WEEK 3: Character Acting 2 -- Walks, wrap-up, transitioning to runs

The famous 'human/dog' comparison scene from 101 Dalmations

We'll wrap up the final stages of the walk, adding subtle details that can make your walk look unique and polished.  There are lots of great examples of hand-drawn cartoon walks from on "Walk Cycle Depot" and "Pencil Test Depot" for us to have a look at.  Good luck with your deadline this weekend!

Next we'll get ready to transition into the run cycle.

Next class I'll show you a bunch of video examples of both sprinters and long-distance runners in slow motion and talk about the mechanics of a run.

Homework: Read up on runs in the Animator's Survival Kit pgs 176-200


Assignment 2:  Run Cycle
Assigned: 25/01/12
Due: 12/02/12
% of final grade: 20%

Use the pre-built humanoid skeleton or your own rig.

Animate a treadmill run that clearly shows the personality and attitude of the character. The run should cycle on its own but also transition smoothly from the walk. By transition I mean there should be a believable weight shift to pick up speed - this could include an anticipation, a change of mood, and a shift forward in the center of gravity.

The timing (both frames per step and timing of secondary actions such as arm swings and head drag) should support the attitude and personality. The character should have a believable weight. Steps should be symmetrical (apparently if not mathematically) and the motion should be fluid and smooth without obvious pops or bumps. Body parts should be offset from one another a bit so every part of the action doesn't occur on the same frame.

Rubric:
Exemplary:  Clear personality and attitude, strong apparent weight, fluid motion with a strong grasp of all animation principles.
Excellent:  Apparent personality, weight and almost entirely fluid motion with a good grasp of nearly all animation principles.
Acceptable: Some personality and weight. Motion is mostly fluid with minor errors or missing animation principles.
Not Acceptable: Generic walk not convincingly heavy or not fluid with quite a few glitches or missing animation principles.

Equal weight will be given to:

Attitude/Personality
Weight
Pacing/Timing
Overlapping Actions / Secondary Motion

Please submit files by FTP. Instructions will be sent via email.

WEEK 3: Modeling and Animation II -- Bouncing Balls, last week

Today we're wrapping up the bouncing balls which are due this weekend.

All animators should be familiar with these equations ;o)

I'll go over how to hand in your assignments via FTP.

We'll also go over the results of the Pixar Story quiz.

Next up: Gravity!


Click here to learn more about Newton's Laws of Motion 

We'll watch a short movie about a physics specialist working in the animation department at Dreamworks.

Submitting work via FTP

All assignments for my classes should be submitted digitally via FTP. You'll need to install a free FTP program like Filezilla or FireFTP.

I'll email you the login info and we'll go over it in class.

Our directory is publicFTP/Tara and the subfolder for your course. Example:

Inside the course folder:

(1) I'll create a folder for each of your assignments.
(ex: assignment 1, assignment 2)

(2) Inside the assignment folder please create one folder with your first initial, last name.
(ex: tdonovan)

(3) Inside each subfolder, put your named files.
(ex: tdonovan_walk_cycle_001.ma, tdonovan_hydrant_uvs.png)

Feel free to leave me a note as a .TXT file. Word Files are too slow to launch.  Always send me an email regarding any verbal agreement for extensions or modifications to the assignment.

Please be careful with the files in this shared directory. If you accidentally delete someone else's file please let them and me know asap so it can be restored. Always have backups saved in more than one secure location (ex, a portable hard drive as well as saved on a backed-up computer as well as sent to yourself via email or DropBox.)

If you're unfamiliar with using FTP programs and/or you have trouble, please ask for help from the peer tutors. It only takes 5 failed password attempts in 5 minutes to lock yourself out of the server. At school, that means the whole school's IP.  Stop after 2 failed attempts and check all the info again. 99% of the FTP problems students have had in the past resulted from typos.

Files can take several minutes or longer to upload especially if the server is busy. Please allow time for uploading and don't wait 'til the last minute to send your files.

If you encounter a big problem, such as our server crashing, please send me a screen grab confirming the error and I'll issue extensions to the whole class.  

Assignments cannot be handed in via any other means but FTP  without special permission.
Please do not email me your videos or other large files as attachments.
I'll explain other options as needed.

WEEK 2: Animation Direction 2 -- Guest speaker: Stop motion puppet maker, Kathy Shultz

The puppet making department of Cuppa Coffee Animation

First we'll continue where we left off with the history of stop motion.

