Saturday, April 28, 2018

Animating Crash Bandicoot

Hello there one and all hope everything is excellent with you! I've been trying an animation app called Rough Animator. It's pretty good in spite of the many bugs. I've learned to work around them and am having fun while using the software to teach some basics.

Here's something I just finished. It's the very first time I've ever animated Crash Bandicoot. Not just pose him but actually get the character to move through sequential images. An 8 pose cycle animated on 4's.

I've been doing a lot of cycled animation lately thanks to this very easy to use program. It's inexpensive and the tools are limited. There's no tech support but it can do simple things and it's enjoyable and great for practice.

Anyway there ya go! Maybe we'll see more of him moving about and doing things.


7 comments:

Demoniccapra/Rose said...

Hi Charles ! Glad to see your posting Crash Bandicoot stuff. I think I posted a year ( or a few months. Time does fly by ! ) or so ago, I had a question on everyone's favorite time doctor, N. Tropy, and what was under that helmet and armor of his. It's still a huge mystery for the Crash fandom and unfortunately the remasters didn't answer our pleas of curiosity. I was wondering if you ever considered making a few sketches of N. Tropy armor-less? Or perhaps if you had more information into his concept / design and what kind of character he is. This would help bunches, thanks for the consideration if you see this!

Also, how does an artist get into the business of concept design ? It's always something I've wanted to do since I was little, and you've been a huge inspiration.

Thanks again, Veronica.

Hazman said...

Hey Charles! I really like the animation here! It makes me wonder why he all ways a little bit of a blank expression when running in first couple of games while he has a big happy expression to reflect his character. But I hope to see more of this animation stuff later on!

Charles Z said...

Hi Veronica / Demoniccapra/Rose. I thought about what N Tropy would look like without his garb way back when I first designed the character. I think it would be more fun seeing what fans come up with. As far as becoming a concept artist my best advice would be to get as good as you can get and start posting samples of your work on ArtStation.com. That's where the great concept artists of the world are showcasing their stuff. Mostly video game people. Try also ConceptArt.org. Become a great artist first. the very best you can be at what you do. Develop your own look and make it a point to share your work along multiple venues. Good things will happen.

Hello Hazman! I'm creating quite a few of these animated gif's. Really enjoy it. Will follow up with more.

Anonymous said...

Hey, glad to see Crash come to life in your beautiful style! Hope to see more of these animations, maybe the crash dance? That would be fun!
Also if you're looking for a free animation software there is OpenToonz, it's open source with an active community and constant updates. I tried it but my old graphic card isn't the best for this kind of stuff sadly.
Also, did you helped at all with Crash's animations in the games? I know about your concept art for the spin attack, but Crash has some very unusual animations (like his running animation for example) that I really enjoy, he looks scared and confused and he's flailing his arms back and forth like he doesn't know what he's doing but he has to do it. Love it.
http://rs663.pbsrc.com/albums/uu357/Mechavelli/Run_Crash_Run_by_Robotniko.gif~c200

Charles Z said...

Hey Gabriele how are you? A couple of my students downloaded OpenToonz and are learning it. I like TV Paint for traditional high end animation software but haven't had a chance to spend a lot of time with it. Powerful and lots of great features. Unfortunately it's kind of pricey which is why OpenToonz is a good alternative. Rough Animator works for me because it's easy and immediate and I can teach very efficiently with it. The animation at the link you posted was done by someone at Naughty Dog. Don't know who. They did a good job.

Anonymous said...

I have to try Rough Animator, maybe it works better than OpenToonz in my computer, and it looks like a great tool to get started with frame by frame animation in a quick and easy way.
Like sketching but with animated cartoons.
About Crash's animations, it's incredible to see the ammounts of details that the animator at Naughty Dog were able to get, like make the ears bounce or make the nose follow the movement of the body, stuff that seems easy nowadays but wasn't back then, especially since they animated not with bones but editing the vertexes of the model.

Charles Z said...

Gabriele although it's convenient software for animating it's also very buggy and tends to crash. Rough Animator is good for quick stuff but very limited in what it can do. One of my students is using Animation Desk on their iPad pro. Much better! Check it out as it looks to be a step up from and a good alternative to Rough Animator.