AM Tutoring Tips and Tricks part 14 - Control Your Curves

As an animator who uses the computer as a tool, knowing how the computer works is extremely important. Not only for the sake of saving time, but also for problem solving when something goes wrong (and it always does).

There is one thing I have to clarify at the very beginning, computers don't think! They do not create anything. Actually, the computer is probably the most loyal in-betweener ever.

There are a few principles I follow all the time. The goal of using the graph editor for me is to take advantage of the computer as much as I can. At the same time, the computer won't have a chance to decide anything for me, or send a killer robot to the past to terminate my mom. :)

1. Control your extreme poses.

I always have flat tangents at my extreme pose. So the computer knows where I would like the pose to hit the extreme and then generates mathematically correct in-betweens.

If I don't have flat tangent at the extreme poses...

...then the computer decides where the extreme pose should be. Which you might be lucky to get to look right, but people are not always lucky.

2. After the extreme poses are made, make your breakdown poses controlled as well.

I set up breakdown poses by using keys, instead of pulling tangents in/out. That way I can decide which pose I would like to favor, or how much slow in/out I like.

I know I mentioned that I use weighted tangents all the time, but I only pull them in/out for preview - then set keys after it looks right. I can work fast without wasting time on setting unsure keys, and gain control back later.

For breakdown tangents, please make sure they follow the curve...

If you don't make the tangents follow the curve, those flat(or whatever they are) tangents will create unintended extremes. You might not be lucky enough to get the nice arcs this time. Even though sometimes these types of curves could give me a nice touch of realistic randomness, I'll still set keys on those places pointed by the red arrows, that way everything is still under my control.

When you're frustrated by a popping coming from nowhere, or an arc that just can't be smoothed - before you stand up and get a hammer to give your computer an "animator-smash", calm down, they're innocent. Most of time, we are the ones who cause the trouble. Good news is, we are also the one who can fix it.

I guess in this regard, it might be a good thing to have control issues.

Cheers.

Article created by Erik Lee, refined by Eric Digilov.