My friend and I we're on a video game streak the other week and came across and game, "Cell Factor".
Great game and all, but now we plan to make a minimovie over it. Like, maybe 30 minutes.

We've planned out that all human characters will be played out by real people, and we'll have Guardians (Giant Robot thingies that look like General Grievous clones.) done in Animation Master.
So I blew off the dust of my CD and started it up.

I'd like to know the difficulty of adding Animation to actual video footage. We're also going to be using psychonesis and will be using objects in A:M to throw around.

All this is actually going to be planned out to be done in the fall, right now, we're just setting our crap straight, props, Etc....

I'm still a NOOB at modeling, but I'm exceptional at animating.
Any Tutorials over making practice models that I can brush up on?

Thanks.

(Whoops, posted this in the forum thingy.... might wanna move it.)

I'm still a NOOB at modeling, but I'm exceptional at animating.
Any Tutorials over making practice models that I can brush up on?


This tutorial series is well worth the money. But the rigging part although important to watch and learn is far to difficult to do from scratch. I recommend using the TSM2 rig. I would recommend the lite rig but the tutorials are still under development last I checked. After you purchase this and do all the tutorials contact me and I can point you in the direction of more training. I believe I have every video tutorial ever made concerning AM. It would take you 1 year of non stop training every day to get through all the material. For now start with Barry's Training its the best most well rounded video tutorial made to date for AM. My only complaint with the AM training community is that the people who start to Master AM move on to Maya soon after. The people who don't move on but know the program best don't often if at all make video tutorials and share their knowledge.

I guess the problem is that CG in general is very complex. Learning CG in my opinion is like Learning Photoshop, After effects, Final Cut Pro, Pro tools, Motion, and Compressor, all rolled into one package. Modeling, Rigging, Surfacing, Animating, and Rendering all require a large investment of time and practice to achieve Photo realistic results. I don't know that many generalists who do it all professionally. Most Just do one or two jobs, Modeling and rigging, or just animating, or just surfacing. To do it all is like asking a professional director to Act, operate camera, Produce, do makeup, and write. Sure it can be done but something often suffers. Even if you study hard and you have lots of talent, you may not have the time.

The good news is. AM is one of the more user friendly packages as compared to the big dogs. AM's concepts are mostly universal aside from splining. Your efforts will not be in vein if you need to learn the other packages for a job.

Tutorials are here.

http://bzundel.googlepages.com/animation%3...ter2005training

Depending on what you are searching for:

Have a look www.patchwork3d.de

*Fuchur*

I don't think that is an accurate statement. Knowledge is freely shared on this forum every day...and that includes one on one help, video tutorials and examples, written tutorials and sample models. It takes a lot of time to put together a comprehensive set of tutorials, so, something like that doesn't happen every day (Barry's tutorials are the most recent commercial set that I'm aware of). However, all of the information you would need to put something like that together exists here. If you can't find the information you're looking for, ask, and someone will either point you at a tutorial or help you with your problem.

There's a boatload of useful tuts in the tutorials subforum. But you gotta look.

You may need to explain your plans more for mixing CG and real. That can work in different ways and there are solutions that work for one way that don't work for another.

His comment might be a mild slam at me . I just suck at doing tutorials and teaching in general. If people ask me questions, I try to answer as well as I can. I also don't have money to get video capable software.

Please don't take offense at this comment if you were not refering to me Jason. I just knew you wanted me to do some things before my pc took a crap on me.

Dont know what you are looking for, but I am a longtime A:M user and I create many videotutorials especially if you got a special question.
From the technically side I know A:M quite well. I only lag of talent

And just to mention it: There are many users like Robcat, etc which have both the talent and the knowledge here and will give you all the informations you need.
*Fuchur*

Just to mention it:
CamStudio is OpenSource and Free

I use it for all my videotutorials.

*Fuchur*

Not trying to slam anyone or ruffle feathers. I sometimes forget that anything said on a forum is said with a megaphone.

But there is truth to my statement.

Zaryin, you are a master at SSS and AM paint, I have offered to pay you for video tutorials regarding those subjects. My intensions were not for resale. I would donate the tutorials to the community.

Agep is a master of modeling, surfacing, rendering IBL and HDRI.


Heyvern Is a master of Newton Dynamics, modeling, and animating among other things

John Bigboote does great professional work as well.


I shouldn't name any names because the list goes on and on and I don't want to hurt anyones feelings. So if I didn't list your name please don't be offended. Thank you to those who do contribute.

