Animation Fundamentals : Project 1 : WALK CYCLE (VANILLA WALK ANIMATION)
Animation Fundamentals GCD61104
NAME: Sea Hirayama
I.D: 0347596
COURSE: Bachelor of Design in Creative Media / Taylor's Design School
●Instructions
●Lectures
Week 6 :
We looked back the lecture so far such as timing and so on. After that we got the instruction of project 1, Walk cycle animation, VANILLA WALK ANIMATION.
Basics of walking animation.
Point 1 of the walk 'On contact and centre of gravity'
Basic poses of the walk
First of all, it is important to keep in mind which poses are the basics of walking. There are four basic poses in total.
- Contact
- Down
- Passing
- Up
(1) Contact and straightening the legs.
I have written a previous article on contact poses, so please refer to that as well.
To briefly review contact, contact is the pose just before force is applied. In other words, the force has not yet been applied. In this case, force is applied when weight is placed on the feet. When weight is placed on the feet, the knees bend. This means that the contact is just before weight is placed on the foot, so the foot should be extended in the opposite direction. If the foot bends, it visually gives the information that the weight is already on the foot.
(ii) Up-and-down movement of the hips
The up-down movement of the hips is the point where beginners are most likely to make mistakes. Many people lower their hips at contact, but to review what was said earlier about contact, you should not lower your hips at contact because you do not have weight on your feet yet. On contact, the hips should be "just about down". Then, the up and down should be the highest and lowest, respectively, to create a natural up-and-down movement of the hips.
(iii) Create weight in the two poses of contact and down.
Adjust these two poses to create the feeling of weight on the feet in the flow of the pose from contact to down. These two poses are the most important in the walk, so pay particular attention to the poses until you get the feeling of weight being placed firmly on the feet. Look at the repetition of the two poses below and see how the change from contact to down makes it look like weight has been placed? The key points are the lowering of the hips and the bending of the knees.
Walking point 2: 'Lateral movement of the hips'
Left-right centre of gravity movement of the hips
This left-right movement of the hips is also very important for expressing the centre of gravity and physical movement, but it is a part that is often surprisingly missing in beginners' walk cycles. In the case of walk animations, there are two patterns with regard to the left-right movement of the hips.
(1) When weight is equally on both feet (contact) => centre of gravity is in the middle.
(ii) When 80-10% of the weight is on one foot (passing, down, up) ⇒ The centre of gravity is towards the foot on which the weight is on each.
*Caution.
One of the main differences between running and walking is the width of the left and right foot. The width of the left and right foot is narrower when running, while the width of the left and right foot is wider when walking. Narrower foot widths mean that the movement of the left and right hips is greater. The narrower the foot, the more stable it is because it eliminates the movement (blurring) of the left and right hips.
Wider left-right foot width = greater left-right movement of the hips.
Left-right rotation of the hips
Next, regarding rotation of the hips, there are actually two types of rotation of the hips during passing. One pattern is that the side on which the foot is raised rises, and the other pattern is that the side on which the weight is on the foot rises. I have heard that both patterns work as a walk, but personally I think that the one where the weight is on the right side looks more natural.
Point 3: "How to move the feet" in the gait
In this article, I will write about the way we move our feet. The movement of human walking is a movement that we perform for quite a long time in a day, so it is basically quite energy-saving and efficient. In particular, if you try to save energy (movement with little waste) as much as possible in your footsteps, the movement will become more natural.
Energy-saving foot movements
As mentioned above, foot movements can be made natural, especially if you move them with the least amount of movement necessary. So, are you raising them more than necessary? Are you rotating more than necessary? You should move them while checking. The trajectory of the movement should look like this. The natural height is just barely high enough that you don't brush against the ground. (That's why people sometimes stumble.)
*Caution.
Movements where the feet are raised more than necessary are also often seen in beginners' walking animations. If the feet are raised too high, the walk looks peculiar, as if the person is walking through muddy ground.
