Drogoth, I considered what you said about the left leg bending front too much, but it doesn't snap or break his leg or anything. It's a natural bend (if you saw it from the side). So I figured that was the assumed main issue and left it alone.
Oooh, looks nice! How'd you add all that splendid shaking? And you're the best judge.
I'll be fixing the animations up on the next stream. So if you haven't seen the new animations, you'll get your chance!
Also, I might jump around between animating projects (specifically HW/TP Link and Shulk), but I might just finish up HW/TP Link (I don't have much to do for him tbh, he's going to be the 3rd smallest PSA I've worked on) instead of jumping in between. But we'll see.
Stream to do list:
1. Shield Bash (make the bash faster) 2. Up Smash (add more obvious recoil after releasing the arrow) 3. Helm Splitter (redo completely) 4. Mortal Draw (redo completely) 5. Jump Slash (redo completely)
Seeing as how ~2 animations takes about an hour, I'll probably only get up to and probably do a bit of the Helm Splitter before ending the stream.
Stream is scheduled for Thursday night/Friday afternoon.
Yeah, the skype name is TheShyGuy along with the same avatar.
Gotcha
Quote
About the left leg: Forward in what direction (image left or image right?, toward viewer or back into the distance?) and around what frame?
About frame 13 when the left leg moves towards the viewer. And left would be Ganondorf's left.
Quote
1) Yeah, I playblast it using with the PNG image type, Save Animation to a folder, open all images as layers in Gimp, then export as a gif and finally setting the correct delay time and disposal type.
I'll keep it in mind. I'll ask more on skype or something lol
Quote
2)I don't understand what you were trying to say with the example =/. Before I go into how I went about this animation, I'd like to mention a few things..
First, I haven't animated in a while so er that's my disclaimer.
Second, from what I've come across from animation "research", it's preferred to first block animations out. That means you "turn off" interpolation (stepped tangents) and create all the important key poses. You'd then make all the necessary intermediate poses. After all that, then you can turn on ipo and work on the final touches.
Why not just work with linear or splines right off the bat? Because the computer isn't going interpolate between keys exactly how you'd like it to. Usually, you're going to be fighting with it to get the correct keys.
Instead, it's usually better to block out *enough keys so that once you turn on linear/spline tangents, the program can't possibly screw things up...- and thus you'll have less to clean up.
*This doesn't mean you have to key every single frame. If there is a significant change between frames, it might be better to make your own intermediate frame instead of letter the program screw it over- and you'd have to clean it up. If two poses are pretty close, then there's no point.
If you use HumanIK, at this point, I stop setting full body keys and set it to specific body parts.
... I guess that explains my current workflow, actually. Block out key poses. Block out enough intermediate poses. Turn interpolation on. Clean up.
Thanks for all the info
Quote
3) From what I remember, I thought TransN moves(translates) characters in game without the character teleporting back or does the HipN bone also do allow translation?
If the character is returning to wait1, then there isn't much of a problem. But in your case, yeah TransN movement would be needed. What you could do is manually remove the hipN horizontal movement keyframes and use TransN.
Feet sliding is acceptable when it looks good animation-wise. Looking good takes higher priority than anything else.
Noted
Quote
As for how to go about moving the feet....uh I don't really know =/.
But, I'll tell you how I go about things, maybe it'll help. I uh...hmm. I just make key poses without trying to align anything to the previous frame. For the Gannon animation, I made each of the 3-4 key/main poses starting from the T-pose (mostly because working for the previous pose was too distracting/tedious). After that, I move the entire model with HipN to align the foot with the most weight on it(Though, I should probably use TransN....).
That'll give you blocked poses where, if the feet should move, it already is. Now, you just gotta animate the inbetweens so the step or slide looks natural.
Uh...I hope that helps.
Of course, any information helps. Maybe I'll try doing this next time. Specifically for the Jump Strike and Mortal Draw
Quote
Now, I'm going to move onto messing with tangents, unless there are any glaring issues?
Seems alright to me. Although something seems off about his left leg during the step forward. I think it bends a bit too much forward. I'm also assuming that left foot sliding back is intentional. Which looks perfectly fine to me. And the left arm movement is fantastic. Love how it just flows to the grab. Wanted to do that with the sword salute, but I couldn't quite get it.
Quote
Also, drogoth, you ever hear of how you should "have nice smooth arcs" in animation? The phrase is more of a simplification of the idea that real life objects move smoothly unless abruptly acted on (getting hit, pushed, etc). So, if anything ever "jerks" in your animations, you should make sure it theres a good reason for it. Otherwise, it's very distracting.
