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in this tutorial you'll be learning how
to model rig and animate your very own
four-legged creature you can make it go
any direction jump and maybe we can give
it a little bit of an attitude using
only blender
so we'll be working in blender version
2.93 and we'll start off by deleting
everything and creating a plane and this
will be our leg
so go to edit mode by pressing tab and
right click merge vertices at center and
now all we have in our entire scene is
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one single vertex i'm going to extrude
this on the z axis by pressing e and
then z
let's do
4 meters so we're going to add thickness
to our leg by using the skin modifier so
go to modifier properties add modifier
skin and now we have a rectangle and you
can't rotate or scale any points of this
you have to use ctrl a to adjust the
radius of the vertex so let's make it
pointy at the top and let's make it
wider at the bottom and this is actually
our leg upside down but we'll come back
to that so if you want to see what's
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going on next click x-ray mode and then
select both the vertices right click
subdivide
and then increase the number of cuts to
two
so now we have these two joints if you
press g you can move them around and you
can see that we have created bones but
right now these are still just vertices
so to make them into actual bones we can
click create armature but this button is
disabled until we have exited edit mode
so let's go back to object mode and in
the skin modifier click create armature
and now we have an armature object with
a bunch of bones that are connected to
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our leg so now we can access pose mode
which allows us to select the bone and
rotate it and our leg will follow
and this also unlocks some incredibly
powerful tools like inverse kinematics
so go to pose inverse kinematics add ik
to bone make sure you have this last
bone selected
and then add this ik to new empty object
so now when we go back to the object
mode you can select this empty and we
have a really powerful rig already so
the technique we'll be using in this
tutorial is to move this empty object
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around in a clever way to make this
other stuff behave like a leg so to keep
things tidy let's rename this empty
object to ik target
and there's one thing that we need to
fix because if we were to move this down
and now you can select the armature on
the leg and you can move this around by
pressing g you can see that there's a
limit to how far we can move this and if
you watch this from the front or the
graphic view which is numpad 1 you can
also use this widget and click minus y
and now you can press g to move this
around you can see that we are limited
to this area
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so we want it to be in this area instead
and that is roughly 45 degrees so you
can actually fix this by just rotating
it so hold down control and do -45 so
now we can move this around and we have
a much more comfortable zone to work in
so let's make a body shift a let's make
a cube let's move this cube on the z
axis by pressing g and then z and then
let's rename this to
body and now we can move our leg and our
armature just outside this and let's
just give you some more room and now we
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can take the armature and our leg and
parent it to the body so select the
armature on the leg hold down shift and
click on the body and go object parent
which is control p
this is where things get really
interesting because now we can move
around our body and we can rotate it and
we can move this leg and we're getting
close to something that looks like an
actual character i think this looks a
little bit weird right here on the edge
so i want to make a fake joint so let's
go shift a let's make an icosphere and
open this menu and set the subdivisions
to four and then right click set the
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shading to smooth and then we can move
this on the z axis and then place it
like in the middle here a little bit it
feels more like an actual joint select
the sphere hold down shift and parent it
to the body as well so now you can move
the body and we have this joint and we
have a leg and things are starting to
look really good now we're ready for the
next step which is to make this walk
we're going to use a path shaped like a
circle so go shift a curve
circle and then go to edit mode and
rotate this by 90 degrees on the x-axis
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let's go back to object mode let's move
this over here select our ik target go
to object constraint properties add
object constraint and select follow path
and then set the target to be the bezier
circle and now this looks really weird
because this ik target has a lot of
weird random location data so let's
remove this by going object clear
location which is alt g
and now you can just increase the offset
of the follow path
and we're walking
and it's stretching a little bit so
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let's just scale this down
and move it in a little bit
perfect so to animate this let's go to
frame 10 and then insert a keyframe on
the offset value and then advance by 20
frames so frame 30 and then if you set
this to 100 that's exactly one cycle so
let's just type
100 and then insert another keyframe now
this only does one round so to keep this
going forever you can hold your mouse in
the timeline go shift e and set it to
linear extrapolation and this will just
make it keep going forever even after
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animation ends it's going to keep going
now one problem is that this is a circle
and it's not really touching the floor
we want it to walk more like this so you
can select the circle go to edit mode
and select these two control points
and go to control points set handle type
vector
and now you can for example click and
drag on these two and you can press s to
scale it up and then you can take this
bottom control point and move it on the
z axis and if you want to be really
precise you can set the transform pivot
point to 3d cursor and scale it on the z
axis by a value of zero
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make sure your 3d cursor is reset before
doing that so now we can press play and
we're walking and we can actually select
this one and we can scale it up
and this is really powerful what's
really cool about this you can actually
just move this around still and it works
perfectly okay so this is looking good
but we need more legs so select
everything except from the body and then
view it from the top view you can use
the widget and click this z button you
can also use numpad 7. and now we're
going to duplicate it and rotate it at
the same time so go to object duplicate
object which is shift d so press shift d
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and then r right away so we're rotating
it while we're duplicating it then you
can hold down control to make it exactly
90 degrees and don't do anything else
because we just made one action and we
can press shift r to repeat that action
so shift r and then shift r again and
now this looks like a complete mess but
it's actually completely fine the only
thing that's the problem is that these
ik targets are out of position so we can
reset their position by going object
clear location which is alt g and then
you can also reset the rotation of these
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bezier circles that are used as paths so
to reset this go to object clear
rotation which is alt r
and now when you press play they're all
