Hi,
My goal is to master character animation with blender... but how to I get there?
How can I structure this journey?
I guess I need a master to learn it from, a online guide.
I made some basic steps with Blender, still a noob but with couple of animations in my harddrive. I wish to advance with gaining some good overview of the workflow, i.e. some practical control of it, to a limited degree, but still.
In particular I wish to have a better understanding of modeling and rigging so I can evaluate and understand and express the character. At the moment it's hard to animate when suddenly the left leg of my mesh jumps to the corner after seven steps...
As mastering isn't a one day journey, I wish most of all to costantly know what are my limits, which are the point that I need to maximize. It good to break limits, but less when all is broken...
Also, I wish to try to center at the essence. Seems obvious, but some tutorials try to sell by-products which are confuisng for a beginner - it isn't clear if it's the essence or just a marketing motivated (totally understandable, but then still confusing, learning wise).
I heard of this community, about the cgcookie learning space potential. Then, I don't know how to evaluateso I can learn if it is right for me.
Any advise ,help to share? It would be fun to learn from your experience!
Hey donbonbon,
Welcome to the cookie. I think you’ve picked a very good place to start your journey in character animation. The animation courses here are awesome and will provide you a very solid foundation. It’s going to take you from the basics starting with the bouncing ball, up to your first walk cycle. The later courses will build off of that and teach good body mechanics (lifting, jumping, kicking) and later get you started on lip sync. The instructor is great and takes the time out of his day to provide detailed feedback on all the exercises submitted. The community forum is always here for when you have questions.
You mentioned you also want to understand modeling and rigging. I know there are courses covering both those subjects. More so on the modeling side than rigging but the resources are there to build from.
My advice:
Work hard on every exercise. Exercises like the bouncing ball can feel very basic and boring to people starting out. But there is a reason why EVERY animator everywhere started this way. These beginning exercises are going to teach you very important skills that you will take with into the more difficult ones.
Feedback is important both in receiving and giving. You will get lots of feedback, and sometimes it might feel like you’re not progressing anywhere. Important thing is to take it gracefully, not take it personal, and keep working at it. Giving feedback to the exercises will be important as well. It helps strengthen your “eye” for animation. The more you critique work, the more you will see what’s potentially wrong with an animated shot, thus helping in your own work.
Finally I would say stay active in a community. Doesn’t have to be CGC, but….you know, I think everyone is cool here. Make friends and help people out when you can. The community is going to push you to be better especially when you start getting to know everyone. It's also very uplifting to be able to “talk shop” with like minded people. Especially if there isn’t anyone in your non-digital life that understands the struggles of what you’re learning.
Hope that help answer your questions. Just ask if you have more. Best of luck to ya and happy animating!
Hey Phil
Thanks so much from taking from your time to set some candles on my trail... truely appreciated to be introduced!
DB
The animation courses are great, Wayne Dixon is very helpful and encouraging, and does a great job explaining things. I am still working my way thru the courses and am having lots of fun and have learned a lot, even though it can be discouraging at times. You definitely need to start with the bouncing balls, since a lot of animation is based on that. The amount of detail in animating something so it looks believable is unreal. Speaking for as someone who has very little sense in timing and still working on developing an eye being able to submit exercises multiple times has been very helpful, I won't admit how many times I have had to submit somethings to get a decent result or wanted to hit my head and wonder how I couldn't have seen something. The advice given has always been helpful and spot on. Anyway try not to get discouraged, realize it takes time to learn to make a mesh, rig it and animate it (in my case way longer than I thought), and it is really neat to watch something you made move.
Hey donbonbon
Just wanted to say welcome as well!
Also wanted to put in my two cents ;)
Both these guys are right, the animation courses on here are fantastic! Wayne is a great teacher, and he makes the courses fun to watch and follow along with! Just make sure you take your time going through all the fundamental stuff! I made the mistake of rushing through it, because I wanted to get to the character parts. It ended up biting me in the butt, so now I'm going back through it and taking my time. If it takes you a week to get a basketball rolling across the screen to look right, then it takes a week. It will make you better in the long run! The next time you do it, it will be a piece of cake, and take you not nearly as long. Because you took the time to figure it out the first time! Animation is very hard, but if you have a solid foundation it will make it so much easier!
There are a lot of great modeling courses on here too! If you're completely new to blender, I would recommend going through the Blender Basics course. They go over the essentials of every discipline in Blender, which will help get you going!
One last note, I'm interested in rigging as well! Just learn the basics for now. Then once you get comfortable animating, start learning more advanced rigging. That way you can learn how things should or shouldn't work, and make rigs that will behave and move in a predictable way.
Hope that was helpful!