The basics have been covered in a million and one tutorials, so if you haven't read up on easing, poses and flow,
I recommend you do so before trying to learn anything else. I also suggest you visit this thread
to learn how to make 1 pixel movements with your keyboard, very helpful.
That being said a few good general pivot tips are:
-Move every joint in each frame
-Try to use somewhat realistic poses (if your aiming for realism)
-Ease your stops and starts (there are certain cases where this does not apply)
-Check to see if your spacing is consistent, if not, edit the frames
-Make sure your stick has correct foot placement
-Consider the laws of physics
Learning in this tutorial is based mostly off explanation and demonstration through pivot files!
So I encourage you to download and study the pivot files as I am not explaining frame by frame.
I strongly encourage it if you plan to only skim through the writing ;)
Gif links are provided incase multiple gifs being displayed lags your screen.
Feedback and suggestions would be nice.
Upcoming Tutorials:
-Walking
-Camera movements
-3D
-Requested movements
Correcting General Errors
Spoiler (Click to Show)
Even though most have been taught about easing, flow and moving every joint which does make a huge deal of
improvement, everyone runs into trouble at some point or another.
The most common for a new animator is stiffness, and yes, moving every joint each frame will cure this but
this usually brings on a whole new problem. People move the joints each frame without actually thinking how that segment
should be moving, just for the sake of eliminating stiffness. With lack of thought to how the segments should be moving
results in inconsistent spacing. Inconsistent spacing leads to shakiness.
If you animation is jittering all over the place it is because you spacing is going wild. When you move a limb, unless some
large force is acting upon it (like getting a fridge thrown at your stick) then you should ease your starts and your stops,
and keep your spacing in between fairly constant. Be mindful of any changes in direction of your limbs movement, it can
give it a shaky look if they change for no reason or if the direction change isn't eased. Another cause is foot placement
but with a little concentration that is easily remedied, especially if you learn how to use your key board to make 1 pixel
movements (link at the top of thread). So whenever your animating and you see some shakiness, review your frames.
If you have a segment that moves something like 5 pixels, then the next frame only 2, then the frame after that it moves
4 it is not going to look good.
Another problem is the speed of the animation. If you do not animate enough frames you will find your self with a fast,
rushed sort of look. No matter, just add some more frames in your movements. The more frames you have tend to increase
smoothness, but don't go overboard because then your movements can become to slow and boring. Although you can
obviously alter your frames per second to accommodate for your spacing, I tend to animate at 17 fps like most others
(frame delay 6 on pivot 2).
My number one tip for eliminating these issues, is move every joint and review each segment individually to see how
it should be moving, if it is speeding up or slowing down, if some other force is acting on it etc. If you review these things
you tend to make less mistakes. If you look at movements in general, moving every joint isn't solely for eliminating stiffness
it's essential for making realistic movements. How often do you kick a ball and have your arms hanging side by side
completely rigid? Once you realize how your limbs should be moving in your movement, and incorporate that in your animation
you will notice a much more lively and realistic look to your animations.[/spoiler]
Running
Spoiler (Click to Show)
animation etc. you are going to have to animate some running. I won't analyse each frame as there are only five and looking
at the piv file should suffice.
Here is a quick 5 frame loop I whipped up in a couple of minutes, nothing special but it will do. Runs with 5 frames tend
to be a bit floaty and at an almost jogging pace, if you don't like that look make a 4 frame cycle instead as shown below this example.
Gif|Piv
Feel free to edit the poses or add/remove frames to make a run that suits your style
I know the loop is in almost static position, if you wanted it to run across the scene just space out the origin in each frame
evenly across the screen, like in the example below. This is a 4 frame run cycle, which is why it looks faster than the run
above. If you dislike the speed, adjust the poses slightly and reduce the origin spacing.
Gif|Piv
Credits to UG314 for the base
Tips for making a good run:
-Do not keep your origin still in the vertical axis - your body moves up and down as you run; so should your stickman
-Unless you are increasing/decreasing in speed, keep the horizontal origin spacing relatively even
-To increase/decrease the speed of a run, add or remove some poses/frames.
-Your back stays relatively still when you run, only move it by a couple of pixels
[/spoiler]
Acrobatics
Spoiler (Click to Show)
So some key factors in animating acrobatics are using realistic poses, correct spacing and applying the laws of physics.
Yes I know, they are key factors in most animations but in my opinion they are much more vital in acrobatics, as the quality
of a good acrobatic animation is based on how 'life-like' it is.
The spacing of an acrobatic animation is a bit different to most others, usually tumbles and flips are chained together, and
as they performed the stickman carries momentum. Lets say you have a stickman start with a run, into a dive roll, then
immediately after exiting the roll the stick does a round off into a backflip. If we were to animate that we would ease the stick
into the run but from that point on the spacing would remain pretty much constant throughout the following movements as the
sticks forward momentum will be carrying him through those movements at a fair speed. The spacing only decreases as he lands
the backflip at the end. To reduce the momentum we would most likely have to animate the stick taking a few steps back after
landing the last flip.
Essentially what I am saying is we must account for momentum. I made this acrobatic animation a while ago to show how I believe
momentum would act on a stick's movement.
