Anim8or Community
Artwork => Finished Works and Works in Progress => Topic started by: johnar on March 29, 2013, 07:57:48 am
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Haven't posted anything in ages. Just thought i'd pop this in. Haven't anim8ed much 4 a while either, so had a play around with steve's spring. More about getting the anim8ion ok than texturing or anything else. Not sure if it has a future...lol
(edit) Have replaced dead links with Springy final. 1minute 38 seconds
Added some screenshots of Springy in action. ;D
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I think I remember this thing :P
I like the animation. It's good in terms that it doesn't feel slow and sluggish which most animations with anim8or seem plagued with.
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hello there cooldude234. True, you would've probly seen the eye b4. The spring is from the scripts. Courtesy of Steve G.
Joined 2 2gether, added a strait up and down bone structure and morphs for up and down. I think most anim8ors, (anim8or in particular ??? ), just seem to use too many frames. Did you know that in a blink it can only take 2 frames for 'shut' and 3 frames 4 'open'.. That's only 5 frames per blink. That's about 1 5th of a second.. (The eye is the fastest moving part of the body).
Anyway, to all anim8ors, if anyones anim8ions seem slow, get into the time track, where all things happen, and delete some frames. look out that u don't delete any KEYS!!!.
Then i render it out, look 4 slow movements, get back in there, and delete some more frames. !!
The original name of the video is 'springtest023' !! So it took 22 previous tests. I don't bother with materials when 'test rendering', coz it just takes so loooong. Most of my 'test renders' are all done in about 5 minutes. I think this one took about 15 for the render i posted. My PC is an old Packard hack that came out with a 10GB hardrive. ;)
. Thanks 4 the comment. ;)
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and I thought I was bad for only having a gig left on my tera-byte :P
Anyways, it depends on what your frames per-seconds are as well. If you were getting 60 frames per-second, it would take more frames to close and open your eye. But of course the key frames would be also being played faster so the animation may look less laggy. You can change the play back of the frames per second in your preferences window in anim8or.
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Yea. I pretty well stick to 24fps, so thats where i get the '2 frames close 3 frames open' thing.
I suppose using a faster frame rate would also increase the size of the finished video.
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Yea. I pretty well stick to 24fps, so thats where i get the '2 frames close 3 frames open' thing.
I suppose using a faster frame rate would also increase the size of the finished video.
Yup, also I try to stick with a 30 frames playback. It's the standard for movie frame playback rate (there not really any technical word for it :P ).
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Like always, nice and bizarre, johnar ;) It looks pretty good, especially considering that it's animated in Anim8or. I do feel that the physics need to be tweaked a bit more. His initial hopping does not have enough forward momentum in its movement--it looks like that animation would work only if he was hopping in place. I think if you made the bottom part of the spring (his "feet"), angle so that they face more towards the direction he's landing in anticipation of said landing (but only in the last quarter of each hop), it'd look more realistic. Kind of like how you walk and plant your heel first and then the toes follow.
The center of gravity and center of rotation for the backflip seems to be off. Its current motion seems to suggest that the heaviest part of its body is in its feet and it's the feet that is dragging the rest of the body along with it (kind of like how if you put a rock in a plastic bag and throw the bag, the rock influences its rotation in the air the most). You need to make the center of rotation be nearly equal to that of its center of gravity, and the center of gravity needs to have constant gravitic translation while the rotation motion is also constant around that center of gravity. Right now both are a bit unequal and inconstant. What I said probably doesn't make much sense, but just look at some vids of backflips if you haven't already ;)
Hope that helps. I know this wasn't an all-out serious animation, but it'd be interesting if you actually went somewhere with this.
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Hi Raxx, and thanks for the input. The things you mentioned are also the things which i realise are not quite right as well. Trust you to spot them. :D
I think if you made the bottom part of the spring (his "feet"), angle so that they face more towards the direction he's landing in anticipation of said landing
Yes, i have actually tried for that, but i see that it does need to be more obvious. Have got a morph target in the bottom of the spring for the movement you have explained, (the 'heel toe' thing), and will tweak that up to make it more exagerated. (noticeable). You can see that bottom movement in the last couple of fwd bounces, but now realise that its far too subtle. Will sort that out.
I was wondering about those first few jumps being not quite right.
