Digital Tutors - Animating with Extreme Inbetweens and Smears in Maya

In this Maya tutorial we discover the process of creating smears using traditional concepts on a CG animation.

We will start the project with a blocked animation. Then, we will begin talking about dynamic poses, line of action and silhouette, but also leading edge and how we build smear frames. Throughout the training we will spline the animation, cover hot keys to speed up your workflow, and talk a bit about the graph editor. We then leap into creating duplicate frames and smear frames similar to those created by 2D animators.

By the end, not only will you know about smear frames and be able to apply some of the concepts that make 2D animation great, but you will also be able to spline your animation faster will better key poses.

Animating with Extreme Inbetweens and Smears in Maya content:

1. Introduction and project overview

2. Dynamic poses: Thinking in shapes

3. Concepts of Inbetween keys

4. Graph editor hot keys

5. Adjusting the animation curves

6. Continuing to adjust the animation curves

7. Finishing adjustments on the animation curves

8. Dealing with bad arcs

9. Animation curves of the feet and chest

10. Foot spacing and stretching

11. Finalizing the feet

12. Working on the head arcs

13. Finishing the head arcs

14. Adding squash and stretch to the head

15. Finishing out the head animation

16. Moving on to the arms

17. Preparing for blur frames

18. Continuing the arms and spacing on the arms

19. Finishing the arms and spacing of the arms

20. Creating duplicate geometry and smear frames

21. Continuing to duplicate geometry and add smear frames

22. Finishing the geometry and smear frames

23. Adding the final touches to our smear frames