Gif|Full Size|Piv
Credits to Blademaster for the base
Admittedly it isn't animated all that well, but I aimed to show despite the fact he was doing a backflip and landed on his knees,
his forward momentum allowed him to transition into a forward roll instead of failing the flip and hurting himself. He takes a step
out of the roll (and possibly one or two more had I animated more) to follow through and reduce the momentum he is carrying.
I see a lot of animations where a stick is running a high speed, does some kind of tumble/flip then stops dead still after they land.
Not good.
Here is an example of chaining a couple of movements together. As you can see there is no easing between when the flips are
chained together due to momentum, only when he stops on the wall and changes direction (and obviously at the very start and
end of the animation) is there easing. This was a joint with Yogurt.
Gif|Piv
Credits to Caleb and Yogurt
Another thing we can take from that animation is using the arms for build up. If you act out a lot of acrobatic movements ourselves,
you will notice your arms are heavily involved in building up the power and momentum to be able to perform the actual movements.
So make sure you have an adequate build up, nothing looks more awkward than a flip that has little to no arm movement in the build up.
I made this to show how to animate a standing backflip, take note that the build up plays a big part in the realism of the flip. The
landing of the flip and the step back aren't up to scratch in my opinion but I'll leave that up to you to animate, the most tricky part
I feel is getting the spacing and poses of the flip itself right. Take a look at the piv!
Gif|Piv
Even with great poses, good build up, and correct use of the limbs and body to generate the necessary power, if the physics are
messed up then your flip will look terrible. It's not just gravity you have to account for, it can also be how much force it appears
your stick is generating versus how far off the ground the stick has moved. E.g: Animating a tiny build up and slow spacing in the
legs on the jumping part of the flip but showing the stick to have jumped twice as high as his height. It just won't look good.
Take into account these things and apply them to your own acrobatic movements and hopefully you will have a nice animation going.
Modelling your movements after your own and off videos of others is a great idea, and a great way to improve. With that being said,
here is a 931 frame acrobatics/tricking joint I organized on DarkDemon - this features a heap of different movements from some of
DD's best animators which you can analyse and learn off.
Gif|Full Size|Piv
Credits to Blademaster, Krustalien & everyone involved in the joint[/spoiler]
Fighting
Spoiler (Click to Show)
know and consider a few things: Muscle control and power, how to animate a punch and kick, chaining attacks, reactions and fight choreography.
Basic Punch and Kick
We gotta know how to animate some basic punches and kicks if we even want to consider animating a fight. Sorcerer explains
how to do these quite nicely in his tutorial so go check that out if you haven't already. Pivot files below could
also be studied to teach you how to animate some basic moves.
Here is a pretty rough punch loop I made in 10 minutes, there are some errors (especially in the legs) so don't look into this
example too much but it does demonstrate a general outline of the poses and spacing involved in a punch. Take note of how
the arm gets heavily spaced as the punch is delivered.
Gif|Piv.
Here is a more snappy example I made, and the style I prefer to use. Take note of the way the body snaps back a bit after each hit to emphasize the power. I didn't really focus on the legs so ignore that shit. :P
Gif|Piv
Muscle Control and Power
We have to have an understanding of muscle control and power. The general rule of easing isn't necessarily followed to the
letter when it comes to fighting. If every move slowly gains speed and slowly decelerates, your going to have really weak,
slow and boring looking fighting moves. This is where muscle control comes in. If you extend and retract your arm as fast as
you can, you will realize that through your muscles you can do this at quite a fast speed, and that you have the ability to stop
your arm mid movement by tensing the muscle. So through this, we can see in real life not everything has a gradual build up in
speed, some actions we do are quite quick and snappy due to our muscles. This is what allows fast fighting moves and reactions
when we animate in pivot. Don't be afraid to use heavy spacing on punches and kicks, if used correctly it convey a quick and
powerful attack which looks great in a fight animation.
Chaining Attacks
When we watch a fight, I'm sure we can all agree we would rather see a succession of awesome looking fight moves rather than
a guy getting punched once or twice resulting in a knock out. So we are going to have to learn how to link attacks together.
We want each attack to flow into the next one. Here is a succession of punches I animated as a beginner, as you can see each
punch leads into the next all while the stick is moving forward. Take note though, your stick doesn't move forward at a constant pace,
it should have some slight pauses between some moves. Changing the pace keeps the fights interesting and believeable as in a real life
fight people don't charge blindly at one another and throw punches, they attack a couple of times, then tend to pause to regain
balance or brace themselves for an incoming punch/kick from their opponent or even just to think what their next move might be.
Gif|Piv
Credits to Lithium for the base
Not the greatest quality, but it does showcase a basic punch, an uppercut, rapid punches and some sort of spinning punch at the
end and how they flow into each other. Change the type of punch/kick your stick is doing to keep your animation interesting and
try to keep a good amount of both kicking and punching, not just all one type of attack like the animation above.
Here is another small combo, featuring a heavy spaced kick. This heavy spacing coupled with a tremor and ground crack, leaves
you with a very powerful kick. Using trails or blurs can compensate for the heavy spacing, it tends to keep the powerful look while
making it look slightly smoother. Admittedly it is a horrible trail but you get the idea.
Gif|Piv
Get creative with your combos, combine them with acrobatics and it will set you apart from the generic 3 hit combos everyone else animates.
Gif|Full Size|Piv
Credits to vagiC for the base
Reactions and Choreography
Putting the fighting together with so
