A complete guide to 3D Animation

1. MIND SPIRIT DESIGN A complete guide to 3D Animation www.mindspiritdesign.com One of the most asked question I get on a daily basis is “I want to be an animator/do animation. Where do I start?” The production pipeline of a typical animated short or a movie can be divided into three stages: pre- production, production and post-production. In this article we will be discussing these three key stages in detail. The first process in 3D Animation is to know the PRE-PRODUCTION and it’s also the most important. It begins with the main concepts; once the story has been finalized you need to have a script, shot sequence and lastly the camera angle. You need to consider some major components of PRE-PRODUCTION are Storyboard, Layouts, Model Sheets and Animation. A note about 3D: You’ll have to learn different skills other than animation such as lighting, texturing and rendering if you want to produce nice looking videos. If you know already the beginning then let’s move forward to the second process PRODUCTION First, let us learn about the basic definition of 3D animation. In its simplest form, 3D animation is the process of creating three-dimensional moving images in a digital environment. 3D models within 3D software are carefully manipulated to make them look like real moving objects. Just like traditional animation, the goal of 3D animation is to make it appear on screen as if the images are actually moving when in fact, they are simply a series of consecutive images which are shown on a very fast sequence. During the PRODUCTION stage the process of animation begins, this is usually the longest stage and also the busiest of them all. The animators, artists, designers and architect. You need to get the Layout & animation the 3D objects are positioned in such a way that it will appears as of movement is actually occurring on screen. Model sheets are precisely drawn groups of pictures that show all of the possible expressions that a character can make, and all of the many different poses that they could adopt. These sheets are created in order to both accurately maintain character detail and to keep the designs of the characters uniform whilst different animators are working on them across several shots. As compared to 2D, 3D animation is more expensive, time-consuming and tedious. It’s the extra depth perspective of 3D animation which requires artists to do almost double the work done on traditional 2D animation. The third process is POST-PRODUCTION involve exporting and rendering of animation frames. Pieces of animation are edited together and soundtrack including effects and voice-over incorporated. And sound actors and dubbing to name just a few of the many post-production tasks.