Introduction
In this blog we will be animating the run cycle for our ninja character in adobe after effects.
Character Run Cycle
Next we are going to begin to give our character a run cycle. Before we can start any animating, we need to understand the movement and key poses of a run cycle. For this, we went to google images to see what we could find.
In this first key pose, named ‘straight leg’, we can see that the front leg is very straight and not touching the ground. We can also see that the back leg is not touching the ground either.
Timing is also very important in this process. As running is faster movement, the timing of this animation will be very fast. The walk cycle alone last for about 1 second itself, knowing this, we may have to time our run cycle using 2 frames per leg.
We decided to tilt the body forward so that the character could lean more into the leg movements. The back leg is above the ground, bent at a 90 degree angle and the front leg is relatively straight forward.
It is important to remember that we start with the key frames, such as the start frame, the middle frame and the end frame.
In this frame, the same leg comes forward and is pushed down as the weight of the body is now being placed onto it.
On the image reference above, the fourth pose has both legs off the ground. The toes are pointed more downwards and the leg is pushed more backwards.
The same has to be done with the back leg, whereas here we are going to do the opposite animation to the first leg we did. The process is pretty simple, adjust the pins and points of the leg, rotate the feet to point up or down correspondingly and moving the leg slightly up or down if the leg is on the ground or not.
Here we can see where the calf is moved down and the heel of the foot is beginning to make contact with the ground. The back leg is stretching out and bending, before starting the cycle again.
The back leg may need to be bent a bit more and moved inwards.
We needed to add more puppet pins to the feet to allow it to bend and move easier and give it more fluidity and flexibility.
Now, we are moving onto the arms. Animating the arms is a similar process to animating the legs, as well as the majority of the body to be fair. First off, we need to establish where and how the arm is going to move. It needs to suit his temperament, and to do this, we set the first, last and middle position of the arm. This helps us stay within those boundaries we set ourselves when animating more frames, so we don’t ruin it.
The elbows in this frame are very sharp and pointed, meaning they are bent at a 90 degree angle, which helps give the character a serious, irritated or angry undertone.
Here is the same arm as it comes up. You can see in this frame, the other arm has not been animated yet. We need to make sure that the head does not interfere with this animation, so if the head layer is above the arm layer we need to swap them around to prevent any clipping from happening.
As for animating the other arm, in the frame above – the other arm would not be necessarily visible from the angle we see the character at. However, it is still good to practice hiding the visibility of the body so that we can set the animation for the other arm in the correct place, allowing it to look accurate and realistic when it becomes visible again.
Next we need to add movement to the head and the body, otherwise the animation will look awkward and stiff. The body needs to have a slight bob to it when it moves. In turn, this will make the head move slightly too.
The key frames for the body allow the body to move up and down slightly. We added puppet pins to the body to give us full control over the body movements and positioning.
More pins means more changes we can make, small or big to enhance the animation.
Finally, we must animate the head and cape accordingly.
Animating the head is relatively straight forward. First I need to make the head look more forward, I can do this by moving the head and neck slightly down and forward. Then copy and paste this to the last frame and add subtle changes in between, as well as having a middle frame. This will impact how the animation looks at the end.
The cape animation is pretty straight forward, we need it to be raised as the wind from the character’s fast movements are causing it to raise up and fall down as he moves. The cape’s movement is simple, irregular movements between flowing up and falling down.
Conclusion
This sums up our character’s run animation. I don’t understand how to use adobe after effects much and I’m heavily reliant on Gareth’s recordings right now, learning this software is difficult for me as we are going straight into the deep end with it and I have little desire to use it for animation.
Leah Morrell Games Designer 