Original subtitles

- [Instructor] In this video,

we will work on the first shot.

I've already added a camera rig

and I've already created a keying set

for the different controllers

but also the camera properties you can access,

pressing the N key.

I have keyed the focal length and the focus distance.

I will now move my mouse cursor

onto the 3D view we have on the right

with the camera view.

Press Z and switch to rendered view mode.

I'm using the Eevee render engine

and the scene is pretty light.

Is it should render properly on almost every graphic cards.

Let's now have a look to the organization

of the scene.

All the assets are organized into the scene collection

and there are sub-collections.

All the collections tagged in green includes all the assets

for the environment

so that you can deactivate them

whenever your computer is slowing down, for example.

The set collection includes all the lights,

the lights effect and the camera.

The particle emit collection

includes all the particle emitters

that generates the falling leaves

but also the birds flying

that we can see in the beginning of the teaser.

I won't show you how to create all those assets

because this is not the purpose of this course.

All the bushes and trees are currently instanced.

As when we link an asset from another scene,

you can instance an asset into the scene.

So you can see,

those are empty object instancing a collection.

Those collect are under the asset main collection.

So if you want to modify the tree model,

you have to do it in those assets

but I advise you not to do it.

But if, for example, I scale down one

of the trees, you can see that now the trees are very small

in my main scene.

So you can easily duplicate and change the orientation

or scale of the objects that are available

in the scene to create your own environment

or tweak this one if you will.

Let's now import our character.

I will make sure I have my main scene selected.

Go to File, Link, insert for the squirrel finished file.

I will go into the collection

and link our squirrel collection.

I can move it on the y-axis

so that we can see it.

From there in the outliner,

I will expand the squirrel library,

search for the collection, right click.

ID Data, Add Library Override Hierarchy.

It has created a new collection,

including our rig and our character centered

in our scene.

So we can now select the source

and get rid of it.

I can now select the armature of my character

and place it wherever I want in the set.

From there, let's check

if we have all our animation available.

Select the character armature.

I advise you to use the outliner to select it

because on complex scenes,

selection can be a bit messy.

From there, in the 3D view, press Control + Tab

to switch to pose mode

and in the action editor,

have a look at the different linked animation.

Logging set can be useful,

so I will duplicate it,

so now I have a new copy of the keying set.

I remember I have named

my final run cycle animation Runcycle.

So as I find it, I will duplicate it

and since I'm missing the idle animation

we have created in the previous videos,

I will go to File,

choose Link, but you can append the animation,

browse into my Blender file

and go to the Action folder

and choose the idle.

If you have append it, it will be added

as a new animation.

If you have linked it, just browse in your library,

select it and click on the icon

to make it a new action.

To create this shot,

we will combine the run cycle and the idle

and we will layer some root motion using the NLA editor.

We can now switch back to object mode

and we will position our character more or less

where he has to land where he jump out of the bush.

Don't worry, we will be able

to fine tweak its position later on.

Since we have a pretty noisy ground,

you don't really care if your character

is perfectly contacting the ground.

Just raise him a bit

so that we can distinguish its feet.

To make my life easier, since I will be mainly working

on the character, I will make sure

that I will make all the other collection unselectable

by clicking this icon.

If it's not available for you,

just go in the filter and activate it.

Now I will go back in pose mode on my character.

I will load its keying animation,

duplicate it and rename it to create a locomotion action.

This is the action we will layer on top of our run cycle

and idle to move our character in space.

Now we can open the NLA editor

where we will combine those different actions.

I will enable the show only selected option

and I will get rid of all those NLA tracks

that are not used.

We have a first NLA track that is available called run,

so as seen in the NLA video,

if I close my action,

then the NLA track will be rigged.

And we can see one cycle of the run cycle.

I can press Shift + A and add an idle action

so that our character will make one run cycle,

then jump into the idle

and then I can add a more run cycle action

after the idle or you can duplicate the current one.

I will duplicate it three times

so that our character will make three cycle.

Or you can simply change the strip length.

Since there is a cycle modifier on the curve,

the character will repeat the run cycle.

But this might not work

since we have linked the animation.

And it might create conflict,

so the NLA editor won't allow you to do so.

But we will see that later as it's a bit complex

and we don't need to dive into this topic.

Now I will select the first NLA track

and press Shift + A and add our locomotion animation to it.

The strip is almost empty

because the action is only one frame for the time being,

so let's open it in the action editor.

The idea is to key our first move.

If you remember well, our run cycle

was performed within 12 frames

and our character was moving by 0.7 meter

in the negative direction.

My root bone selected in post mode.

I will type in -0.7 meter in the y location channel

and insert a keyframe.

Remember to enable the autokeying in the timeline

and the keying set to available only.

I can add a keyframe by simply pressing I

in my action editor.

Then I will select my root keys and press V

to switch them to vector.

Since I already have a track

with the locomotion action onto it,

I can close the locomotion action in the action editor

and my character is still moving,

reading the locomotion track.

If I disable it, the character will read the next track

with the idle in the run.

To combine them, we need to change the strip blending mode.

And this is where it's a bit tricky.

