CGTalk - Camera Animation

DrSnooze

10-10-2005, 10:53 AM

Hi folks, just a general question about best practise for animating a camera...

I'm about to animate a camera through a scene and i know from experience that it can be a hassle. I usually path constrain the camera and then animate the percentage, problem being that if you change the length/shape of the path it screws everything up. Anyone got a cunning trick, perhaps i should use multiple, shorter paths on the same camera (if that's possible)???

Previously i've independently animated the target but i was considering constraining that too...

Perhaps i could link both camera and target to a dummy that's constrained to a path giving me more flexibility...

Anyone got any top tips or does it just depend on the scene?

ExP

10-11-2005, 08:33 AM

Hey DrSnooze,
Personally I wouldn't use a path constraint unless you really have to. I would rather manually animate the camera loosely, and then go in and tweek its XYZ trajectory in the curve editor.

akika

10-11-2005, 11:08 AM

I also recommend avoiding path animations with cameras. Also using target cameras isn´t a good idea. I nearly always use free cameras linked to a dummy, which I animate. Or I use the new walkthrough mode in MAX.

There is a way to blend an animation between various paths:
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=185573&highlight=jump+path

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