Today I have finished blocking out the environment where the meditation scene will take place. In the next week I will be modelling the background props such as some vegetation and more.
10th June 2024
Today I am halfway through my walk cycle test following LEARN CGI with Yawyee’s tutorial (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jiI4vWjR2Fc&t=2151s). I have encountered some problems with the arms and legs movement. At first, I did not know why it looked so weird and wrong but then I realized that instead of animating the opposite sides together, I animated the same sides. Here are the playblasts:
I entered the graph editor and just adjusted the keys in order to make it right.
Also animated the head
12th June 2024
When animating the hips, it made the legs move a bit weirdly; the knee was going in too much into the middle, I adjusted it in the Channel Box from 15 to 5 in the Rotation Z axis.
I finished polishing it in the Graph Editor and created instances of the mesh to arrange it in four different views with a moving instance at the bottom.
15th June 2024
I have decided to use the Azula Rig to practice a run cycle as I want to get familiar with both Rigs so whenever I animate my scene, I know all the controls because both rigs are different.
I like it but it looks choppy and I do not understand what the problem could be, I have checked my graph editor and all the curves are smooth where they should be. I will ask Joshua on Monday and also consult the Discord Chat.
Now, looking back at the walk cycle, I think the shoulders should move a bit more because they are to stiff.
20 June 2024
Referenced SlothArt’s run cycle (https://youtu.be/bVk2qxH2YUU), timing the key poses myself and eyeing the different poses. I am very pleased with this improved version of my run cycle.
21st June 2024
I started the key poses for the expression test. In the last key pose, it is changing the hands’ position even though there is no key in the graph editor or the timeline.
23rd June 2024
I have textured the background. I am keeping it low-poly and simple to focus on the animation.
25th June 2024
So, I was already making my in-betweens, and my file got corrupted and I did not make backups. I feel really enraged because it was all fine until yesterday. The reason why it got corrupted, is because I canceled my subscription to the Animbot service. I normally save my file and leave it open until the next day, then save it again just before I start working on it. But when I saved it, it said “The file cannot be saved because there was a problem with the script” or something along the lines. So I decided to close it and open it again and I never opened it.
I will still try to get it back somehow, but I will move on for now.
27th June 2024
Timing for the key poses
Key Poses, adjusted the timing to have space for the in-betweens.
30th June 2024
In-betweens. I have also removed the flap from the trousers.
1st July 2024
Adjusted the timing and added keys when Aang sits down.
Facial Expression keys
2nd July 2024
I tried to turn the tangents to spline but did not have enough In-betweens so I added a lot more.
3rd July 2024
Polished the graph editor and added more spacing so it takes more time when Aang looks around him
BEFORE
AFTER
4th July 2024
I have started blocking the second scene here most of the focus is on Aang’s facial expressions. I am going to experiment with the camera animation next.
Camera test 1
5th July 2024
Camera test 2. Adjusted timing, added keys, and modified camera placement.
added more keys at the end
7th July 2024
Adjusted timing and spline
20th July 2024
Final video