The following notes pertain to the Rambling Walk Assignment in 2D Animation One. This is a project when students animate a character moving as a bipedal treadmill walk, one in which the figure takes a long journey through 3 or 4 distinct and interesting locations.
The protagonist walks though the regions but also acts and responds to surroundings while rambling along, moving and reacting with interesting gestures and performance.
In order to portray convincing character animation, where the figure progresses through the long panning scene with intention and emotion, the creative goal has been to go further than merely animate a straight-forward treadmill walk. Instead, by animating even just a few separate actions, the character will look around and respond to the surroundings while journeying forward. As a result, they will certain to appear lively, with a personality.
To do this, you learned the importance of splitting the character into separate layers. You then planned, organized, and animated levels/segments of the character to move and act as timed cycles, such as the figure’s:
- Head, with head turns and glances side to side (even sequences with the eyes and mouth if you wish)
- Torso/body
- Near arm, with gestural animation, consisting of one or two simple actions
- Far arm, with gestural animation, consisting of one or two simple actions
- Legs cycle, the lower-body continually walking as an ongoing cycle
As we have discussed in class, there are several techniques you could utilize for the project, including digital drawn animation and cutouts, as well as physical drawings and 2D puppet methods.
These methods are intended to then be composited in After Effects in this instance, although other software would also do the trick.
The following notes are intended to cover the production stages once the character has been animated and rendered. This is when layers are ready for additional compositing and further timing in After Effects. The figure will need to be assembled as layers in the software, with everything parented to an AE camera, which will then be automated with keyframes to pan through the environments. As the figure walks through the surroundings, you will then time the actions you animated and prepared, to make the character respond to particular regions and items in the scenes.
To begin, export image files as layers, to then be assembled in After Effects
As always, be sure to place image files in an appropriate place in your project folder. In this case, you should also create sub-folders for various phrases you’ve created in the source animation.
When you export from the animation software you are using, be sure to export segments as layers, to allow for further timing adjustments in After Effects. For example:
- legs_and_lower_body_sequence
- head_sequence
- upper_body_sequence (only necessary if you animated the actions to be different than the lower body and legs)
- near_arm_sequence
- far_arm_sequence
The legs and pelvis, and perhaps the torso as well, will be an ongoing cycle. The footsteps are like “the engine” for the piece. They will continue on, walking away, and all layers will “sit above and be carried,” throughout the long sequence.
To this end, make note of how many frames are in one step cycle. For example, there are 16 positions in the full treadmill walk cycle, which includes both the near and far feet.
When you import the images into After Effects, you will loop the legs and feet (the process describing how to do this will follow).
As part of the overall sequence, you have animated various actions, segments that you can time and swap, as the character walks through locations and responds to the surroundings.
Each of these segments are meant to connect with the movement of the overall treadmill cycle.
To organize these, make note of the frame numbers for each particular phrase. This example considers a series of head movement phrases:
- Looks forward: 1 – 16
- Glances upwards: 17 – 32
- Continues to look upwards: 33 – 48
- Turns head: 49 – 64
- Continues to look behind: 65 – 80
- Glances back forward: 81 – 96
When you import images into After Effects, you can organize specific groups of frames to be loops and be reused at certain points in the Rambling Walk.
You may want to do further organizing, to accommodate various phrases you have created. That is, the sequences that will link to the core looping step cycles. For example, these correspond to what has been initiated above:
- head_phrase01_looks_forward
- for example, frames 1 – 16
- head_phrase02_glances_upwards
- for example, frames 17 – 32
- head_phrase03_continues_to_look_upwards
- for example, frames 33 – 48
- head_phrase04_turns_head
- for example, frames 49 – 64
- head_phrase05_continues_to_look_behind
- for example, frames 65 – 80
- head_phrase06_glances_back_forward
- for example, frames 81 – 96
Remember, these are the layers and organization you have produced so far. There isn’t new animation, it’s just that everything is meant to be placed in appropriate folders and formats.
When you import the sequences with After Effects, you will organize the layers in the same way.
Now, with After Effects
Before you import files as image sequences, envision first how long you anticipate the overall walking journey to be:
- If the journey will be 30 seconds and the core walk cycle (e.g., the lower-half, feet and legs) is 32 frames in general (e.g., 16 images, on “2s,”as double frames), you could anticipate that the sequence will loop 23 or 24 times in 30 seconds.
With regard to sequences that have additional repeating phrases (e.g., head, near_arm, and far_arm) you should import them separately.
Import the image files, as sequences:
- Main Menu > File > Import. Browse the image folder in your project folder and import the various sequences.
- When you import an image sequence, be sure to do so in this order: click only on the first in the sequence. Then, look down at the bottom region of the Import File Window and make sure that “PNG Sequence” is selected (or the sequence according to the file type you are selecting).
