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Animate Blocks In Carrara 8.5

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  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,543
    edited December 1969

    Yup. Same here ;)

    For animation, it's also quite valuable to know that when you select keyframes on the timeline you can:

    Hold ALT and Drag to copy all selected keyframes to the point where you stop dragging

    Hold Ctrl and Drag to stretch or shrink the amount of space (time) in between the keys

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,543
    edited December 1969

    Check this out. I had to take a break for a few minutes just at the beginning of this episode. Upon hitting 'pause', I thought the resulting frame looked so freaking cool, I had to take a screen capture - it reminds me of a Ralph McQuarrie Star Wars painting!

    Since then, I've noticed some rather Ralph McQuarry Painting moments watching the actual movies as well.

    Note:
    I might seem to be obsessed with Star Wars. I'm certainly not one whom knows all of the SW trivia, whom collects all of the hoopla, books and other stuff... I'm just very interested in watching for ideas for animations (timing, alterations and variations, etc.,), background imagery, special effects, etc., and SW, especially "The Clone Wars" (since it's closer to the 'look' I'm going for), seems to be an excellent collection to give me pile after pile of inspiration and ideas.
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  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,543
    edited December 1969

    While first watching the initial movie for The Clone Wars, I was finding myself to be very impressed with the work the animation team has done with facial expressions. Stuff that many animators overlook, like the timing of eye-movements related to blinking, the tongue movements when pronouncing "r" after a vowel, and just all of the feeling that becomes obvious - simply due to the body and facial animation is second-to-none, in my opinion.

    If you have NetFlix streaming, I strongly encourage a look, with a "Study for Animation Ideas" homework assignment in mind as you enjoy the show!

    Star Wars: The Clone Wars - On Netflix

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  • TimVukmanTimVukman Posts: 45
    edited December 1969

    Hi:

    Thanks for including the info on Alt and CTRL for moving keyframes. That's good to know. I will file it.

    The picture that you have posted really is awesome!!!! Is this a computer generated animation series? That screen cap doesn't look like something someone drew by hand.

    On your recommendation I will watch the movie as a study for inspiration and an example of animation style and methodology. :)

    Thanks

    Tim

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,543
    edited December 1969

    Yes, it's a 3d animated CG series.
    The main Human and Humanoid characters are quite stylized. The ships and other prop work is nicely detailed, with great looking large paint brush strokes for textures... looks fantastic! Too bad NetFlix doesn't have the extras that come on the DVDs - words from the artists, directors, etc.,

  • TimVukmanTimVukman Posts: 45
    edited December 1969

    I started watching last night. There are some effects like I would like to know how they did. The holograms for communication and the energy weapon.

    I noticed the textures in space in particular, which would be the large brush strokes you mentioned, on the ships colours to imply some indication of usage and distance traveled through fading.

    As with all of the Star Wars efforts, they have some imagination when it comes to character creation! It's really interesting to see the effort made on lip syncing them, and I did notice the eye movements. They really add life to the characters.

    There's a lot for me to learn from their lighting. I am struggling in that regard. I haven't got that dialed in yet.

    I noticed as you had mentioned that they have indeed used a light touch on arm swing when the humanoids are walking, but I was a little surprised at the overall approach in some of the walking motions themselves. I found them quite stilted as though there's an intent to drive a hard contact on each step.

    I will continue to watch. I ideas and inspiration can be found in many places, so it's a good source. I like the pacing and crisp scenes. There are no unnecessary movements to distract from the conversations and the plot line.

    Thanks for suggesting it!!

    Tim

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,543
    edited December 1969

    This is a cool start to the process: Make a Hologram - by Cripeman

    It would be the same for animation, except we'd then render the hologram animation as a sequenced Tiff, or whichever format... I use Targa, because I can use that directly in Dogwaffle as an animated brush - but that's another story altogether! ;)

    Ctrl + Drag and Alt + Drag...
    Man, I slaved away for quite some time before finding this out! (copying and/or stretching keyframes)
    So I try to mention them right away in animation conversations!

  • TimVukmanTimVukman Posts: 45
    edited December 1969

    Wow on the hologram. Hard to follow the steps, but the results speak for themselves.

    Thanks

    Tim

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