Thursday 4 December 2008

How to improve my walk...



Above are very quickly sketched ideas of how I could change my 2D walk and the main things I needed to think about when trying a new version of my walk. Below is the second attempt at 2D:



Analysing this animation there are a few areas I still need to change and correct to improve the walk. I have added extra frames when comparing it to my first attempt. I think the arm movements are much clearer in this new one, but perhaps not as exaggerated. Also because I have added in frames the movement is slower. I don't think that this is necessarily a bad thing as you can see the movement better, particularly with the arms. I also think that the bob is much smoother and flows quite nicely.

To improve this 2D walk I need to work on the head shape. I tried to put in some squash and stretch which I think would work well if it was more accurate, but it varies too much in the animation above and just makes the head look a bit of an odd shape. I added frames to give the walk a bit of anticipation and overlap at the highest point of the walk and before the step, however I still think another frame could be added at the highest point that is really exaggerated with the leg and arm up much higher so that the movement is almost over emphasised.

3D walk :



Second attempt at the 3D walk. I been finding this one much easier to recreate each key position in the walk as you can compare the live against the character much more easily then in 2D. Therefore the body positions of the character are quite accurate compared to the live version. The movement works well however is slightly twitchy and could be made smoother. In this version I also tried to alter the speed of the walk by making the lifting of the leg and arms a little faster. However they look a bit too fast now and un-natural.The movement in general is well exaggerated.

To improve the walk I still need to change the left hand. It could be brought forward in front of the body similar to the right arm rather than just straight up. Both of the arms could also swing a little more moving from back to front as at the moment the movement looks a bit too like a march.
The bob is more noticeable in my first attempt because the character moves down more. I need to try and make the bob as large as possible because this is a very key aspect of the walk. To do this I need to make the character move a little lower on the down frame and giving her a more upright stance on the highest up frame. I could also add in some head movement, even just a tiny amount to make it more natural as well as adjusting the speed. I need to get some consistency in the speed of the walk, maybe by making fewer steps so that the same ones are repeated more often and there is less variation throughout the walk.

My second attempt has got improvements and there is more urgency in the walk, however I still think some key parts could be changed to make it more accurate.

2 comments:

Adam Biles said...

Nice work Steph, looking brilliant so far, i wish i could have picked up the 2D stuff aswell as you have picked up the 3D stuff.
I missed the last half of the presentations because i had to rush to Jolly old London for a gig but how did yours go?
I was pretty nervous about mine at first but i did ease up a little into it, shame we over ran the time limit(and the fact my actual presentation didn't work). I could see Ann looking at the clock through the last 5 minutes :)

Andy Wyatt said...

Your work has come on leaps and bounds...quite literally. You are also evaluating and analysing your animation extremely well. Good stuff