In my opinion there is a lack of in context tutorials regarding

SSS, AM paint, IBL, HDRI, and Newton Dynamics.

Sure you can spend countless hours tracking down a useful thread of info here and there but that is such an inefficient way to go.

I am going to take on the challenge of creating a well rounded complete set of tutorials for IBL and HDRI rendering. I have spent at least 16 hours so far researching on the forums about these subjects. I appreciate all the help I have gotten.

What happened to the tech talks and the feature focus tutorials? They have not been updated in years.

I wish Hash would put some money behind creating Video Tutorials and turning his site into something like Lynda.com but for all the features in AM. I pay $250 per for a subscription to her video tutorials.

There is money to be made in Video tutorials and better than that it will advance AM because a product is only as good as the examples of what it can do.

The easier it is to learn the faster we can create cutting edge cg using AM.

I could be wrong on some of the points I have outlined and I am sure people will let me know of that, however there is truth to what I have said.

Start asking questions about the features you need help on and someone will chime in and fill in the details.

Thanks Robcat

Jason

Wow! I took a look at your website and you are master of alot of things as well. Nice looking website by the way. I think some of the stuff you have created I would be interested in a tutorial or two. Nice job!!

Steve

Yeah, you are right about offering to pay me, but that's not my main issue. At the time it was my pc crashing. I would have felt a little indebted accepting help at the time. If I can I will see If I can work up something for a tutorial, but like I said I am really not good at teaching. I wouldn't even know where to start with a tutorial on any subject. Including what I think would be something I do rather well.

I would do it for free if I thought I could do it. But like I said, I have know idea how to go about making it and making it good. I am really horrible at teaching, I am not kidding, haha.

I mean I basically already did a "mini-tut" for SSS in my Crystal Apple thread by giving the settings I used. I'm also using 14c. I don't even know what's new in 15x. And I am definately not an expert in A:M paint. I painted a displacement map and some color and got lucky because it looked good. But I have no clue about the ins and outs of that program -- just that it's awesome.

I hope everyone with even a cursory interest in tutorials will avail themselves of free screen recording programs like Camstudio. If you are into animation you need to be recording at least some of what you are doing. If you are really serious about animation I recommend a dedicated screen recording program like Camtasia.

The real reason to have any recording program is to allow others to see from your point of view. This can help with troubleshooting, help with create demonstrations and assist with your production workflow too. If you've ever watched someone else perform something new in a video you know the value of using screen recording. Its a very useful tool.

You don't have to make tutorials of course but once the raw video data is recorded others could.
And when you need assistance it can certainly help others help you.


Zayrin,
You have already proven you are a good teacher.
You deserve serious credit for the teaching you are already doing.
I've certainly learned a lot from you.



I agree with David here.
It takes time to create tutorials. Time is valuable and limited for those people who make tutorials too.
Most people didn't get into animation in order to make tutorials. Most are created as a way of saying "Thank you for sharing your tutorials."

If interested in seeing more tutorials on a given subject start by creating and sharing a few tutorials of your own.
If nothing else it'll help to understand the work that others put into them.

If you have a subject matter of interest ask about it here.
Its quite likely others will be interested in the subject matter too.
And someone may be willing to create tutorials.
If there isn't one or two already available to use.

Edit: I think we've very effectively hijacked Gaduunka's topic.
In light of that I've changed the title and moved it to the Tutorials forum.

Pfft, thanks a lot...

Just kidding, but I'd like to thanks everyone for their replies on my topic... even if it was a little off.
We've got what you might call a "Storyboard" of what we want to happen. As I've told you before, I can animate quite well... just as anyone can, but i'm
having a very, painful, headaching, Tylenol popping, hard time just to make these complex models i'm after!
It'll take me MONTHS trying to make these! I feel one of my weakest points in A:M is the modeling, I can draw, but modeling is waaay over drawing!

I'll keep searching the tutorials section.

Gaduunka, I'll second the recommendation to get Barry Zundel's video tutorials! They were really my key into being able to do stuff in A:M! I've got a few little comic-book-style tutorials here that cover some of the fundamentals of modeling.

It does take time and experience to learn how to model, but you can learn while you're doing, so it's not too much time lost! :-)

When you run into specific problems, post a question on the forum and you're bound to get some answers. I say plural because there are many ways to do the same thing in modeling.

Good luck and we look forward to seeing your movie!