What's the normal way to do this walking guy animation?

[Humph Sg]

Hey happy new year guys!
I wanna make a 4 minute animation but I'm a bit newbie...
Here is the scenario :
I have my ai character from illustrator... I wanna do a walk cycle and I'm OK with that.... There is 4 major changes in my walking character...
Do you offer doing it in the same composition the whole 4 minutes or creat a 10 sec character comp and then by putting it in the other comp I can make the 4 state changes?

So  I want him to walk till second 20 and then nod in sec 20 while he is still walking... And in second 50 he does something else...

What are the best options for creating comps and how many would be? 

Thanks in advance...

[Ro Hackett]

Interesting i dont know if there is a norm... 🤣🤣

(First thing i do is keep a project file of my character and keep it in its own folder and not touch it. Thats my back up. Then i copy that and make an animation.)

If your character is doing a continuous walk with different versions... 🤔 I would animate a looping walk the full length of the vid...

- precomp that loop into a main comp 

- now duplicate that precomp layer 4 times (or however many you need) (select comp and press CTRL D 4 times to duplicate)

- now you have 4 copies sitting in one main comp... give each one a name etc....

- now go to 20secnds of the first one and trim it back there ( ALT and right square bracktt or just drag its end in) 

- on the next comp in line... trim its start in to 20 sec...  double click into it and and add a nodding animation to that loop and so on with the other comps

(Remember you can open up two timelines and two viewers if you need to to see your main comp and inside the precomp 😮 but i dont think you need to) 🤔

[Humph Sg]

Thanks so so much!

Your friends should be really happy to have you guide them such beautiful! 

I could understand what should I do but if there was a small problem I'll ask you my friend... 

Thanks 🙏💙

[Ro Hackett]

🤣🤣

🙏

[Humph Sg]

Actually I potatoed again 😁

So you said in my character comp, the length of all layers (body parts) would be that 4 minutes and then I use the loopOut expression and after all of these then I precomp this comp and put it into the main comp?

Is that so? 

[Ro Hackett]

🤔

Yes i think i would put the loop out on the layers that are animated in the walk cycle

🤔

[Ro Hackett]

You could try to put the loopout expression on the precomp instead which i dont think would be a problem either 🤔

[Humph Sg]

Sorry to spam it but there was no edit option.... 

My scenario : I have like 4 minute comp and my walk cycle is only 2 secs.... According to my previous text... What should I do here? I can't loop all the layers!

[Ro Hackett]

How many layers animated in the walk? Yes I would loop those layers. Because when you precomp that layer you will cut that layer at 2 seconds....

then you duplicate the precomp and add extra animation for the head or remove the loop... but you want the walk to continue? 🤔

[Humph Sg]

There are 10 layer including right and left part of body that are kinda animated.

For example he walks till 2 secs, then he stops and nod or something and then starts walking and next can kinda jump and do others stuff... But focus is just walking and interaction with head and eyes at next steps...

I'm just wondering this 2 sec ealki cycle in a 4 minute comp doesn't make problems for next steps, pre comps and so on...? 

[Ro Hackett]

Well if you have the loop in a seperate precomp it wont cause problems with the rest of the animation and it will join on to the second precomp easily.

In a copy of the precomp you can remove the loop and do a different animation.

You can do all of the animation in the same comp with ten layers if you like but then you will have to stop the looping layers at 2 sec.

Or you can copy keyframes for walking and not use the loop expression 🤔

[Humph Sg]

You know, I tried the loop in all  10 animated layers of character comp and worked for the entire parts instead of right arm(its just activated in even number loops lol!)

First I wanted to yeah... Copy all key frames in one main comp and forget about precomp and... 

And because of this problem I think I just copy and paste all key frames to next frames but I guess it will take a decade 😢😁? Is it something that is OK in animating? 

It's not a hard one too? Eh? And there wouldnt be no loopOut? 

What would you do in this situation? 

Kinda confused which way to go! But I'm more eager the easy way... 😁

[Ro Hackett]

🤣 well as a beginner 4 minutes is a lot ...

Well the easy way is to make a copy of your character comp.... animate one walk loop... now put that character comp copy into a new main comp and put the loop expression on that precomp.... cut the end at 2 seconds... you know how to loop a comp?

then go back to your first character comp and do the rest of the animation... this character comp will then be put into the new main comp at the end of the loop comp 😮🤔

[Humph Sg]

Hi again dear friend! 

I just decided to pcopy and paste key frames into my character comp... 

I progressed somehow about 30 secs.... 

Now there is a problem.. I wanna start those walk cycle key frames again after 30 sec but they follow the previous key frames! Can you guide me how to separate the first 30 secs of this comp so my new scene won't follow previous kfs..... 

