Rodney

Hope it's a great one!

Welcome to the A:M Forum David! Very nice. And with a timely message as well. I don't know if you are wanting feedback so I'll just say that for a first animation this is an impressive effort. Now that you've got this one behind you I assume you are already off and running on your next project?* I'd love to hear more about your experience creating the clip. *Added: I visited your website and see that you've already answered my question to a large extent. Keep on keepin' on!

Um.... Wow. How do you come up with this stuff! Color me impressed. Added: Now you've got me wondering how I could get digital ink to transfer from off of one of the rollers onto the paper... Perhaps we can use a negative force to stick particle ink to the paper.

My daughter downloaded the app and we had fun playing with it for about an hour. Pretty impressive.

Quality with Quantity pays off once again.

Nice!

You could create the path as a spline either in your main Model or as another Model added to your main Model (either as an Action Object or simply put in place. Then you can easily animate that spline, moving around it in a circular motion and then... you wouldn't even need to animate the object following the path... but you could if'n you wanted to via the Ease such as when/if you want it to move in reverse. Paths can't be circular if you use the standard Path in a Chor but they can be if created as a Model and then dropped into a Chor. In this way, any spline can be a Path, even the splines on your main Model.

[vimeo]27135819[/vimeo] This video gets into how to maximize the effectiveness of painting trees in 3D.

Nicely done Mark!

That's pretty amazing. More videos... demos of the previous versions: [vimeo]27366282[/vimeo]

Very flexible indeed! And... it looks more like real rubber than CG. (That's a good thing)

He's starting to look like the animated Obiwan Kenobi!

Nice whip! He has a kindly face. Reminds me of an uncle of mine. (without the long hair)

Perhaps the easiest way would be to parent all the Bones hierarchically in the PWS and then when applying to the path (which could just be a controlling spline BTW) use Compensate Mode to keep the Bones from moving. Alternately in an Action, you could adjust the ease of each Bone to move it into the ideal location. Then you could just drag/drop the Action wherever needed.

Very nice!

Short animation definitely should be the focus of an A:M contest. The name of the software is Animation:Master after all. I will say however that in the future (perhaps 2014 timeframe) I'm hoping to see a few rigging contests. What that would look like... hmmm.... I'm not entirely sure. Perhaps a fairly simple object could be offered and everyone would be invited to rig it and make it 'work'. I suppose the same can be said for Texturing and Lighting but I think Rigging is especially one of those areas that folks tend to be afraid to tackle until it's seen for what it really is and appreciated for what even the simplest of rigging can accomplish for the animator. There is nothing like a good contest to get the information to sink in fully through practice, repetition and (as someone said) just doing it! Edit: I see David has expressed a similar sentiment.

Lots of good feedback here. It seems to me that the common thread throughout all the feedback in about 'clarity'. Making the storytelling absolutely clear will pay off big dividends. Regarding the very first part of the animation it would help to put in some sort of reference to clue us in to what is happening such as ROM's spacecraft passing a recognizable planet. With the first view being that of the spacecraft (presumably) moving toward Earth the next shot would logically be that of passing the Moon and heading toward Earth. I've taken the liberty of putting together an example with two spheres and a lathed circular plane (see attachment). There are textured planets posted in the A:M Exchange area of the forum to play with. I've added a hastily put together progression of passing Saturn and Mars and approaching Earth (just spheres and a lathed plane around Saturn). I'm not suggesting that you necessarily follow this but something in the scene to provide a comparison with ROM's travel/trajectory would help clarify that we are tracking an object moving toward Earth. Approach.mov

Lots of good feedback here. It seems to me that the common thread throughout all the feedback in about 'clarity'. Making the storytelling absolutely clear will pay off big dividends. Regarding the very first part of the animation it would help to put in some sort of reference to clue us in to what is happening such as ROM's spacecraft passing a recognizable planet. With the first view being that of the spacecraft (presumably) moving toward Earth the next shot would logically be that of passing the Moon and heading toward Earth. I've taken the liberty of putting together an example with two spheres and a lathed circular plane (see attachment). There are textured planets posted in the A:M Exchange area of the forum to play with. I've added a hastily put together progression of passing Saturn and Mars and approaching Earth. I'm not suggesting that you necessarily follow this but something in the scene to provide a comparison with ROM's spacecraft would help clarify that we are tracking an object moving toward Earth.

If you are using After Effects to composite you have to tell that program to recognize the Alpha Transparency. If using A:M the transparent areas will automatically be transparent. In that way there is no need to use Cookie Cutter. Edit: When opening your TGA image in an image editor I don't see any transparency.* I'll add it and upload it. Update: Updated image attached. *Note: When creating a transparency in image editing progams make sure your background layer is empty/transparent. If it is just a layer of white then it isn't transparent. Green_01_wAlpha.tga

I'm not sure where your updated animation is at this point. Did you try to upload it?

An ad for alcohol would be an interesting choice because... when Hopper painted the image (1930) prohibition was still in effect (1920 to 1933).

Something isn't right there because the object would actually be slowing down as it falls in that scenario. It's not toward the downward (destination) that the half is divided but toward the upward (origin) for any accelerating object such as one falling under gravity. If it were slowing then the division would favor that deceleration. This isn't quite what you are taling about but... "Fourth Down in Half the Time" makes a bit more sense (to me): ikQo5k7YtuU

You've changed quite a bit here so I'm not sure what you did. The frames I mentioned still appear to be there so I'll assume you removed some prior to the faceplant vs after. I think I'm going to echo what Sebastian said here... my purpose of suggesting you remove the frames was to lessen the effect of what I percieved as an incorrect fall. This last one looks almost like he intentionally does the face plant... something only idiots do (and usually pay an extreme price for). Unfortunately he's still easing into that fall/slump which makes it appear he is to an extent consciously controlling his fall. It's almost like someone saying to themselves, "I think I'll stand on my head" then hitting the ground with their head entirely too hard... but reacting in an odd fashion. Aside: My Mom apparently did something similar last week although she (luckily?) fell backward and hit the back of her head rather than forward into a face plant. She is recovering quite well (after a few staples) but it does make me consider the effects of balance and weight on the aged... and youth as well. It's something that will (or does) affect us all. Gravity isn't just a drag, it's like the power going out (or on) and having everything immediately and uncontrollably fall. The only thing that dicates the how of it is the underlying bone structure. Added: It's interesting to note that I thought your first face plant was painfully accurate up to the point of the face plant. Even the scooting forward on the face immediately after the faceplant... painfully accurate. It was only the lingering at the top with the prolonged ease down that was problematic. ...and only by approximately two or three frame at that. I should have just downloaded and removed those frames to demonstrate what I was talking about.

Looking good. I believe that if you removed just one or two frames from immediately after he does the face plant that would work quite well. The delay in his body dropping to the ground is a good idea but it's just a bit too slow. If delaying, I'd do that at the top. In old world animation terms removing the frames would be the equivalent of transitioning from a slow action (on twos) to a fast action (on ones). Up to the face plant you've got the slow action. As soon as that registers with the viewer it'd be good to let gravity FLOOOMP* the body down to earth. Avoiding the Slow Ease down will help with the comedic effect while offsetting the pain we feel for the character. Having the Ease downward is simply delaying the characters agony a few frames more and (if desired) it would probably be better to keep that delay as a moving hold up at the top position before the fall rather than during the descent. If you can get away with having this sequence a few frames shorter I'd just removed the frames and press on. That's be enough to tell the story. *FLOOOMP being the techical term.

Nothing says you can't work on more than one story at the same time.