BootCamp 4

Biped!!!

Biped's: the ultimate challenge, the ultimate goal.

Somewhere I got IKJoe for A:M rigged with the setup machine. But I couldn't remember where. (As far as I know IKJoe was originally built by the guys at www.rigging101.com)

anyway, here's joe

and here's joe zipped

And if you aren't ready for arms, torso, and head yet
get the little ball from this thread but you should probably adjust like Parlo recomends.

I like Joe because he's simple and he doesn't have a really expressive face to distract us, we are still focusing on basics. Anyway, I think we'll be using IKJoe for a few bootcamp's, so now's your chance to get used to him. Re rig him if you want, but remember we are focusing on basic animation, so don't get to distracted. If you have some other model you really really want to use that's fine, just don't get caught up in detail's.

Excercise A:
Side step. Make Joe take a step to the side. Keep in mind: balance, anticipation, weight, follow through (especially on the arms, and also on the head) exageration, personality. Victor Navone's side step

Excercise B:
Big jump. Make Joe jump big. Keep in mind all the same things as for A.

Bonus points: make these actions looping, with stride length.

Something else to keep in mind is reversing arcs of the body. You can sell weight better by doing this, and it makes things more interesting. "Animator's Survival Kit" talks about this. In example B you could do this by having the body curled up for the anticipation to leap, then while airborn have the spine reversed to a big arc, and then the impact snaps the body back into a concave curled up shape.

No Excercise C this time. Go and do A and B again, but completely differently then you did before, a whole new direction. Try it with the ball with feet. Try it with both, like they're competing. The skies the limit.

Have fun, be bold, experiment, push things til you break them!!

-Alonso

already a new camp!!! Well it must be time, I was starting to see juiceboxes in my sleep

Well at least i'll have time to get both excercises done in a week this time.

thanks for keeping these coming amarillospider.

-s

Alright! I've been waiting for this one .
Anyways, I've ran into a bit of trouble if anyone can help me out. So here's the problem, for my sidestep with Mr. Ball, it has a pause in the middle of it, so how do I keep him from moving forward while he's stopped? He's supposed to take a step, pause, then take another step and so on. When I put has stride length, it keeps him moving across the screen even when he's not supposed to move. hmm... . So anyways, here's my looped sidestep for both mr. ball and IKJoe.

Robert: nice job, very accomplished. An improvement you could make on the ball is adding more up and down. When the ball shifts it's weight over it's right foot so it can place it's left, you could emphasize that by moving the ball up a little to get it in place, and settling it down over the foot. As it takes a step it's suggesting an arc, but you could exagerate that more, so an arc with the highpoint in the middle and settling onto the other foot. Looking at the ball in loop, it looks like it's posing with it's foot out there, and then placing it, I'd suggest really flourishing it (tilt the body more, wiggle the foot more) if your going for the charicature, or smoothing out that catch by placing the heal on the ground and going straight into flat. Joe looks great! In loop it looks like he is moving fairly fast for not looking where he's going, maybe have him glance to make sure where he is placing his foot is okay, or slow him down some to add to his cautiosness. Both your character's have a lot of personality from their floppy toes. With Joe, his right leg is turning while his weight is on it, not possible. Try it, with all your weight on 1 leg try and change the direction your toe is pointing (if your doing it by hopping your cheating, cuz your weights in the air). The easy way to change this is weight till he places his left foot and really quickly shift the weight to move the foot, and shift it back (little weight shifts like that add to the character's believability also, I think) Not quite buying the push off from the left foot, mainly because the torso and leg are moving at the same time, and I'm not seeing the muscles push the body over to the right side before being pulled along afterward (leg needs to straighten some to show this). What I said about the ball arcing more up and down, can be applied to Joe's butt as well.
Both character's are doing a bent leg side step. Try straight leg, less sneaky, just to flex more.
Great Job!!!

As for stride length sliding, there is a work around. You have to counter animate your character when it's standing still. When your character is not covering ground, move the root bone over the amount that the stride length is trying to move them in the opposite direction (so stride length + counter root animatin = 0 distance)

Wow, look how long a post you got for being first.


-Alonso

OK here's my 1st attemptsidestep A

OK, Here's my attempt at Exercise A (no credit for looping - still have to work that one out).