I feel like I have the opposite problem. In the up smash animation, I wanted to add a jerk for recoil after shooting the arrow. But... you can't even tell it's there. Some pointers on how to actually add jerkiness would be nice.
Couple of more maya questions:
1. What did you use to make the gif? Playblast it and then stick it in GIMP?
2. During your blocking phase, how do you make the animations just go from one pose to the next? I'd guess you have two key frames X distance apart and 1 frame after the second keyframe for the pose you'd have the other one and then continue as such.
3. You said this:
Quote
I move the entire model with HipN to align the foot with the most weight on it(Though, I should probably use TransN....).
Why TransN and not HipN?
EDIT: Also, you got a skype or something? It'd be easier to ask questions on that instead of waiting for replies on here or through PM. Just send a PM with your info if you want.
If the video doesn't load it to the correct time, it's at 1:55-59 and a bit onwards.
And even then, it still feels like a throwing action. Maybe an down-up movement or a left-right movement. But right left in that way feels like he's throwing something. IDK, but either way, I like how it looks so far, regardless of how I feel it looks like he's doing lol.
And a general question: when is it acceptable for feet sliding? Usually allow feet sliding when I'm acting out the animation and it just feels more natural to slide it across the ground as opposed to stepping.
I also feel like my animations lack feet movement. It seems like (and I believe that) there is very little foot movement. The knees/legs/rest of the body move much more than the rest of the body. I tried to rectify it by moving the foot so he's standing more on his toe or the side of his foot is on the ground, but is there anything else I can do?
I'm assuming it's supposed to be something similar to what Ganondorf did at the end of Ocarina of Time? The start looks almost like a start to a special (like a single handed charge up thingy). I personally feel more comfortable going for a grab from left to right (using my left hand for the grab).
If you could give more detail on how he's supposed to be holding them or something that'd be awesome. Because it could either be like a choke, or having the opponent be surrounded by dark energy .
The animation itself is very nice. Although what's with that little tick at frame ~40?
Think about how long you want an action to take. Then match your main key frames to that. The new batch's timings are all odd, where small actions take forever to happen. For example, the startup of JumpStrike, Link takes too long to grab his sword. If you want to keep the overall action slow, make the jump anticipation last longer instead.
I guess I just wanted to make sure that the player could actually tell that Link is moving to hold his sword.
Quote
For the jump strike, you didn't give much details on the mechanics, but I wanted to give a little input. There could be a "minimum" movement allowed that's in the animation already. That way, no matter what the player does, it looks good. Then, the toggle stick would only allow a small influence to either increase or decrease strike distance. The influence values should be less than or equal to the default change in horizontal distance per frame of the animations strike. This means that if the player holds back, they won't actually go backwards and look broken....
The Jump itself will be stationary without any controller input. The only direction you can go is forward.
Quote
I just started this animation today. It's a requested grab animation. It looked simple enough so hopefully I'll finish it =/. These are just the main key frames. The fingers are not keyed yet.
I... didn't even know what I was trying to make a point about.
Just for funsies, I checked what the Start animation length was (10 frames). Mortal Draw and the Jump Strike have about 20 frames and... looking back at it, I could make the jumping look much better (making his legs bend more before he jumps
Of course I say so! I can't improve without someone telling me what I'm doing
Quote
Needs more speed on the bash. As it is now, it's more like a push. You said you don't wanna speed it up for balancing reasons? Simply extend the startup, and then make the actual bash a fast one! We say it's too slow because the actual bash it too slow. Be more specific, guys... lol...
Got it!
Quote
I'd broaden that range to about 5 - 30 (2 in Zelda's case) cause you also have to take into account on which frame the hitbox will start at when doing the actual attack.
By start up I meant like the AttackS3Start animation
Quote
Legs stay in the same position even in the Air. There's no force driving him to actually jump.
Yeah, I'm not really sure how to animate the jump X.X
I blame Nintendo for this one. Velen will understand <:V
Quote
Some recoil when he shoots the arrow would be nice...
Aaaaand I knew I forgot something lol
Quote
This is an Animator thing in general. Before you even think about animating in Maya, it's a good idea to draw out your animations first. Make a few sketches, draw some pictures as to what the motion will look like, and be sure you can push poses to make it read better. No, you don't have to have the artistic ability to draw realistically, nor the knowledge to draw cool animu waifu characters. As long as you can do some gesture drawings on some medium to help you get an understanding as to how to pose the character, and break down the motions, you'll get some results.
I personally act out my animations instead of drawing. Helps me understand how the character might move or slide.
Show Posts
