animation - how?

hoktar

i have to do an animation for school (in c4d),of course i choose a scifi animation (stargate sg1/sga).
well, but now the "problem" is, i never did an animation befor, only stills.
i mean a really animation. ok, made ships move from a to b and stuff like that but no real battle scene or something interesting you know...

so i would be really very happy for any help!:p

for example, what is the best way to use cameras for space scenes?
letting them move along splines?

i'm really a totally noob on animations:rolleyes:

(it would be amazing if anyone could give me a file with a short animation (3 seconds or so ^^) only that i know how to build such a scene.),
i'm telling you because the animation needs to be finished in about 4 weeks.
the ships are almost finished but the animation...

Guerrilla

Moving to 3d Q&A.

Andrew Boulton

The "best way" rather depends on what it is you're trying to do. How long is the animation, and what happens?

L2K

1st thing ALWAYS : draw a storyboard.

you'll think about what, where, when, what moves, what not
you'll draw all of this on a paper, like a comic strip.
only when this is finished, you begin to model, texture, rig and animate.

[Deleted User]

For space animation I usually use splines. Make sure the splines in C4D are set to "uniform", by default they're set to "adaptive", which will make the ship jump along the straights really fast and go around the corners really slow.
I would probably use splines for the camera

Cinema 4D also has a "Vibrate" tag that is great for simulating camera shake

hoktar

i'm sorry i didn't reply earlyer, i was at seminar with school.

@Andrew Boulton: it should only be about one minute or so, as it is the first year working with 3d for my classmates.
the story is just to show the ships, nothing special..
like a ship is firing at another one or the puddle jumper flying trough the stargate or some ships entering/leaving hyperspace...
of course these scenes are connected to a little story

@L2K: yea, first we had to draw a storyboard so i do have that already

@Pyrocitor: ok, because i would have just moved the ships (without splines).
i already discovered the vibration tag , (first i thought i would need coffee for getting camera-vibration ^_^)
but how do you make a ship leaning to the right when flying a curve to the right by using splines? you know what i mean?

thanks 4 your help @ all!!

Andrew Boulton

You mean like in this?

YouTube - Traveller - Research Station Gamma clip

First, make sure Tangential is ticked in the Align To Spline tag. Then, simply set Rotation.Bank keyframes at the start, middle, and end of the movement. The ends should be 0, the middle maybe 30-45 degrees.

[Deleted User]

Tangential is the easiest way, and will probably work fine for what you want to do. Otherwise I would use a set of nulls (each one controlling a different axis) and animate the banking and turning by hand. The other thing you can do is make a secondary spline next to the main one that controls the banking (rail spline)

hoktar

oh ok, so just rotating and keying, thought there might be a "prfessional" way.. ^_^
thanx!

[Deleted User]

It is pretty much the professional way except you can do some things with expressions less complicated.Generally you should/could add some more dynamic by making your pitch angle dependant of where you are in the curve. Greater pitch angle in in the middle of the turn than at the end or the beginning. Also add dynamic by adding some acceleration when your ship leaves a curve. Anyway just play with it until you get the feeling from it you desire. The Editor preview is a good help here. Fast and everything you need to check the motion.
Moreover camera plays and important role in space animations. A plugin like SteadyCam helps alot because it makes cam setup and movement a lot less complicated and time consuming. It also offers features like muliple camera paths and blending between multiple paths and camera targets. On the website you can get a free version.
tcasteadycampro

[Deleted User]

thanks for that link ven1ce, that will be really helpful :thumb:

Andrew Boulton

Try not to be too ambitious if this is your first attempt, especially if you're working to a deadline. It always takes longer than you expect.

Count Count

I use a very special possibility for moving the camera: I go to a point of the animation while have the camera selected. Then I take a key, go to the next important point of the animation, put the camera in the right position, take another key and so on...Sometimes its a bit exhausting but I like it.

L2K

yep, thats the best thing to move a camera.
with a spline, it's always difficult to set the proper timing.
you move a point of the spline, and all the timing to the trash.

keyframe for cameras.



and, in a general manner, keyframe for loads of things.

hoktar

yes that looks really cool in the tutorial vids, thx for the link!

@Andrew Boulton, yea i already noticed that xD

[edit]
wow, that tool is amazing!
thank you so much
[/edit]

[Deleted User]

I cannot think of working without it anymore when doing camera work^^