I'm curious what people's thoughts are on this. My goal is to have a pre-made rig or set of rigs that includes a full rotation with actions like lip sync and blinks at any of those angles.
When I tried to do this with one rig (for TheMinahBird), I found that I couldn't directly control how the blink and rotation combine. Is there a way to control this that I am overlooking? I also had issues with the layer order animation changing order all the time, but this may only occur while you're still adding/deleting layers? So this made me suspect that separate rigs for the main angles with less rotation might be more "stable" and give the rigger more control. I suspect that even the animator would have an easier time working with separate rigs (in most cases). Thoughts?
Rigs for Each Principal Angle or One Rig for all Angles?
Moderators: Víctor Paredes, Belgarath, slowtiger
Re: Rigs for Each Principal Angle or One Rig for all Angles?
Hi
I don't know how complex your animations are or how elaborate your plans are, but generally a "one fits all" goal for a character doesn't become practically, as the number of layers you'll need to accomplish that task (with all the subtleties you seek) will be enormous, it will be hard to manage, and you'll end up with slow rendering and Anime will quit a lot (the good thing is Anime is good for recovering the lost file). Rule of thumb: animate with the FEWEST number of layers possible.
Economize Layers
How? Draw your backgrounds, etc with as many layers as you need, save that file. Merge as many layers of the background onto one layer for use, retaining the original file in tact. Dump the merged "one-layer" background into the Library, then import it into the file you're animating in.
Character Management
If you will be showing a lot of camera shots and angles (wide, medium, close-up), then you will essentially have several versions of the same character designed for different uses, all copies of the original body and face. The most important thing of the Character is always the face. As a work flow, perfect your face, and body, all angles, add all the expressions, etc. When you are super-satisfied with the character, face and body, put it in the library as your character master. Going forward, whenever you want to make adjustments to your character, make changes to the master, always putting the latest version back in the Library. You work flow will then be, for any occasion, to export a copy of the master into your animation and get rid of any layers you don't need for a "shot".
I think of my projects Hollywood-style shooting, shot by shot. I actually make a separate Anime project for each shot, not each scene. It allows me to have many camera shots and angles in the same scene very quickly, with minimal loss or risk. It simplifies editing in the Timeline because instead of managing a million dots and going crazy, shot-by-shot the action is relatively simple, problems are easier to solve.
I have a lot of scenes with characters in cars. I import them into the scene, most likely a driver won't do a 360 in his seat, so I delete the back and rear 3/4 views completely off the bat. For the front and front 3/4 views, unless he will get out of the car, I eliminate every layer waist down, bones and all, as they won't be seen. If there are any head angles I don't need, they go too. Chop, chop, chop, whatever is not needed in the shot I am after goes. My original Character Master is in my Library if I screw up. The result is an easy to manage Layers window. If I might need them again in a car, I save it as well in the Library. If my Character is running through the park in a wide shot, not speaking, you can toss all the views and even face and mouth layers you don't need for that shot. What you end up with is a series of specialty characters for various views (you'll have the "close up guy" who has all the subtle facial stuff, which were not kept in the guy running in the wide shot). Put these in the Library as well.
In Summary, make a kick ass master Character, all views, kept in the LIbrary, export copies in your shots or scenes. Updates are made on the safe master in the Library before you start a scene, (making character changes in the scene makes your master version obsolete). Export a master copy into each scene, toss every view and layer you don't need. Merge backgrounds prior to animating to one layer or a small Group Layer for backgrounds.
I also color code Layers based on function. All switch Layers YELLOW, Character Master and Bone Layers BLUE, body parts or prop layers GREEN (this leaves patch layers easy to find), Group Layers PURPLE, and ORANGE anything that won't be used but is helpful when cutting and pasting back and forth between layers, as it implies "construction parts-not for use". This makes it easy to find what you're looking for when you need it, if I'm looking for a forearm, foot, or torso I just skim through the "greens", it's fast, because you know it's not a switch layer (yellow). If you color code your master character this way, it takes a little time, as there are 5 master views, you'll hate me, but it pays off big time, because all you "scene copies" are pre-colored from now on til infinity. I do this for all my main characters. What ends up as "PLAIN GRAY" are patch layers, eye, and mouth layers, the switch layer is yellow. I save RED for something crucial that needs to be "red-flagged" (something I didn't finish or needs fixing or not to delete, etc), I almost never use red, thankfully.
