GR#148 - Slashing Animation

[Zizka]

Hello guys!

So I'm continuing my work on this game:

1st attempt:


2nd attempt:


3rd attempt:


4th attempt


5th attempt


As usual, I will rework this as many times as necessary.

[Gamer36]

The second one is much better than the first, it is more slashing, while the first it looks like he is spinning a rope around. I am on my school laptop, and thus do not have a very good image editor, but when the knife is behind his head, I don't think it is long enough that you would see the tip of the blade. (I counted pixels). I'll leave critiquing the colors and anatomy to someone else

[HarveyDentMustDie]

First one is not so good, it looks like a parody of a sword fight.

Second one is almost identical as .

It's great as a basic reference but you shouldn't copy it frame by frame, cause then there will be two games with the same character movement, but your will only be a copy.

Try to use what you've learned so far from this example, and create your own version. Maybe yours will be even better.

[Zizka]

@HarveyDentMustDie:

I did use that animation as a reference. To be honest, I didn't think it would improper as the sprite I animated is my own. I guess it depends on the person, although I do feel like I'm being put on the spot here as if I'm some sort of imposter which is sort of upsetting .  . Also your message doesn't really provide any input as to how I can make my original animation better so... so yeah, it sort of puts me on the defensive.

I didn't copy it frame for frame but at it open in another window and I tried to reproduce it. I did the exact same thing for the running animation using a tutorial from ptoing and no one mentioned anything. Where do you draw the line when using a reference? Isn't ok to use the same movement if the sprite is different? I don't know, but it wasn't my intention to steal anything from anyone.

If I used a video as a reference and I copied the movement, would it be ok? I just want to make sure I'm doing the right thing.

To sum things up, in your message, you said:

1. Your first animation is bad. I'm not telling how you can improve it, just that it looks like a parody...

Why not provide some pointers in other to help me improve instead? I mean, I don't know how to use this criticism...

2. Your second attempt is a copy. You can't use a reference like this in my opinion.
Ok, I see your point about if the game comes out and I agree with you. It's not clear how much I'm ''allowed'' to use a reference and I doubt it's a universal truth either. But in this case, I agree with you, what you say is logical.

@gamer36:

Thanks for the comment about the knife, I agree, you're right.

[ErekT]

It's completely cool imo, at least for learning. Reference, copy, whatever. You can learn a lot from reproducing the techniques of others. I referenced hard back in the day and still do when I try to expand my comfort zone. (Um, that's not an endorsement for blatant rip-offs of course ) But it has its limits. If you want to become a good character animator you need to make yourself conscious of how the body actually moves when it performs an action. From your animations I get the feeling you didn't try the movement out for yourself, did you? If not, do that. And while you do, pay attention to what your body does to carry out the swing. What happens to the hips? Do they rotate? Do your hips move before or after your arms? What about the torso? Shoulders? Get a feel for these things and you'll be a lot more free to create completely original animations. You'll be extra happy with your work too.

[HarveyDentMustDie]

Sorry if I offended you, that was not my intention.

I said that the first version is not very good, and if I were you I would continue to work on the second one.

Second one, I clearly said that is good as a reference, but you need to add more of you into it. Using reference means, trying to learn form it, not trying to recreate it. If this wasn't obvious copy how would I recognize it from the first view. Same leg movement, same head movement etc. only he is now dressed for a winter. How can anyone help you to improve already good animation.

For me your work it's not a problem at all, I only post this comment so you try to make it more of your own creation. Create some interesting move by using things you learned from this animation like motion blur, frame timings etc.

[Selassin]

 I agree with HarveyDentMustDie, it's good but with better timing you can make it more fluid I think.

 Here, I cut 2 frames, first one is before the slash effect, because it slows down the and prevents "powerful smash" feeling, and second one is the last frame, because when you loop the animation, he's left legs look weird, like bouncing. And I played with frame times:


 And this is more fluid animation, I just played with frame times, but it needs more frames for better animation(like preparing for attack or more ending frames):

[astraldata]

The fundamental problem with your 2nd attack is not the frame timing (as was suggested by Selassin), but instead is the timing of the stomping of the foot itself. Having practiced Kendo for some years, I can easily spot the lack of power being wasted by the stomping of the foot too late in the attack.

Try to make him step forward completely just as he's beginning to swing his weapon, then follow-through with the attack as it is now (you'll mostly just need to delay/slow the upper-body movement by a few frames before he swings [this is all assuming you're going for a powerful sword strike of course] ).

The main thing is to make sure he has stepped forward first (his upper-body dragging behind a little), then, once his weight is placed on his front leg almost completely, lean his upper-body in for the slash.

[Zizka]

@ErekT:

I get the feeling you didn't try the movement out for yourself, did you?

I did and I got the first result. Maybe I need to use a mirror or something.

@HarveyDentMustDie:

What upset me is that I had the feeling I was being accused of something I never considered in the first place considering that I thought it was ok to do what I did (and still kind of do to some extent). No hard feelings anyway. Anyways, this won't happen again as I will always put up every single reference I use in the future.

@Selassin:

I think removing some frames might be a good idea.

@astraldata:

I've copy/pasted your message and try to improve my version although I might remove the foot thing entirely in order to the animation to be more different than my reference.

[wolfenoctis]

Copying to figure out what someone did is ok, as long as you don't stop there, understand the principles he used and apply them to your own animation. It's clear from your post that you didn't understand why he made that char move the way he did(referring to chasm's), which is why you ended up with a shallow imitation. Now there is a reason people tend to look down on copycats and plaigerisers, they are seen to be ripping off someone elses work rather than doing the effort of coming up with their own and the practice is rightly frowned upon. I'ts ok for practice but not when presenting it as your own work. To illustrate my points I made two variations using the same principles used in the chasm sprite:




See the difference, the expression of my movements are my own, but I used the same principles as that of chasm's sprite instead of copying the expression of chasm's sprite.

Also try to keep your sprite rough like I did mine until you've finalised the animation, and then detail it, it will save you a lot of unnecessary work 
A good resource on animation and it's foundational principles can be found in "The Animators Survival Kit" by Richard Williams (Highly Recommend you obtain it if you're able).
Hope it helps and good luck 

Edit: The pauses at the beginning and end of my animations are just to show off the movement, they should not be present in a game scenario because they will make the controls feel unresponsive, no one wants to press an attack button and wait for an attack to happen