More Ball Bouncing

Today I experimented with the scaling tools in Maya to deform the ball to make it appear smeared when bouncing, I found this simple to do and the effect it created was more cartoon like and smooth in nature. I used the same bar sheet as the rubber ball.

Ball Bouncing

I have practiced with different ball bounces in Maya and 2D, I used my own reference with different balls to help with this. The weight and material of the ball effects the bounce, if it’s a dense material and it is heavy the ball won’t have a large bounce and will come to a stop fairly quickly. However, if the ball is lighter and made from a bendy material the bounce is greater and will travel longer. Overall, I found this rather easy. I used the ghost tool and made the y movement first so that I could fully see the movement before adding any x axis movement.

For the first one I used a tennis ball.

From this I made a bar sheet.

Then using the bar sheet I translated this into 3D.

Then once I have the animation down in 3D I used that as reference for the 2D, which I did in Photoshop.

I used the same process with other types of balls:

With a rubber ball.

With a heavier ball.

Maya Block Interaction

I did the maya animation of the block interaction, the idea beginning that a small cube is like the baby and the bigger cube is a parent. They are walking next to each other and the small cube is getting tired so the big cube gives it a piggyback ride.

I found using the scale tool was easy and the overall animation was simple, I am planning to do this in stop motion on Wednesday. I have already created the bar sheet for this.

Update :

I have now done the stop motion of this, I found that I had to change the jumping to tilting as I have no way to make the cube jump at this stage. The hardest part of the animation was making the cubes rotate as they moved as the rotation made them move further away from each other. I have noted that you can noticed this as well as a singe frame that is out of place when the cube it tilting.

Update:

I presented my interaction animation to the class and the story behind the interaction was guessed immediately so I think that I connoted the story successfully.

Animation 101

I have been experimenting with the spider rig in maya and have created a small animation. I just found it strange that it only had one pivot point, in the future I might add joints to the spider to make it move more independently and realistically.

Pendulum Attempt 2

Today we went through how to do the pendulum in Maya properly, learning that the way I did it before was inconvenient, that there is a much easier way. Moving the pivot point to the middle so that you only have to rotate one axis. The way I was doing it made it so I had to translate on the x and z which made the whole thing appear un-arch-like. Using this new technique I redid the Maya animation and I am more happy with this version.

 

Update :

I also did the pendulum in stop motion, I found this one harder as I couldn’t figure out a good way to use my ruler to make a smooth arch, however I think the motion is there even if the movement isn’t smooth.

Pendulum with Maya

I also tried to do the pendulum animation in Maya, I found this harder than the anticipation. Trying to get the motion of the curve was harder and fitting it down to a couple of seconds made it worse. Overall, I think this is a start. It has got the motions of the pendulum but I think that it’s too jerky, and to do this I think I need more frames too work with. I will ask the question if we can go over more than 4 seconds later in the week so that I can retry this.

Anticipation Animation

I have done the anticipation animation with Maya so that I can reference it for the stop motion I will do tomorrow. For the anticipation the cube rolls back twice, I did this so that I could test out having the cubes do rotations. Then the cube pulls back before shooting forward, coming to a abrupt halt and tilting forward with the follow through.

This is the bar sheet depicting what happens for each frame. 

And here is the actual animation.

I think this is a good attempt at anticipation and follow through, it’s not jerky and I tried to make the tilting accurate. If I were to do it again that’s the only thing I would work on.

Update:

I now have done this in stop motion. I found the anticipation animation very easy and did it very quick compared with the previous animations, the only problems I have with it is that the animation didn’t end up being centred in the shot and that I would make the sliding forward of the cube quicker.

Animation 101

Today we went through the principles of anticipation and follow though. How air resistance and fiction effect the movement of the cube. We also were shown the movement for a pendulum, how gravity and weight makes it move. I plan to do these principles in Maya, then I have booked to do stop motion for them on Monday.

Maya Practicing

I have done the basic A to B in Maya, I found it very easy and simple to do and edit with the graph editor. (Bar sheets with the stop motion)

 

 

 

You can see the difference in the movement from altering the graph editor. I also tried this technique with the car asset.

The way the car moves is cartoon-y in style, going back before going forward then going back at the end. I also found this easy but I didn’t like the way the car stops, I think it’s too sudden. I want to extended my knowledge of Maya and I plan on trying other techniques and methods.

Animation Practicing ( Stop Motion )

Today I did stop motion A to B with easing, it took an hour and a half because at the start I accidentally hit the camera so I restarted. Somehow in the middle of the animation the camera dips a little anyway, but it is very minor. Other than that I think I did alright, the shift is subtle but it’s there, I might make it more obvious if I did it again.