Heel and toe movements
Foot movement consists of two main movements: toe movement and heel movement. In the first half, the heel precedes the movement, while in the second half, the toes overtake it and finally slam to the ground. It is important to create a good combination of heel and toe movement in this section.
*Caution.
This combination of heel-toe movement is the key to the natural walking foot carriage movement. If there is no toe overtaking movement, the foot will appear to have no power. Incidentally, this movement is called overlap. If you would like to know more about the overlap, please refer to the article 'About the swaying movement'.
Walking point 4: "Arm swing"
In this article, I will try to summarise some points about the swing of the arms. It is quite simple compared to the movement of the legs, so as long as you keep the points in mind, you can create a pretty good looking movement.
(i) Arm overlap.
Don't forget to include an overlap of the arms. Use your wrists and elbows to shift the timing of the movement between the tip of your arm and the root shoulder.
*Caution.
If you would like to know more about overlaps, please refer to the article 'About swaying movements'.
Overlaps are not difficult if you only pay attention to the part where the direction of the movement switches back and forth.
When switching, create one or two frames where the direction of movement is reversed at the upper arm and wrist. This area is also discussed in the article 'About the movement of swaying objects', which you can refer to if you like.
(2) Back and forth movement of the shoulders
Remember to move your shoulders back and forth in line with the swing of your arms.
When you swing your shoulders forward and backwards, you should include a forward and backward movement and an upward movement in addition to that, respectively. During the middle pose in the middle of the forward and backward movement, it is a good idea to lower the shoulders slightly. Be aware of the wide range of motion of the shoulder blades.
Walking point 5: 'Upper body twists'
In this last article in the walking series, I will write about how to move the upper body. The most important part of walking is the movement of the lower body, so the movement of the upper body should basically be balanced against the lower body. Try to move in the opposite direction to the lower body.
The balance of the upper body is based on two balances.
(1) Balance of lateral rotation.
Lateral rotation is the balance between the chest and pelvic rotation. It is easier to understand by looking at the timing of the arms and legs forward respectively. The timing can be naturally balanced by thinking of the left arm swinging forward when the right foot comes out.
(2) Balance of vertical rotation
The balance depends on the direction of rotation of the pelvis, but the chest is rotated in the direction opposite to the direction of rotation of the pelvis. The image you should create is that the rotation of the pelvis is offset by the rotation of the chest, and the left and right positions of the head should be fixed as much as possible.
Week 7 :
Week 8 :
●Project 1 : VANILLA WALK ANIMATION
1. Study vanilla walk cycle that includes poses and timing from the book of Animator’s Survival Kit as a reference as these:
a. Contact pose (3 frames)
b. Down pose (3 frames)
c. Pass pose (3 frames)
d. Up pose (3 frames)
2. Create a project in Adobe Animate. Set the setting as 24fps, 16:9 aspect ratio with 1280 x 720 (HD720p) resolution.
3. Using the same character that you did in exercise 4, animate the rough animation of that character, walking in the same spot at the side and front view. The rough animation process should be using basic form and sketchy stroke.
Example of Rough: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nBGHsa72SI
4. The animation should show the quality of being appealing, fluid and flexible which you have mastered in the previous exercises.
5. Output the rough animation as video with any of these format, *.mp4 format or quicktime *.mov.
6. Clean up each drawing using a cleaner stroke and color fill to finalize the animation.
7. Output the clean up animation as video with any of these format, *.mp4 format or quicktime *.mov.
Example of Clean up: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5ffy-YwybA
8. Label each progression clearly as “Rough” and “Clean Up” respectively and compile both as one reel and output it as compilation video.
9. Upload progress and final work on your e-portfolio and update the link on MYTIMES platform as submission.
10. Deadline for submission is by next Wednesday 19th October 2022, 12.00am.
Week 6 :
So for this project 1, I tried do with Astroboy which I used in exercise 4. First of all, I just focused on the his body balance for sketching the walk animation from exercise 4 design.
