I had to animate a run cycle. Before the class, I attempted to do a quick walk cycle using my own character design. I did really use a reference, but it came out stiff and weightless.
When in class, we got a running animation reference. I used the same character design for the running exercises. I first started off by doing a run from just the reference, it being 7 frames.
I doubled those and set it at 12 frames a second. It came out better than the walk. I added a shadow to one arm and the opposite leg to differentiate them from each other, making them easier to tell them apart. I also added a subtle head bob to give the animation weight.
Next, I added extra frames to the animation and tweaked the limbs on the duplicate frames to give the movements more weight.
After that I also tried to do my own run. It features the character at a medium shot running down a hill. I tried to go more out there with the animation, such as giving the character a goofy facial expression.
I used tweened movement on the duplicate frames like on the second run. I added a simple background to show the speed of the character, as well as by animating a tree go past and into the back.
To be honest, I don’t think this one came out well, though this was just me to do something new with my run cycle, especially with the angle used.
I did another walk cycle featuring the same character.
I started off with just doing the basic poses of a walking cycle. I changed the perspective from the previous walk cycles I did as to try to animate in a different perspective. I added a bounce to parts of the character on each step such as the head and nose to add personality to the character.
I was to also animate a character doing another action, so I chose to animate a fight scene. I chose to animate a fight scene from the movie “Dragons Forever”, directed by Sammo Hung. The scene features Yuen Biao fighting a number of henchmen in a factory. The scene was choreographed by the stunt teams of Jackie Chan and Sammo Hung, who also star in the film.
I chose to animate 4 shots that lasted 5 seconds. I animated this by observing the figures in the video rather than using rotoscope techniques. While animating I focused on the posing and flow of the characters so that I could replicate the weight of the actions in the scene. I included smears into the drawings to give it that feel.
Other ways I interpreted movement was through the use of action lines and color. The action lines I included on some of the drawings as some of the poses in the video were unreadable when drawn normally so the action lines helped with showing off the movement of the characters.
Color also helped with this, as I drew the color coming off of the characters in the direction of the movements, as a way to show the speed of the action.
I tried to add my own stylistic flares to the animation such as adding more exaggerated expressions to the characters upon impact of the attacks they inflict on each other.
I did some simple backgrounds as a way to focus on the perspective shots of the video. I also edited and transformed the backgrounds as a way to get them closer to the original perspective shots.
The footage that I took reference from is from a 720p quality YouTube video, so I didn’t have the best source to take from to get a crystal-clear view of the character’s actions, so I tried to replicate some of the uninterruptable footage using smear frames.
I rendered Yuen Biao’s character in red and the henchmen all in green as a way to differentiate between the characters. I’d draw the red character first and then render the henchmen.
I went back to animation a bit after finishing to fix a few things, such as dodgy perspectives and other issues to help with the look and pacing.
Upon completing the animation, it came to 64 frames. After finishing the animation, I moved around the layers of the characters and background as there were shots where the character was behind a metal railing, so I put the character layer behind the background layer in that part.
Doing this animation really taught me certain things that will help me in the future. One of the ways that I improved during the creation of this animation was the way I animated movement. I kept the characters’ proportions and placement on the screen consistent even when exaggerating the movements such as the character’s head turning. Another example is how I animated the jacket sliding off the character and going back on while turning.
This also helped with certain perspective shots that I’ve never drawn before that I think came out better than I thought it would, especially when I have to draw multiple drawings from the same shot with different poses and actions such as when I draw the character crouching or winding up for a punch. I feel more confident that I could animate in something other than a 2-point perspective.
After the 2d animation, I also did some 3d animation. My class was given a rig to animate with in Maya, so I started off with a run cycle. I animated a big running step at 12fps.
The rig had a few controls set on the model, for example, if you move the foot up, it cause the shin to go up, causing the leg to make a crouching stance. I started off with moving the legs first as well as moving the entire model forward to make it move. I did the same for other parts of the body, such as swaying the body from side to side. I did the same thing with the arms, but the rig won’t allow me to move the elbows the way I want to, so it looks like the character is gliding, rather than running. I think the actual animation came decently, but it needed to be longer and more intricate.
The next run I attempted was more intricate. I first started by putting the rig in a preparing to run, similar to what you would see in cartoons. Like the run that I did previously, I started off with animating the legs.
When I was done with the legs, I wanted to animate the arms afterwards, but the run looked too off, so I didn’t. The speed of the movement was off, the leg movements looked too robotic and the way I contorted the legs, it messed up the model, so I couldn’t make it look right, so I left the animation as it.
When I chose to animate an action that wasn’t a run, I decided to go with a slap.
I added 2 Jack rigs into Maya with them facing each other. I made the one on the left slap the other. To show the speed of the slap, I slightly move the arm back and then have the arm move super fast forward. I transformed the fingers to make them look longer for 2 frames at the mid point of the rig hitting it’s victim, but put them back to normal size when it’s hit connects to also show the speed. I did this to replicate a smear frame that you would see in a 2d animation.
Lastly to show the speed of the first rig’s movement, I have the character step forward and then step back.
With the second rig, I first put it in a slouching position and then I had it fall back after getting slapped. For the falling pose, I had the neck and head stretching back and the arms and legs go out as it’s falling back. As soon as the rig hits the ground, it bounces and then lays it’s head back.
A problem I have with the animation I did with these 2 rigs is the speed of the fall. The 1st rig does a super fast slap, but the speed of the 2nd rig’s fall looks too slow. Another problem I had was with the rigs, due to the hands not being able to turn around, so the slap looks more like a slicing move with the fingers turned inwards.
I did like how the animation came out overall though, due to the posing and putting in the more subtle movements such as the little steps the slapping rig does and the head bobs of the falling rig.
I enjoyed my time doing these, as it helped me learn certain skills, even with how flawed the animations came out. My favorite work here is the animation of the fight scene, as it helped me with improving my skills, such as with timing and drawing the mechanics of the body.