need some crits on my assignment

[RaoUUUL]

might be my computer but its comin out really choppy, so its a bit hard to read the animation...you have a great start, but it looks like he has a firm footing on the post then he purposely makes himself off balance by putting one leg out in the air. imagine you were on the top of those posts and beneath were sharks or sharp spikes...would you act this way? good luck.

Raoul

[Darknessseeker0]

Thanks for the crit RaoUUUL. I have a question about the last thing you said. In my video ref my roommate does the same things Stewie does(except she's jumping on marked spots on the ground instead of posts) and its clear that she's clumsy and is off balance. How can I fix it so that Stewie doesn't look like he's putting himself off balance?

The choppiness isn't caused by your computer, the animation is in stepped keys.

[RaoUUUL]

hire a better actor..haha jk. its awesome you have someone to help you. um i dont know, if yer a movie buff check some reference from movies or consciously make it up try different stuff. sry dont really have an answer.


raoul

[Darknessseeker0]

Ok. >_< I've sent a note to my mentor about it, I'm sure he'll be able to fix it. Thanks for pointing that out though! You've made a good point. ;)

[GuzzaBee]

If it helps I'd say make more of the recovery from the first jump –around frame 90 he goes off balance and doesn’t recover, it might help to add some counterbalance to the pose around 100 and some more frames, his head currently maintains the same position. Again I’d say the same for pose around 132, but another alternative would be increase the pace here so that he ‘falls’ to the next step giving a bit of variation & interest to the piece – he’s currently appearing to recover or be in control of all the steps. Might look interesting if he's out of control at some points.

Just my thoughts, discard if you wish :)

[Darknessseeker0]

Thanks GuzzaBee, I'll impliment your suggestions. I'm quite busy right now, so there may not be an up-date on the blocking until later in the week. :(

[Darknessseeker0]

I've finally gotten enough work done to submit an up-date on my assignment. I've gone through and tried to simplfy everything. My mentor said to keep everything kinda slow and let the part where he gets off balance be the "exciting part". What do you guys thing of it so far? Does anyone have any ideas on how to get more personality into the shot without over complicating it?

Up-dated Animation (http://studentpages.scad.edu/%7Ejcofer20/week6blocking.avi)

[Darknessseeker0]

No one has any ideas? :surprised

[GuzzaBee]

Yep , sorry been busy, I can only say what I would do at this stage, what my personal choice would be – which would be to reduce the hold from frames 75 & 82 – allowing a faster step to what is currently on frame 90 – extend this range to make more of the recovery then go for either a slower controlled step from 128 onward or a faster out of control step as if the desire is to reach the last step but the one previous serves to prevent a fall – if you’ve ever run of stepping stones in a stream you’ll know what I mean.



Hope this helps - looking better for the alterations :thumbsup:

[Darknessseeker0]

Alright, I'm in my Q&A right now so this will have to be brief. I've up-dated the blocking and will start refining after the Q&A. Here's a link to the up-dated blocking.

http://studentpages.scad.edu/~jcofer20/refining.avi (http://studentpages.scad.edu/%7Ejcofer20/refining.avi)

I've just toned down some of the poses and adjusted them the way my mentor suggested. I've also removed a few things as well.

[morphius-ms]

ok here is what I see..

First off it is jumpy: almost like you are supposed to do the assignment with just keyframes (don't let the computer do any interpolation, almost like you are drawing each frame) is that correct?? If not there are a couple of parts where it jumps considerably. One thing that may help this is if you go through it frame by frame in Maya. there is this arrow that looks like ">|" it steps forward. I know it is 200 clicks but it may help you with the choppyness.

Next There are a couple of parts (when he first gets ready to jump, when he sticks his leg out to catch his balance the T pose) that he seems off balance and I am expecting him to fall forward or off the cylinders (spelling). Now this may just be because of the camera angle or the camera lens but I just thought that you might take another look.

In the T pose most of his "Mass" ,since his legs don't have much mass to them at all, nor are they much longer than the body, is in the front which makes it look as though he is going to tip over. (just an observation), it may not matter but something to keep in mind.

Next keeping with the mass aspect: if you are trying to go for where he falls into the 2nd to last jump (the one right after the pose where he looks like a T) you may want to make him fall foward like he is catching his balance (basically his hips move down, or forward a little more, and he has to compensate for more) and if you are doing this you may want to hold the T pose a little less maybe instead of 10 frames make him hold it for 5 frames or even 4 frames (make it shorter than the foot foward position, it would , I think, make it look as if he is trying to compensate for being off balance but fails and falls into the 2nd to last step). That's what it looks like you are going for.

I didn't mean to tear it apart but these are things I think would help your animation out. It's a nice start! Keep it up!

Oh yes one more thing that may help out if you have access to a Video Camera. Tape yourself doing these actions. not necessarily on blocks or cylinders but recreating the actions. And try to act as if you have no arms :shrug:

[Darknessseeker0]

Thanks for the crit Morphius! First, it's choppy because it's in stepped keys. I start refining and working on the inbetweens today. No need to appologise for giving a good crit. Thats why I post my work, lol!

Thanks for the info about his "T" pose. Animating a character loosing balance is quite hard. For the part where he seems to fall into the 2nd to last post, I had him leaning forward more originally. Someone at cgchar as well as my mentor said to move him back. They said that because he's so far forward it looks like he's intentionally trying to have trouble with the jumps. I'll test out making the hold on the T pose shorter, that sounds like a good idea.

As for video ref, I had my roommate jump around with her hands behind her back. Everything You see in my blocking came from what she did. She's quite clumsy and lost balance in more places than I have in my animation. Would it be a good idea to post the ref as well? Maybe you guys can compare the two and catch something that I've missed.
:shrug:

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