trunks

Hey ya’ll.

I just wanted to stop and chat a bit and tell you how much I enjoy working on this website.  There are a few big things coming down the pipe.

I will be working on 3 animated cinematic comics.  I’m going to be doing it in 3d so I am building the assets.  I will actually be showing you how to build those assets and how I do this stuff step by step.

I can’t wait.

But I had a question.  I was wondering what type of tutorials would you like?  What type of inspiration?  What would you like to see here on this website?

Usually I look all over the web for the best tutorials and share various methods you can use to make your own animation/anime.  Now I would like to know if there are any specifics to 3d anime, 2d anime, etc.

Please feel free to share.

So this was quite impressive.

They did this live.  Now imagine if you applied this system applied to your animated characters.  You could create an anime quite quickly.

Here is how to do it.

 

Personally I think you could use this for head animation and then use something else for the body like 3d cellshaded to match the head.

Here is a video breaking down a rig for Puppet Animation.  Personally I’m okay with it if it is creative and good.  I guess because I come from the old flash days when you had to do things differently because there was no streaming at the time.  Tween animation helped keep file sizes down.    Because of this I’m okay with this type of animation if done correctly.

Here is a tutorial breaking down a rig.

Here are examples of good old fashioned tweening.  Funny thing is this has become really popular over the years even in mainstream work.

I’m working on 3 Anime/Manga series.  Basically animated comic books online.  I’m going to document all my steps.  One of the biggest things for me is to give it some style and a different look across the board.  I’ve finally decided on the 3 styles for my 3 very different series.

Wink! Multiverse Adventures will be my first order of business.

Coverss copy (1)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a combination of styles but the main style will be done similar to JOJOs OP style done by Kamikaze Douga Animation.

I think your style is very important to creating something awesome but style can also mask some deficiencies in your own work, make it yours and work within your limitations as an artist yet still set you apart.

Here is more stuff from them.

Anime is quite different from its counterpart in America.  For example American animation usually uses 24 FPS for the entire animation.  Avatar: The Last Airbender is an example of that.  It has very fluid and consistent animation throughout the series.  They also had a 2 million dollar budget compared to a usual 200-300,000 per Episode budget of an anime series if that.   I’ve seen much lower.

With such low budgets there is a need to take some short cuts to animation while still making it look good enough to watch and in most cases still look beautiful.

A few years back I found this great cheat sheet breakdown over at Celshader.com.  I love that site.  Check out these awesome anime cheats that you could use in your next video.

Here are some essentials, some check boxes and some tricks to keeping your anime awesome but your animation time lower.

General Tips


Essentials (present throughout the entire animation. DO NOT skimp on these)

  • Story — the foundation of your animation. If this fails, it all falls apart.
  • Direction — a good director can wring more out of less, in my opinion.
  • Storyboards — because good storyboards save you $$$.
  • Art Direction — present throughout the entire piece.
  • Character Designs — make those held cels works of art.

Next Level (try to make these as high-quality as possible)

  • Color Design
  • Voice Acting — carrying the weight of the character’s emotions.
  • Music — film-quality music lends a cinematic feel to the animation.
  • Sound FX
  • Backgrounds — the more detail, the more “expensive” it looks.

Scene Level (reducing the amount of total character animation work)

  • Convey Complex Actions Off-Screen — using editing and sound FX
  • Reduce the Number of Characters On-Screen
  • Reduce the Amount of Character Interaction
  • Intercut Complex Character Animation with Simpler Shots

Shot Level (aka: “If It Moves, It Can’t Possibly Be A Comics Panel!”)

  • Camera Moves
  • Rack Focus
  • Background Animation — ’cause you got to animate something
  • Life Cycles — minor animations that dress up a “held cel.”
  • Light FX — easier than character animation
  • Specular Animation
  • Cutting Animation with Held Cels — stretching your animation dollar.
  • Hide-the-Mouth — to cut down on the amount of lip-synch work
  • Hide-the-Feet — eliminate “foot slide” with creative cropping
  • Held Cels

Frame Level

  • Strong Poses and Facial Expressions
  • High Illustration Quality — don’t let it look “cheap.”
  • Glow — a relatively inexpensive enhancement.