- “Interpret the Footage.” Once you have imported image sequences, you will need to Interpret the Footage. This will allow you to [1] set the frame rate of the sequence, particularly if you have been animating single images at 12 fps; and [2] you can set “loops” for the sequences, making it so that files will repeat (e.g., 23 or 24 steps in 30 seconds).
- From the Project Window, select a particular file, context-click and choose > Interpret Footage > Main. From the Interpret Footage Window, select the following:
- Frame Rate: Assume this frame rate > change to “12 frames per second” if necessary. Remember, the Comps you have established in AE are at 24 fps. Interpreting the footage will turn single-frame sequences to 12 fps and therefore play them as double-frame.
- At the lowest region of the Interpret Footage Window, under “Other Options,” find “Loop” and type in the amount of loops you would like. Doing so will cycle the image sequence.
“Rename” sequences in the Project Window:
- If you wish, you might want to rename the sequences you imported, to organize them as clips that make sense to you, according to the animation you’ve created.
- To do so, select the file in the Project Window, context-click and choose “Rename.”
Add the various phrases/layers to an overall walk composition
For the panning treadmill to work effectively, you will parent the camera to the walking character. Rather than link the camera to a single layer, you should parent the camera to a comp, which will house the treadmill feet and legs, head, and arm movement phrases. To this end:
- From the Main Menu, go to Composition > New Composition
- Name it “Walking Figure” or something like that
- Parent the camera to that particular comp, to Walking Figure. (If you cannot find the Parent Option, go to the Layer Section of the Timeline, context-click on the label region and choose Columns > Parent, to call up the Parent Column.
Now, when you set keyframes and automate the camera pan, the Walking Figure comp will follow along. In the comp, you will put the various layers and timing of the character, to suit what occurs in the scenes.
Timing of the character’s actions
You should now organize and time the various layers of the character, to perform and respond to places and things in the environment.
You know already that an ongoing sequence will be the character’s legs and feet, as a perpetual “engine” for the whole piece. That is, the feet keep walking, one step after another. Use this as the basis for the performance. All other actions will “sit on top” of the continuous walk. Therefore, to begin in the Walking Figure comp, at the bottom layer, place the “legs_and_lower_body” sequence. Inherent in the layer, it loops many times over, even for longer than you need.
Then, place layers on top of the “legs_and_lower_body.” For timing purposes, you will want to add layers more than once in the Walking Figure comp. A good way to start is to list the actions in the Timeline, as actions in order. For example, as you have already considered the animation, when you originally created the various phrases:
- head_phrase01_looks_forward
- for example, frames 1 – 16
- head_phrase02_glances_upwards
- for example, frames 17 – 32
- head_phrase03_continues_to_look_upwards
- for example, frames 33 – 48
- head_phrase04_turns_head
- for example, frames 49 – 64
- And so on
You will then organize the phrases along duration in the Timeline. A simple way is to:
- Place segments in the Timeline, first as layers, all beginning at the same start point.
- Then, select the top layer, hold down the Shift Key and choose the bottom / last layer in the sequence.
- To organize the timing, go to the Main Menu > Animation > Keyframe Assistant > Sequence Layers.
- From the Sequence Layers Window, Press OK. Don’t choose “Overlap.”
To edit the timing of a particular layer in the Walking Figure comp
It is, of course, totally fine to adjust the timing of the layers and phrases, according to how events and actions are revealed as the character walks through the different scenes. Once you’ve observed how the figure behaves, you might want to make adjustments. This is why you put everything in a containing comp in the first place (i.e., Walking Figure comp).
Here are some notes to consider if you want to edit particular layers or qualities within them:
- If you would like to edit the start and end point of one of the layers, such as an arm movement, locate the layer you choose to adapt. Move the curser to the start edge or head of the layer, click and drag to the right. Doing so will set a new “in point.” You would do the same at the tail or end section of the layer to set a new “out point.”
- You can also “split” the layer. This is the closest thing in After Effects to doing a cut, as you would with Premiere. Doing so will break the layer at the Current Time Indicator, into two layers:
- Move the Current Time Indicator to the place in the layer where you would like to split it or make a cut.
- Referring to the Main Menu, go to Edit > Split Layer.
- Once the layer is split into two, you will probably want to delete the second layer.
Remember, you have proceeded with the process of separating the various actions from the legs and feet. Therefore, you can arrange the various head, arm, hand, and body actins on top of the leg actions, organized in all sorts of combinations. Reuse each of the phrases as many times as you wish. The only actions that should generally synchronized with the legs are the arm swings. But, they too can be staggered by a frame or two or three, after the legs, to overlap the leg and arm cycles.