I didn't use the supplied model as I didn't like the rig and I can't rig a model myself (yet) so I used another forum members model (recently posted BasicMan3 by Steve George - very nice rig)

Exercise A

Cheers

Hey David yours looks a lot better than mine. Since I'm such a noob at animation got any tips for me? Did you use IK or FK arms? Thanks for the complements on BM got any suggestions on how to improve him?

OK this wasn't one of the exercisesbut I had to do it

Exercise X

Hi Steve,

I can't think of any improvements for basicman3 - he did everything I asked of him without any problems at all.

Your animation looks like a first pass. That is you have moved the body and the feet (though it looks more like a foot slide) into position. What you need to do in pass 2 is add some anticipation. ie body weight will lean in the opposite direction of the movement - let the audience knwo you are about to do something. Now you do have the body weight move WHEN he moves the foot but this is just balance - not anticipation.

Pass 3 - look at making the moves bigger - ie exaggerated. rather than raising the foot an inch, raise it a foot, bend the knees.

Pass 4 - Movement involves the whole body. Each part of the body is a link in a chain for movement and follow through. DO NOT BE AFFRAID to go overboard with the movement.

It wasn't until I animated too much movement in a character that I could go back to my old animations and see just how stiff my animating was.

Also try to avoid any jerky movements. Halfway through the step theres a bit of a jerk in the horizontal movement of the body. Look at the graph editor it might make it easier to see.

The easiest thing to do right now is stand up. Let your body loosen up ie stand there and bounce a little, DON'T leave your hands by your side, bend the elbows a little and watch what happens in a mirror - NOTE the timing - all the movementis just a little delayed and a little offset the further down the body chain. Now do a side step. Repeat over and over again and study your own body movements. Now sit down and animate - DON'T try to do it all at once - just do a bit at a time and repeat the acting each time to refresh your memory.

Cheers

Xade,

That really is a great animation but I have one issue - the head doesn't move - at least a glance in the direction of a step would be good or a wobble of the the head as the body moves sideways. (I think I missed this in mine as well)

Cheers

Steve,

Exercise X - nice - just need to add some follow through on IKJoe (ie some bounce on the protruding extremities)

Cheers

Thanks for the critics and advice David heres a 2nd pass at exercise A


Exercise A 2nd pass

Hi Steve,

Some improvement. Issues I can see:

1. Left foot - it's a side step. Your action looks like a drag (even though it is just off the ground)
2. Hands and fingers are static
3. Right foot is twisting on the ground before being lifted off the ground.
4. Both hands are penetrating the body. Don't forget that you are animating in 3 dimensions - not just 2
5. Head starts off well but looks like it only had one more keyframe (right at the end) so the motion in the second half of the animation is just a slow turn. Add some follow through to the head (think tail - bootcamp2 - body is th eball and the head is the tail - same should apply to the arms)
6. Arms are too static - remmeber he needs to act - show personality - have some prominant secondary motion and follow through and there is no harm in adding gestures.
7. Body is stiff. Remember balance. body bend at the start is OK but there is nothing at the end. Look at the position of the body when the left foot is picked up. The body is well to the left of the right foot so it is a physical impossibility! The body needs to lean over to move the CG to the left (his right)

If you have autobalance turned on then I recommend turning it off. With it on you cannot properly animate anticipation and follow through (IMHO)

Cheers

OK here's pass 3 looking better if I do say so myself. I'm gonna keep tryin' till I get this right. I can see it now this time next year "sidestep pass # 346". anyway thanks for all the help thus far..........


Exercise A pass #3

Hi Steve,

A marked improvement on the previous version - marked - now you need to sweat the detail

1. His right knee - once it's lifted it seems to be locked until right toward the end.
2. His left foot 'flicks' off the ground
3. His CG is still not quite far enough to his right on the step
4. Still need to do something with the hands and fingers
5. Right foot is still twisting on the ground. Lift it off the ground before twisting it (knee pointer)
6. Do something with the shoulders - he looks a little like Herman Munster.
7. Bend the body at the waist - at present it only appears the bend is at the hips.
8. The head pointing is good but try to add a little side to side wobble. The head is a VERY heavy object - it doesn't stop still.

