Character Creation (Mechanicals)

Deprive · Post by **Deprive** » Wed Dec 19, 2007 10:46 pm

Is there any breakdown on character creation? I'm not talking about "designing a character". What poses do I need (full front, three quarter front etc.)? Is there some sort of template out there?

mkelley · Post by **mkelley** » Wed Dec 19, 2007 11:23 pm

I think you'll get all kinds of answers out there -- mostly the "whatever you want to do with it" kind.

I look at two "examples" -- the characters sold here:

http://www.cartoonsolutions.com/store/c ... c-290.html

but to me the "master" template of a fully realized character is Agent Rose:

http://store.e-frontier.com/us/user/ros ... duct_31125

(dubbed as the "first authentic, anime style 2D character" from them, I also think she has the distinction of being the last :>).

The nice thing about Rose is there are free videos showing her creation, many of which give me ideas about how to create my own, even if I use a completely different style. I highly recommend downloading them.

The other thing I've learned from my 3D animation work is don't get so bogged down in creating your characters you never do anything with them. Sometimes the best advice is just to start animating and when you get to a situation where you need another view/prop/character create it then. I've seen situations time and time again where young animators spend a ton of time getting the workflow right and never actually create any work. I know full well the temptation to have all your tools laid out, but I also think a lot of learning can be OJT.

human · Post by **human** » Thu Dec 20, 2007 12:02 am

Deprive wrote:Is there any breakdown on character creation? I'm not talking about "designing a character". What poses do I need (full front, three quarter front etc.)? Is there some sort of template out there?

I haven't gotten very far with animation yet... I'm just a novice, in the long and perilous process mkelly warned us about. So you should definitely take this with a chunk of salt!

But it seems to me that if you really want to please the modern audience, you need to compete against the full visual vocabulary of modern live-action film. Ideally, you should animate against a model sheet with

- Full frontal, - profile, - three quarter front, - three quarter rear, - rear... all the views of the character designer's "turnaround."

Meanwhile, I think you should build up your "morgue file" obsessively. The more photo references you have, the more you'll learn about how people really present themselves in the world.

For instance, a good morgue file will tell you things that your fellow artists may not have thought to tell you--for example, that human beings spend a lot of their time (most of their time?) propping or leaning against walls, furniture, and even each other. A good animation ought to reflect that, too.

Good photos also reveal the great visual interest of unusual camera angles and foreshortening. Study the state of the art in comic books (and in case you haven't noticed, comic art is now astonishingly sophisticated). You'll find the best of them crammed with high-impact camera views. I think modern audiences expect it.

As mkelly said, it's strictly up to you how much up-front work you want to do. But this might mean that you're not done once you have a turn-around; if you want maximum effect, you'll want to incorporate these more novel views of the characters.

slowtiger · Post by **slowtiger** » Thu Dec 20, 2007 10:31 am

What poses do I need (full front, three quarter front etc.)?

This depends only on the story you want to tell.

The project I work in right now is a TV series, and there are model designers who do just that. They had to build each character in at least 5 different views because ast the time they built them the scripting for all episodes wasn't done, so they had to prepare them for being able to perform anything.

But if you're doing just one film, you should start with a storyboard and then analyze it so you can see what you really need in terms of views and poses.

slice11217 · Post by **slice11217** » Fri Dec 21, 2007 5:44 pm

mkelley wrote:
The nice thing about Rose is there are free videos showing her creation, many of which give me ideas about how to create my own, even if I use a completely different style. I highly recommend downloading them.

Where are the free videos? On Youtube, or are they included with the package?

mkelley · Post by **mkelley** » Fri Dec 21, 2007 5:52 pm

If you just follow the flash video link on that page you will see them.