At the time I'm recording this video,

I've tested it on Blender 2.91 and 92

and we can't edit the strip behavior used

by a linked data,

which is a bit weird

since we can modify the action

but we can't modify the way the action are used

with the NLA editor.

To fix this, and I believe this is a temporary fix,

and the behavior will change with newer Blender versions,

we need to make our rig fully local,

breaking the link between the scene and the original file.

Simply left click on the override icon near the name

of your object.

From there, the strip option are available

and we can change them,

making this run cycle action, for example,

longer and repeating over time.

Or more important in our case,

selecting the locomotion action

and switching its blending mode to combine.

This way we get both the locomotion action

and the running cycle action combined together.

And since we are using Alt + forward,

our character keep the last position

of the root bone we have keyed,

exactly as shown in the NLA editor video.

So now that we are able to move our character in space,

let's position hin properly based

on the camera position.

I will also clean up a bit my file

by renaming the locomotion track, locomotion.

From there, select the armature of the character

and make sure that you are in object mode.

The goal is not to animate the position of our character

but just properly frame where he'll be standing

while performing his idle animation.

So by moving the armature object in object mode,

I'm kind of setting where the animation starts

and the idea here is to do it in top view

and double check in my camera view how it looks.

The character goes through the bush

and kind of land in the middle of the screen.

So it looks great to me

but you are free to move the bush a little bit

and then we will edit the camera position.

So now I'd like to make my character move

once he's escaping.

So we need to edit our locomotion action

and we can press the Tab key

to enter tweak mode and automatically access our action

in the action editor.

We can duplicate frame 12 and move it

on frame 104.

This way, the root of our character doesn't move.

Now for the next 12 frames,

I'd like to move my character by 0.7 meters.

So I will input a value of -1.4 meter on my y-axis.

And Blender should automatically write the key.

But it doesn't and when I try to force it,

pressing the I key,

I get an error message.

Blender tells me that this action

is used in the NLA editor

but the NLA editor has no influence to using this action.

But when I check the NLA strip

and I check the action influence,

it's set to one but what's happening here

is that our locomotion strip on the locomotion track

is too short.

So it has no influence beyond the frame 12.

Hence Blender doesn't allow to insert the keyframe.

To fix this problem,

we can ask Blender to automatically update the length

of the strip.

We just need to go to the action clip option

and enable synchronize length.

Now if I change the value of the y-axis

of the root bone,

Blender will automatically insert a keyframe as usual.

I will select the newly created key,

press the V key

and switch its handle type to vector.

So that we have now fixed this problem

and we can move our character in space,

I like to give some variation to the animation.

Instead of making our character moving

in a straight line, I like him to rotate a bit

on the second jump.

So I will go into top view

and I will disable the bush collection

so that we have a better overview of our character.

I will rotate it a bit

and offset it a bit on the side, only using the root bone

and being on frame 160.

Then I will move the playhead 12 frames later

on frame 128

where our character will land for the next time

and I will offset its position.

It doesn't have to be super accurate.

I'm just trying to offset my character by 0.7 meter

in the same direction.

Since our character is jumping out of the frame,

it doesn't matter if it's not perfectly accurate.

The motion might look a bit robotic from the top view

but from the side view or the camera view,

it does look pretty cool.

That's another thing we haven't tackled yet

is that you generally animate to camera view,

meaning that it doesn't matter how it looks

from other angles.

The thing is that it has to look straight

from what will be outputted in the movie.

So now if you want, you can add some extra motion

to your character.

To keep things simple for this animation,

we will only add a bit of rotation

in the main torso controller.

Add a keyframe on all channels on frame 104.

From there, I will try to have a better angle

on my character and select the main root torso controller.

We will go on frame 109,

more or less in the middle of the jump

and the idea is to slightly twist our character

toward the direction he's jumping to.

So the idea is to slightly rotate the main controller

on the local y-axis.

So I will switch the pivot point to local,

press R and then Y to constraint on the local y

and slightly lean our character.

Then on the frame where he's landing,

I will press Alt + R to cancel the rotation.

This will just add a little twist

to the character body while he's changing rotation,

making it look more natural.

What I want to show you there

is that you can fine tweak your animation

at will using this method.

If you want, you can lay a bit of head rotation

or tail rotation

and this is a very good method

to get high-quality results

without spending too much time on the animation.

So it's a perfect method for beginners

or if you are tight on the time budget.

Now is the perfect time to work on our camera animation.

If you press Tab or select another action strip,

Blender will automatically exit the tweak mode.

And the length of our locomotion strip

has been updated thanks to the synchronize length option.

From there, I can press Control + Tab

to get out of pose mode

on our squirrel armature.

Make sure that I make my collection selectable

and I will select the camera rig

and press Control + Tab.

The dolly rig action should already be assigned

to this armature.

The first thing to do

is to frame our main shot.

I think it's easier to keyframe first

where you want to go than where you come from.

So I will go on a frame

where I can see my character

and I will lower the aim controller of the camera

to better listen to the character.

Then I will increase the focal length of the camera

so that we are a bit more zoomed onto the main subject

of our animation.

This is going to be my default pose,

so I will move the keyframe on frame zero.

