"Strange Oaks" Rigging breakdown

Rigging breakdown for "Strange Oaks" by Miquel Campos.

Check out his rigging reel below.

Ciao for Now

Beautiful animation by Juandi.

51 Great Animation Exercises to Master

Useful post on animation exercises at Animator Island. Check it out and start exercising today :)

Terms used for Character Rigger

Did you know!?

Character Rigging is the most confusing and misunderstood process in 3D animation pipeline!

It goes by many names:

i. Character Setup
ii. Character Rigging
iii. Character Enveloping
iv. Character Puppeting
v. Character Technical Director (TD)
vi. Technical Artist
vii. Technical Animator 
viii. Creature Technical Director (TD)

GTC 2013: Face Works

Advance Real Time Character Performance demo by NVIDIA Co-founder and CEO Jen-Hsun Huang featuring Face Works technology running on the GeForce GTX TITAN GPU to create realistic simulation of human face. There is still a long way to go pass the Uncanny Valley but this looks promising!

Student Animation Snippet Exercise

The principles of animation have been laid down by Disney Animators Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston in the “Illusion of life ” in 1981.

Some more concepts have been added over the years and one of the most important addition, or clarification, is the concept of “weight shift”.

Here is a quick animation snippet by student Rajson Shakya.

Overlapping Action is another of the cornerstones of animation. By overlapping the actions of a characters' body, hair, tail, clothing or for this exercise, the arm; your animation will feel more fluid and life-like!

Here is a quick animation snippet by student Niroj Karmacharya.

To learn like Rajson and Niroj, apply to Puppeteer Lounge!

facerig test by erazerhead

Check out the face rig test by erazerhead! Cool stuff. It would have been even better if he had screen captured it :)

Houdini sparrow rig

Interesting Bird rig with procedural wing animation done in Houdini by Valerio Di Napoli.

Rigging & Python Programing Instructor ~ David Vega

Meet David Vega!

A new member of Puppeteer Lounge family joining the Rigging & Python Instructor team.

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David graduated from the Full Sail University in Character Rigging and Scripting. He is currently a Character TD at Durga Digital ~ Red Giant Studios and Burning Dog. Previously he worked as a Rigger and Techincal Artist at LLC and ESPN. He specializes in Character Rigging, Dynamics, MEL and Python scripting.

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I would like to personally welcome him into this new and exciting venture :)

"Welcome aboard David!"

Puppeteer Lounge Animation Workshop Promotion

At Puppeteer Lounge, we are really excited to announce our latest promotion!

We are now offering a substantial discount on our Animation Workshop program. The price list is more affordable and flexible at the same time. Meaning you pay less and learn even more =)

Head over to Puppeteer Lounge website for more info!

Python Workshop

Anyone with an interest in CG who wants to develop their technical skills further!? 

Well we have recently launched our latest workshop focusing primarily on Python Programing.

Head over to Puppeteer Lounge website for more info!

Animation Showreel December 2012 by Rob Byrne

Animation showreel by Rob Byrne featuring really impressive creature animation.

Rob'n Ron - Making of - Rigging

Check out the cartoon character rigs here!

One of the Oscar nominees, and to some, the one that should have won...

 

 It is a pity ParaNorman didn't recieve an Oscar!

Come on give some love to stop motion animation :)

Image and post headline from Character Design Facebook Page!

Character Animation - "Sinka Walkcycle" -2012

Cool integration of Sinka character with live action by Jimmy Litz.

Jeremy - Animation Test

Cartoon animation test by Max Loubaresse. Very impressive.

Daisy "The Little Girl" Images

Beautiful work by student Niroj Karmacharya, here at Puppeteer Lounge Niroj Karmacharya! 

Stay tuned for his latest animation shot featuring beautiful "Daisy" :)

To learn like Niroj, apply to Puppeteer Lounge!

Character TD ShowReel 2012 by Jorge Bellot

Check out this beautiful rig demo by Jorge Bellot featuring cool dynamic rigs, deformation work on multiple characters.

animation creatures&human by Tatiana Pushkareva

Beautiful animation by Tatiana Pushkareva.

