Monday, 21. July 2008
Week 4
...was to make this ball and socket joint puppet walk.
At the End of the week I managed to coordinate the legs and the torso sometimes. I tried a few times to let him walk but it was really hard work. Even a normal walk is hard to archieve. Sometimes I think I'm too analytical while trying to understand how it might work. I made the experience that sometimes my instinct is more right than the left side of my brain: if I trust in my intuition the walk got better. And that's reasonable and makes totally sense: I know how walking works, because I'm doing it every day. If I tried to remember that my animation got better. But I have to practise more, I guess. I have to practise how to get that knowlegde about movement into the puppet.
Some of the results may be seen in the flash file below. Arril said, one thing could be to give the head something to do, so that he might have a reason for moving in a special direction. This could make it easier, when he has to be on which point. I'll have to keep that in mind. Another good thing is blocking the movement out. Bringing the puppet into the key poses of the complete movement and pointing it out on an acetat put on the screen. After that, you would normally have a curved line your puppet could follow through the animation process.
For the run, I helpend myself with a rig to support the puppet, it was bound around the puppets waist and hidden unter the jumper. It's a simple supporting rig, there are hundreds of possibilities to use (broken tripods, self-made wooden ones, helping hands, ...). This is cheap and easy: just a hinge joint screwed on two blocks of wood, for flipping it back when you only use it for measuring. The wire is a squared one which is harder to bend than aluminium for example because it has to keep some weight in place.
You could use it for supporting the puppet like I did but also for measuring the position of one point you'd like to keep for a whole shot. If you'd like to keep the puppets head in position while his hands and legs doing something crazy, for example, you would spot the end of the wire to the puppets nose or any significant other point, flip it back, take your shot, move your puppet, compare it to you rig and flip it back again, capture you frame... If you use it for supporting your puppet, be aware that every time you use it, you have to remove it in post. You could try to hide it in the backdrops. It's always good to take one shot of the situation without puppets and other moveable things because then you have a picture without shaodws and so on. Sometimes you need to remove bigger parts of the frame and then it's good to have a kind of placeholder. Be careful with the shadows, too, because they sometimes evolve a life of thier own....
Comments
Brause wrote on Tuesday, 22. July 2008 at 12:31:
love it! you did quite a great job there- AGAIN. Hope you can see, feel and enjoy the progress!
Darkstrider wrote on Thursday, 24. July 2008 at 07:38:
Wow, great work Jessica!!!
Keep in mind, walking is the hardest thing to do in stopmotion... when you've got that down, you'll be a master. I agree... I do better when I just work instinctively. I don't know if the instructor wants a certain kind of walk, with the bobbing head, or if maybe that's the kind you want to do, but I tend to try for a smooth head movement. A lot of people's heads don't bob when they walk, instead they glide forward. So I try to use the 'grabber to make sure the torso and head glide forward the same amount every frame, without wobbling, and the legs and arms do their thing (whatever they need to do to get the torso there for that frame, make sense?)
But then I'm a beginner when it comes to walks - definitely do whatever works for you!
Jessica wrote on Thursday, 24. July 2008 at 09:02:
No, Mike, you're totally right! Getting a smooth movement of the head is so difficult. It wasn't my intention having the head bobbing around and I'd be glad if I ever get a normal or a real cartoony way of moving head and torso.... It's very difficult. But: I'm still trying! And trying! And trying... ;)
Darkstrider wrote on Friday, 25. July 2008 at 15:49:
Here's what I like to do.... it might be something you'd like to try:
When I grab the puppet, I sort of wrap both my hands around it in such a way that I have simultaneous control over all parts... torso, head, arms and legs - I can feel them all at the same time. First I move the entire puppet forward (if it's a walk Im doing). Of course the tied-down foot stays where it is - that pretty well pulls that leg to exactly where it needs to be. But - as I move the puppet forward, I try to maintain the angle of the head - and if it was turning or anything I try to maintain that as well, to whatever extent I can. Sometimes I can even sort of move the arms in the directions they need to go, all at the same time, as Im pulling the torso forward, but more likely I'll leave the arms till a bit later.
Now, Having pulled the puppet forward, being careful to keep torso and head at the same angles they were at before, I then move the secondary leg. This is a big limb - much bigger than an arm, and more important in overall balance and weight, so it must come first. Then the arms. Sometimes when I'm animating arms I think of them as limp spaghetti noodles and make them sort of dangle loosely and follow the action of the torso, as if they're just hanging there and being moved by it. Or sometimes I have them actively swinging. Depends on the walk.
Anyway, and this step is absolutely crucial! When you're done moving all the limbs, maybe the fingers and face if they're involved, then look carefully at your framegrabber image. Scroll back and forth a few times and examine how it moves. I most often find that, as I was moving all the various little parts of the puppet, I've thrown off the main movement - the torso and head! It happens without your even being aware you're moving them. So usually have to just push the head and maybe the torso back ever so slightly to get them where they need to be. Also - last thing to check each frame - make sure the head is "tracking" properly. I mean, if it's supposed to be turning to the left and down, make sure it's doing just that, and in the right amount. You might also want to do the same check for each hand, each finger if they're visible.
Some of the best advice I ever got was from Misha Klein - and I'll pass it on to you. He said if you want to express in the pantomime, move every part of the puppet. Wrists, knees, elbows, fingers... nothing remains static. Got to be careful though, and not get carried away!! Don't want your puppet twitching all over like he's got ants in his pants!!
Jessica wrote on Friday, 25. July 2008 at 17:50:
Well, this really sounds helpful... I already did it intuitive on the quadruped walk this week. It's working much better now. I'm going to keep that in mind for my following animation.... Thanks a lot!
Nils wrote on Saturday, 26. July 2008 at 02:47:
Ich bin sehr beeindruckt.
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Shelley Noble wrote on Tuesday, 22. July 2008 at 02:51:
Hilarious! And so well done. I'm a fan.