All language subtitles for 03-12-02-Polishing the run Cycle - chest and hips

- [Instructor] Let's continue
polishing our run cycle,

working on the hips, chest and head.

Before I work on those curve,

I like to be able to see the
cycle repeating over time.

To do so, in the graph editor,

we will display all the curve
using the see all filter.

Then we can press A to
select all the curve

and press Shift + E

and choose Make Cycle.

This will add the cycle curve modifier

on all our curves and the
animation will repeat infinitely.

This is something we have already done

on our bouncing ball exercise.

Now I don't want to do
so for the root bone.

So I will activate the
show selected only filter

so that it only displays
my root bone curves

whenever I select.

I zoom on the curve, pressing the dot key

and then press Shift +
E, linear extrapolation.

This way, I will have a
continuous move forward

off our character

but it doesn't seem to work

and this is because we
have also a cyclic modifier

on those curves.

So we'll press Shift + E again
and clear cyclic modifier.

So now all my curve are cycling

but the root bone curve

that has linear extrapolation

and if I now increase the frame
value of my animation end,

I will see my character bouncing

and bouncing and going forward.

This is just a little trick

that will show us the
animation moving forward

as it should be.

It will just give you a better feeling

whenever you are reviewing your animation.

So let's reset the N key to frame 11

and let's start polishing
the chest control.

As usual, I prefer to start

with the most influential curve.

This is going to be the x rotation curve

that makes our character
learning forward and backward.

So this is something
I've already said before

and that I will repeat a lot
during the course I believe

is that it's better to work first

on the biggest changes in your animation,

so work on the curves

that will influence the most the motion

and then go ahead with the details.

It's like any piece of art.

You always start by
blocking the main shapes

when you are sculpting, for example,

and then you go deeper and
deeper into the details.

But if the main shape or main motion

for our animation doesn't work properly,

then the whole animation,

no matter how much detail
you are inputting into it

won't be working properly.

I tried to keep the chest aligned

with the motion of the whole body

but I input a bit of
anticipation or dragging

before the character is landing,

raising a bit the curve will
currently raise a bit the chest

just before he lands.

And then when he's diving
into the next jump,

I try to curl the chest

towards the next point.

So when he's about to land,

he's leaning backward
to anticipate the impact

and when he's pushing to the next jump,

he's curving his body towards the target,

the point in the air.

The y curve is the twisting curve.

It's super subtle.

As we have seen before,
I have just input a bit

of twisting in the chest

so it depends on the position of the legs,

so I will redisplay the legs.

To be honest, what I will mainly do here

is try to match the pose

by twisting a bit toward the leg

that is the more forward

and then I clean the curve
to have a smooth transition

between the different keyframes.

What I mean here is that I don't want

to have any glitches on this y curve

or on this y rotation motion.

This is why I pulled up
the keyframe number one

so that it better blend

with the previous key.

And I do the same with frame number 10

by pulling it down a bit.

I will do the same with the z rotation

and once I'm done,

we will work a bit on the location.

So the idea is to use the z and y location

of this controller to
add a bit of squashing

and stretching to the torso.

I will be working on those
location curve at 5:07.

(tranquil music)

As usual, I will start
to polish my animation

from a side view.

The first thing I will do

is to move the curve a bit trend only

to see how my character behaves.

Because the chest controller
is the child of the body

and we have see in the
parent-child relationship video

that the child will inherit
the orientation of its parent

and so the y-axis of our character

might not be aligned with world space.

And this is clearly not the case,

but what I've spotted is
that the y-axis allows me

to stretch the character along its spine

and the z curve allows me to shift it

a bit up and down.

So I will be mainly working on the y curve

and the idea is to stretch our character

as much as possible when he's jumping

and squash it as much as possible

when he's impacting the ground,

when he's absorbing his own weight.

Don't be too shy and push those curve.

It doesn't matter if it's a bit too much

but it will look boring

if it's not enough.

With the experience, you will learn

to balance those poses.

And we will have a full
chapter about pushing the pose.

What I do with the z curve

is just creating a bit of balance

of my character.

The z location curve support
the x rotation curve.

That makes the character
leaning forward and backward.

I keep this motion subtle

because the character
is light and he's agile.

So there is not that much
inertia in his chest.

