Month: June 2026

This week, I continued polishing my animation and focused on improving the overall quality of the movement. I spent more time refining the timing and adjusting the COG (Centre of Gravity) to make the character’s motion feel more balanced and natural.

I also worked on smaller details, particularly the overlap and timing between different body parts. This included adjusting the order of movement in the hands and feet to create clearer body mechanics and more believable motion. Through these refinements, the animation became smoother and closer to the reference.

This week, I continued refining my Advanced Animation Shot and moved further into the polish stage. I focused on adjusting the COG (Centre of Gravity) to improve the character’s balance and weight distribution throughout the movement.

I also refined the timing of several actions and edited the animation curves in the Graph Editor to create smoother and more natural motion. These adjustments helped improve the flow of the animation and made the overall performance feel more believable.

Through this process, I gained a better understanding of how small changes to timing, weight, and animation curves can have a significant impact on the final quality of an animation.

This week, we learned how to use the Animbot plugin in Maya. The plugin provides a variety of tools that can help speed up the animation workflow and make editing animation curves more efficient.

After learning the basic functions of Animbot, we used the plugin to create a short animation exercise. Through this practice, I became more familiar with some of the tools and gained a better understanding of how they can be used to improve animation production. The exercise also helped me work more efficiently when adjusting poses and timing.

We also attended a presentation about the stop-motion animation work of Laika Studios. During the talk, we learned more about the production process behind professional stop-motion films and gained insight into the techniques and challenges involved in creating this style of animation. It was a valuable opportunity to learn about a different animation pipeline and broaden my understanding of animation as a whole.

This week, I started working on the Advanced Animation Shot (Blocking) assignment. After looking for reference footage, I chose a parkour video because I wanted to practise body mechanics and improve my understanding of human movement.

During the blocking stage, I focused on creating the key poses and establishing the overall timing of the action. By studying the reference carefully, I was able to break down the movement into clear poses and better understand balance, weight shifts, and momentum.

Although the animation is still in the early stages, this exercise has helped me improve my observation skills and my understanding of body mechanics.

This week I continued refining my animal walk cycle animation. I focused on improving the timing, weight, and overall movement quality of the character. By reviewing reference footage and comparing it with my animation, I adjusted several poses and refined the spacing between key movements to create a more natural rhythm.

I also spent time polishing the body motion and improving the transitions between poses. Small adjustments to the timing helped make the movement feel more believable and better match the behaviour of the animal. This process gave me a better understanding of locomotion and the importance of subtle details in creating convincing animation.

This week, I continued working on the wolf walk cycle animation. Most of my time was spent refining the movement and comparing it with the reference footage. During the process, I found several problems that still need improvement.

The main issue was that the wolf’s body gradually moved forward while the animation was intended to be a walk cycle in place. This made the loop less convincing and affected the overall rhythm of the movement. In addition, some parts of the animation did not match the reference closely enough, particularly in the body motion and weight transfer. As a result, the movement sometimes felt less natural than the real animal’s walk.

Although I encountered a number of difficulties this week, the process helped me better understand the importance of observation and reference analysis in creature animation. I plan to continue refining the timing, body movement, and overall mechanics of the walk cycle in the following weeks to achieve a more believable result.

This week, we learned how to create looping creature animations. The focus was on understanding animal movement cycles and creating smooth, seamless loops that can be repeated continuously. Through this exercise, I gained a better understanding of creature locomotion and the importance of timing and rhythm in animation.

At the same time, I continued polishing my dialogue animation. I refined the lip sync to better match the audio and improved the overall clarity of the performance. I also added anticipation before several major actions to make the movements feel more natural and believable. In addition, I spent time refining the facial animation, including the eyes, eyebrows, and other facial features, to improve the character’s expression and make the performance more engaging.

Through this week’s work, I learned how small adjustments can have a significant impact on the quality of an animation. Both the creature cycle exercise and the dialogue polish helped me develop a better understanding of movement, timing, and character performance.

This week, we started learning about Creature Animation. The lecture introduced the research process that should be completed before animating a creature, including collecting reference videos, studying animal movement, body structure, and behavioural characteristics. We also explored the differences between various types of animal leg structures, as well as the physical and movement characteristics of herbivores and carnivores. These studies help animators better understand how different animals move and behave, leading to more believable creature animation.

In addition, we continued learning about lip sync animation in greater detail. The tutor used Weize’s assignment as an example to demonstrate how to analyse dialogue and match mouth shapes to different sounds. The class focused on the relationship between speech rhythm and mouth movements, as well as how facial expressions and head movements can support the performance. This helped us understand how to create dialogue animation that feels more natural and convincing.

Through this week’s lessons, I gained a better understanding of the importance of research and observation in animation production. I also developed a deeper understanding of the workflow of lip sync animation, which will be useful for future character performance and dialogue-based animation projects.

This week, we learned about idle animation for games. The focus of the exercise was to create a character that appears alive and engaging even when not performing any major actions. We explored how subtle movements such as breathing, weight shifts, and small body motions can help make an idle pose feel more natural and believable.

Alongside the new exercise, I continued developing my blocking animation from the previous weeks. I refined several poses and adjusted the timing of certain actions to improve the overall flow of the animation. Some parts of the sequence still require further timing adjustments, and I plan to continue refining the movement and transitions in the next stage of production.

Through this week’s work, I gained a better understanding of how small movements can add personality and realism to a character, as well as the importance of timing in creating clear and appealing animation.

This week, we learned about infinite animation cycles in Maya. We used the Pre Infinity and Post Infinity functions in the Graph Editor, which allow animation curves to repeat automatically before and after the existing keyframes. This technique can be useful for creating looping animations without repeatedly copying keyframes.

In addition, we started learning lip sync animation. The class introduced the basic workflow for dialogue animation, including Blocking, Blocking Plus, and Polishing. During the Blocking stage, we focused on key poses and facial expressions. In Blocking Plus, we added mouth shapes and facial transitions. Finally, the Polishing stage involved refining the animation and improving small details.

For lip sync, we learned three main steps: Jaw Opening, Phonemes, and Polish. First, we identified the jaw movement based on the rhythm of the dialogue. Then, we adjusted the mouth shapes according to different sounds, such as M, B, P, F, and V. Finally, we refined the transitions between mouth shapes, tongue movement, and subtle facial details to make the dialogue appear more natural.

Through this week’s lessons, I gained a better understanding of the workflow of dialogue animation and learned some basic principles of synchronising mouth movements with speech.