Looped walk cycle

[bearklaw]

I have 100 frames so far of a walk cycle. What is the easiest method to make it loop seamlessly?

[james-lang]

wow, 100 frames for a walk cycle!!

Which way do you mean seamlessly loop? If you mean so it will carry on walking and walking beyond your 100 frames, then use infinity cycle. Check the docs on a fuller explanation.

Hope you post it up for a gander.

[bearklaw]

is 100 frames too many? You can take a peek at a test of the animation at the following link:

www.aaronfaircloth.com/Images/walkloop.mpg

feel free to give me some feedback!
thanks, aaron

[james-lang]

100 frames, yes, that would be too many, the animation would simply run too slow, but after watching your small clip, I've noticed that it isn't a 100 frame walk cycle as he takes 3 steps during the 100 frame period, i.e. 100/3 = 33 fp second walk cycle.

As for feeback, it's looking good but a bit static and slow moving, try removing a couple of keyframe and making it shorter, like 24 frames per second, so the whole step will happen over that 24 frame period, this will help make it look a lot more fluid as well.

[bearklaw]

well i changed it up a bit and rendered it as well if you feel like taking another look at it. I had to update the link as well:

www.aaronfaircloth.com/3D.htm

Though it still is not perfect, I truly appreciate your advice!
Thanks, aaron

[james-lang]

Hi, yeah, that's a lot better and smoother, I don't know it may just be me, but he still seems kind of rigid, hard to tell from a front on shot though.

Hey, any other guys want to comment? I'm more of a modeller and texture artist than an animator anyway! 8)

Nice model though!

Regards

[wtyler]

Hmm..First off you want to make your animation visible to people.. especially on a demo reel =).

Don't put a black character on a black background.. you can hardly see any motion. If you are demoing motion and trying to get a job as an animator... people need to see your sense of timing and weight on tape. Don't waste their time.

Don't put a front view of a walk cycle on your reel.. it reads bad.. even well animated walkcycles will look awkwards especially from a pure front view. If you want to show off.. try to show as much as the side view that you can.
The 3rd quarter view is a start [from what little I see of the character] but I'd push the camera over a bit more.

If you want to blow peoples socks off and get a job really quickly.. combine all your animation into one clip.. no moving cameras to hide bad animation. Use cuts if you have to.

[wtyler]

Sorry for the short posts but high end won't let me post a long message. Sigh.

Anyways as I was saying show your work but also include an animation such as a playblast to show motion clearly.. eg.. blue on grey background.. make sure the colors don't bleed too much. You can get animation work alone on wireframes if your weight and timing is good enough beleve it or not.

To make your reel stand out I'd suggesting putting more breaking/resuming motion in your animation. eg have your character walk... then bolt into a run... jump over something.. jump onto a rope... swing to a rubber ball and roll around on it. Or have a character pitch a baseball to another character using a bat. Or have a character try to lift weights.

In otherwords.. don't just stick a walkcycle on a reel..take this chance to show off your animation!

[wtyler]

Anyways.. back to the animation at hand [I tend to get sidetracked on these things]. The overal timing feels almost right.. some more snap and a slightly faster walk could do but I think its going in the right direction. its just I can't see much else.. eg. the leg motion...

[waboflex]

Definitely a good start, although I would say the thing that stands out to me is the proportions of the legs (or leg bones) - the lower leg seems very short compared to the upper leg. It'll be difficult to get it looking realistic when they're like this, I think if you could move the knee joint up a bit the existing walk cycle would look much more natural and flowing.

Once you've got a general flow you're happy with, you can start adding more key 'detail' for things like rolling off the ball of the foot just as the heel is being raised to bring it forward. Try to keep it as simple as you can (it's easier to adjust curves in the graph editor with fewer keys), but at the same time don't be afraid to add keys at 3-4 frame intervals where needed. Another common problem is the knee joint 'clicking' or snapping at the extremeties of it's motion. You might want to fiddle with the knee joint's rotation damping to make it ease in and out more smoothly.

Hope it helps.

[bearklaw]

thanks for all the advice guys!