AuthorTopic: I need critique on this animation stat!! (WIP 3 Attacks)  (Read 8680 times)

Offline Mike

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Re: I need critique on this animation stat!! (WIP 3 Attacks)

Reply #10 on: January 25, 2009, 04:02:39 am
Thanks ndchristie, seeing this example really helped clear some things up for me.  I do have a question though.  You said you did this all without watching it, I was wondering how?  Normally when I do an animation like this I have to act it out for more than several minutes.  Is there some kind of hint I can get for laying out these attacks better?  Do you use action lines or anything like that?  I've never actually tried laying out the line of action and then draw from it(pretty much how you do that first bouncing ball exercise in animation class)  Sorry I'm rambling a bit, to summarize I just want to know if there is a more methodical way of laying out attacks.  Technically I should be able to bust these out fairly quick but its been taking me a few days for this one.  I guess I'm not quite at the point of just completing a process.  I'm still at that stage where each animation is a learning experience.

Anyway I'm gonna take a look at your animation frame for frame and see what I can do.

(edit)

However, it is *only* the keyframes that I would use in this animation - I haven't even started to tween them!  in a combo, recovery from one move is the anticipation of the next, so counting "idle" it's an 8-key animation to me : idle -- set1 -- attack 1 -- rec1/set2 -- attack2 -- rec2/set3 -- attack3 -- rec3 -- idle

This is good stuff and makes perfect sense, the recovery from one attack is the anticipation of the next, that's brilliant and quite economic.  Although I was wondering; will I be able to break these down into 3 separate animations?  Furthermore there won't be a need for an idle since after the attack is done the idle animation will play.

with that said I still think I definitely have huge problems with inbetweening...
« Last Edit: January 25, 2009, 04:33:11 am by Mike »

Offline ndchristie

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Re: I need critique on this animation stat!! (WIP 3 Attacks)

Reply #11 on: January 25, 2009, 07:15:07 am
While it's not always the case, and while this animation I've given you needs a lot of changes to be made (particularly to final timing), you should really be able to throw out a first draft sketch like this without a reference and then use those types of things to 'fix' your intuitive strokes.  I am not a fantastic animator either, but I have a sense more or less of ho the body needs to move across basic bat-swinging.  I'm using a very simple marionette here which helps.

I actually suggest never watching an animation before you start revising.  I learn more about motion if I give myself fewer guides from the beginning.  Think of yourself like a lab rat - try it, and when you fuck up, prepare to be shocked.  Once you get shocked you probably won't do that again.  The monkey only touches fire once.  However, it's much better than reading the rules book and playing straight through without ever knowing why things are done a certain way.

Quote
Furthermore there won't be a need for an idle since after the attack is done the idle animation will play.

on a loop I always list the first frame last as well for clarity.  "1-2-3..." isn't half as clear as writing "1-2-3-1..."
A mistake is a mistake.
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The same mistake three or more times is a motif.

Offline Mike

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Re: I need critique on this animation stat!! (WIP 3 Attacks)

Reply #12 on: January 25, 2009, 08:20:44 am
Here is an edit of just the first attack, it isn't like ndchristie's though.  Unfortunately I couldn't figure out how to properly draw out the line of action the bat takes.  I know its an arc but I had a hard to time drawing it.  So to fix that I had to add more frames.  I don't know whether or not if that helped or if it made it worse.



Its supposed to be a bat...not a sword.  I feel like it moves too much like a sword in this animation.  I have been trying to give it a horizontal movement...

back to the drawing board.

Offline ndchristie

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Re: I need critique on this animation stat!! (WIP 3 Attacks)

Reply #13 on: January 25, 2009, 10:01:08 am
this is almost precisely what I warned you against doing - I hope that is clear to you now because it's not working.  Congratulations little rat, you've been zapped again!!

the motion you've arrived at is pretty complicated for an amateur.  it's not reason not to try, but it's one of the main reason this doesn't work at all.
by working blindly you've added in far too many frames, ending up with a slow, wobbly swing.

in general, there are to types of attacks you want to make : fast attacks, and strong attacks.  both use, in general, a single frame to bridge anticipation and recovery.  the main difference is that strong attacks tend to be longer animations with more parts, particularly in recovery, but both really put most of the effort into the frames around the attack.  you're doing the opposite here, putting very few frames into the start and end but giving us hat, three or four for the swing itself?  the result is a very weak attack that doesn't look properly executed - because it isn't.

