because then I might be able to find what I'm looking for under a different name or toolbar. What I need is to enter a what the tutorial called a "channel". I apologize, I know I'm being very vague, but here's the link to the tutorial and a link to the reference i…
Last reply by Ganthofer, -
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You can keyframe and vary certain camera properties like motion blur % For demonstration this clip shows a ball that repeatedly moves in an arc over one frame. If there were no motion blur the ball would appear to stay in the lower left corner a it is always keyed there at the beginning of the frame. As the motion blur % is increased from 0 to 100, the blur covers a greater portion of the path the ball travels during the frame. This shows motion blur with 16, 25 and 49 passes and then the non-multipass motion blur. BlurVarying_16_25_49_Post.mov Multipass blur is more accurate if you use enough passes, but nonMultipass blur is way faster. In most…
Last reply by robcat2075, -
Hi all I am Jof! I am sort of new to animation, well not really I have just stacked up numerous unfinished projects. Can anyone advise on how to change bone Keyframe Interpolation eg., to Linear 'in one go' instead of having to go to one bone channel after the other and changing each one's interpolation one at a time? What I mean is changing the keyframe Interpolation of each bone in my model all at the same time instead of having to select bone channel after bone channel then choosing the interpolation method. 'A way of setting all to Bone Keyframe Interpolation to Linear by default will be brilliant so anytime I move a bone I know that t…
Last reply by robcat2075,
