How to smooth transform a background for a walking illusion

[El Wombat]

Hello,

is there a way to move a background (or any bg element like clouds for that matter) WITHIN CH?

While I CAN transform any element and drag it manually through a scene, I don't seem to find a way to do this:

Element A, kindly move from x-position 1 to x-pos. 2 in amount of time (* seconds).

Just like I can easily do in Pr or Ae. And yes, I COULD, of course use these, but it would be nice to be able to do as much as possible in CH and it doesn't seem to be a tremendously complex feature so I wonder if I just miss s.th. or whether it may be added in the future?

That way I would be able to move a bg so as to create a walking illusion for my character or if it's standing move some clouds or birds. I HAVE done this by mouse-drag-changing the transform settings or a draggable handle of a bird and some clouds but it didn't seem to be a very elegant solution and neither is it incredibly smooth to move an object that way.

Thank you very much…

[ubanim95860298]

I so wish they had KEYFRAMES.

[El Wombat]

My guess is that Adobe wanted to get rid of Keyframes for a more simple interface and usability altogether, but I'm afraid that the result is that some of the most basic things like moving an object from a to b using keyframes for positions over a certain time start to become harder to do than need be.

We'll see, maybe them wizards are onto a different solution while we are wildguessing…?

[oksamurai · Accepted solution]

The only way to do this currently would be to arm Transform > Position X, record the background in one place, then adjust and record it in another, and blend the top one so it eases in. But you don't have a lot of control.

I would say this is currently better suited for After Effects. I treat Character Animator as my actors/actresses and After Effects as their stage.

Keyframes have been requested often and I agree - it should be way easier to do stuff like this. We will be addressing workflows like this for sure in future updates.

[El Wombat]

Hi!

Thanks once more for the quick reply!

Sure, in Ae it would be an easy thing to do, but not only would it make things easier to be able to do basic object movement and scale animations within Ch, but also it would encourage people who want to buy or rent only Ch, or maybe they just don't know Ae and don't want to get into it and still be able to create basic scenery animations and thereby possibly do complete shows or motion pictures done with Ch.

So totally makes sense to me that it is s.th. we can look forward to in upcoming updates! Great!

[Emily_Watts]

As an update, in case anyone comes upon this old thread looking for info, Okay Samurai featured a hack to create a moving background and foreground within CH, using the Walk behavior.

Here's a link to the video - it's the "Nuketown Camera Hack" segment at 6:33.

Character Animator Tips & Tricks (February 2018) - YouTube

Essentially, you tag your background and foreground as "Hip" body parts. Then you enable the walk behavior with 0% Strength (so it doesn't bob up and down), and you set a negative value for the Body Speed if you have a character walking in the scene and want the background to move in the opposite direction of the character. The video above does a great job of explaining in detail.