Animation in Carrara - Let's Animate - Q&A - Come One & All
wgdjohn
Posts: 2,634
Come on in Folks... please wipe your feet at the door. :)
Why would I want to create an animation you might ask??... well I've got quite a few objects I've modeled and just hate to let them sit around collecting dust... still images are good but I like to them objects move... or have the camera move... or both. Nothing is as much fun as breathing life into your models and/or content.
Animation is much easier than you or I think it is. The first time I made a simple animation in Carrara it was without reading anything... only playing with some of the gadget/tool settings. Admittedly I had made a few anims in Imagine 3D but that was long before Carrara and the interface was entirely different.
Please note that when I use Anim(s) I'm talking about Animations.
"Below are a few questions/answers I made up, in my tiny little mind, that anyone might have first." If you have more... just ask or send me a PM.
q: What is the first thing I need to know?
a: Well of course you must know how to use Carrara... ohh... goofy me, you probably mean about animation??... you do need to know what keyframes are... they tell Carrara any changes you've made to a scene at different points in time.
q: Can I post problems and questions of any kind here... as well as my own and others animations, renders and screengrabs?
a: Of course! Feel free to jump in anytime. That is the main reason for this tread. Anims must be located elsewhere like YouTube where they can be linked to.
q: How hard is it to animate in Carrara?
a: It is very easy to get started and create simple or even more complex animations. The more complex you want to make one the more you might need to learn. See next post for some Pay tutorials at reasonable prices and also check out some of the YouTube videos and Forum links. I'll also be posting some basic mini tutorials to get you jump started. Don't worry... I'm no animation wizard like PhilW, 3DAGE, mmoir, Dartanbeck, Wendy and many others.
q: Can add actual video I take along with a Carrara Animation?
a: Yes of course. I've seen it done but haven't tried yet. You can also incorporate more than 1 animation together... perhaps as a background, tv/monitor, moving pictures anims in frames/etc.. etc. It has been pointed out to me that a compressed .AVI will likely not work, use an .avi that is Un-Compressed instead.
q: Will other programs like Blender or DAZ Studio be discussed?
a: I don't expect so since this thread is for learning and helping to animate in Carrara. Anims done in both can be linked to of course.
q: Will you be answering my questions?
a: This depends on the question. I admit that I don't have answers to everything. Right now I can only answer simple ones but hope to learn more of the features to animate better and easier.
Come Learn With Me! Let's enjoy this ride... perhaps when it's over we will all be cranking out anims in no time at all.
"I will be adding more questions above... if anyone has a simple one liner or more... please share it with me"
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Resources for learning Animation in Carrara. Forum Discussions, YouTube Videos, DAZ Pay Tutorials and perhaps other sources for animating.
Influentional References & Image/Animation Composition: Influences on motion, animation timing and more.
Forum Discussions: Note that I've not read all of the NLA clip questions/problems... I should since I've questions myself.
Other Forum discussions: More kewl info about animating and more.
2017 Carrara Promo Reel - by Dartanbeck - Must Read! - Submit your animations or stills so they have a chance to be included in the Promo Reel. Let's show off some cool Carrara Art including Anims!
The Animation Club for Carrara... great information to be had in the links below. "I'd love to breath new life into it."
Animations Finished or WIP:
be back in awhile... have a bunch bookmarked... gotta go find them
YouTube Videos - Animation related tutorials: **Recomended**
YouTube Videos - Animation examples: I'm holding back on listing a lot since there are so many great animations done in Carrara... I could easily have pages and pages of links to anims only... but hey... if you see one you are welcome to post it yourself or let me know that it should be added here.
DAZ Pay Tutorials & Programs: **Recomended**
DAZ Pay Tools & Programs:
No longer available here... *don't bother to click the links":
Note that anything marked **Recomended** only means that these are must haves, must reads or videos that are must watch. I haven't watched or used some listed enough to rate them... as far as am concerned everything is Recomeded... I've found very helpful info in everything listed.
"Please let me know if I've left any off and I'll get them added... also if you find any errors or broken links."
reserved
I've just posted a link to this video by mmoir to my Modeling thread. It covers creating a believable bouncing ball, adding modeling to the ball and finally shading domains and shaders.
My own bouncing ball anim done for an exercise for mmoir's thread. I'd not seen his video shown above... he did provide the scene setup. I reshaded it and replaced the little blue ball with my own as well as varied from his example animation shown only for an idea.
Hey... whaddya know... I've a question already about NLA Clips. First what I believe to know about what they are...