Now my recommendation for the next pass is to not be shy or subtle. I believe you will learn far more overdoing the action than you will taking tentative steps up to a point you think might be right. This is an animated character so don't be shy.

I'm not saying I am a great animator but I was at your stage about 2 months ago before I joined the A:M Apprenticeship program under Frank Silas. The BIGGEST lesson that I have learnt is to not be tentative or subtle. Critiques are useful to a point but you have to learn to be able to see whats right and wrong with your work. As I said earlier - It's not until you go too far that you see just how poor/stiff your earlier efforts are in comparison.

Your making excellent progress

Cheers

David thanks so much for the critics. at first I was going for a kinda sly side shuffle like in Navone's example, hence the foot twisting before it moves and the 2nd foot kinda dragging but this is much more fun and I'm learning a lot! I didn't notice the knee twisting before the move till after I rendered oops. and I had more spine and head movement in there but I thought it looked to "rubbery" I'll increase it and show you what I mean any way thank you for all your help.I would'a never learned this much on my own. it's off to work I go I'll try some more when I get back tomorrow.

PS are we the only one's left in this thread?

I'm still here. I've got a pretty good start (I think) for a sidestep, but I'm having trouble trying to get Stride Length set. I want to try and accomplish that before I make further passes. I think he has to be moving to the left (his right) to appear stationary until his right foot leaves the ground, but at some point he'll need to shift to the right of center to get back to the starting position. Any pointers out there?

On a side note, the action shown here is pretty much my first pass. I think I've turned a corner with my understanding of how A:M works. As I set each key pose I'm thinking about the next, and what I need to do to get there. I'm no longer wondering why the left hand is moving constantly from frame 0 to frame 30 because it isn't - I know to set a key when and where needed and how to adjust the curves to eliminate drift or control the motion. In short, I think I "get it" now. Isn't A:M cool?

Anyway, here's my first pass:

Sorry guys, I haven't had a chance to put up some critiques. I'm off to the SF MOMA right now, maybe tonight.

Patrick, skip the stride length. Just work on the basic animation, side length is icing after that. (I never use it anyway).

Listen to David, try to exagerate your animation so far that it's ridiculous, be bold and adventurous. Once you learn how to push it really far it's easier to reign it back in, and you'll learn faster than by going with little tentative steps.

-Alonso

Here's my first shot at the sidestep. It looks a little "girly", but hey, I'm a girl!

Exercise A

Yes, you have made the character look female. Was it intentional, intuative or a happy accident?

Anyways it's a good job.

Cheers

Mike

Wow, that's a lot of posts in two days. Wow .

Sooo...here we go

Steve, that extra animation you did was hilarious ! nice.
But about your sidestep, the only thing that sticks out to me is the way he shifts his weight onto his other foot. He seems to throw his upper body a bit and in real life he proabably would've fallen over. Also, one thing that kind of adds to this is I think there's a bit too much anticipation. But other than that, it flows pretty well and the character (I'm sure you've heard this) is great! Especially for animating.

Dave, I liked that sidestep you did. The only thing that stuck out to me was how the arms were really dangly, and kinda loose. Not that that's a bad thing though, its just what I noticed. Everything else looks great.

Patrick, The foot movements pretty good for now, but maybe some bending of the feet themselves coming off the ground and landing back on would help with the fluidness (is that a word?) of the motion. Also, some upper body movement would add more to its personality. Good work so far!

Cindy, nice . The one thing that stood out to me was how the right arm bends. It looks off when compared to how the left one bending the opposite direction. Other than that Its looking pretty good!

Whew! I think that's everybody who posted one.
Anyways, here's my animation of IKJoe. I made it so he now looks where he places his foot. And I made it so he goes up on his toe to pivot his foot, not sure if it works though. Well, here it is

Hi Cindy,

Nice start and some good acting there. Here are a couple of things to look at.

1. Balance. When her right leg is lifted the body and all it's weight is on the right side of the left leg. If you play the animation backward the weight is correct!
2. Her left arm elbow joint appears locked for most of the action.
3. Her first step is very fast but there is no wobble/follow through in the head.
4. You might have a touch too much knee bend int he right leg on the first step (it's considerably less than in the second step)
5. The right upper arm doesn't appear to have much movement or it's movement at the elbow looks a little off. Are you providing any twist action in the limbs are are you just bending the joints. (ie look at the action side on and see how much movement you have in the Z axis)

Cheers

That's it I'm done lurking....