moving in the same direction and we have
a really cool rig that we can move in
real time we can rotate it around but
now all the legs are jumping at the same
time so to make it actually walk you can
select the ik target for the first and
then the last leg and then let's zoom in
on the timeline a little bit you can see
that there are 20 frames
which means that on 10 frames they will
be halfway
so select a to select all the keyframes
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and then press g and then move them 10
frames
and now when you press play we can still
move this around and have a lot of fun
now what's incredibly powerful with this
rig is that these four paths are
controlling the direction of our
character so if you set the transform
pivot point to individual origins you
can press play and then you can rotate
them on the z axis
and now we can adjust the direction of
our creature
and this is just incredibly powerful
so to control this properly let's reset
the rotation and then let's go shift a
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let's create an empty set to sphere
and then let's call this
direction controller and then right
click adjust empty display size and then
let's scale this up so now we can select
this first path and in the object
constraints properties we can go add
object constraint copy rotation and then
set the target to be the direction
controller so now this will only copy
the rotation not the location select
these three as well hold down shift to
select the first one go to object
constraints and then copy constraints to
selected objects so now these all have
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the same constraint and we can rotate
the direction controller
and we have a really powerful rig
but let's make things a little bit more
interesting by adding some random
movement to our body so right click and
select vertical split and set this
editor type to graph editor let's select
the body and press i and insert location
and rotation keyframes so now our object
has object transforms for x y and z
location and rotation so select the x
location and press n to get up this menu
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and click modifiers so now we can access
the f curve modifiers and the one we're
going to use is called noise so once you
apply the noise modifier our body is
immediately start to shake so we can
increase the scale of this movement
let's do 15
and you can increase the strength one is
great for now though and then you can
change the face if you like and now you
can copy this modifier because it's
currently only applied to the x location
so copy f modifiers and then go to y
location and paste it but now when you
press play you can see that it's going
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diagonally and that is because the x
location and the y location have the
exact same face
so if you adjust the face you can see
that now we're getting random movement
on both channels and this is starting to
look really organic
so let's do this for the z location as
well let's paste the modifier and let's
give it a new face
you know let's lower the strength a
little bit for the z axis
perfect and now we can do the same for
the rotation so go to the x rotation
paste but now we want to lower the
strength just a little bit
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so let's do uh
0.4 is good let's give it a random face
copy go to y-axis face random z
yeah you know the drill and now it's
almost as if we have a living creature
that is walking in our scene
perfect let's make it actually walk
across the screen
so let's make a new object shift a empty
cube right click adjust the empty
display size and make it really big and
now we're going to call this character
controller now hold down shift while you
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select the direction controller all
these paths and the body and now you can
press g and you can just see that
everything is moving and then hold down
shift and select the character
controller and then ctrl p
so now you can only move the character
controller and this will move now at
this point in the tutorial if you're
familiar with drivers feel free to go
ahead and add a driver for the offset
but right now we're just going to
quickly eyeball it which is also really
fast so let's move our character
controller on the x-axis
and then press i for insert location
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then let's move it a few frames over and
then press g x and move it over here and
then insert another location so now
we're running into the same issue where
we want to make this go on forever so
have your mouse in the timeline and go
shift e linear extrapolation so now when
you press play it's going way too fast
it's sliding a lot so to fix this let's
just have a look
okay so it's sliding too much and then
select one of the keyframes press g and
then let's move it back a little bit
and now you can actually just
wow did i actually just nail this on the
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first try
okay so
if you don't get super lucky and nail
this on the first try that's actually
quite insane um you can just sort of see
okay it's sliding too much let's move
this way
oh not as too little yeah so this is
just a really
i actually just messed this up by
nailing it on the first try okay now
this is walking across the screen but
for the cherry on top there's one final
thing you can do which is just
absolutely insane so let's uh split our
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viewport again go to graph editor
let's select the z location see this one
let's bring up the f curve modifiers
again
and let's add a modifier called built in
function and this creates a sine wave
and now this looks absolutely crazy we
don't want this we want to set it to
additive so it lies on top of the noise
and you can already see where we're
going with this look at this guy going
completely crazy and i just love this so
much so we can lower the amplitude a
little bit
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and then lower the face multiplier which
is basically the frequency
so let's lower this to point
let's do 0.5 and 0.5
and look at this look how much character
we're suddenly getting let's lower the
amplitude a little bit increase the face
and this doesn't even have to be in sync
with the legs you're just getting so
much emotion from this guy just bumping
up and down
and i love this so much
so let's collapse this so now you have a
really powerful rig where you can for
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example rotate the direction controller
on the z-axis by let's do 30 degrees
and then let's rotate the character
controller on the z-axis by minus 30
degrees and you can see that this sort
of goes now it goes sideways a little
bit so now you have this cute little
character walking around in your scene
look how fun it is that he's just sort
of walking across the screen like that i
really love this guy already and it's
really cool that you can just you can
make it jump and this is a really
powerful rig
i really like this rig so if you want to
make this easy to use in all of your
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project files you can just rename the
collection let's call this
creature let's go to for example blender
version 3.0 with the super fast cycles x
render engine oh we have to save this
first and let's go file append and then
just find your blend file and under
collection you can see that you have a
collection called creature and harris in
another version of blender works
perfectly fine if you want to see my
attempts at these things follow paul if
you're on instagram and yeah
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