Ready to transfer your animation skills to MotionBuilder but feel a little overwhelmed?
Look No Further!
Motion Editing 101 is your guide to mastering the tools and techniques you'll need to get you editing mocap like a pro...
...even if you've never used MotionBuilder.
After completing the course, you'll have 5 animations that blend seamlessly from one action to the next...
...just like this 👉
Hi, I'm Simon Kay
Over the past 20+ years I’ve used MotionBuilder to help bring hundreds of film and video game characters to life at some of the world’s leading VFX, Video Game and Motion Capture Studios including DNEG, Sony and Centroid
Why MotionBuilder?
When it comes to editing motion capture, Autodesk MotionBuilder is the go-to software for professional animators and motion editors around the world.
Its real-time interface and powerful toolset have helped bring hundreds of characters to life at some of the world’s leading VFX, Video Game and Mocap Studios.
What Will You Learn?
This hands-on step-by-step course will walk through the entire motion editing process, showing you the tools you’ll need and how to use them to get the job done.
From mastering the interface to advanced motion editing techniques and workflows, you'll gain the skills and confidence you need to start creating lifelike animations in no time.
How to Setup Your Scene
Before we do anything, we'll add infinite undo's just in case we make any mistake!
Then we'll change a few camera settings and create a real-time character shadow to improve the way our scene looks and make it more user-friendly.
How to Import Mocap onto a Character
We'll start by looking at how motion capture data is usually delivered, what issues you might run into, and how to import it onto your character.
How to Realign and Trim Mocap Takes
Once we've imported the data on our character, we'll use MotionBuilder's Story Tool to realign it, and select the best clips to use to create our 5 animation clips:
- Stand Idle
- Stand to Walk
- Walk Cycle
- Walk to Stand
- Twitch/Fidget
How to Create and Apply Poses
Now we have all our animation clips, we'll use MotionBuilder's Pose Controls to create and apply poses so the clips blend perfectly.
Understanding the Control Rig
Before we get into full blown editing, we'll have a quick look at MotionBuilder's Control Rig: what the different setting do and how they interact with each other.
How to Create Idle, Looping and Transition Animations
Now it's time to use everything we've learned so far to edit the mocap and fix any issues, add missing detail, enhance the performance and create our 5 animation clips.
How to Export Your Finished Animation
Once you've finished motion editing, it's time to plot the animation to your character and export it.
...don't forget to export the Poses to use on your next file.
How to Render Your Final Animations
To help improve feedback, we'll use HUDs to "burn in" some useful information to our renders so it's clear what everyone is looking at.
How to Increase Responsiveness and Reduce Distances
There'll always be notes, so in this final lesson we'll look at how to make the stand to walk feel more responsive and our walk to stand stop in less distance with a little help from the TimeWarp tool.
Step-By-Step Video Workflow
- 23 Understanding Animation Layers (9:01)
- 24 Walk Cycle Plan Edits (6:20)
- 25 Walk Cycle Fix Foot-Floor Contact (20:17)
- 26 Walk Cycle Loop Action (15:25)
- 27 Walk Cycle Fix Foot Slide (28:12)
- 28 Walk Cycle Reduce Head Motion (6:18)
- 29 Walk to Stand Create and Apply Stand Base Pose (11:32)
- 30 Walk to Stand Fix Pose Transitions (17:41)
- 31 Stand to Walk Fix Foot Floor Contact (8:02)
- 32 Stand to Walk Paste Base Poses and Fix Foot Slide (6:34)
- 33 Stand to Walk Add Drive (12:58)
- 34 Stand Idle Paste Base Poses (1:37)
- 35 Check Base Poses (1:14)
Who's this Course For?
Whether you're a complete beginner or an experienced animator looking to add MotionBuilder your skill set, this course is for you.
The step-by-step lessons are designed to be accessible to everyone, regardless of your previous experience or skill level.
And with lifetime access and no production deadline, it's the perfect pressure free introduction to motion editing in MotionBuilder.
What's Included?
Characterized MetaHuman Character
The only thing left to do is import the mocap.
Example of a production ready MetaHuman character in MotionBuilder. Including, characterization, import and export groups, textures and shaders.
High Quality Motion Capture
The same 43 seconds of mocap I use in the videos mapped to a female MetaHuman skeleton, ready to import onto included Kendra character.
Max & Maya Keyboard Shortcuts for MotionBuilder
In the course you'll learn how you can change MotionBuilder's keyboard shortcuts to match 3DS Max or Maya.
This PDF will give you a printable version for easy reference.