Here is my attempt at Exercise 4A. This is just my first pass, I know there is "Floaty" feet, hand-through-legs pass through, and not much upper body movement. I need some comments about the overall look so far.

Exercise 4A

Thanks in advance! This Animation BootCamp is a wonderful Idea! I'm learning so much. I need to go back and do the first three exercises

Steve:
Your last attempt was a good improvement! The first thing I notice is that you've added more follow through on the arms, so they feel more natural. I think you've got the weight shift down pretty well, you could go slightly further towards screen right on the anticipation. 1 thing you might try is not bending the knees so much. When the weight is shifted over the left leg for the anticipation, I find myself locking that leg, so my knee stays straight and my pelvis actually rises, and then when I'm reaching my other foot until it contacts the ground I find that that leg is straight, and maybe when the weight comes on top of it is when the bend would come (and that juxtaposition of straight to bent would help show the weight of the character more.) You might offset the contact of the searching foot and the weight (Center of Gravity COG) shifting over it, usually our feet get there before our COG, in your's it's almost the same time. The follow through on the hands looks good, you could plus it by putting some offset in the wrists (so the wrists are following a little behind the elbows(if your really fancy you can do this again with the fingers following the wrists) The head is interesting, it looks over, but not down at where it will be stepping, then it tips back on the step (which I actually like 'cuz it has that "away we go" feeling) but I'm not sure if you want that impression (since you don't have eyes the assumed gaze is where the face is pointing)and then it hits the same time as the body. 1 thing I've noticed with heads, I've tried giving them all this follow through and stuff and it always looks like to much, so personally I have concluded that being on the top of our columnular bodies our heads are pretty stable and don't bounce around much. However, you can put follow through in the head if you want that affect. Something I suggest you do is go into your timeline, and shift up your keyframes on the frame where everything is landing, push things back so you have more follow through and overlapping and everything doesn't happen at once. You are doing great though, and we can see your improvement, keep it up!


Everyone go read Keith Lango's Pose to Pose tutorial right now!! That's basically where I started to learn to animate.

David:
You got some skillz, so suggestions I make might just be personal taste. The attention being so strongly down, the feet placed so carefully, and the arms held high like that give me the impression that it's stepping over or onto something precarious/dangerous, but the timing doesn't back that up. The attention is very strongly down, if this is just a casual side step then only a casual glance would be needed. The arms being bent at the elbow's doesn't feel natural, to me at least. But overall it looks great, the character is believable.

Robert:
Good improvements, I love that little glance, That's Perfect! Still wanting to see the 2nd foot straighten out more before it leaves the ground. Lookin goo.

Patrick and Cindy, I was wondering where you guys where. Glad your still with us

Patrick:
Good start! I think you have the weight shift down, even the counter shift to get Joe's left foot over, excellent! I agree with Cindy that Joe's right foot should arc up and back down, instead of being such an L. Looks like you haven't touched the upper body yet, when you get to it, remember the TailBall excercise, except this time it's backwards and your root is the pelvis. Looking good so far! (Oh and stride lenght is like Dynamic Constraints, it can be a usefull tool, but it's good not to get to caught up in it )

Cindy:
Nice character in your Joe. That first step is too fast, if we had been following the character for a while we would be ready for it, but since this is a short excercise you'll need to either slow it down, or stage it with a big anticipation so we are ready for the movement. After the step you transfer the weight from Joe's Right to his Left well. Your pelvis arcs are a little boxy, the way Patrick's foot arcs where, over and then up or down, try and get more of a curve with the peak in the middle. Your close with your torso, but it's a little off, think of the ribcage/shoulders balancing against the pelvis. If the left hip juts up, the right shoulder will jut up (and the left shoulder will be lower) to maintain balance across the center line. Maybe that doesn't make any sense I like where your going with the arms, the hands flaying out like that is the main thing giving Joe a feminine flair. The arms can be smoothed out some though, right now you are treating them kind of like sticks with hinges, think of them like the tail on the ball (3 joints, just the same, the ball will be Joe's shoulders) Your making good improvements Cindy! Love that cute pose at the end, well done being aware of twinning.