As a workflow, it's easier to control audio as smaller pieces in smaller scenes, more control. I then edit my final project using Final Cut, adding SFX there, but most of the audio is lip-synched in Anime. Audacity is great, easy, and free to lay out your audio tracks, then easy to import into Anime.
I am doing a series, and working on a schedule that will be puts out a new 5-6 minute episode every 3 weeks, with about 60 camera shots in each, fully manually lip-snyched, writing it and doing 8-10 different voices and all SFX and editing, working alone. I could not even think of it without finding a million shortcuts.
Sorry for the book, I hope some of this is useful, but I wanted to pitch in, for what it's worth.
All the best,
Dave
I don't know how complex your animations are or how elaborate your plans are, but generally a "one fits all" goal for a character doesn't become practically, as the number of layers you'll need to accomplish that task (with all the subtleties you seek) will be enormous, it will be hard to manage, and you'll end up with slow rendering and Anime will quit a lot (the good thing is Anime is good for recovering the lost file). Rule of thumb: animate with the FEWEST number of layers possible.
Economize Layers
How? Draw your backgrounds, etc with as many layers as you need, save that file. Merge as many layers of the background onto one layer for use, retaining the original file in tact. Dump the merged "one-layer" background into the Library, then import it into the file you're animating in.
Character Management
If you will be showing a lot of camera shots and angles (wide, medium, close-up), then you will essentially have several versions of the same character designed for different uses, all copies of the original body and face. The most important thing of the Character is always the face. As a work flow, perfect your face, and body, all angles, add all the expressions, etc. When you are super-satisfied with the character, face and body, put it in the library as your character master. Going forward, whenever you want to make adjustments to your character, make changes to the master, always putting the latest version back in the Library. You work flow will then be, for any occasion, to export a copy of the master into your animation and get rid of any layers you don't need for a "shot".
I think of my projects Hollywood-style shooting, shot by shot. I actually make a separate Anime project for each shot, not each scene. It allows me to have many camera shots and angles in the same scene very quickly, with minimal loss or risk. It simplifies editing in the Timeline because instead of managing a million dots and going crazy, shot-by-shot the action is relatively simple, problems are easier to solve.
I have a lot of scenes with characters in cars. I import them into the scene, most likely a driver won't do a 360 in his seat, so I delete the back and rear 3/4 views completely off the bat. For the front and front 3/4 views, unless he will get out of the car, I eliminate every layer waist down, bones and all, as they won't be seen. If there are any head angles I don't need, they go too. Chop, chop, chop, whatever is not needed in the shot I am after goes. My original Character Master is in my Library if I screw up. The result is an easy to manage Layers window. If I might need them again in a car, I save it as well in the Library. If my Character is running through the park in a wide shot, not speaking, you can toss all the views and even face and mouth layers you don't need for that shot. What you end up with is a series of specialty characters for various views (you'll have the "close up guy" who has all the subtle facial stuff, which were not kept in the guy running in the wide shot). Put these in the Library as well.
In Summary, make a kick ass master Character, all views, kept in the LIbrary, export copies in your shots or scenes. Updates are made on the safe master in the Library before you start a scene, (making character changes in the scene makes your master version obsolete). Export a master copy into each scene, toss every view and layer you don't need. Merge backgrounds prior to animating to one layer or a small Group Layer for backgrounds.
I also color code Layers based on function. All switch Layers YELLOW, Character Master and Bone Layers BLUE, body parts or prop layers GREEN (this leaves patch layers easy to find), Group Layers PURPLE, and ORANGE anything that won't be used but is helpful when cutting and pasting back and forth between layers, as it implies "construction parts-not for use". This makes it easy to find what you're looking for when you need it, if I'm looking for a forearm, foot, or torso I just skim through the "greens", it's fast, because you know it's not a switch layer (yellow). If you color code your master character this way, it takes a little time, as there are 5 master views, you'll hate me, but it pays off big time, because all you "scene copies" are pre-colored from now on til infinity. I do this for all my main characters. What ends up as "PLAIN GRAY" are patch layers, eye, and mouth layers, the switch layer is yellow. I save RED for something crucial that needs to be "red-flagged" (something I didn't finish or needs fixing or not to delete, etc), I almost never use red, thankfully.
