Week 8, Session 8 - Bounce

Using the simple ball rig, this lesson focuses on adjusting timing for keys,  tangent angels and tweeking animation in the key and value boxes using *= and /= short cuts in the Graph editor, as well as importing animation from other files.

This is my final "Bounce2" animation for Maya Springboard.

Enjoy,
Max

Week 7 - Session 7 - Circle

Objective: Deepening our understanding of the graph editor as well as using motion paths.

How: Animate a ball rig moving in a perfect circle.

My method: I typed in respective translator data to key the ball in four extreme points of the circle using (5,0,0) (0,5,0) (-5,0,0) & (0,-5,0).
Spaced the keys,
Used clapped tangents
THEN, I created a nurbs curve Circle in the same size I wanted my motion path to be. Next, I put that circle in another layer which I made a reference layer.
From there I could refine my motion path with the circle curve as a guide.

I did hit a snag when I realized I hadn't imported the ball rig, andhad animated a plain sphere. The result would have been the same but I'm a perfectionist. So, I copied the keys and put them on a ball rig.
The trouble was the center/ pivot points were different so I had to move the new graph editor lines collectively for the center to be right where I wanted it.

Thumbs up for learning to fix problems!

Thanks for reading,
Max