His initial hopping does not have enough forward momentum in its movement
Thats it. Cheers. I'll work on it.
The center of gravity and center of rotation for the backflip seems to be off.
I do understand what you are saying. The backflips were a bit of a problem from the start. The simple rig that i've used made it a bit difficult to get it 'physically' correct. Because it is rigged 'from the bottom up', then only the upper body is bendable with the rig. This anim8ion was done straight from my head, so I will take your advice and study some backflips and try to get it more equal, constant and realistic.
Appreciate your 'eagle eye' and the decent explanations of your observations. ;) . Gold. 8)
Will post updated video in the next day or so. Thanxx.
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I think his forward jump looks better now. Never realised how 'out' it was till i started fixing it.
Only the fwd jumps here;
edit/update.
dead link replaced with springy final.
Will work on the backflip next.
geez, its 3 in the morning ::)
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The animation is great johnar!
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Thanks Blick. ;D
Hav fixed up the backflip. Still not perfect, but better than it was. (Thanx for pointing those things out Raxx. It has defineately improved because of it. ;) )
May tweak it as i go, but need to move on. Wanting to stick it all together, add a bit more, tweak a bit more, maybe change the scene setup, add some music...lol.
Actually, been thinking bout a poem....
I made a little thing, it was a little spring, and it sprung off down the road to see the view.
It sprang around with glee, it was absolutley free, and everything it saw, to it, was new... lol
Backflip only
edit/update: Replace dead link with springy final.
Thanks again for your inspiring comments ;)
Will update as things progress.
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Nice job on the animation 'Johnar'.
That's exactly how I get out of bed in the morning.
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Really nice-looking, johnar! Nice to see you around here.
Regarding cooldude...
I'm not so sure about that one... 30fps for the smooth video look, 24p / 24fps for the 'cinema'/filmic look.
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The backflip definitely looks a lot more natural, Johnar. Good job!
The forward jumps also look better, but they may be suffering from too much keyframing. I'm just nitpicking though ;)
There's been plenty of debate on the internet regarding framerate. Personally I think whatever works for you will work for most, and let the videophiles whine if they will.
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Hey there guys.
Crashdrive. Thanks.
That's exactly how I get out of bed in the morning.
Lol
davdud. Thanks. Its good 2 be back. Finally got a reasonble internet connection at a reasonable rate. $20 per gig, thru mobile phone to laptop. Was paying $5 per hour b4 that!
Thanks raxx. I hear what you're saying, and will always keep your c&c in mind. Cheers.
I've added sound effects, and a little xtra bit at the end.
edit/update. Hav replaced dead links` with springy final.
Will hav 2 leave this for now. Not sure where i'm going with it. When i get back to it am thinking about starting again and perhaps having a go at making a kids story-book. Maybe even a wee 'e-book' like would go on a e-reader. Don't know how advanced these e-readers are today, but i'm guessing they would support 'at the least' animated gifs, which could be quite cool.
(speaking of animated gifs, think i'll redo my avatar. ;) )
So, thanks again, and not a stranger anymore. Will pop in daily. cya. ;D
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Love this character johnar and awesome animation, also great to see the development through this thread.
Re frame rate, my normal rule of thumb is (where possible) to have an idea of the final 'use' of the animation. Most animations I have done in the past were rendered for PAL standard (720x576, 25fps), more recently HD 1080i, but the point is to try to not convert frame rates between the animation and the end result.
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Hi again ESONIQ5.
thanx for your comments.
Re Framerate:
PAL standard (720x576, 25fps), more recently HD 1080i, but the point is to try to not convert frame rates between the animation and the end result.
Its a funny thing. I use 'sony vegas movie studio 8' for editing, after upgrading from vegas video 4. In 'vegas 4 project properties' the choice of frame rate ranged from 12fps (half film), up to 29.97, (NTSC), and included 24fps for "Film", which i've always used.
But now, in 'movie studio 8.0', there are only three options. 15fps (multimedia), 25fps (PAL) and 29.9 (NTSC).
It now seems rather strange workn in 24fps, considering PAL is actually 25. So i'm missing 1 frame every second between the Anim8or rendered film and the final vegas rendered film. Not noticeable in final video, but noticable in post production when trying to match up the frame numbers between the two. Not a biggy, but....