I will then select all those keyframe

and move them away in time.

It doesn't matter where I put them.

So let's now create our first framing

by moving the aim controller of the camera

towards the sky.

I will also slightly move up the camera controller.

It will just add a bit more texture

to the camera animation.

Just imagine you have the camera on your shoulder

and you're raising and looking at the sky

at the same time.

So there is a bit of translation and rotation.

For the time being, this shot is pretty blurry,

so I will search for the focal distance

and I will increase it's value

until I get a sharper result.

So now we have our camera going back to the ground.

It will stop here for a few frames,

then have a look to the bush where our character is hidden

and then follow the character.

So we can select the keys on frame 60

and duplicate them on frame 78 or 80.

So there, I will go on frame 94 or 95

and I will move my end controller

toward the main bush.

Then I will go into the action editor,

press I and insert a keyframe on every controllers.

The base animation of our camera

is now what we need to do

is to synchronize the movement of our squirrel character

with the current set we have created.

And with the NLA editor,

it's gonna be very easy.

Let's press Control + tab

to get out of pose mode, select our squirrel character rig

and in the NLA editor,

I just need to select all the strips,

press G to offset them onto frame 100.

If we uncheck the show only selected option,

we can see also our camera action.

And if we play our animation,

we can see our camera getting low

and our character jumping out of the bush.

So now let's select back our camera rig

and press Control + Tab

to get back into pose mode.

I will move the last keys for our camera

whenever the camera is framing the bush

by two keys so that I have a slightly smoother motion

and then I will duplicate those keys

and move them on frame 109.

This is the moment our camera will start

to rotate to follow the character.

So I make sure there is a slight delay

between the time our character jump out of the bush

and the time our camera is starting to rotate.

It will look more natural.

Do not make your camera anticipate the motion

of your character.

That will look fake or CG.

Now we can duplicate our keys from frame 60,

which are the frames that are focused on the character

and move them around frame 125.

From there, we need to increase the length

of our animation.

So I will set the end on frame 250.

To do so, position the playhead on frame 250

and press Control + End.

Now I can duplicate the keys from frame 125

to the frame 203.

This is when our character is preparing to flee.

And since I want a bit of delay for the camera reaction,

I will duplicate or offset those keys on 209.

Now I can move on frame 227

and offset the aim controller

toward the bush on the right

where our character is disappearing.

Now if we check the animation,

we can see that our camera is trying

to follow the character but we have a bit of delay,

which looks pretty natural.

Now the final touch on the camera animation

to make it look less robotic

is to add a very slight overshoot

through the graph editor.

I'm not really good at animating cameras

but what I can tell you

is that try to keep your camera motion

as simple as possible.

With that being said,

just switch to the graph editor

and with the aim controller selected,

I will expose all the different channels

and hide the rotation channels

since they are not used.

And now what I will do,

whenever a curve hit a keyframe before a hold,

where the camera is not moving anymore,

I will slightly rotate the handles.

That will create a very subtle overshoot

that will make our camera motion

way more believable and interesting.

From there, we will just add the final touch

to our animation, making the bush move

and adding some particles.

So I will make myself a bit of room

in the different editor.

Get back to pose mode

and select the bush our character is jumping from.

I will position the playhead more or less

just before the camera is rotating toward the bush.

And with the bush selected,

I will insert a keyframe on its rotations.

From there, I can switch to the action editor.

We don't need to use the graph editor for this.

And to make the bush shake,

I will go just two frame later,

slightly rotate it on the left.

Go two or three frame later,

slightly rotate it on the right.

Repeat it two or three time

and finished with its original keyframe

by simply duplicating the first keyframe we have set.

I will then offset those keys,

create a hold by duplicating the last key

and move it whenever the character is jumping out

of the bush.

And I will repeat the process,

making a slight shake

whenever he's getting through the bush.

From there, I will just offset the first group

of keys just before the camera is rotating

toward the bush.

The bush shakes, the camera turn.

Now we need to adjust the particles.

In object mode, go into the particle collection,

select the bush emitter.

Our character is jumping out of the bush

on frame 104.

Knowing that, let's go into the properties editor,

select the particles property

and under the Emission tab,

change the start and end value to 102,

two frames prior our character is jumping out

of the bush.

It's basically a simply plane emitting leaves particles.

So you can adjust its position if you want

and I've just shown you how to modify

when it emits the particles.

I won't go further

because this is not a course about particles

and particle system could require a full course.

When you're happy with your particles,

if you want to make sure that they will render properly,

go to the Cache tab,

check the Disk Cache option,

and whether click the Bake button

or Bake All Dynamics, it will bake all the particle system

in the scene.

If you need to tweak the particle setting,

just delete the bake

and bake again after you have tweaked your settings.

If you want to adjust the birds in the sky,

it's the same system.

Just unzoom a bit

and you will find a particle emitter

for the birds or you can select it directly

into the collections.

Then you can offset the start and end values,

even before frame zero

so that those birds will be emitted

before the animation start

and they will be in frame on frame zero.

So for this current shot, a value of -64 and 0

is currently good.

And when you're done,

don't forget to bake the dynamics.