Judge feedback

Judge feedback is anonymous and shown in a random order.

• It was a smart move to avoid spending a lot of time building a fresh rig to concentrate on animating time What I am looking for here when I am judging is solely the animation and how effective it is and whether it fits into a game environment. Given this, I think you probably spent too much time working on the facial animation. While the sizing up expression is one of the more successful parts of your work here, It would be hard to see in a game context unless in a cinematic. You are much better served by getting strong posing and silhouettes. The areas I would recommend you focus on to bring you up are your posing, spacing and timing. I would say for you reference is absolutely key, trawl for relevant reference, film your self or someone you know. For timing, you can also speed up and chop up footage until it feels impactful. I would recommend getting any footage into your scene so you can refer to it constantly. For posing, really think about the each key pose and how a persons skeleton and muscle system would feel in that pose, can you adopt that pose yourself? Where is the center of gravity where is the direction of force and weight in the character and is the pose in the best position to support that. Timing wise, for a game animation this move is very involved and long. It feels like a set of moves that you would have to complete. As a player of a game think about how you want animations to feel. Usually you want immediacy and impact, One other thing to think about is how the character moves in a game, You can already see you have had to solve a bit problem of getting the character back to where they were. You also have to think about where this character might be, could they be in front of a wall, at the edge of a cliff, could their opponent here be right in front of them stopping them from doing this move. Game animations are often on the spot animations for this reason. You don't often know where you will be in the world when they are triggered. I like the choice of the power up being an intimidating stance, and the power hit is nice. however, I would be wary of employing back flips for the sake of it where it doesnt really fit the character. Back flips are a bit of a cliche and I often see them in student work. They are fun to animate, but is back flipping to catch a ball really suitable here rather than self indulgent. I feel like you are sitting between 2 and 3 here on most criteria. I can see you have worked hard in some areas, but I feel you could have spent more time on areas that have more impact
• Hey, I think the basics are there, but you need more basic fundamentals behind you to achieve a big piece like this. The weight is all off and its very poppy in places and at one point the power up seems to be one still pose. For that section, you really need some breathing and moving holds to keep the character alive. I would do some ball and legs exercises to get used to weight shifts and hoe the feet hips interact with each other before attempting a huge animation like this. If you had the weight working nicely this would be a solid piece, also video reference is key on all the ground movements. It will help you show the weight shifts and foot contacts a lot clearer and help your work a lot more. Keep on pushing you will get there :)
• Read the issues you had with the looping idle and power up animation so won't comment on those. Release - Throwing arm would benefit from an arc swinging the object through and releasing it at the top. Watch the object doesn't snap from the hand without the appropriate force being put into it - Good to dart the character back in swing anticipation, this gives room to really drive them forward when they go to hit object. - When going to hit the object, lead the motion with the root. The front foot wants to plant down early and in front in order to transfer the energy of the character through. - In terms of the upper half, think of the bat as the tail end of a whip, it wants to whip through after the rest of the body has already gone through. Watch the bat snapping out the hands. - Motion trails and tracking the arc of the bat will really help the swing read nicely. - Watch the transition in weight with the jump. The character's weight will be back and down and then like a coiled spring, explode out. - Watch the spacing of the jump/flip and anticipation. It eases in, speeds up and slows down too sharply. - Good hold at the top, working on the spacing will help with sell this point. - The character will then want to ease into the slam but accelerate all the way until their feet hit the ground. It's only once their feet hits the ground does their energy get discerpated. - Further issues with the bat leaving the hands, but I can see you're aware of these. Return - Cool idea and fitting to the character - Similar issues with spacing as the release - Further focus on the settles will help convey some of the weight of the character - Object drop is quite linear, think of it as a bouncing ball exercise where it's accelerating into the down position. The root is essentially the same. Overall, interesting and dynamic idea. I would recommend a few bouncing ball exercises and this will help with your space/timing and a few other animation principles. Good work though and keep at it.