If it was a very heavy characters

and pretty sloppy, we
would have a lot of motion

in the chest.

Once I'm happy with my chest motion,

I will start working on the hips.

So as before, I will
start with the x rotation.

Again, I want to use squash and stretch.

That's for sure.

But I also want to communicate
the agility of the character.

So on the jumping stage,

I will push the hips up.

The hips are catapulting
the character upward.

Think of a horse kicking backward.

The hips motion is something
really hard to get right,

especially on animals
or humanoid character

and if you have already watched tutorials

about animation, you know
that a lot of animation

is led by the hips.

So it's important to do your
best to make it look right.

And if it doesn't, just
look at some reference

and rework your animation.

Don't be afraid to fail,

don't be afraid to restart your animation.

At the end of the motion,

when the character is about to land,

look how I've bent the hips forward

in an anticipation to the landing contact.

This is something we can clearly see

on our reference

if you follow the curvature of the body.

It's straight during the pushing

and when it's about to land,

before the back legs touch the ground

and since we are creating
a more extreme motion,

we have to make this pose
contrast more extreme too.

This is exactly the kind of
thing you have to look for

when you watch your reference.

We will go deeper into
this later in the course.

As I did for the chest,

I'm working on the twisting
of the hips, the latest,

because it's the most
subtle rotation in the body.

And then I will work on the
location curve of the hips.

It will be very close

to what I have done with the chest,

working with squash and stretch,

stretching the character when it's jumping

and when it's in the air

and squashing it when it's
absorbing the landing.

So I will see you at the
timestamp 11 minute and 12 second

to polish the head.

(tranquil music)

Time to polish the head and guess what?

We will start with the x rotation.

Since the head is the
extremity of the torso,

it will have a bit more
overlapping motion,

dragging, et cetera

because it's influenced by
the rotation of the body

and the rotation of the chest.

So we have to input a
bit this dragging motion,

meaning that when the
body is leaning forward,

the head is leaning a bit upward.

The tip of the nose is dragging

but we can't go crazy with this end motion

as we will do maybe with the tail.

When you are in locomotion,

whether it's running or walking,

your head is rotating a bit,

it's dragging a bit

but you're trying to
stabilize its position,

especially its x-axis rotation.

This way, you can stare forward

and see where you are going.

So we have to input a bit of dragging

but try to keep also
the head stable enough.

Don't go crazy with it.

When I'm looking at the loop,

I feel there is a little
glitch when my character

is reaching its highest point.

It's pretty subtle and
it might be difficult

to see it in the video

but when I'm animating,
I can clearly see it.

When you get this kind of issue

but you can't really get what's
wrong with your animation,

use the motion path.

But use it on the point further away

from the rotating joint.

In this case, I will use the
tip of the nose controller.

It should draw a smooth arc as
seen in the previous lessons.

But here, it's not the case.

On frame five, the nose is going down.

Then on frame six, going up.

While on frame four, it was going up too.

And it generates some kind
of popping in the animation

that doesn't look right.

So what I'm doing now is
slightly polishing the curve

so that I get a nice arc
of the tip of the nose.

We don't need to create
a perfect elliptic arc

but we do need to have a smooth transition

between the different keyframes.

So I'm really refining the curve,

even adding a keyframe on each frame

until I get a nice arc.

I will then work on the
other rotation curve

and finally, on the location curve.

So here what you have to focus on.

The head is the part that
will be moving the most

because it's at the extremity of the body

but we do need to try to keep
it as stable as possible,

making our character staring forward.

When you will input a bit
of squash and stretch,

do it with a bit of delay
compared to the chest.

If the chest is fully
squashing on frame one,

for example, the head will be
fully squashing on frame two.

One frame of delay will be enough.

Do it and keep it subtle

and once you have finished
polishing the location curve,

recalculate the motion path.

And check if the tip of the nose

is making a good arc.

And you will see at the end of the video,

I will recalculate my motion path

and make sure that the nose
is doing this great arc.

And I will get a nice
controlled head movement.

I will leave you there for this video.

At the end of the video is a time lapse

where I'm fixing the head
rotation and the location

as I've just explained.

In the next video,

we will start working on the legs

and it will drastically change
our animation and make it.

(tranquil music)