EVERYONE:
Something no one has yet taken into account (very much at least) is pelvis tilts. Stand up (yes you, RIGHT NOW ) shift your weight over 1 leg, notice how that leg is straight, your knee is locked because then your weight is supported by skeletal structure instead of by muscle energy, notice also that with your leg straight up that side of your pelvis is pushed higher than the other side, definite angle/line there. Keep that tilting in mind when you are shifting CoG around.
Another cheap and easy trick (straight out of Keith Lango's Pose to pose tutorial) build your poses, and then use your timeline to do quick and dirty offsetting. Things look better movement wise when they don't all happen at once, but when they instead unfold joint by joint (aka successive breaking of the joints). So in 1 frame set up the whole body in the pose, then go into the timeline and push the torso keyframe 3 frames later, and then push the neck 2 frames after that, and then the head 1 frame later.
Remember the computer loves straight lines, but life likes curvy arcs, don't let the computer make you lazy, shift those toes around, swing those arms. And speaking of arms, like I said before, think of them like the tails on the ball from the other BootCamp. It's good to animate up the heirarchy, so animate straight through from the pelvis then add on top of that the lower back, and then the upper back and then the neck and the head, that way everything adds together. Personally I got used to IK arms, but am now trying to get back into FK arms because that is continuing animating down the heirarchy (upper torso, to shoulder, to elbow, to wrist)

Guess I'll go and take a crack at this so y'all can feel more free to ignore my yammering when you see I'm still learnin to. Great job so far everyone.

-Alonso

Good call Alonso. I was animating him being careful where he places his feet.

As for the arm bend - do this test. Imagine a set of glasses in rows in front of you and behind you. (ie you have a narrow path to step sideways) Now look down to see where you are going to step (use you head and neck to look down - not just your eyes). Now if you are like me your arms have bent naturally - reason - it give your body access to some balancing tools so you don't fall forward or backward - I have just exaggerated the bend somewhat

I'm relatively happy with my posing these days but my timing still sucks somewhat but it is improving slowly

Cheers

Robert:

I love the slow and precise movement on this one. It has a marshall arts feel to it.

Joseph:

Nicely done, your quick almost jumping movement works well.

Here's my first attempt at the sidestep

Cheers

Mike

Hi Mike,

Some things up front.

1. Balance. On the step the weight is to the right. With the balance here the character would not be able to pick up their foot. It all appears to happen at the same time. He should bend to his right first then while his CG is over his right foot, lift the left foot then the body balance can recover to the left to allow hom to plant his foot. Similarly when he is lifting his right foot the body weight is halfway between both feet - a physical impossibility to lift his foot.
2. During the step motion you did not animate the arms.

PS - Just as a footnote (and not just for your attempt Mike) but most of these animations have started with the character in the default position. Interesting that most haven't posed the model in Frame 0!

Cheers

Thanks David.

On checking frame by frame I've attempted a weight shift but it is subtle and, as you've stated earlier, this does not register at full speed.

I've altered the motion, exaggerating the shift and animating the arms.

It still looks a little odd to me but I can't put my finger on it, any observations folks?

Here's my animation 500k mpg

here's my rig on Joe .mdl file

here's my action file .act file

So I re-rigged Joe 'cuz I'm not very fond of the set up machine. If you use my rig, the Core null is just for moving the body around, not for rotating at all. And the head and chest control bones move and rotate.

Joe's got big hands.

Another tip, hide the arms while your are animating the feet and body, once you have those down well, then go in and work on the arms. Much less distracting that way.

Let's leave working on the jump 'til next week, seems like a sidestep by itself is worth a week of BootCamp

-Alonso

Here's my second attempt at the sidestep - Sidestep_A2.mov

I started over from scratch because tweaking it just messed things up . I agree that the first one looked correct when run backwards.

This is just the legs, head, and torso movement. I'll work on the arms later. The arms on the IKJoe rig are kind of hard for me to control because the forearm tends to flip if I raise it too far.

And thanks for delaying the jump assignment... I'm gonna need the extra time!