I tryed split layers but it's not the answer.. 

Ther is a cut option in premier but there isn't an exact one in after effect! (why? Or I don't know) 

[Ro Hackett]

Im not sure i understand. This is why i use precomps 🤣 What happens when you paste in the walking keyframes again?

Make sure you position your character first by adding new keyframes on all your layers to hold the character there and then paste the walking keyframes after those? 😮🤔 why do you need to cut the layers?

[Ro Hackett]

You have to think ahead to editing later on... you export everything you need as video and then cut the videos together 😮🤔

[Humph Sg]

U know I have this 4 mins character comp... I have a main comp 4 min too 

I change layers and movement key frames in character comp and that comp is put in the main Com that has background and other stuff....

Look at second 30 he stops moving and looks somewhere... The I wanna kinda flash the screen and a new scene starts... When I paste the walk cycle main frame (with key clone script😁) the thing that happen is : it continues from the previous key frames (that is the key frames that my character stops... And when I paste the walk cycle kfs it doesn't start properly aside from the previous footage... I don't want after 30 secs to follow prevous ones...

And u k kw there are 10 layers that change during the process.... 

[Ro Hackett]

Well you see... you can just copy the walking comp you already have in the main comp, and move it along the timeline you dont need to make it again... 🤔

If you dont want the new paste keyframes continuing from previous keyframes you have to first set keyframes to hold the character down... then maybe right click them and - keyframe assistant - toggle hold keyframes ... then paste your walking frames after those). Or else just copy the character comp in the project panel and make a new animation. Your different animations do not have to all be in the one comp.

The comp you put into your main comp is still the same character comp unless you make a copy. Select it in project panel - press Ctrl D to make a copy - so new animation on new character comp. Delete the walking keyframes.

What I do is.. I animate my character walking. With no background. Then I trim the comp so it is only a couple of seconds. I export that as a Quicktime (RGB and Alpha) video. The alpha means it has no background.

I do this for different comp animations.

Then I import those animation videos and put them all into the background and I edit them and move them and copy them and so on ...  to make my video. That is like editing. 🤔🤷🏼‍:male_sign:

[Ro Hackett]

To cut a layer in the timeline ... put yoyr timer where you want the cut and press ALT + right square bracket... or just click the end of it and you can drag it in or out

[Humph Sg]

Thanks again dear...

I think I will just copy the character comp.. It's like those precomp you told me! 

This looks better... 

🙏😁

[Ro Hackett]

Yes and always keep a copy of the character comp with no key frames as a starting point.

Duplicate that each time for each new animation piece.

And a precomp is just a comp that sits inside another comp. 😮🤔

[Humph Sg]

Actually this right arm not looping in all my Timeline length is making me angry! 

Everything works but this right arm doesn't get the loopOut option in its first loops after every 2 sec!!! 😶

Every other 9 layers are working great and smooth with loopout ()! But right arm is so.....

What could be the problem?! That's so weird to me! 

[Rick Gerard]

If I understand your project correctly by far the easiest solution to walk cycles is Adobe Animate. It's part of the creative suite.

If that is not an option you could use Puppet Pin and set up a comp with just the walk cycle so that the last frame and the first frame are identical. You only need one walk cycle. You use another comp for your character for each action you want to repeat. To make your character walk all you have to do is drag the walk cycle comp into the timeline, press Alt/Option + Ctrl/Cmnd + t to enable time remapping, press K to move to the last keyframe, press Ctrl/Cmnd + Left Arrow to move back one keyframe and set a new time remapping keyframe at the previous frame using the diamond icon in the timeline panel next to the stopwatch, then add this expression to Time Remapping:

loopOut()

You can now extend the walk cycle as many steps as you like by simply dragging the out-point of the walk cycle layer. You can also make your character walk faster or slower by adjusting the space between the time remapping keyframes.

If you have a little money in the budget you can also take a look at DUIK BASSEL.2. It's a very powerful tool and all they ask is a donation. The idea is basically the same for all approaches.  Create a walk cycle that you can loop, drop it in your main comp, position it as needed to line up with the other comp of your character doing whatever they are going to do before they start to walk, and use time remap to control the duration of the walk cycle. There is no need to make your walk cycle comp longer than one walk cycle. All you have to do is make sure that the first and last frames are identical.

If your character is talking or waving their hands then the walk cycle comp could be just the legs and torso. 

There are a lot of decent tutorials on creating walk cycles. The tools and the apps may be different but the technique is always the same when you are animating, if you create a movement that you might want to repeat - make that a separate thing (comp) that you can drop into the timeline any time you need it.