But here they are (just in case the above isn't clear):

http://www.e-frontier.com/article/artic ... 2267/1/793

They are also supplied if you buy the character, but since you can download them for free this isn't necessary. They are without sound, but apparently that's the way they come even if you buy the package.

jahnocli · Post by **jahnocli** » Fri Dec 21, 2007 6:55 pm

I downloaded these files, but they are almost worthless with no commentary either written or spoken. Very hard to concentrate on, often difficult to follow what is happening, poor visual quality...It's such a shame, because the end result is so impressive. The videos also concentrate on the head alone -- I would have liked to see at least some time devoted to the body and fluttering drapery. So I was disappointed...

Danimal · Post by **Danimal** » Fri Dec 21, 2007 9:26 pm

I agree. The one thing watching those videos taught me is I need to learn the keyboard shortcuts cuz that guy flew through different tools with no problem. But without commentary I don't know how he/she did it, and the drawing tips were pretty well useless without commentary and with so much focus on the head.

rplate · Post by **rplate** » Sat Dec 22, 2007 12:02 am

jahnocli wrote:I downloaded these files, but they are almost worthless with no commentary either written or spoken. Very hard to concentrate on, often difficult to follow what is happening, poor visual quality...It's such a shame, because the end result is so impressive. The videos also concentrate on the head alone -- I would have liked to see at least some time devoted to the body and fluttering drapery. So I was disappointed...

I just bought and downloaded Agent Rose and the instruction videos were in the download. Its on sale for $29.95 for now. There's quite a lot in the package for the money. I think. I'm pleased about it. I bought it as a learning tool.

If Vern is going to package some of his work for sale, he's got a marketing model in this package.

By the way, because the files are in "Flash" if you drag your window to a smaller size you can focus the quality of the tutorials.

Is there a way to pause and step through a flash video with a shortcut key?
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.
. Bob P

mkelley · Post by **mkelley** » Sat Dec 22, 2007 3:55 pm

I converted the flash videos to WMV and then I can step through them and it's much easier to see how things are done this way (you can even scrub through them with the right tools -- for me I drag it into Premiere and work from there).

rplate · Post by **rplate** » Sat Dec 22, 2007 4:37 pm

mkelley wrote:I converted the flash videos to WMV and then I can step through them and it's much easier to see how things are done this way (you can even scrub through them with the right tools -- for me I drag it into Premiere and work from there).

Sounds like a time consuming job.

I watched all the clips and learned so much. Simply amazing. It does take some concentration to watch because it moves so fast. Your idea of putting them into a movie file is the way to go.

I tried to feed the clips back into my video camera but they lost even more clarity. I'll try importing them into Final Cut Express. Thanks for the idea.
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. Bob P

mkelley · Post by **mkelley** » Sat Dec 22, 2007 5:11 pm

Time consuming? About 20 seconds for each clip, so, no, no big deal (I use FFMEG to convert). Dragging into Premiere takes only a couple of seconds, so the whole thing takes less time than it takes to type all of this <g>.

rplate · Post by **rplate** » Sun Dec 23, 2007 3:54 am

Can anybody help me?
I want to put the Agent Rose SWF files into a Quicktime movie file. I could use Snapz Pro but that would take forever.

mkelley wrote:no, no big deal (I use FFMEG to convert). the whole thing takes less time than it takes to type all of this <g>.

Is FFMEG a javascript converter? What platform are you running it on?
I did a google search for it and then I downloaded it on my Mac and for the life of me I can't even begin to figure out how it works.
What exactly are you converting with FFMEG?
When I do an Open File I get this JMStudio Error.

...

mkelley · Post by **mkelley** » Sun Dec 23, 2007 4:42 am

I'm strictly a PC guy, but it appears FFMPEG will work on Macs as well.

Here is the PC guide to it (and it might be useful to you Mac folks):

http://worldtv.com/blog/guides_tutorial ... verter.php

and here is some Mac info on it:

http://stephenjungels.com/jungels.net/a ... howto.html

Hope this helps.

Deprive · Post by **Deprive** » Thu Jan 03, 2008 11:04 pm

Thanks People!

I'm going to go through all the material. Hopefully I can come up with a FAQ soon.

Character Creation (Mechanicals)

Character Creation (Mechanicals)

Re: Character Creation (Mechanicals)

Thanks People