AuthorTopic: Chasm: Character Animations  (Read 22155 times)

Offline slym

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Re: Chasm: Character Animations

Reply #10 on: December 24, 2012, 05:49:39 am
Yaomon: The exaggeration is intended to create a clunkier and more soldier-like run. But I do agree that between the exaggeration and the legs there is a timing issue. Here's an updated version that I think handles it a bit better, but still has the sync issue.

« Last Edit: December 24, 2012, 07:53:40 am by slym »

Offline Helm

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Re: Chasm: Character Animations

Reply #11 on: December 24, 2012, 09:40:18 am
Please consider the lengths of the legs in these in-between frames. I'm no animation master, but I can tell you it's a very common rookie mistake to mutate the legs every frame, shorten, lengthen, move the knee wherever. PPP or Ptoing will probably post a few useful charts for you.

Offline ptoing

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Re: Chasm: Character Animations

Reply #12 on: December 24, 2012, 04:55:30 pm
Just gonna post this, in case you have not seen it yet.


And yeah, keeping your volumes is one of the most important thing in animation. Of course these rules can be broken if you wanna go for really broad animation with swoops and smears and such, but for a normal walk like you go there I would not recommend it.

Also people generally do not turn their heads while walking, which also is a pretty common rookie mistake. Before animating anything you should try to act it out if it is at all possible. Walk across the room like you want your character to walk and observe how you move. Don't rely on how you think people move, use reference.
There are no ugly colours, only ugly combinations of colours.

Offline slym

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Re: Chasm: Character Animations

Reply #13 on: December 24, 2012, 09:10:26 pm
Thanks for the awesome critique. Just to clarify, this is a run animation not a walking on. So that could also be an issue with it. It's the difficulty of capturing a heavy run animation that could be causing it to look like he's speed walking. Here's the current version:



@Helm: Thanks for the tip. Yeah I definitely noticed some shrinkage and growth going on in his legs, hopefully that is fixed now.

@ptoing: Yes I have seen that chart before, but it's always nice to see it again! You're definitely right about that head =P

Offline ptoing

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Re: Chasm: Character Animations

Reply #14 on: December 25, 2012, 01:04:07 am
For some reason your images are not working for me atm, but as far as run animations go, they need at least one frame where both feet are OFF the ground.
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Offline slym

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Re: Chasm: Character Animations

Reply #15 on: December 25, 2012, 02:34:05 am
ptoing: how about this?



(and alternate source since Dropbox seems to be kinda unstable right now):


And here's a frame by frame thing:
http://gif-explode.com/?explode=http://dl.dropbox.com/u/73544729/012Projects/Chasm/Character/Animations/drafts/run_30.gif

Offline ptoing

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Re: Chasm: Character Animations

Reply #16 on: December 25, 2012, 07:58:30 pm
The bounce is a bit too heavy, for what he looks like and the front shoulder looks like it unhinges quite a bit when going forward. In the legs you have a weird pause when they are moved forward and curled up most, I would make those frames more distinct, looks oddly robotic.

Other than that you are coming along nicely. Perhaps even try to have him off the ground for longer, 2 frames or something.
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Offline slym

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Re: Chasm: Character Animations

Reply #17 on: December 25, 2012, 08:17:52 pm
How about this?



That shoulder comment was really awesome, it looks much more natural now.

Offline tehwexxl0rz

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Re: Chasm: Character Animations

Reply #18 on: December 25, 2012, 09:36:05 pm
This has a really nice rhythm and flow to it. :)

The amount of bounce is good, but I think he comes down a little too hard; there's a bit of a jolt. (Maybe that's what ptoing meant by "heavy?")

Offline ptoing

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Re: Chasm: Character Animations

Reply #19 on: December 25, 2012, 10:05:32 pm
Now he is gliding, as in not really setting down. This can be fixed by moving 2 of the frames down 1 pixel, I think it is the contact frames, where his heel hits the ground. This will also result in a smoother bounce and look less forced/robotic/heavy golem like (which he is not by design, unless he is some android with a really heavy skeleton).

The shoulder issue still is there. Also look at the frame where the front shoulder is most to the right, his front leg, while being back, is also to the right. The hips and shoulders move opposite. If the hips are like / the shoulders are like \ (viewed from above)

There still is discrepancy between sideview and a kinda 3/4 view which you need to unify before it will look solid.

On closer inspection there still is quite a bit of deformation of volumes in the legs. This being sideways, try to map out the legs and feet using single pixel lines of same lengths with 2x2 or single pixel clusters of other colours as the joints. Once you have an animation with that where the length of the lines does not change, then you can add volume and everything will be a lot more consistent. You can also do this for the entiry body. It helps a lot until you are more fluent in animation. Construction is a good thing here, and animation needs planning.
There are no ugly colours, only ugly combinations of colours.