A lot of character models, particularly those used in video game engines, have facial animation driven exclusively by a simplified facial bone structure. In this tutorial, you’ll be introduced to Reallusion’s G5 Game Bone, a simplified version of the conventional G5 Facial Bone which is optimized for use with game engines. You’ll also learn how you can import these facial bone models into iClone to create fast and detailed facial animations using iClone’s versatile facial animation tools.
Many character models out there contain minimal or no facial bones, and their facial animation is driven exclusively by blend shapes created in software such as Maya or zBrush. These blend shapes are then blended together using animation software. In this tutorial, you’ll learn how you can import your model in FBX format along with all its blend shapes into iClone by first bringing it into 3DXchange 5.4 and assigning different blend shape values to different expressions. After that, you’ll be able to utilize tools such as iClone’s real-time facial puppeteering as well as lip-syncing and muscle-based motion key editing.
Characters with the best potential for facial animation performance often contain both facial bones as well as a variety of blend shapes. While the bone structure maintains the structure of the facial shape, the blend shapes compliment these movements by providing more subtle detail to the lips and other areas of the face. In this tutorial, you’ll learn how you can combine both facial bones and blend shapes to create more detailed animations, and how you can import these special types of characters into iClone. You’ll also see an example of how you can map a tongue as an extended bone for a floppy tongue effect.
Version 5.4 brings iClone into a new era of facial animation. With the powerful new features, it allows you to lip-sync, and animate facial motions for any character. Its improved motion editing capabilities will help you animate easier thanks to its new bone settings. You will also be able to apply spring effects to multiple extended bones for natural ear, hair or tail movements. The Motion Modify in the Timeline also gives way to a variety of possible motions.
3DXchange 5.4 allows you to facial-animate any type of character, from bone-based, morph-based to bone/morph hybrids. You may now define facial movements with the intuitive Expression Editor including Head, Eye, Jaw, Lip-sync, Muscle, and even customize your own! In version 5.4, extended bones can be designated into groups with different types of spring for all kinds of performance needs. Moreover, with the one-click DAZ character import, you can fine-tune facial animations as you wish!
Feb 132013
Butterfly and fly swarms. Just drag into scene, position and press play to use. Each swarm can be scaled to adjust area of coverage and each insect can be edited if necessary.
The Avatar Toolkit allows you to both create a super quick animation based on template expressions, or go into detail by separately animating each facial feature. In this tutorial, you’ll learn one of the fastest and easiest ways to create an exceptional animation by combining lip syncing, avatar component puppet, and direct body puppet. You’ll also pick up some tips on how to customize your monster’s lip sync so you can take full advantage of their morph-based facial animation support.
http://www.reallusion.com/ContentStore/promo/2012AvatarToolkit/
Beyond the face, you can also animate a number of other components included with the Monster Workshop such as wings, tails, and horns. This tutorial demonstrates how to combine iClone motions clips along with avatar component puppet animation to create a totally new and exceptional animation result.
http://www.reallusion.com/ContentStore/promo/2012AvatarToolkit/
This tutorial goes a bit more in depth into how you can create a more unique looking character. You’ll find out how important texture maps are when it comes to customizing the appearance of your monster by playing around with bump, glow and diffuse maps and adjusting other material properties such as transparency. You don’t even really need an image-editing program to get this done, just a bunch of cool texture maps.
http://www.reallusion.com/ContentStore/promo/2012AvatarToolkit/
If you’re about to embark on a journey of custom monster creation, you’ll probably want to take a gander at this tutorial first. You’ll learn the basics of character color and proportion change, attaching different items to different parts of your monster’s body, swapping monster heads, quick body texture editing, and many more other gruesome operations. Time to create your own Frankenstein!
http://www.reallusion.com/ContentStore/promo/2012AvatarToolkit/
Avatar Toolkit is finally here! Avatar Toolkit is a leading-edge 3D Avatar creator system that allows you to freely animate your imaginative creatures. It’s designed with the intuitive control panel to puppeteer characters’ facial expression and accessory animation as versatile as you need!
http://www.reallusion.com/ContentStore/promo/2012AvatarToolkit/