At 1 pm we'll welcome a helpful guest:
Kathy Shultz, stop motion puppet maker.
She'll be presenting some puppet-making ideas and examples of professional puppet builds.

I hope you bring lots of questions and your drawings with you so she can give you some tips on how to proceed with your creations...

Click here for a fantastic document Kathy put together for us about creating stop-mo puppets. It's full of resources, ideas, how-to's and more.. 

WEEK 2: Character Acting 2 -- Blended Game Cycles: Walks & Runs

Walking, continued..
We'll dig in to some more of the details from Richard William's lengthy chapter on walks.



Assignment 1: Walk Cycle
Assigned: 18/01/12
Due: 29/01/12
% of final grade: 20%

Use the pre-built humanoid skeleton or your own rig.

Animate a treadmill walk that clearly shows the personality and attitude of the character.
The timing (both frames per step and timing of secondary actions such as arm swings and head drag) should support the attitude and personality. The character should have a believable weight. Steps should be symmetrical (apparently if not mathematically) and the motion should be fluid and smooth without obvious pops or bumps. Body parts should be offset from one another a bit so every part of the action doesn't occur on the same frame.

Rubric:
Exemplary:  Clear personality and attitude, strong apparent weight, fluid motion with a strong grasp of all animation principles.
Excellent:  Apparent personality, weight and almost entirely fluid motion with a good grasp of nearly all animation principles.
Acceptable: Some personality and weight. Motion is mostly fluid with minor errors or missing animation principles.
Not Acceptable: Generic walk not convincingly heavy or not fluid with quite a few glitches or missing animation principles.

Equal weight will be given to:

• Attitude/Personality
• Weight
• Pacing/Timing
• Overlapping Actions / Secondary Motion

Please submit files by FTP. Instructions will be sent via email.

Please hand in 2 files named as follows:
tdonovan_walk_000.ma
tdonovan_walk_000.avi

Include any referenced files. Please watch your naming conventions. No caps, extra characters or spaces.
Feel free to number the files up to 999 as you like. It will help differentiate the files should you need to resubmit.

WEEK 2: Modeling and Animation II -- Bouncing Balls, continued

Gravity. Always a downer. 

We'll delve into the 12 Principles in more detail.

We'll start polishing those bouncing balls and by the end of class you should be able to know without a doubt what different types of action will result from different types of curves in your Graph Editor.  Digital Tutors has some excellent video explanations of the Graph Editor -- a powerful tool that you should be very comfortable using by the end of this assignment.

We'll have some time to watch 'The Pixar Story' in class today. There will be a *quiz* worth 10 bonus marks! These may come in handy later...

Click here for the Pixar Story Quiz (note: it's only available once I open it during class)

Assignment 1: Bouncing Balls
Assigned: 18/01/12
Due: 29/01/12
% of Final Grade: 20%

Animate at least 2 contrasted bouncing balls showing as many of the principles of animation as you can.
All balls should be in the same file. You may add primitives such as cubes, planes, and use them to create simple obstacles such as stairs, a wall, a room, or a sloping plane. Be sure the balls have very obviously different weights.  Animate the balls bouncing until they come to a stop.
Find a flattering camera angle from which you can see your animation clearly. Tracking camera moves to keep the balls in the scene are permitted but keep them very simple.
Rolling, squashing, and stretching are optional.
No marks are given for rendering. Please do not light these or apply any special textures. You may make the objects different colours if you wish.

The final output should be 2 files: an .avi and an .ma file. Please include your referenced rigs in the file if necessary.

Files should be named as follows:
tdonovan_ball_000.avi
tdonovan_ball_000.ma

The file number (000) should be whatever version of the file you hand in. You can hand in any version up to 999. This could come in handy if you need to resubmit. You can simply send me the new file with the new version number.

Careful with your file naming.
No caps. No extra spaces. No extra descriptors.

Rubric: 
Exemplary:  Advanced grasp of animation principles evident. Balls have unmistakable and contrasted weights.
Excellent:  Strong grasp of most of the animation principles with few mistakes. Balls have clear and contrasted weights.
Acceptable: Reasonably executed animation utilizing most of the animation principles with some mistakes. Balls bounce clearly and believeably with some contrast.
Not Acceptable:  Lack of evident understanding of the animation principles with several mistakes. Balls not clearly contrasted.

Assignments will be handed in via FTP. Instructions will be sent via email.

Animation Direction 2: Assignment: Stop Motion Film

What's with all these darn words???

At long last it is ready - the lengthy tome that is your assignment sheet!

Pour a nice cup of tea and sit down for this one. It is 3 pages long.