MG_toolsLite and PRO : custom nodes for maya to enhance your rigs 1.1.0 (maya plugin)

Amazing share by Marco Giordano. Check out his custom tools for character rigging in Maya. Head over to Creative Crash to download it!

Great share Marco my friend! ;)

Source code on github!

Laika Studio Tour - Animation

Check out this video featuring the making of ParaNorman by Laika Studio. Despite being tedious, stop motion animation is unique, brings out the real puppetry! For this very reason the animators love it :)

Creating an Advanced Multi-Character Rig for Futurama’s Bender in Maya

Head over to CgTut+ to learn how to create an Advance Multi-Character Rig for Futurama’s Bender in Maya by Shaun Keenan.

Disney Is Producing New Mickey Mouse Shorts

 

Disney producing new Mickey Mouse shorts! Check out the post on Cartoon Brew for more information.

Looks beautiful and CLASSIC! Reminds me of the Golden Ages of Disney animation :)

rigging demo reel 2012 ~ Gorkem Oztas

Beautiful rig demo feature some interesting character and setup by Gorkem Oztas.

Student Sungmin Hong - Class 5 Character Performance

Beautiful performance by AnimSchool student Sungmin Hong.

Avatar | Visual Effects Making Of

Making of Avatar's unseen scene!

Building Maya Interfaces with Python

Check out these series of tutorial videos by Jeremy Ernst going over building interfaces in Maya using the power of Python scripting. There are 10 video series. Check out all the video over here!

A* Path finding

Interesting video featuring a solver for path finding from point A to B by Kevin Hayes.
For more information on solver and the technique, click here.

Feel free to check out his rigging reel below featuring intuitive custom tool development.

Jahirul Amin rigging demoreel

Rigging reel by Jahirul Amin. Nice demonstration of procedural animation and deformation.

Animating a Car Crash in Blender

Blender tutorial to create an animated car crash! I find similar techniques can be applied on other package to achieve similar effects.

2013 Rigging Demo Reel ~ Brad Hiebert

Cool rigging demo reel by Brad Hiebert showcasing some of his amazing work at Rhythm and Hues.

Creature Rig Deformation/Range of Motion Test

Creature Rig Deformation test implementing surfaceSkin tool by Grant Laker.

Street Fighter x Tekken - Behind the scenes

Check out how Axis animation did the digital head replacement on Street Fighter x Tekken.

Tribute to VFX artists by Roger Flambé

Check it out! A tribute to all VFX artists in the industry!

Pixar’s 22 Rules of Storytelling

Pixar’s 22 Rules of Storytelling by Emma Coates, Pixar’s Story Artist!

Bird rig by Aziz

Automated bird feather rig demo by Aziz.

Rigging Reel 2012 by Olessya Zalipyatskikh

Student reel by Olessya Zalipyatskikh.

Digital Banana - commercials, TVseries, clip...

Check out this studio showreel from Digital Banana!

Animation Instructor ~ Bill Broeckel

Meet William (Bill) Broeckel!

A new member of Puppeteer Lounge family joining the Animation Instructor team for the Animation Workshop!

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Bill graduated in 2007 from the Mohawk Valley Community College, Utica, NY with AAS in Digital Animation. Later in 2009 he received his Diploma in Advanced Animation Techniques from Animation Mentor, Emeryville, CA. He is currently an Animator at Four Directions Productions, Vernon, NY. Previously he worked as an Animator at PLAY ETERNAL, Philadelphia,PA. 
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I would like to personally welcome him into this new and exciting venture :)

"Welcome aboard Bill!"

Below is his latest animation reel!

Nike runner - Exploit yourself rework

Exploit yourself by director Carl Erik Rinsch and produced by Big Lazy Robot Visual Effects studio. Cool stuff!

Fridge Monster

I just stumbled upon this really resourceful site!

Go ahead, check out some really useful and fun tutorials on setting up mechanical rigs for animation such as gears and piston and other cool stuffs over here.

Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag

Check out the trailer for Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag!

"The Avengers" ILM Visual Effects Supervisor Jeff White speaks

Check out the interview with ILM Visual Effects Supervisor Jeff White going over some of the cool behind the scene stuffs on the making of "The Avengers". Click here!