As a workflow, it's easier to control audio as smaller pieces in smaller scenes, more control. I then edit my final project using Final Cut, adding SFX there, but most of the audio is lip-synched in Anime. Audacity is great, easy, and free to lay out your audio tracks, then easy to import into Anime.
I am doing a series, and working on a schedule that will be puts out a new 5-6 minute episode every 3 weeks, with about 60 camera shots in each, fully manually lip-snyched, writing it and doing 8-10 different voices and all SFX and editing, working alone. I could not even think of it without finding a million shortcuts.
Sorry for the book, I hope some of this is useful, but I wanted to pitch in, for what it's worth.
All the best,
Dave
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neeters_guy
- Posts: 1619
- Joined: Mon Sep 14, 2009 7:33 pm
- Contact:
Re: Rigs for Each Principal Angle or One Rig for all Angles?
Now that smart bones can controls switches, it's much more feasible to draw each view separately. Full turn around rig is possible, but I find myself losing steam by the time I work on rear views, which aren't used that much anyway. I favor ddrake's idea of limited turn rigs, say a from quarter view left to right, or front to quarter view.lwaxana wrote:So this made me suspect that separate rigs for the main angles with less rotation might be more "stable" and give the rigger more control. I suspect that even the animator would have an easier time working with separate rigs (in most cases). Thoughts?
This tends to happen when you have many layers, like in typical body rig which has like a dozen layers. I try to do layer ordering last, and sometimes I'll write down the layer order and color the layers to help me see the changes.lwaxana wrote:I also had issues with the layer order animation changing order all the time, but this may only occur while you're still adding/deleting layers?
I can sympathize. The problem is it's difficult to predict how sb actions will combine. I offer these tips:lwaxana wrote:I found that I couldn't directly control how the blink and rotation combine. Is there a way to control this that I am overlooking?
--For each sb, I move points in ONE axis only, vert or horizontal, not both. This makes the combined sb actions on points more predictable. Eg., sb HeadTurn moves horizontally; sb MouthOpen, sb EyeOpen moves points vertically.
--Make sure all the point keys are linear.
--The initial facial expression should be neutral, that is, eyes and mouth half way between fully open and fully closed.
Of course moving facial features in one axis look unnatural, so one thing I've been trying is adding bones to tweak globally all the facial features, ie., shear, perspective, and shift. I use these as touch up, after the main animation is done.
Here's a proof of concept file you can try that demonstrates these ideas: Commander Faye
@sceech, thanks for the great ideas.
Re: Rigs for Each Principal Angle or One Rig for all Angles?
Wow, thank you so much Sceech and Neeters for your insights! There is a lot here for me to incorporate. I really like the idea of a master character rig. And I am blown away by your rigging example, Neeters! That is brilliant to separate the motions of each axis and to add the shear, perspective, and shift bones. It's amazing; no matter what angle it is, you can adjust the smart bones for a perfect pose. That's the main thing I've been unable to achieve with smart bones. Doing all of this pre-rigging is only useful to me if I can get exactly the pose I want. I'm looking forward to trying out these ideas! Thanks so much, guys!
Re: Rigs for Each Principal Angle or One Rig for all Angles?
oh, forgot to mention, I love the Commander Faye character! Is that for a project you're working on?
Re: Rigs for Each Principal Angle or One Rig for all Angles?
That's a very nice setup! Thanks for sharing your insights and the example.
G.
G.
D.R. Greenlaw
Artist/Partner - Little Green Dog | Little Green Dog Channel on Vimeo | Greenlaw's Demo Reel 2020 Edtion
Artist/Partner - Little Green Dog | Little Green Dog Channel on Vimeo | Greenlaw's Demo Reel 2020 Edtion
-
neeters_guy
- Posts: 1619
- Joined: Mon Sep 14, 2009 7:33 pm
- Contact:
Re: Rigs for Each Principal Angle or One Rig for all Angles?
Thank you both. She is supposed to be part of a sci-fi-adventure-themed pack I wanted to sell or start some project with. Still very much in its early stage. 
Re: Rigs for Each Principal Angle or One Rig for all Angles?
I haven't done a ton of work in ASP yet but for 'survey' purposes, here's my experience so far.
'Scareplane' was my first ASP short film and when we started that project, I really didn't know what I was doing and I essentially made up the rigs as I went along. The film had been designed as a learning project for me and Alisa, so I storyboarded actions that covered nearly all of the tools and techniques available to 9.5, and by design the animation progressed in complexity from start to finish. Because of this progressive nature, we thought it was best to start with a fairly simple rig for each character and build on what we learned as we moved along. That wasn't a bad approach for our educational purposes but it probably wasn't the most efficient path either.