Click here for the Assignment Sheet for Animation Direction 2: Stop Motion Film

You'll also need the new and improved course outline which has the milestones and week-by-week breakdown of what you'll be doing.

Click here for the new course outline.


I will provide you with rubrics for all your major milestones and many more helpful resources in class.

Any questions? Please ask! 

WEEK 1: Animation Direction 2 -- Stop Motion!

Things are about to get very hands-on in the Octagon.
Stop motion, people! Pixilation, claymation, puppet animation -- anything that can be moved is fair game in stop motion.

Stop-motion is the granddaddy of all animation dating back as far as 1825 with the invention of a simple gadget called a 'Thaumatrope' - a simple spinning disk with images on both sides, such as the famous bird & cage example. When spun quickly the images seemed to blend together -- a phenomenon called, "persistence of vision".
Click here to see this in action.

Just think how exciting your life could have been with one of these babies

It progressed through the centuries into the multi-faceted medium it is today. Stop motion shares elements of live action, traditional and even CG animation. Like live action, you need to create sets, lights and real objects or puppets to animate. Like traditional animation you need a sense of timing and a means of planning and tracking your animation. Like CG you'll be manipulating jointed characters frame by frame. You can easily transfer your CG animation skills stop motion, and the same is true in reverse.

Phil Tippett making history on The Empire Strikes Back

We'll have a look at a sampling of various under-the-camera animation techniques, take a virtual tour of Aardman animation, and try out a bunch of simple frame-by-frame animation styles.

Today we'll start planning the major project for the term.

WEEK 1: Character Acting 2 -- Blended Game Cycles: Walks & Runs

Welcome back!

We're combining all your hard work and analysis from last term to create some great game cycles for your reel.

First up - revisiting walks.  Walk cycles again? Oh yes.. you can never get enough walk cycles. You've learned a lot since last year. Trust me. I'll show you last year's walks so you can get some perspective.

This time around the walk needs to transition smoothly into two more cycles -- the run and the attack.  All 3 cycles should cycle independently and blend seamlessly.  If you get them all working smoothly, the group of cycles should look as badass at this dude's dog.

I want character walks, not just any old generic tutorial walks. You shot reference, you can shoot more.  This is where all your animation principles and study all come together. Make it yours and make it awesome.  

Use any high-end rig you like. Here's a link to my post about sample rigs:
http://tarateach.blogspot.com/2011/01/license-free-maya-rig-testing.html


We'll get started this week with some refresher concepts about cycles and animating walks in Maya.

For next week, please read the chapter on walks from page 102-163 in Richard Williams' "Animator's Survival Kit".

(The walk cycle assignment description and rubric will be posted shortly.)

WEEK 1: Modeling and Animation II -- 12 Principles of Animation

Introduction to animation starting with Animation history 101:  "the Pixar Story".

The Twelve Basic Principles of Animation first recorded by Disney animators Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas in their 1981 book The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation.

I highly recommend reading the lengthy and beautifully illustrated chapter on the Principles of Animation, see "The Illusion of Life" Chapter 3, from p 47.

We'll be studying the 12 Principles of Animation in detail in the coming weeks. Here's a brief overview of the 12 Principles:

1 Squash and stretch
2 Anticipation
3 Staging
4 Straight ahead action and pose to pose
5 Follow through and overlapping action
6 Slow in and slow out
7 Arcs
8 Secondary action
9 Timing
10 Exaggeration
11 Solid drawing
12 Appeal

Bouncing Balls: 
Animating a Bouncing Ball is nearly always the first animation assignment given to both 2D and 3D animation students.  This deceptively simple exercise can teach you a lot about the nuts and bolts of animation tools, but more importantly how to give believable weight and appealing timing to your animation.

Strobe photos are fantastic for showing the beautifully symmetrical parabolic arcs followed by everything that leaves the Earth... except a rocket.

tennis ball

basketball

golf ball

I have some great reference vids for you:
Sony Bravia & Nissan Qashqai ads contrasting super bouncers and bowling balls.
Also check out the video "Ball Tests" by Brendan Body (also in sidebar links -->)

Click to download Maya Ball Rig
http://game.georgebrown.ca/~tdonovan/Rigs/ballMaya.zip


I've given you both .ma and .mb files and we'll talk about the differences.

Homework!
Study "the Pixar Story" (it's up on Youtube in 9 parts) -- there will be a quiz! :oD
Start experimenting with animating some bouncing balls in Maya -- we'll go through it in more detail next week. You can use the rigs or just primitives.