David:
Your right, I tried that and I do pick up my arms.

Joseph:
Very spritely step Good arc on the pelvis w/ antic and then up, over, and then recovery. The weight feels pretty good in the beginning, but the landing it feels like it should swing more to screen right while the R leg gets positioned, and then redistribute over both feet (watching it now looks like he doesn't put any weight on the right leg when it cathes up) Currently the whole body/torso/head is moving as 1 piece, try mixing it up, put some contra posta in there, a little bit of offsetting. The arms are way stiff, (I don't think I've every stood like that ) try and make them more flowy. You've got some natural snap in your animation, that will be really nice once you get it polished!

Mike:
Very passionate Joe lol. Be careful with twinning, currently the arms are going up to his face, and coming down in the same time and same positions as each other. It's good that you bring that emotion down into the body, not just in the head. You are close with shifting the COG for that stamp, but you need to go further to screen left to free the leg for it. Good Sigh! You need to shift the COG around more for the actual step, shift it over the right leg so that the left leg can move, once the left leg has landed shift the COG over it so the right leg can be moved. I saw your comment on the soccer player side jump, you will need to be faster to sell that, and you will have to make the torso sell it. To do that you will need to tilt the pelvis as it falls, and probably the body would offset as it followed through, it's a good challenge to attempt. I see your follow through on the head, that's good, it's a little subtle, don't be afraid to make it bigger. Good job so far.

Any other lurkers out there? Come on in!

-Alonso

Hi!

Here are my sidesteps. I went for the simpler model to focus on basics of weight shifting. Thanks to Chris Pescatore(Pesto) for Mr Ball model.

sidesteps

P.S. I know it is a little late to ask, but what is a boot camp?

Cindy:

I like the way your two steps are not the same. Did you use the Navone example as inspiration?

You're on the right track, look forward to seeing your completed animation.

Alonso:

Two very different emotions conveyed with your steps, wish I had the eye to help you improve on it but it looks as good as it gets to me!

I've done a little work on my animation as you suggested, I'll probably be ready to post tomorrow. Thanks for the advice.

Michel:

Nice work with Mr Ball, you convey emotion well.

I used the Alonso rig for this
A sidestep

Here's my cleanup of the first pass. I tried to get the upper body involved, as well as secondary motion and offsetting. Still looks like there is more to be done, but it's coming along.

After this, I agree we should wait on the jump, too.

Alonso,

QT are better as it allows us to check frame by frame.

First step is great. I see no obvious flaws (although you haven't animated his fingers)

Second step starts well but the balance is lost when he is picking his right foot off the ground. Try leaning his body to his left (have it at max just before lifting the foot off)

Yes, having the body off balance is good for the 'falling' step but you cannot lift your foot off the ground unless you have balance or have built up considerable momentum to the left - it didn't feel like it had the required balance. ie look at a walking action. At what point is the rear foot lifted from the ground? Only when the bodies balance is over or almost over the front foot OR the rear foot has launched the body forward!

Cheers

Patrick - VERY GOOD. I like this one. A tad jerky but the only thing I would have done different is pose the model on the first and last frame to have the feet closer together but the action itself is great - a real Fred Astair/Gene Kelly side step.

Cheers

Okay; I thought I was going to take a break, but I thought, "It won't hurt to take a quick look". I saved a copy of the original, baked all actions and reduced channels, and tweaked a few keyframes. Here's the result:

Still has the jitters at the beginning and end.....

Something that does disturb me a little - once again - character balance. You have almost got it but not quite toward the end of the step. The motion should be a push off with his right foot and the weight (balance) at the hips should continue to the left for 5-10 frames longer than you have before recovering to the right. You sort of reach an upright state rather than continuing through before recovering.



Yours looks like a step off so the balance toward the end of the step is 'off'

Cheers

Here's another try at the sidestep, now with arm movement. I'm happier with the arm moves this time as compared to the first one. However, the left arm kind of pops on the second slide. I also redid the legs. No finger movement yet.

Hypnomike, thanks for the comment!

Sidestep_A3.mov

Patrick, I like the way he looks down and to the left before he starts moving. I also like the hand movements. I gotta work on that stuff tomorrow.