There is a lot of small mistakes within the animation, I tried to solve these but instead I found it was easier to hide the mistakes with the position of the camera and props. Once I realised I could do this the animation I progressed a lot faster as I wasn't stopping every few frames to perfect parts that wouldn't be seen in the final animation. I used cycles for the drummer and the guitarist since they don't do much movement in real life unless it's a solo. This also helped save time when animating which allowed me to work more on lighting and the singers movements. I really like how the singers jump onto the amps turned out, I think it's very seamless and flows quite well into the next movement.
Monday, 18 May 2015
Final Animation
There is a lot of small mistakes within the animation, I tried to solve these but instead I found it was easier to hide the mistakes with the position of the camera and props. Once I realised I could do this the animation I progressed a lot faster as I wasn't stopping every few frames to perfect parts that wouldn't be seen in the final animation. I used cycles for the drummer and the guitarist since they don't do much movement in real life unless it's a solo. This also helped save time when animating which allowed me to work more on lighting and the singers movements. I really like how the singers jump onto the amps turned out, I think it's very seamless and flows quite well into the next movement.
Reference Material
While creating this animation I had a constant chain of videos of live bands playing on a second screen, partly to spark new ideas for the animation and partly to find reference material for the actions I had already planned as when I searched for reference material before starting the animation it was quite hard to find anything that was similar to the more complicated actions in my animation.
Not every action within my animation is referenced from sourced videos, a lot of the actions I couldn't find online so i had to act them out myself multiple times before trying to animate to get a clear idea of what I would need to do, then I would also act them out again whilst animating when i was struggling to get the animation right.
Because I had the reference material playing in a chain I didn't save most of the links but here are a few I managed to find again after completing the animation.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ir7S5617z44
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnZtGDFu3k0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Dic5RWvuOM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_AK0ZmZWAw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_5by1Bsj1w
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0vf3o0vOi4
Not every action within my animation is referenced from sourced videos, a lot of the actions I couldn't find online so i had to act them out myself multiple times before trying to animate to get a clear idea of what I would need to do, then I would also act them out again whilst animating when i was struggling to get the animation right.
Because I had the reference material playing in a chain I didn't save most of the links but here are a few I managed to find again after completing the animation.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ir7S5617z44
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnZtGDFu3k0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Dic5RWvuOM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_AK0ZmZWAw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_5by1Bsj1w
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0vf3o0vOi4
Test Renders
These are quick single frame renders I used to make sure the lighting was correct before doing the final batch render.
Post Production
Here are my initial sketches after coming up with the idea to have a band playing on a stage.
The below images are a more accurate storyboard of how I would like my animation to look. There was a part in my storyboard with the singer interacting with the drummer which I wanted to be in my final animation but it would have taken too long to animate, and with the added workload from my other module I instead decided to go for a simpler interaction between the singer and guitarist.
Character Animation
Character animation is the process of bringing characters to life through animation.
In my opinion the most important principle of animation when it comes to character animation is exaggeration. Exaggeration is when a movement or action is over emphasized to add more life and characteristics to an object or in this case a character. When using exaggeration you need to be careful to keep it toned down if you don't want you animation to look too theatrical.
Follow through and overlap animation is also greatly important when it comes to character animation as these techniques give the impression to the viewer that the character follows the laws of gravity. A good example of this technique is if a girl with long hear bends over, once she is bent over her hair will drop to be pointing directly towards the ground (giving the impression of gravity). The follow through principle can also mean that nothing on the character suddenly stops all at once, it does it slowly and steadily too emphasis real life movement. When using follow through and overlapping animations getting the time right is very important to making the final animation look to a good standard.
Animators can add a secondary action to add more dimension and depth which will also reinforce the main action. So for instance a character could be walking or running happily and the secondary actions would be small arm movement to accentuate the leg movements. This will help add more character as if you just had the legs moving it would look odd and too robotic.
Another principle for animation is the appeal. Characters should be able to appeal to the audience and seem aesthetically pleasing. This can be done by portraying the characters personality through it's characteristics and features. Appeal can include how clean the character drawings are, or how easy it is to understand the design.
Staging is a very important principle that can be used to communicate to the audience about what type of mood or idea the character is showing. Animations are usually quite short so there is limited time to set up scenes and sequences that can properly narrate the story of your animation. It's important not to overload the audience with too many movements or scenes at once, a steady pace is needed to avoid confusing and feel cluttered or messy. The background of the animation shouldn't be too over dramatic as it may distract from the focal points of the characters.
Character animators have the ability to play god as they get to bring a character into a fantasy world, where they can make them say or do anything they have the ability to animate. This allows for a lot of creative freedom which is why animation appeals to me so much.
In my opinion the most important principle of animation when it comes to character animation is exaggeration. Exaggeration is when a movement or action is over emphasized to add more life and characteristics to an object or in this case a character. When using exaggeration you need to be careful to keep it toned down if you don't want you animation to look too theatrical.
Follow through and overlap animation is also greatly important when it comes to character animation as these techniques give the impression to the viewer that the character follows the laws of gravity. A good example of this technique is if a girl with long hear bends over, once she is bent over her hair will drop to be pointing directly towards the ground (giving the impression of gravity). The follow through principle can also mean that nothing on the character suddenly stops all at once, it does it slowly and steadily too emphasis real life movement. When using follow through and overlapping animations getting the time right is very important to making the final animation look to a good standard.
Animators can add a secondary action to add more dimension and depth which will also reinforce the main action. So for instance a character could be walking or running happily and the secondary actions would be small arm movement to accentuate the leg movements. This will help add more character as if you just had the legs moving it would look odd and too robotic.
Another principle for animation is the appeal. Characters should be able to appeal to the audience and seem aesthetically pleasing. This can be done by portraying the characters personality through it's characteristics and features. Appeal can include how clean the character drawings are, or how easy it is to understand the design.
Staging is a very important principle that can be used to communicate to the audience about what type of mood or idea the character is showing. Animations are usually quite short so there is limited time to set up scenes and sequences that can properly narrate the story of your animation. It's important not to overload the audience with too many movements or scenes at once, a steady pace is needed to avoid confusing and feel cluttered or messy. The background of the animation shouldn't be too over dramatic as it may distract from the focal points of the characters.
Character animators have the ability to play god as they get to bring a character into a fantasy world, where they can make them say or do anything they have the ability to animate. This allows for a lot of creative freedom which is why animation appeals to me so much.
Rigging
I used the Rapid Rig plugin for Maya to create a simple rig on Gobber, this made it so i could bend his limbs and body but when i bent some parts
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