WIP: Stuff you are working on 2!

[CameronMcDonald]

Needs more Danger Zone, JDog.

[Kremator]

JDog that is cool. Having a full deck of support personnel doing different functions would be great!

[ANZACSAS Steve]

Jdog.
Very cool m8.

[konyo]

Jdog.
Very cool m8.

Agreed, that is very good work as usual JDog :P

[Laqueesha]

Hopefully sometime later in the summer I'll release an update to the Nimitz with this and additions to the model/functions.

That sounds bloody fantastic, mate.

[Max Power]

Now that the school semester is over I have some time to work on ArmA projects again Namely adding to and refining the Nimitz. I've studied Maya this semester in class so decided to try and get a custom animation going, came out pretty well for my first non-school-assignment animation I think! Hopefully sometime later in the summer I'll release an update to the Nimitz with this and additions to the model/functions.

The posing is very strong. The timing is a bit flat and there's not much weight to it. I think you could antic in to the drop and then have him recoil on impact, then really snap his arm out quickly. I think you could recoil from when he puts his arm up before he drops, too. Again, I like the posing, very strong.

[sarge4267]

looks great!

[Slatts]

@JDog

rather surprised you didnt add the top gun music but its looking great, look forward to release

[JDog]

@Max, really not much anticipation to be had before the drop. All he does it put his leg out and it pulls him down. Spent some time making sure it looked like the leg was pulling him down and not his pelvis pushing it down haha. I'll take a closer video later perhaps.

@Blink, nah everyone else always adds it lol.

[Max Power]

@Max, really not much anticipation to be had before the drop. All he does it put his leg out and it pulls him down. Spent some time making sure it looked like the leg was pulling him down and not his pelvis pushing it down haha. I'll take a closer video later perhaps.

I don't wish to detract from the fact that you've done a good job and you're the only person that I know of that has done a custom, moving animation in this game. That in itself is an achievement. If there have been others I don't know about, they are very rare.

When he changes his balance from both legs to his right leg, he should lean to the right a little bit as he drops. Creating realistic animation is a very subtle thing. If your animation is super realistic and he still seems like a robot doing a pantomime, you still fail. You have to sell it. Even the guys doing mocap do really over the top actions. In ArmA, which uses mocap exclusively the animations for just hanging out and talking or whatever are way over-sold. This is because they have to be identifiable from all angles, at all distances, at limited resolutions, and at a glance. So, you should see what happens in the video and push it. I don't mean push it until it breaks into cartoonish silliness, but things like antic and recoil make the animation look more natural and identifiable. If they didn't, they wouldn't be principles of animation.

edit: If you're using Maya, which you seemed to indicate, you have all kinds of neat graphs and controls over the keyframes. You should push the timing using those tools until it looks like loony-tunes snappy, then dial it back until you have something that looks realistic. If you're using O2 to animate, you've already done an amazing job. In my opinion it's better to over exaggerate the physics involved slightly than to fall short on it and have it look floaty.