All language subtitles for 03-12-04-Polishing the run Cycle - tail

- [Narrator] The tail motion is

almost exclusively follow through.

It is supporting the ax made by the body

of the character when it's
jumping and moving forward.

On such a character, the tail is used

to balance the motion.

As explained in the previous video,

if I want to show that my
character is balanced and agile,

I won't make the tail wobbling around.

But I'd rather try to make
it having a smooth movement.

So as usual, I'm starting
with the X rotation

because it's the most
influential transform channel

on the motion of the tail.

As the tail is using
forward kinematic mechanism,

it's better to start polishing the base

of the tail or the root of the tail,

and then go along until
the tip of the tail.

So I've been mainly
smoothing the rotation curve,

and we have a bigger gap
whenever our character

is hitting the ground.

Protect pose occur on frame 11,

and the rotation of the tail
is offset by one or two frames.

During the blocking,

I've also input a slight location change

in the tail to support the
shape and the silhouette

of the character.

I'm just editing a bit the curve so

that it transitions mostly
from one key to the other.

So I'm mostly doing this
to avoid any glitches

in the animation.

The Z rotation curve allow us

to swing the tail from left to right.

And this is typically the kind of motion

that will translate the lack
of balance from your character.

If you're walking on a thin line

and you try to keep your balance,

you will spread your arms on each side.

So that you could use
them as a counter weight.

And the more your body
will move left to right

when you are moving forward,

the more you will translate
this lack of balance.

When put a very subtle
left to right motion just

to support the line of the body.

This will support the line of action,

and the realism of our character.

We will have a more in depth discussion

about the line of action
later on in this course.

But you should understand

that this slight tilt brings
some kind of randomness

or make the character a little more uneven

and make it this way more realistic.

Don't forget on your cycle
to make sure that the first

and last key frame are the same

and that their vector are
aligned with the curve

to get a smooth transition.

Now we can jump onto
the second controller.

And what I will do is that I
will re input the root motion

to my character

and calculate the motion
pass to see how it goes.

I don't want to repeat
the mistakes I've made

in the previous video where
I've checked the motion

of my character with the root
motion on a bit too late,

and I had to fix a lot of things.

As for the root of the tail
around the impact frame,

we will have some kind of
big change in the curve.

And then it will be mostly
smoothing out the shape

of the tail so that it
follow the flow of the body

or the motion of the body in space.

Think of it as a train or as a ribbon.

As the root of the ribbon is
throwing shape in the air,

the rest of it is following
in the same motion.

The same flow,

the same arc,

the same path.

This way you are really
supporting the motion

of your character in space.

And it give more freedity, more smoothness

to the jumping motion.

This kind of fall through
animation is pretty easy

to set up on such a cycle animation,

and on such a smooth animation.

But it's kind of more complicated

as soon as you get a more snappy animation

or a lot of big variation into the motion.

On same note with this joint,

I will jump on the last one.

So this is all I have for this video,

and I will see you in the next one.

(soft music)