An NLA Clip is simply a format to save Keyframes to right?? From what I've read I can create a walk cycle for a character then save it as an NLA clip which can be looped. One question is do I only have to load the NLA Clip once and it will repeat or do I need to load it more than once to last as long as I wish to change to a different motion or action??
I think of an NLA Clip as a collection of poses which will repeat and so loop back to the first pose seamlessly... this way the entire Clip can loop over and over and "you get the idea".
OK... down to my main question... I think I know the answer but want to verify it. Since they are poses for a specific figure like V4 or Genesis 2 will they only work on that figure?? I suspect they will not work without being modified even for different Characters of the same generation... TRUE??
You only need to load an NLA Clip once, with the Clip selected you will see a Loop check box in the information panel top right. If this is checked and you drag out the right hand edge of the Clip on the timeline, it will loop and you will see a dotted line where each loop point is. If you drag it in the same way but with the Loop unchecked, it will slow down the action rather than looping it - you can also set the playback speed in a box.
You can apply a Clip to any figure that has the same skeleton configuration - but you might not get exactly the same results due to the relative lengths of limbs etc. But a Clip designed for M4 can be used on V4 for example.
anything with an animation group can use a NLA clip
you can create an animation group for anything
for example I can swap iClone FBX imported animation between iClone figures imported into Carrara using NLA clips once I make each an animation group.
But figures with different skeletons will not work properly - you can't for example use a V4 animation clip on a Genesis figure.
Thanks Phil, That is just too easy and a good reason to create some action cycles/keyframes and save as NLA clips. Glad you mentioned V4 and M4 being the same.
Guess now I should take some time to watch your Animation in Carrara Tutorials and do a bit of reading in the Carrara manual.
Wendy, Welcome!
So I could just throw a bunch of diff objs into an animation group and then have that groups spin or whatever and save as NLA Clip for the entire group... kewl.
yes
Let's go folks... time to become a CarrarAnimator. I've created a scene with only a few objects, an example video (shown below) and some very simple instructions to help anyone get started... they are not technical at all so go have some fun. Be warned... the anim is only 4 seconds long. :)
The .zip file should have objects and shaders as shown in the anim or visible at the top of a Carrara window. Please let me know if it does not look correct or if anything is missing... note I did set the YoYoSpool object to appear at 0x0y so you can start it out and mess with moving, rotating, scaling or even having the shader change color during your version of the anim.
If you have any questions please ask.
[edit] I forgot to mention in the pics how easy it is to get started. [end edit]
"Let me know if you catch any spelling, grammer or just plain wrong things in the text... I have the original files and can change anything easily".
I've been busy watching some YouTube videos about Carrara animation so have added a few that look to be helpful to Page 2. "Feel free to let me know if there are better ways to do anything or they simply do not quite fit in."
Keyframes and Tweeners,.. what are those and why.
These two terms both come from traditional animation, where each frame was hand drawn by an artist.
Obviously that took quite a bit of time for one person,. so a production process was developed.
The Lead animator would draw the main figures in a series of "key" positions to describe the story,..EG: walking, waving, sitting,. etc.
those "Key frames" would then be handed down to an assistant animator, who created all the frames between those Key frames. (this task became known as "Tweening")
With computers,. that process is almost the same,. but hopefully easier and faster,.
You pose your figure in the timeline,. move forward in time and change the pose,.
When you Play the animation or, scrub the timeline forward,. the computer has already calculated the frames between your Key frames
you can select the area in the timeline between your Key frames,. and select a different type of Tweener
Carrara has a range of Tweener types,which can make animating simpler and easier.
For example:
If you want to animate a figure waving,. you can create two key frames for the arm motion,. then use an Oscillate tweener to make the arm move backward/forward several times,. without making any more keys.
You can also Copy and move keyframes,. or adjust the spacing between two or more key frames,. to either speed up, or slow down the motion.
Hi Andy, I just found the tweeners thanks to you... now I can have even more fun. Below is a screenshot of the list of tweeners available and a very short explaination... which is much the same as yours... hope you don't mind. :)
OOh, you have a "Stack Tweener" that I don't have! Where did that come from?
Beats me... it just might be from Fenric... just looked and it's talked about here by SteveK and Fenric. What does it do? Perhaps I also have a readme laying around somewhere... nope can't find one. I'll check it out further.
Aha... found it... Fenric's Pose and Shading Tools 2 ... got if from DAZ. Dartanbeck mentioned it in "Carrara 9 Give Us a Sign" Challenge#27 WIP... here.
