Character Animation
Week 1
Introduction to 3D Animation, the bouncing ball
Pendulum Animation
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Week 2
The Obstacle course
Enable motion trail
Select Animation menu from drop down.
Go to Visualize > Motion Trail Editor
Motion trail automatically displays editable keyframes in scene.
Further edits done by Graph Editor.
Auto Tangents/Splined Tangents
Linear Tangents
Combination of Linear and Splined Tangent.
My Experimental Obstacle Course
Animating Cubby on a springboard
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Week 3
Posing an IK Arm and Leg Rig, Disney ‘Sack of flour’ animator training exercise
Creating and Posing and Arm Rig
Creating and Posing a Leg Rig
Creating Poses with ‘Sack of Flour’
Sack of Flour Originally above.
Depressed Sack of Flour
Jumping/Celebrating Sack of Flour
Falling Sack of Flour
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Week 4
Creating Poses, working with Human Rigs
Using the Eleven Rig
Head Turn Animation + Blinking
Head Turn Animation + Blinking & Smile
Head Turn Animation + Pointing at + Blinking & Smile
Animating the Sack of Flour
Jumping Sack
Falling Sack
Looking Around/Searching Sack
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Week 5
Poses continued, Character head turn and walk Pt. 1
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Week6
Walk cycle animations and challenge
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Week7
Lifting Weights
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Week 8
Animation Reference & Rotoscoping | Ball Kick / Box Lift | Industry Roles (Character Art & Animation)
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Week 9
Recap/ Catch-up Workshop/ Progress
Unrendered Videos
My Idea for my 11 second animation.
@johnseventine.vfx @Limpopo_Boy grooving with the Jujutsu Kaisen villain when curses meet killer moves! 🔥🕺👹 #DanceOff #CursedRhythms #AnimeGroove #jujutsukaisen #jjk #gojo
I will using this video above to root my Rig to dance to the music. Like a “music video” on the street kind of vibe.
Progress will be compiled at the bottom of this page.
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Week 10
Lip-Sync | Eleven Rig Controls & Viseme Blocking
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Screenshot
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ASSESSMENT 1
For the 1st assessment, we had requirements to adhere to.
We needed:
- a half_pipe,
- a spinning component,
- a springboard,
- a ramp
to be included in our animation.
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I modelled everything except for the the Rig which kicks the ball at the end.
For the Spinning Component, I modelled it from a a Cylinder. Extruding 4 faces on opposite sides, and then bevelling and adding edge loops.
For the Half-Pipe, I also modelled it from a cylinder, deleting faces and bridging across.
I used a Ball rig for the animation, but first I gauged the size using a standard sphere to see how it will basically look.
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I also modelled a simple ramp from a cube by moving its edges.
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I applied a Mesh Light to the individual letters and animated them to light up as the ball passes them.
I also modelled 2 hoops for the ball to go through as it “runs home”.
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Finally I begin to animation the ball going through the obstacle course.
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I modelled and animated 2 trigger traps to hit the ball when triggered. This is the first trap.
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Finally I used the 11_Second Rig I had previously nimated to kick the ball back to the beginning.
I move all the keyframes using the graph editor so that itmatches where the ball ends to synchronise the kick animation.
First is a CLOSE VIEW Render shown below
Then a FULL VIEW shown below
Final Renders Below
For first part of my 1ST ASSESSMENT I compiled both renders above into one video to give the illusion of a repeated cycle. Shown below.
The second part of my 1ST ASSESSMENT, I compiled most of the the Bouncing animation we did in class: shown below.
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ASSESSMENT 2
For the second assessment, we needed to show,
- at least 2 Flour Sack action/emotion state poses
- a Character walk forward
- a Character walk cycle
- a large box being lifted, and any heavy-weight lifted and animated
- a ‘Kick’ roto animation.
Below is my compilation of the above although not in that exact order.
The above for my assessment is a compilation of poses, weight shifting and lifting, and the application of pre and Post Infinity cycles.
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ASSESSMENT 3
For my third animation assessment, I roto-ed a dance routine of one of my favourite dancers.
The animation is to be at-least 11 seconds long.
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For my scene I acquired free models to help bring my idea to life.
I only modelled the road and ground. For the road I applied an AiStandard surface, used a road Jpeg of a road, and applied some noise as a bump map to make it look rough like.
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Everyother mocel was acquired, like the Plane, Both cars, the Park with green trees and both houses.
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There were issues with some models I acquired, so I had to remodel and fix some edges, remesh, and or add edge loops.
Other than that it was straight forward.
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I assembled my scene to my liking, placing the cars, park, houses and plane.
I scaled the individual models up and/or down to size, based on the size my Rig Character to match visually.
Did a quick render view to see how it looks.
SEQUENCE CREATION
I then downloaded the dance video for my animation and took it into after effects to create my sequences and include a time stamp for the frames.
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In the Timcode settings, I selected Frame Numbers for the Display Format, so that it counts the frames as I go.
I also readjusted its position on the sequences, so it that doesn’t obstruct my view when animating.
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In the Media encoder, changed it to a TARGA Sequence, as other formats aren’t properly recognised by the MAYA software I will be animating in.
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I changed the Frames Per Second (FPS) to 24 to match my animation’s sequence rate.
I then gave my sequences a name to rendered as.
In Maya, I created a plane, applied a material to it, and selected “Use Image Sequence”.
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This brought the sequence in with the right width and height, all I need to do was to scale it up proportionally.
Another reason I chose this method, was because of it’s brightness. Using the plane in the first had a dull dark colour making it a little hard to see clearly.
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Now to animate, I first set my parameters for my Rig.
I changed the Knee IK spaces to follow the Ankles, and the Arm IK Spaces and the Neck space to follow the Rig’s Chest.
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I animated poses, and points where the legs cross over.
I focused mainly on the legs, for reference purposes, since the body follows the legs naturally.
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Once the legs postion is guaged correctly, the body can be more easily poses for that frame.
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I also Animated the plane in my scene for a dramatic effect.
FACIAL ANIMATION
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For the purpose of this dance, the Character is mostly looking down towards his feet, or tip of hands as part of the expression for this dance style.
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I then rendered the frame sequences of the animation done so far.
I compiled the sequences to an MOV format using QuickTime Player on AppleMAC, the Operating system of my computer.
FINAL COMPILATION
.I acquired the audio for the dance video and used Adobe Premier Pro to put the sound to match the dance.
I had to time when the audio kicks in to match the dance moves and fit the dramatic entrance of the plane in scene.
Final Render below