I was undecided whether to do my run cycle in 2D or 3D. I completed a run cycle in both, and decided to submit my 3D run cycle for my submission. Whilst having also done the run cycle in 2D I found this beneficial for applying the process when animating the 3D model. I did get feedback on my 2D run cycle from Aodhan before I decided to go with the 3D animation. I got great advice from him about mirroring the sides can make the animation have a blurred motion and to try to have slight differences when doing this. As to not waste time I didn’t get to apply this to the 2D animation but for future it is valuable knowledge that I can apply to my projects!

Feedback from Aodhan:

• Look at shadowing of arm and leg position (Duplicated poses make it harder to read)
• Everything else was good

3D run Cycle:

I decided to not use the rain model and sourced a Woody from Toy Story model that was fully rigged and animated this. I wanted to use this model instead as I always focus on very anatomically correct and realistic movements when animating and wanted to push myself to try something a bit more exaggerated and cartoon-like. I really enjoyed using this model and it was fun to be presented with a model and rig created by someone else and figure out the controls and how to move it properly. I did have a few issues with the rig initially but after having a chat with Rachel in class, she showed me how to simplify it down and use it properly and it made the animation process a lot easier and quicker!

Test Render:

Feedback from Rachel:

• Re-do the run and look at the effect of gravity more on the leg movements
• Now that the IK is off and I have access to the controllers for the individual parts of the arms it should be easier to move them without them distorting

Quaternion was turned on – Rachel advised that I check this in future and change it to XYZ Euler.

IK controllers were hidden so Rachel helped me look for them and get them turned on – this made re-doing the animation was SO much easier! I had struggled with the arms and movement quite badly in my first test run of animating Woody.

I rendered out the 32 frame animation at 24fps and added it into  to loop and lengthen it.

I had to render this out quite a few times as there was always a slight glanky movement that I wanted to correct. Even with the final render there’s a part when his hand moves down and it flaps a bit. I looked over the blender file so many times and it looked fine in Blender but when rendered out it was noticeable.

A bad test render:

Final render:

References:

Woody Blender Model sourced from – https://app.gumroad.com/d/354283c2d8ca409a9a2cc7b5e8fd14fd

Run reference:

ToyStory 3 game for PS3 – looked at gameplay on YouTube to see reference of movements:

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I used videos like this for referencing a more exaggerated run and looked into the positioning of the arms.

I found this video very helpful with looking at a fast paced leg movement and was able to use this as a great reference towards animating the legs on Woody.