For this weeks homework assignment, we had to animate and learn the basics of skeletal animation and rigging. I decided to follow the Lynda tutorials from the beginning of the exercise; looking at key framing and adding techniques like Motion Paths and Ghosting to help with the work flow. Below is the exercise file model of a Submarine that I used to create the techniques for guidance.
I found that keying in the frames and thinking of motion in 3D was really straightforward. I made sure the Subs path was in actual animation and in alignment to what the real thing would move like. Furthermore, I double-checked this in the Dope Sheet with the hierarchy summary. Below is last lesson of the tutorial. I began with a simple cylinder shape and used the joint tool and smooth binding feature to create the 'moveable spine' that is then manipulable with the parent-to-child like system for morphing the entire object.
Above is the final stages of my fish body animation (model from the exercise files). Following a similar approach with the cylinder, I created a spine for the fish using the joint tool to position the stems from the center. I was then able to go in and select key circle joints to branch out connecting 'bones' for areas of the fish, for example to the tail and fins. After binding the joints to the polygon skin, I used the Paint Skin Weights Tool to edit-paint the sections of rotation that were deformed (seen on the grey-scale fish). Finally I was able to animate the fish by key framing the circular joints on the timeline. Underneath is my animation sequence I am really happy with; seen with the joints highlighted using the X-Ray feature.
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