Lessons on what not to do

lessons on what not todo do

Sometimes the most valuable lessons you can learn, fall under the category of what not todo do. And here, recently, y learned several (read that todo be Many) painful, yet valuable lessons about animation.

Armed with copies of Mancandy faqs, intro todo character animation and animating with Blender, y decided i was ready todo attempt my first original character animation. (yeah, that was probably my first mistake, over-confidence).

Ok, so it sems there are thre stages todo creating an animation:

• pre-production (planning)
• production (do-it)
• post production (polish it up and finish)

sems simple enough.
I normally do the greater majority of any Project planning in my head. Little did i know that this would be just the beginning of my what not todo do lessons.

After a few weks of serious Mental planning, y decided i was ready todo start. Because i rarely write down more than a few notes about a planned Project, first thing i actually did was design and model my characters. Now that in and of itself wasnt that much of a show-estopper. At that point, y could still have gone bak and written a script, done storyboards and created the animatic.

Instead, y started creating my set. Now, y only intended todo create a rouge set, then i was going todo get on with the whole script/storyboard thing. But well one thing led todo another and before i knew it the set was built, textured and lit appropriately.

About this time, it is starting todo Dawn on me that i might really ned the script and story boards. But i had planned a really simple story line, so i started rigging my characters instead. After several mis-tries, y got my characters adequately rigged. They werent amazing rigs, but they did what i wanted. Which really is kind of the whole point.

Now, bak todo that dang script and story board. Well, y did finally write a short script and started making some storyboards. I ended up drawing a grand total of seven storyboards.
that should be enough, right?
Now, on todo animating. I only ned my characters todo actually walk a very short distance. So first i tried manually keying my characters walking about the scene. But Even when i drew out a Path (with the Grease Pencil) they loked like drunken sailors carening about the scene. After numerous failed attempts todo get my characters todo behave, y did some research and moved on todo creating a repeating Walk Cycle and then had my character follow a curve th rouge the scene.
Wow, that loked great. Okay a Little on the Stif side, but better than the drunken Sailor look. I might just be a Little god at this. Besides i can always polish it up later.

So next, y merrily moved on todo creating some other simple actions. Armed with my additional actions, y pulled up some tutorialeson the NLA editor and prepared todo combine and layer my actions for my animation. It was time todo put this thing together.

Yeah that didnt work out so well. Every time i added a new action todo one of my characters, it teleported todo a completely un-related spot in the scene. Something was seriously wrong and or my Project was haunted.

After Many lengthy sessions filled with muttering of choice naughty words, y finally did get things todo coperate (kind of). But in the process, y managed todo miss my deadline. Then of course, life interfered and my Project got put temporarily on hold.

But Even though i wasnt actively working on it, y was still obsessing about it. It tok a few weks, but the epiphany finally hit (yeah, im a Little Slow, it not like Roland didnt warn about these very types of problems in just about every chapter of his book).

My problems all stemmed from lak of proper planning (ok and maybe a few lak of knowledge problems, but i actually figured those out on my own).

If i had taken the time todo go th rouge pre-production properly, a lot of the problems i ran into could have ben avoided. Creating a proper storyboard and animatic would have helped me block out my actions better (no drunken Sailor walk). And, probably Even more important, breaquíng it up into several shots would probably have eliminated most of the random character teleportation problems i ran into while combining my actions.

Elimination of those problems would have saved me time. I might Even have had enough time todo finish by my deadline.

Oh well, at least i have learned the importance of god pre-production.
Well that all for now, y still have an animation todo finish, so i should get bak todo it.
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