One of the most common mistakes junior animators make when staging their shots is to position the camera above the action, looking down on the characters. This can be tempting to do, because it is an easy way to capture everything that is going on. However "CCTV Camera" is usually a mistake (though you might need to create a particular effect in certain circumstances). A better choice is to position the camera at eye level - where the camera becomes a non-participant observer in the scene. Watch this very short video to see why.
Thursday 18 April 2024
Wednesday 17 April 2024
Animate a Vehicle Coming to a Sudden Stop
In this super simple beginner animation tutorial we show how to animate a vehicle coming to a sudden stop. The free tutorial uses the free "AnyCar 3.1.4 for Maya" rig, downloadable here from Creative Crash.
This is a fun, simple tutorial that is aimed at animation beginners in Autodesk Maya, part of our series of animation basics for students who have never used Maya before.
Monday 15 April 2024
Animate a Traffic Cone Being Knocked Over
Animate a Traffic Cone Being Knocked Over |
You can however use any vehicle, and animate it by simply setting a keyframe at the start and the end of the motion. The timing of the traffic cone is very simple; with just a few rotation keyframes we can add texture to the scene.
Thursday 11 April 2024
How to Avoid "Zombie Eyes"
Try to avoid "zombie eyes" |
So how do you avoid "Zombie Eyes"? The answer is, use the Eye Direction Controller, and always add a blink on a head turn.
Friday 5 April 2024
Free Rigs and Sets for Animators at Anim-Matt
https://anim-matt.gumroad.com/ |
Thursday 4 April 2024
Michael Caine Acting Lessons For Animators
Wednesday 3 April 2024
What is The Rule of Thirds?
What is the Rule of Thirds? It is a "rule of thumb" for composing visual images. The Rule of Thirds proposes that an image should be imagined as divided into nine equal parts by two equally spaced horizontal lines and two equally spaced vertical lines, and that important compositional elements should be placed along these lines or their intersections. In the simplest terms, try to avoid staging your character dead centre in the middle of the screen.
Tuesday 2 April 2024
How to Use The Eye Direction Controller
Eye direction matters. If animated characters aren't looking at each other, or if the motion of the eyes feels weird and lifeless, the animation will lack believability. Fortunately, most character rigs come with a "Look See" or "Eye Direction" controller, which control the character's eye direction, so that the eyes always seem to be focused and alert. To see how to use the "Look See" control with the Kayla rig (one of the rigs we recommend for learning animation), watch the short video above.
Thursday 28 March 2024
Acting and Performance Reel 2024
Monday 25 March 2024
CMC Wants Your Pitches by 13 June 2024
Children's Media Conference 9-10-11 July 2024 |
In the "Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is" pitch sessions, animation creatives pitch to the animation industry, much like on the BBC's "Dragon's Den". The CMC takes place from 9-10-11 July 2024. The deadline for submissions is 13 June 2024.
Thursday 21 March 2024
Animals & Creatures Reel 2024
Above is a selection of the best work done on animals and creatures at Animation Apprentice. The "Animals & Creatures Animation Reel" includes work created by many of our talented students. Animals and Creatures are tough to animate - the mechanics of the motion need to be accurate and believable, especially so on high end visual effects feature film work. Congratulations to all our students on their excellent work solving the peculiar problems of animal and creature locomotion and performance.
Tuesday 19 March 2024
Lock To World Tool Stops Feet Sliding
We're recommending this new animation script "Lock to World", available for download at Gumroad. The Lock to World tool does the same job as the Anchor Transform Tool - which no longer works in newer versions of Maya since the upgrade to Python 3.
Sliding feet can be a problem when animating a character walk or a walk cycle. Fortunately for Maya animators, the Lock to World tool created by Jesse Ong Pho offers a simple solution.
Rather than manually tweaking your animation to stop the feet sliding, this script lets you anchor a transform for any given time range in your animation.
Rather than manually tweaking your animation to stop the feet sliding, this script lets you anchor a transform for any given time range in your animation.
Saturday 16 March 2024
Animate a Telephone Ringing in Maya
In this very short tutorial (just ten minutes long) we show how to do some very simple animation - animate a Telephone Ringing. This tutorial is aimed at animation beginners in Autodesk Maya.
Simple exercises are a great way to gain confidence in animation, starting with the basics to gradually build up your confidence and skills.
Thursday 7 March 2024
Animate a UFO on a Motion Path
Animate a UFO on a Motion Path |
Motion Path animation is an important animation technique, and can be learned in a few minutes. The tutorial starts by searching for a free set and a UFO at Turbosquid - free assets anyone can download. This tutorial is aimed at Maya beginners.
Tuesday 27 February 2024
Infinity Curves with Offset in Maya
In this very short tutorial (just two minutes long) we show how to use "Infinity Curves with Offset" in Maya. Let's say you animate a character taking two steps across the screen, and you want to replicate the action. By using Infinity Curves with Offset, you can replicate the motion automatically, and have the character take as many steps as you like. Once you're done, you can bake your curves, and then edit the shot.
Monday 26 February 2024
Phone Booth Pantomime Shot
Animators need to tell a story without words, to create "pantomime" animation. The art of pantomime is that the audience should understand the story being told without words. In the example above, by Joshua Reynolds, Joshua tackles the "Phone Booth" exercise, in which the animator must tell the story of a phone call silently, just using body language and expressions, communicating to the audience what the character is thinking and feeling. Start by thinking about the story you want to tell. Then, act it out, draw some thumbnail sketches, and pose out the shot. Make sure the character poses tell the story clearly.
Friday 23 February 2024
How to Install and Use the Parent Master Plugin
In this short video we show how to install and use the free Parent Master Plugin for Autodesk Maya. The Parent Master plugin is a useful tool that allows animators to attach and un-attach objects easily and quickly. Here at Animation Apprentice we've been using it and recommending it since 2014. The plugin is a Python script created by Paolo Dominici and has recently been updated for py3. Watch the video above to see how to install it. You can also read our original blog post here from 2014. You can find the PM official site here, and also find the latest version at Paolo Dominici's site here.
Wednesday 21 February 2024
Animate a "Sneaky Walk" with Monty
Sneaky Monty |
To complete the tutorial, first start with a Basic Walk with "Monty" - which you can learn how to do here.
Then, as with our other character walks tutorials, adapt the basic walk to give it character and personality - in this case a "sneak".
Monday 19 February 2024
Spring Class Starts on Monday 4 March 2024
Animation by Mark Masters |
It's not too late to book a place; all you need to do is visit the main Animation Apprentice site and go through a few simple steps.
If you want to learn 3D animation to a professional level, and start your new career as an animator - your journey starts here.
Friday 16 February 2024
How to Import an Image Plane into Maya
Thursday 15 February 2024
Animate a Walk Cycle "On the Spot" with Monty
Monty goes for a stroll |
There are four video tutorials of just under ten minutes, showing step by step how to animate a walk cycle, animating the walk "on the spot" on a treadmill, then adding a forward translation on the World Control to have Monty move through his environment.
The videos are recorded in Autodesk Maya, and are aimed at animation beginners.
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