Post 42 – get loopy
Today’s highlighted webinar walks you through how to design, rig, and animate a seamless animation loop using Moho’s vector tools. It walks you through the entire creative process, from rough storyboards to fluid character motion. It is such a great tutorial for creating a fun loopable animation!
Things to Know:
✔ create a simple vector character.
✔ use cycle keyframes to loop.
✔ use smart bones and shy bones.
Derail
Okay, well I didn’t do the vector part. lol Mostly because when we were down at the beautiful Newport Beach, we visited the Restoration Hardware store (gorgeous). I had taken this pic of this little Handwoven Rattan Scooter, now on “sale,” for $675, gulp. But I thought, if Adventure Mouse rode a scooter, this is definitely what he would ride ! I mean there is nothing like being with my boys + a beach. And when by Seal Beach, live music at Spaghettini’s is a must.
Bitmap Character
There are special challenges when working with bitmap over vector for this loop, mostly warping the drawing to the point of no return . To help with that I added a mesh layer over the leg. I tried to animate the shin bone, as an action bone, as seen in this video, however, I still created quite a warp, and ended up just animating the points in the main timeline, since it was only an 11 frame loop. I see the value of actions, but so far, keep breaking everything on loop and go back to the (hard) way? or at least maybe the least repeatable, time consuming way, I’m not sure.
To add a mesh on your layer.
In the Timeline Panel:
Go to—Frame_01
In the Layers Panel:
Go to the layer that you would like to “warp” in the animation.
Click: Draw
Click: Create Mesh Layer
You will see the mesh around the layer. You can then adjust points, or add them as you need to.
Rigging Structure
To animate your mesh, organize your layers panel hierarchy like this:
🦴 Bone Layer (The main master folder, where your bones reside)
🕸️ Mesh Layer (linked to the same bones that your bitmap image is⬇️)
🖼️ Bitmap Image Layer (linked to the bone, in the Bone Layer, you want it moving with)
Review mesh layers HERE.
“Simple joys every day shining so bright. ”
— Yanti
Adventure Mouse
Post 42 — Afterthoughts
This week came with a few special challenges. I couldn’t get Little Mouse to really “grip” the scooter. I tried animating the scooter both inside and outside of Adventure Mouse’s bone layer and ultimately left it in. That got me a little closer to the look I wanted, but the target bones still made the finger bones essentially useless. Eventually, I decided it was “close enough.”
After sequencing everything in After Effects, I also realized I should have added a mesh layer to the head. Details, details. I’ll make a note of it for next time. Moving on.
Looking forward to starting class on Monday, maybe I will get some of these hierarchy questions answered. In the meantime…
ride on 🛴 Nik