if there's one thing you should take from practicing these moves yourself, it's the ways you need to move prior to and after swinging.  as I said before, the body does not skip steps, it only learns to do them faster.

also a note : we were always taught that a solid cannot be compressed (aside from the occasional reference, as happens with all impossibilities, to "unless you could focus the power of a billion suns...") so your ice bat idea is just....ice.  the groovy/silly science fiction type solution would be to say that it's actually a chemical reaction in a controlled chamber (the handle) which is absorbing so much energy from the material around it, creating a type of energy vaccum that actually freezes solid the water vapor and other particles in the path of the intake, resulting in a constantly freezing and refreezing "bat" of cold and ice...:P
« Last Edit: January 25, 2009, 10:05:14 am by ndchristie »
A mistake is a mistake.
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Offline Mike

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Re: I need critique on this animation stat!! (WIP 3 Attacks)

Reply #14 on: January 25, 2009, 07:46:10 pm
Aw man...failed again.  Anyway I tried doing a swing like you did but each time I tried to draw the blurs it always ended up looking like he was attacking downward, instead of upward like he is supposed to and like it is drawn in yours.  How did you make it look like he was attacking upward while only using one from?

Also are you saying that I only need 1 setup, 1 frame to show the attack, and recovery for the motion I'm trying to do?  There should be no inbetweens for the swing?  Is the attack swing not as important?  Even why I act it out I have a hard time figuring out exactly what line of action the swing is taken, hence my horribly attack lines.  I'm gonna work on it more today, only using the three frames you suggested.  I figure I should work on 1 attack at a time at least for now.

Offline Ai

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Re: I need critique on this animation stat!! (WIP 3 Attacks)

Reply #15 on: January 27, 2009, 07:02:49 am
Aw man...failed again.  Anyway I tried doing a swing like you did but each time I tried to draw the blurs it always ended up looking like he was attacking downward, instead of upward like he is supposed to and like it is drawn in yours.  How did you make it look like he was attacking upward while only using one from?
The direction of the attack is primarily conveyed by the surrounding frames; the actual swing frame conveys what the speed and force of the attack is.
In the case of your horizontal swing, you may not even need a movement arc. see below

Quote
Also are you saying that I only need 1 setup, 1 frame to show the attack, and recovery for the motion I'm trying to do?  There should be no inbetweens for the swing?  Is the attack swing not as important? 
The attack swing is the most important, that's why there are no in-betweens for it. You have like..
* frame for 'about to swing'
then
* frame for 'have swung'

You don't see such motions as you drew in a real life fight; you just see the actions that imply they are about to happen or have happened.
If you insist on being pessimistic about your own abilities, consider also being pessimistic about the accuracy of that pessimistic judgement.

Offline Fool

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Re: I need critique on this animation stat!! (WIP 3 Attacks)

Reply #16 on: January 28, 2009, 09:43:40 pm
If you plan sword path in advance it will help to avoid eratical moves - path will help an eye to follow the movement.
Here is an example - path is quick shot, but hope you get my point.=) Also, when you have a limited frame rate you most likely have to deal with a key frames mostly, which  makes you to use every frame as effective as possible - each frame put out of sequence would have to be readable as stance performing snapshot.
Anticipation game wise could be better if you make it partially - let say sword and hands anticipating while body moves forward, so you don't lost seconds in attacking.
« Last Edit: January 28, 2009, 09:46:45 pm by Fool »

Offline Mike

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Re: I need critique on this animation stat!! (WIP 3 Attacks)

Reply #17 on: January 29, 2009, 02:10:17 am
wow holy crap that is really good, pretty much exactly what I was looking for.  So you really do have to plan out the line the sword takes before doing the animation?  That's pretty cool and also this is a helpful study aid, thanks so much!!

Offline Fool

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Re: I need critique on this animation stat!! (WIP 3 Attacks)

Reply #18 on: January 29, 2009, 03:24:38 am
In ideal, it is a bless to make path (motion arch) for every moving object in animation. Let say, if arm in one frame goes up, next one - going down, and the next - up again there is a good chance the viewer will not read that at all - there is nothing to keep an eye on the track. As to the sword fighting - in kempo combat sword technique teaching is not a set of slashing and poking moves but rather drawing and wrighting with a sword, (I wonder why japanese writing remind sword marks so much=) Some sword performer insist that runes  and sword path are closely  related.)