In general, what we found worked best for this project was a front facing rig that could turn 3/4 in either direction, and a separate profile rig that could be flipped to face camera left or right. There were a couple of situations where we needed to set up multiple 'specialty' rigs and use brief morphing or FBF animations as transitions between rigs. Sometimes we simply posed matched different rigs in a scene and key framed their visibility.
Because of our improvisational approach to rigging on 'Scareplane', we found few opportunities to completely re-use existing rigs from scene to scene. Most of the time, brand new setups had to be created from shot to shot. Fortunately, most of the animations were not too complicated and ASP allowed us to work in this manner fairly quickly. However, in retrospect we knew that next time we had to become a lot more efficient about our rigging techniques.
The project we're creating now is an animated title sequence for a third-party. This time the rigs are designed more thoughtfully to cover nearly every anticipated actions depicted in our storyboard, so there's been less need to improvise and create 'specials'. For the most part, we're only using two rigs per character: a front facing, 3/4 rotation rig, and a separate side profile rig for side scrolling running/walking actions. We're using ASP 10 this time around, and some of the new tools have made our workflow a bit easier, but mostly we're benefiting from better informed planning and design.
We're still working on the new project but the extra R&D we put into our rigs at the beginning is really paying off for us now.
G.
'Scareplane' was my first ASP short film and when we started that project, I really didn't know what I was doing and I essentially made up the rigs as I went along. The film had been designed as a learning project for me and Alisa, so I storyboarded actions that covered nearly all of the tools and techniques available to 9.5, and by design the animation progressed in complexity from start to finish. Because of this progressive nature, we thought it was best to start with a fairly simple rig for each character and build on what we learned as we moved along. That wasn't a bad approach for our educational purposes but it probably wasn't the most efficient path either.
In general, what we found worked best for this project was a front facing rig that could turn 3/4 in either direction, and a separate profile rig that could be flipped to face camera left or right. There were a couple of situations where we needed to set up multiple 'specialty' rigs and use brief morphing or FBF animations as transitions between rigs. Sometimes we simply posed matched different rigs in a scene and key framed their visibility.
Because of our improvisational approach to rigging on 'Scareplane', we found few opportunities to completely re-use existing rigs from scene to scene. Most of the time, brand new setups had to be created from shot to shot. Fortunately, most of the animations were not too complicated and ASP allowed us to work in this manner fairly quickly. However, in retrospect we knew that next time we had to become a lot more efficient about our rigging techniques.
The project we're creating now is an animated title sequence for a third-party. This time the rigs are designed more thoughtfully to cover nearly every anticipated actions depicted in our storyboard, so there's been less need to improvise and create 'specials'. For the most part, we're only using two rigs per character: a front facing, 3/4 rotation rig, and a separate side profile rig for side scrolling running/walking actions. We're using ASP 10 this time around, and some of the new tools have made our workflow a bit easier, but mostly we're benefiting from better informed planning and design.
We're still working on the new project but the extra R&D we put into our rigs at the beginning is really paying off for us now.
G.
D.R. Greenlaw
Artist/Partner - Little Green Dog | Little Green Dog Channel on Vimeo | Greenlaw's Demo Reel 2020 Edtion
Artist/Partner - Little Green Dog | Little Green Dog Channel on Vimeo | Greenlaw's Demo Reel 2020 Edtion
Re: Rigs for Each Principal Angle or One Rig for all Angles?
Greenlaw--That's a great idea to do all of your story boards first and then create rigs to meet those needs, It combines the efficiency of pre-rigging with the artistic benefits of shot specific rigs.
Neeters--That would be so cool to see a character pack from you! I really feel like well designed character packs with sets of characters that can be used together could make all these new features in anime studio pro really shine. And it's hard to come up with a character pack like that because it requires drawing skills and rigging skills. It's right up your alley! But it would also be great to see a scifi animation project from you!
Neeters--That would be so cool to see a character pack from you! I really feel like well designed character packs with sets of characters that can be used together could make all these new features in anime studio pro really shine. And it's hard to come up with a character pack like that because it requires drawing skills and rigging skills. It's right up your alley! But it would also be great to see a scifi animation project from you!