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[Kevin Gales]

So I created this girl and rigged her but I don't have ideas what to make her do (animation)

[johnar]

walking is a good start. Walking, stopping, then begining to walk again is also a good one to get your head around.
Walk sequences are a great thing to have in your animation arsenal. Export your sequences into a sequence folder for that character. Other really handy sequences to export/keep are hand movements. Open hand , closed hand, index finger bend, middle finger bend etc...
 I've got seperate 'hand poses' for Left and Right hands, and also others affecting both hands.  (like 'both hands closed, both hands open.
 Key only the hand bones in the sequence, and then they can be added at anytime during the animation without affecting any other parts of the body.
 I've also got walking sequences saved where only the leg bones are keyed. So while your character is walking everything 'above waist' is free to be animated doing other things.
 Jumping and running are good ones for practicing 'weight and timing' as well.
 Btw: Nice cloe model
 some of my first character animations involved 'walking while singing' and 'walk, stop, talk, then start walking again. Use arm/hand gestures while talking during a walk and while standing still are all good practice.

[Steve]

Nice model, Kevin.

[Kevin Gales]

@Steve  : Thanks,I also thought I nailed her especially the hair   @johnar : Pretty cool isn't she ? well I thought of a walk cycle but thought it's pretty low..I think I'll work on something thanks for your ideas though

[johnar]

. Yes, she definately is pretty cool. Well done.
 Ideas?    Dancing is a tricky one.
 Picking things up and throwing.
 Gymnastics.
 Opening an umbrella, or a book.
 Ice skating.
 Martial arts.
 Conversation with another.
  Hmmm. Could write a list but there are really so many possibilities.
 As far as walking being 'low', it is one of the most basic movements to begin with, but if you're talking about perfecting the art,  a simple walk cycle is the beginning of a huge range of movements. There's all types of walks. Drunk, sneaky, backwards and so on. (i never got far with different walks)
 Anyway, whatever you decide, it'll be good to see cloe moving.
 Nice one Kevin.

[Kevin Gales]

@johnar : Thanks man...let me do the walk circle first then I'll post the demo... 

[Michel Colaço]

Congratulations on your model Kevin! Another suggestion that works very well for me is to take a very small piece of animation that you think is cool and play it with your character to practice.

I did something like this with a character I made to see him in motion.

https://www.facebook.com/mcolfilms/videos/290798834898815/

[Kevin Gales]

@Michel Colaço  Thanks.Cool clip.. Guess what? yesterday I watched several movies and animation to get references anyway I am working on something...

[Kevin Gales]

I have been busy...but here is a quick walk cycle....

[olan]

nice one kevin

[johnar]

Nice start kevin.
 Theres a few ways to sort out the 'sliding' along the floor.
 One sure fire ways is to use the squares on the floor as markers, or some other marker arrangement is good.
 I'll usually use 3 views, with a side view used for positioning. If your side view shows as the bottom of 3 views, you can 'arc rotate' the view till chloe is standing on top of the time track, with her front toes on one of the time track 'frame'marker lines, then, frame by frame, re-position her so that her toes stay back on that same mark right up untill her front leg becomes the back leg, and until it leaves the ground. Then do the same for each step. ie. Front foot touches ground and is keyed at that exact same position until it is the back leg and leaves the ground.
 Hopethat makes sense. It doesn't actually take very long once you get the hang of it, and it takes away that 'sliding' motion, which never looks as good as when the grounded foot stays in the 'same, right' spot while walking. (or running or whatever)
EDIT: After watching a few more time, i see you have the front foot thing pretty close, aside from the very beginning of the walk.  I think you know what i mean about the apparent sliding. Sometimes the camera movement can also make it look as tho the character is travelling further than a normal stride would carry you.
 The 'side view' marker idea gives a more realistic distance of travel during a walk.
 Just thoughts.

[Kevin Gales]

Thanks @olan ...thanks for the advice @johnar I have to say it's not so easy to animate in anim8or but then I have been coding a script that will allow me to interchange between blender and anim8or(so far so good)...I just like anim8or's simplicity and clean interface that's why I coded the script to import blender animation(my script can do that) to anim8or

[johnar]

That sounds pretty awesome kevin. Hope it goes well.

NickE wrote a script for importing bvh motion files into Anim8or.  It can be found in the ASL scripts part of the Anim8or forums. Might be interesting for you if you haven't seen it before.
 I haven't played with blender, but did muck around with poser animation and have seen the layouts in 3DSmax and Maya.
  I haven't really tested all of Anim8ors animation tools, and stick mostly to using morph targets, sequences, and very basic key framing  techniques. (haven't really played with things affecting 'fast/slow in, fast/slow out', manipulating the little green box handles in the animation path, and other stuff which i'm probly not even aware of)
 I do find anim8ors keyframing setup to be pretty darn good, especially with some of the latter updates, shortcut keys for frame keying, folders, and other bits and pieces.
 Although i can;t compare to the keyframing layout in blender, i'm quite comfortable now with the way keyframing is implemented in anim8or, and, after all, decent keyframing can be the corner-stone to decent animation.
 

[Kevin Gales]

Yeah anim8or is pretty cool I also like the cleaner interface...it would be top notch if there were constrains and parenting of individual bones + physics then it would be a complete package... and to elaborate on why is said it's quiet difficult to animate first you cannot move/rotate multiple bones(not in referring to ik) you can't copy and
(flip) paste poses which means you have to manually repose on each frame....well you cannot preserve volume when rotating bones or on ik I bet for any actual beginner they will suffer...but I considered to work on tutorials to show people tricks just I am busy with Other projects in blender and other tools...

[Kevin Gales]

Another walk cycle...this time I attempted to mimic floor constraint by using a plane as floor reference...and the traditional 4/5 points walk cycle method...*video shows green or grey blocks on vlc.. windows mp recommended