First walk cycle

[pearblossom]

looks good. I think it might help if you bring the feet and pelvis up higher for the 'up' position, after the passing position (a la Williams) ('Animator's Survival Kit', if you don't have it already), so that when the foot goes down there is more of a feeling of impact, and weight.--by frame #3 i think his left foot should already be off the ground, and it should also still be higher (and the hips also) in frame #4a, so that you *feel* the contact in 5 and 6.
cheers,

[bupaje]

Thanks for the reply. Even though the assignment is finished I will revisit and try to improve as you suggested. I actually 'cheated' because after it was done I was told there wasn't enough squash and stretch. I needed to hand it in or lose a grade so I quickly made his neck longer and shorter so I only had to redraw his head instead of the whole body. I recently did pick up the book you mentioned and it is quite excellent.


I'm working on a fat man now but going to scrap it and try again this weekend; what I did before was draw out 5 key frames then I went in to add tweens and try to smooth it, then when it didn't look right in a few places tried to add more tweens and I found it difficult to keep on trying to find tiny incremental tween positions and get it right. Seems it will be easier to just use the book as a guide and draw eight keys and two extra cushioning 'up' tweens and one down on the step all at once and then if there is one or two more tweens to tweak it fine.

What I did first was sort of like interactively baking a cake by adding in just flour and milk and while it bakes add an egg, and if it still doesn't look right while it is in the oven add another, and another until I either have at a huge mess, or in the best case a very ugly cake. ;)

[bupaje]

Well here is the fat guy cycle - I've since added the hair (only lines on this one) for the final animation. Still rough and I note the back leg doesn't go through the same motion as its partner but time is up again. Even with "The Animator's Survival Guide" walk cycles seem tough to me. I'd mostly been a 'napkin doodler' and not use to drawing the same object from multiple angles through multiple frames. Need to learn body mechanics, drawing skills and lots of other stuff.

http://www.stormvisions.com/bc/fat_man_walk.mov

Anyway crits and tips very welcome. I will try to draw at least one additional cycle every week in addition to my regular schhol assignments until I get better at it.

I just did a simple flag animation and now we get to do one of our own choice that demonstartes the wave principle so I am going to try a swimming eel. Going to rent "The Little Mermaid" to see how they handled that motion as my initial tests look a bit strange. :)

[Ebola0001]

I’m pretty ok with the fat man walk, much better than the man in the hat one. However I do have an issue with frame "5" strangely enough between frames 6 and 7...

Anyway I don't see its reason for being there, the motion doesn't flow either from 6 or into 7, it’s just a superfluous frame I think the animation would work fine with it not there, but with it, it just kind of jumps around and doesn't look good ;)

On the man in the hat one, the thing I see is that the fore ground leg in 7a doesn't really move from where it was in 7, I think its needs to be extended further forward more akin to the rear leg in frame 4

[bupaje]

Thank you! There is no substitute for an experienced eye -both your observations were spot on. I pulled '5 'on the fat man and it immediatedly smoothed out. I actually drew about another 5 or 6 frames but pulled some and added one trying to even out the weird hiccup. Wish I had posted it here sooner; that's what I'll be doing for the next one. :)

[bupaje]

Here is a required jump animation. It has some funky hand motion around frame 17 and I think there is a bit in the foot around 15 as well but I've been at it for hours -and swinging my arms in front of the mirror. Figured it was time to post it to get some feedback only have a bit over a week to finish the background layout and two animations so any feedback is appreciated.

http://www.stormvisions.com/bc/jump1.mov (about 970k)

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