3D Animation Project

The heel (page 136) ‘The heel is the lead part. The foot is secondary and follows along. The heel leads and the actual foot drags behind and flops forward – but the heel controls it.’ For walks and runs one should keep the heel flat on the ground until the last possible moment before lifting it. That will give the feeling of weight to the animation. There is an illustration that demonstrates this also: The following drawing serves as a guide for a correct heels motion during a ‘normal’ walk: Also setting a tempo:             Weight shift (page 146) ‘The weight shifts from one foot to another in a normal stride. Each time we raise a foot it thrusts the weight of our body forward and to the side over the other foot. And the shoulders mostly oppose the hips and the buttocks.’ As discussed in a previous post, walking represents a series of controlled falls. As a result, the...

                In this blog post I will continue the research I’ve started last time on ‘The Animator’s Survival Kit’ by Richard Williams.             On page 102 of the book there is a chapter called ‘Walks’ that offers an in-depth look on walking animations and various principles, as the name suggests. The opening paragraph contains a few lines that I found to be quite interesting and particularly useful since I will also be creating walking and running animations. For future reference, I will copy the lines here:              ‘Walks’ (page 102) – ‘Advice from Ken Harris ’ ‘A walk is the first thing to learn. Learn walks of all kinds, ‘cause walks are about the toughest thing to do right.’ ‘A walk is a process of falling over and catching yourself just in time.’ ‘All walks a...

                               Having discussed about the animation principles in the last blog post, I have done some more research and stumbled upon a book called ‘The Animator’s Survival Kit’ by Richard Williams. I have spent some time reading the book throughout the week and found several interesting topics that I will be taking notes on today. Although the book is aimed mostly at 2D animation and hand-drawn animation in general, some of the topics presented techniques that are still used to this day. Greek pot illustration found in the book                                 In the first several chapters of the book up to page 41, Williams talks about his career as an animator and his experiences. He also takes on the history of animation and how animation progressed since ancient...

Last week I have met with the specialist tutor from my course and had a chat about what the overall scope for this project is and to what extent can the final artefact be assessed as meeting the criteria given the current circumstances. For example, in my proposal document I am talking about qualifiers such as ‘convincing, compelling or versatile’ animation, albeit the information was never discussed or mentioned on this blog. Additionally, I have not given any particular reason for choosing to animate a bipedal human model either. As such, in the following blog posts I will be discussing about the questions that I have left unanswered until now, admittedly rushing into the development of the final artefact too soon. The model The overall scope of this project is to successfully prepare and animate a biped model in 3D Studio Max. I have chosen to animate a bipedal 3D model based on the results of my research that I have conducted prior to starting the project. Upon ch...