Figure 1.1 The screenshot of process of exercise 4
Figure 1.2 Exercise 4 final design
Figure 1.3 screenshot of the process sketching in Illustrator
Figure 1.4 screenshot of the process importing and editing in Adobe Animate
Figure 1.5 screenshot of the process importing and editing in Adobe Animate
Figure 1.6 final design on this week 6
Week 7 :
After finish putting clean lines of it, I tried to add some color on it in Illustrator. Also imported it in Animate and edited for final design.
Figure 2.1 screenshot of the process putting the color
Figure 2.2 final animation for project1
Week 7 :
After create Astro boy walking cycle animation, I also tried to create Uran version which is his sister.
Figure 3.1-4 example images for Uran
Figure 3.5 screenshot of the process in Illustrator
Figure 3.6 final design in Illustrator - png
Figure 3.7 final design in Illustrator - png
Figure 3.8 screenshot of the process of importing it into Adobe Animate
Figure 3.9 final design -mp4 in Week 7
To add, I tried to draw Astroboy's front version.
Figure 4.1 Final design - mp4
●Feedback
Week 6 :
General feedback :
In this week, I tried to draw some sketches and import them to Adobe Animate after we got instruction of project 1, walk cycle animation.
Specific feedback :
I can continue with the style and create it easy and simply as well.
Week 7 :
General feedback :
In this week, I tried to draw another walk cycle animation to get used to create the scene as well for project 1.
●References
Experience :
This experience is really important for me to get used to draw simple movement with walking animation for exploring the animation skill. I really enjoyed drawing and exploring the skill in Adobe Animate as well.
Observation :
This opportunity was really good for me to understand the fundamental of walking animation with body shape. Especially, I could know the how the leg move, face, hand and so on. Also I just realized that I need to practice to draw the character each perspective to express more interesting.
Findings :
Particularly, the movement of feet was more simple animation than I expected. Although I should draw and draw to explore the animation skill.
References :
The Human Figure in Motion
This is not a systematic book.
It is an overseas animation resource that does not use animation but uses continuous photographs to reproduce human movement.
A grid is drawn on the background, and the detailed frame-by-frame movements can be seen in the realistic photographs.
There is a mountain of frame-by-frame footage of walking alone.
For example, it features not only normal walking scenes, but also scenes of people holding things and walking up and down stairs.
Male and female nudity, different height differences, and shots taken from the front, back and side, can be used as a reference for various animation patterns.
It can be used as a reference material for converting a series of movements into animation, and the ability to split the frame rate and mid-frame rate from the frame rate is also a big advantage!
gentle portrait painting
Easy Portrait Painting is the definitive introduction to illustration.
This is one of the art teaching books praised in Japan as 'Dr Loomis'.
It features comprehensive explanations of the differences between male and female skeletons, how to take proportions, perspective and how shadows fall.
The book was written by the overseas artist 'Mr A. Loomis'.
It explains the philosophical elements of Mr Loomis's ideas on the beautiful promotion of the human body and techniques for success in the business of painting.
It is recommended to keep a copy on your desk as a sub-book, rather than learning and copying from the Loomis book in earnest.
'How big are the six heads?' 'How would the shading fall if the light shone here?' How do you draw a beautifully proportioned woman?" and use it to check points of concern at key points and points of interest.
Techniques for a successful painting career.
This book is also authored by Loomis.
The original easy-to-understand portraits were difficult to explain and the Japanese translation was difficult to understand.
A reference book that has been duplicated for Japanese readers in an easier-to-understand format is Techniques for Success in the Work of Drawing Pictures.
I can't help but agree with the 5 P's and 5 C's approach advocated by Mr Loomis.
The supervising illustrators and drawing directors are as follows.
Supervision by Ms Sachiko Kamimura
Editing: Mr Tsubura Kakumaru
Translation: Ms Hideko Miyamoto
The content is mainly about perspective of background drawing techniques.
The parts of the perspective explanations are partly coloured, which makes the content easier to read and more complete.
A power-up version of Easy Portrait Drawing can be thought of as a reference book for successful techniques in the job of drawing pictures.
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