AuthorTopic: [Feedback Needed] Female Run Cycle  (Read 5332 times)

Offline Sammy

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[Feedback Needed] Female Run Cycle

on: June 29, 2020, 07:03:46 pm
Hello everyone. These are run cycles I made for this character, facing down and up (so far):
                              

My partner says arms in facing up animation look like she's doing a Fortnite dance.
So I want to know your opinion about it. How can I improve the facing up animation if you agree with what my partner says?
Also if you have critiques about anything else, let me know.

Thanks a lot in advance!

« Last Edit: June 29, 2020, 10:44:03 pm by Sammy »

Offline Chonky Pixel

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Re: [Feedback Needed] Female Run Cycle

Reply #1 on: June 30, 2020, 06:34:00 am
Firstly, great work! I love the design and the detail.

Secondly, I'm no great animator. Hopefully, another pair of eyes on it will help you figure out the problems. Don't take me too seriously though.

But yes, I agree with your partner. The "down" animation looks great. It's a purposeful stride with a little sway that helps it feel natural.

The up animation feels like it has lots more sway. Like, loads. My thoughts for the reasons behind this are:

 - The hair moves side to side a LOT. My brain also sees a bum wiggle that creates the feeling of this being a dance move. If I cover up the hair then I can see that the skirt really isn't moving much side-to-side, so I feel like the big hair motion is the cause here.

 - The arms look like they're moving side-to-side in sync, to me. Because I only see one at once, my brain fills in the gaps. What I'm seeing (possibly emphasised by the hair sway) is each arm extending to near full length on each side in turn. I'm imagining her clicking her fingers at each full extension. Again, maybe because of the hair motion leading my eye, the other arm seems to move across the body at the same time. I imagine it at a similar angle to the visible arm, hidden by her body, also doing a finger click. Jazzy! I'm kinda seeing something like this guy, maybe a little like the character after him as well:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2XtLEp0XAII&t=60

I feel like a couple of things might help here. One is toning down that hair sway in the "up" animation. I feel like it's a bit wide and we'd see more of it from the front view if it was that big... And it seems to be at the root of the whole "dancing" issue. It's a shame though, it's a really great sway.

The other is concentrating on showing the backs of the elbows rather than hands in the "up" animation. I feel like we see too much hand, so it makes the arm look almost straight at full extension. Also, if you can keep both arms visible throughout the "up" animation then I wouldn't feel like they were moving sideways across the body.

I'm not sure how easy or effective either of those would be TBH, but I hope there's something in there that helps...

Offline SeDiceBisonte

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Re: [Feedback Needed] Female Run Cycle

Reply #2 on: June 30, 2020, 08:37:30 am
I am also not an animator, but hopefully this of some use. I basically agree with everything Chonky Pixel said, but I also noticed that the white highlight at the bottom of her tunic in the "up" animation moves quite dramatically from side to side which is emphasizing the wiggle. I think you wouldn't have to tone down the hair movement all that much if you also altered that highlight. I think if you slowed it down and stopped it from moving as far to each side then that would stop the feeling of it rotating to such an extent.

I also think showing the backs of the elbows more would be a tremendous help. Aside from that, the character is great: very charming and with a lot of personality in the movement. I really like her outfit. That skirt is lovely  :)

Offline Chonky Pixel

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Re: [Feedback Needed] Female Run Cycle

Reply #3 on: June 30, 2020, 11:32:24 am
Good spot on the highlight!

I also noticed that her legs seem narrower in the "up" animation. I prefer the ones in the "down" animation, they seem more in proportion.

Offline falz

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Re: [Feedback Needed] Female Run Cycle

Reply #4 on: June 30, 2020, 05:20:25 pm
First up, these sprites demonstrate a lot of character and attention to detail! I think this is for sure looking better and better.

My main criticism is the flawed use of perspective. In adapting the first sprite, which generally has correct (if not stylized) proportions, to another viewing angle, you have warped the character's shape. If you had a look at my game's thread you might have noticed we are using the same perspective for out character sprites. One thing I have learned as I make them: to get the correct look for the different directions, the limbs of the characters cannot line-up exactly between the sprites because that would be ignoring perspective.

 Looking at these bent rods from a side, front, and back view, you can see that to accurately depict them, they must be drawn completely differently. Your character's arms are in a similar shape.





I see that you have lined them up exactly with the purple line. You gotta adapt the shape using tenets of perspective drawing to get a look that is desirable. One last point, with an animation where your character is running so energetically, I would recommend showing the shape of the legs through the skirt because they most certainly would be altering the shape of the skirt with the amount the legs are lifting.

I hope this helps!
« Last Edit: June 30, 2020, 05:27:27 pm by falz »

Offline Sammy

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Re: [Feedback Needed] Female Run Cycle

Reply #5 on: July 01, 2020, 09:57:11 am
Thank you all for your comments so far. Really appreciate it. I have taken note of the critiques and will be applying them.

In the meanwhile, if anyone has more critiques about it, please don't hesitate to mention them to me :)

Offline erdo

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Re: [Feedback Needed] Female Run Cycle

Reply #6 on: July 01, 2020, 05:53:01 pm
Problem is the hand that goes backwards with each step also moves excessively outwards.

I made an unpolished edit of the first and last frames of each half of the animation (frames 1,4,5,8). Just shadowed the arm that goes backwards and brought it closer to the body.
« Last Edit: July 01, 2020, 06:09:20 pm by erdo »

Offline Sammy

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Re: [Feedback Needed] Female Run Cycle

Reply #7 on: July 06, 2020, 04:30:47 pm
I made some changes based on the comments. This is the updated version.

   

Is it better or worse? If you think anything needs to change, let me know! Thanks :)

Offline Chonky Pixel

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Re: [Feedback Needed] Female Run Cycle

Reply #8 on: July 07, 2020, 07:01:06 am
Definitely much less of that sashay. The arms going through the hair is an interesting move, and I think you pulled it off. Nice.

In the down animation, the bare legs are 6px wide, in the up animation they're 5. Again, I prefer the wider ones.

So IMO there's still a bit of a wiggle, and you could still interpret the arm movements as finger clicks if you wanted to. But overall it feels so much more like running than it did before. The work you did on the hair really pulled it back. I'd call it a good job and move on, but as I say, I'm no animation expert.

Great work though.

Offline SeDiceBisonte

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Re: [Feedback Needed] Female Run Cycle

Reply #9 on: July 07, 2020, 10:02:37 am
My brain definitely reads that as running rather than dancing now. It's really good!