... anyway, i had no idea about any of this to begin with, and Steve put 24fps as default in anim8or. So i'm just goin with the flow fellas.
I do personally find 24 is easiest to work with. ;D ;D
Cheers
And thanx again
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Oh well, just couldn't resist it... ::)
More springy. Starts from the big jump off the anim8or stage and onto other thingys.. ;)
What next?.......... ;D
Heres a link to the whole thing so far, from his first jump, to being stuck in a bubble... ;)
edit/update. Hav replaced dead links with springy final
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VERY COOL, johnar! That was a lot of intricate work, no doubt. Great sound effects, too!
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Honestly laughed out loud when Springy dropped onto and gripped the pencil! Nicely fluid animation, very deftly done!
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the pencil part was hilarious.
Firstly I would like to say that I loved the animation on the pencil (the pencil itself) and the bubble, may I ask which method you used?
Overall I think it was good but the bounce sound was getting annoying after the first three times it played (it needs more variation).
Can't wait to see more ;)
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Hi guys, and thanks for the comments. :)
RudySchneider: Appreciate your input, and good to see you still around. The bubble bit probly took the longest time, mostly coz of the computer i was using. (slow). Was quite lucky that it only took a few tries to get that bit right. Put him inside the bubble first, got all the squashy and stretchy bits synchronised first and did the rotation bit later. On the initial attempt i did the rotation bit first. (mistake!). ;)
ENSONIQ5: I can't ever ask for better kudos when someone says that they honestly laughed out loud. To me, that says i'm doing something right, so it means a lot. Cheers. :)
cooldude234 : From the moment he comes off the slide and lands on the pencil, its all pretty well 100% morph targets. For the pencil i used modifiers to create morph targets for the bend. The bubble had only 2 morphs, squash and stretch, although i did need to tweek the scale in some places, just to keep it close enough to springys movements. The bubble is just a default sphere, subdivided, with an environment map and transparencey at 0.1.
As far as sound goes, was thinking of adding some type of music to soften, or disguise slightly, the sound that you're talking about. Bit of a mission at the mo, coz my old 10gig hack of a pc doesn't hav a sound card, so have to copy to flashdrive and transfer to laptop to add sound/music. In days of old it was a lot less mucking around, and could add sounds/music 'on the fly'.
But anyway, i digress...;)
Thanks to all for your positive feedback. (always most welcomed and appreciated).
Will continue with this 'springy thingy', and post updates as things evolve. :D
Cheers.
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Cracked a smile once it got to the slide. None of the animations looked unnatural. Good job :)
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johnar! Awesome work! He/She is a playful little buggar! Nice unexpected ending! :D 8)
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Thanks guys. :)
Couldn't leave Springy in his bubble, so let him out, and now he's resting in the sea. ::) (he won't rust, but will probably stay there for a while).
All other links to the progress of springy are dead now. (had to clean up my new youtube)
So, sorry to say, if you want to have a look, you'll need to suffer thru the whole thing. (1 minute 38 seconds). :P
Really need to get to work on a short movie to enter into a local film festival in September.
Will post bits and pieces of new project(s) as they happen, but, for the unforseen future, its 'bye bye springy'. :'(
Thanks for watching. :)
PS. Didn't make the flowers. (if i remember rightly, they're poser models.)
Land and sea made, roughly, in 'Terranim8or'. (gr8 progrm) ;)
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Haha he's not a really lucky spring, is he!
Congrats on the animation, it's very entertaining ;)
I particularly liked the part where he gets stuck on the pencil..
Good job!
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Nice way to end his adventure ;) Good luck on your short!
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Pencil scene is rather fine.Always interesting to see what you are doing.
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That's some excellent, very clever, and entertaining work you've done there, johnar! I would hazard to say it's your best ever! Very convincing movements! Congrats!
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HaHa, super job on the animation Johnar.
Your 'walk cycle tutorial vid' was a big help to me a few years back.
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Hey there guys. :)
Been busy, but just had to say .Thanks for your positive comments.
Hav a gr8 day. Anim8or rocks. Cya. ;)
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Hi.
Although this isn't springy, its still got a springy thing in it. Really just a test, pogo stick, bouncing hair and a magnifying glass, short, senseless and inane.
Can't seem to get bouncing things out of my head..... ::)
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Great stuff, groovy hair, well done!!
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Funny bouncing hair :)