That's odd - I have bought that! Just reinstalling to ensure that I have it.
Zolly Doom!
oscillate tweener on the wing flaps
camera practice (pretty bad
)
When it comes to flapping wings, the upstroke should be different from the downstroke, so you need at least 4 keys - top, mid-downstroke, bottom, mid-upstroke. Use Bezier tweeners to get a more natural transition. Wings tend to be stretched out for the down and pulled in to reduce air resistance for the up.
If I were to guess it would be since on the downstroke the wings would be fighting gravity... not so on the upstroke. Would the same be true for any flying creature/bird?
Someone recently mentioned rendering with Carrara at 5 to 10 seconds per frame. To me that sounds too good to be true. What kind of render times can you expect with a scene that has actual characters and props, and at what quality?
I'm rendering at the moment at about 15 sec a frame. I have an 8 core windoze machine. However it's only a very simple anim with only 4 vertex objects in it. One of the objects is different for each frame as is it's shadow which gets casts on the other objects at certain times. This I have set at Full Raytracing, Good antialiasing and indirect lighting on which takes a bit longer also. This works out to almost 1/2 hr for a 4sec anim at 24fps total is 96 frames. 5 to 10 secs sounds about right with Fast antialiasing and without indirect lighting for a simple scene. I've not rendered a full scene with chars, props and movement (char,cam or both).
If it helps I have rendered full static scenes at best antialiasing which have taken around 30min. I usually render at Fast antialiasing which cuts the time down considerably... I only render at Best setting occasionally as it doesn't improve the image to my eye... I'd not even bother with highest setting for an anim since it is constantly moving.
What are you using now?
Fast render times can be achieved by compromising on render quality, lighting, etc. In my view, it is the quality of the animation which will "sell" it to the viewer, not the render quality, so if it is animated well then the render quality will be secondary - and certainly less important than a still image where viewers have time to notice every last detail.
Octane is capable of some very fast renders for animation too, again depending on settings, but that is a different discussion.
Crazy John's Anims: A Spinning Sphere that changes colour... twice.
Awhile back PhilW showed how to change colours during an animation in one of his Infinite Skills tutorials. I'd also seen this done in a YouTube video which I added a link to today... no I didn't stut stut stut ter. Oh the link is Carrara Multi-Channel Mixer Tutorial by AgeOfArmor. Wanted to give it a try so came up with the below anim last night.
I've included a few things that I set up and also a screengrab of my main shader channels. I may post the actual shader over in my Shader Creating & Settings for Carrara - Q&A - Come One, Come All thread if anyone is interested... just let me know.
DAZ Studio. Rendering can run anywhere from 2 to 15 minutes per frame with Iray if I'm using the GPU. I briefly tried out 3Delight, but if I put a single Minotaur in the Lost World set, Iray finishes while 3Delight is at something like 7 or 14% (can't remember exactly).
I actually started an iClone trial for better animation capabilities and super-fast rendering (which they achieve by using a good video-game style rendering engine that makes tradeoffs I could live with), but it turns out that despite their advertising as a great way to animate DAZ content, they haven't put much effort into bridging from DAZ to iClone, and zero effort into getting DAZ clothing to fit and animate properly on the characters. I had my money all saved up and my credit card hot to buy, but if using iClone means learning how to make my own morphs in Blender or Carrara, then there's no reason to give Reallusion my money--I should just learn Blender or Carrara. So now that's what I'm doing.
Blender is attractive because of the upcoming realtime PBR rendering engine; Carrara is attractive because supposedly pre-Genesis 3 content just works. I'm hoping that Carrara is a great place to make morphs, but I haven't yet researched that point.
Yes, Carrara is good for creating morphs. And a great environment for animating, I find it far easier than Daz Studio, tools are better integrated and it has proper IK with targets which DS lacks.
I quit rendering even still images in DS because IRay was taking too long... I prefer to render the entire scene as a test render to see how things are shaping up... a fast render is quite good for that and very quick in Carrara. BTW: Genesis 3 is working in Carrara thanks to Misty... she has also gotton Genesis 8 to mostly work... I've see a lot of renders done with Carrara already.
Yes... making morphs is fun and easy.
Thanks I chuckle each time you type that... I'll likely always use that term.
Carrara is on my wishlist, and I'm working my way through its hefty manual. I'm learning Blender at the same time, but I suspect I'll be getting Carrara no matter what because of morphs and the ease of working with DAZ content.