Rig testing

Mixamo

Head Modeling

Model a Head with Good Topology part 1/14 by Glen Southern Sparklvfx.com





Model a Head with Good Topology part 2/14 Box model work flowBy Glen Southern



Model a Head with Good Topology part 3/14 Box model work flowBy Glen Southern


Model a Head with Good Topology part 4/14 Box model work flowBy Glen Southern




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Human Head Resources
Andrew Loomis' Book: Drawing the Head and Hands Page 14 has a nice example of various human head shapes

Short film examples

Blik: http://vimeo.com/polderanimation/blik
Nice example of all of the work of the story being told through gesture. Stylized rendering and character design. Nice staging and nice pace.

Blik from Polder Animation on Vimeo.

Amazing animation

Loom from Polynoid on Vimeo.

The pirate: by Meindbender studios

Beautiful example of realistic rendering style to seem like a puppet and a marriage of classic toon animation with the parrot.

The Pirate from river/Petra Monheim on Vimeo.

The butterfly: Leonid Larionov, 2003 here

Don Bluth

Behind the scenes of The secret of Nihm
Don Bluth Director discusses animation, inspiration behind film.

Lip Sync: Blend Shapes: Phonemes & Visemes

Lip Sync Tips: http://minyos.its.rmit.edu.au/aim/a_notes/anim_lipsync.htmlfrom centre for animation & interactive media.

"The phonemes are the smallest, distinguishable unit of sound used in spoken language."
"The Visemes are the basic visual unit of speech that corresponds with the phoneme."
Eric Allen & Kelly L. Murdock Body Language: Advanced 3D Character Rigging
Here is a nice illustration of some basic phonemes and visemes.
http://www.garycmartin.com/mouth_shapes.html

http://www.garycmartin.com/phoneme_examples.html

http://minyos.its.rmit.edu.au/aim/a_notes/mouth_shapes_01.html
** "Great animators start with the body before the head., In fact you can tell what a person is saying more by their body language than anything else." Eric Allen & Kelly L. Murdock Body Language: Advanced 3D Character Rigging

Websites to find audio tracks for Lip Sync
http://moviewavs.com/
http://www.moviesoundscentral.com/
http://www.rosswalker.co.uk/movie_sounds/
http://wavcentral.com/movies.htm
http://www.freeaudioclips.com/categories.php?cat=8&cat_name=Movies%2FTV

Keith Lango on Lip Sync

Character

What is a character?
Wikipedia define a character like this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Character_(arts)
A character is any person, persona, identity, or entity who exists in a work of art. The process of conveying information about characters in fiction is called characterisation. Characters may be entirely fictional or based on real, historical entities. Characters may be human, supernatural, mythical, divine, animal, or personifications of an abstraction.

Archetypes ( wikipedia)

See also: Archetype and Stock character

A character may be based on a particular archetype, which is a common characterological pattern like those listed below. Jungian archetypes are modeled after mythology, legend, and folk tales. For example, both Puck from the William Shakespeare play A Midsummer Night's Dream and Bugs Bunny are examples of the Jungian trickster archetype because they defy established standards of behavior. When defined by literary criticism, archetypes fulfill a particular role in a story.

Though Carl Jung identifed the first archetypes based on story patterns in 1919,^[1] authors like Joseph Campbell^[2] and James Hillman continued the work he'd begun. Other authors have reorganized the information, often blending Jungian archetypes or recognizing sub-archetypes within Jung's structure. These authors include Christopher Vogler, best known for his book The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure For Writers, and Melanie Anne Phillips and Chris Huntley, whose Dramatica^[3] defines seven different archetypes defined by their "Action" and "Decision" characteristics:

• Driver Characters:
  • Protagonist: "... the driver of the story: the one who forces the action." Defined by "Pursue" and "Consideration" characteristics.
    • Jungian equivalent: Hero
  • Antagonist: "... the character directly opposed to the Protagonist." "Prevent" & "Re-consideration".
    • Jungian equivalent: Shadow and Villain
  • Guardian: "... a teacher or helper who aids the Protagonist..." "Help" & "Conscience"
    • Jungian equivalent: Wise Old Man or Wise Old Woman, also sometimes referred to collectively as The Mentor
• Passenger Characters
  • Reason: "... makes its decisions and takes action on the basis of logic..." "Control" & "Logic"
  • Emotion: "... responds with its feelings without thinking..." "Uncontrolled" & "Feeling"
  • Sidekick: "... unfailing in its loyalty and support." "Support" & "Faith".
  • Skeptic: "... doubts everything..." "Oppose" & "Disbelief"
    • Jung's Trickster archetype often overlaps here, since its purpose is to question and rebel against the established way of doing things

A single character may fulfill more than one archetypal role. A single character may also have many traits and feelings. A complex character may blend characteristics from different archetypes, just as real people embody aspects of each archetype. According to one writer/psychologist,

Though in stories the archetypes are...fragmented into individual characters, in real life each of us carries qualities of each archetype. If we didn't, we wouldn't be able to relate to characters who represent the archetypes we were missing.^[4]

In designing character you can define your characters purpose and use that as an aid in his/ her overall look/ body shape/ form.

In the book, Animation 1, published by Walter Foster, Famous animator Preston Blair categorizes characters in to the following groups. Each category has a definite base body structure.
1: The Cute Character; proportions based on the scale of a baby. Eaxmples: Jerry from Tom and Jerry, Flower from Bambi, Jack Jack from the Incredibles, Chicken Little.. Large head Bigger eyes small pudgy limbs and fingers.

2. The Screwball type: Pear shaped body, longer neck, elongated head.
Examples: Bugs bunny, Daffy Duck, Woody Wood Pecker, Tom from Tom and Jerry,

3. The Goofy Character: Long skinny body, hunched back, large adam's apple, small chin, bucked teeth. Examples: Goofy, Ron Stoppable, Baby Bear, Sheen from Jimmy Nutron,

4. The Heavy or Pugnacious character: Small head compared to body, Big Barrel chest, small eyes, large chin, small waist and short legs..
Examples:Bluto from Popeye, spike the dog,

I would add another category: the mad scientist; Usually, a skinny individual, with a larger cranium area and huge ego..

Walks

Monty Python: Ministry of silly walks


Charlie Chaplin


The Right Stuff: The very end shows the classic walk of the astronauts


Charlie Chaplin sings and dances



Do I have Power: Carlos De Carvalho, 2011, Beautiful walks, runs, poses, beautiful character design

Do I Have Power - Timber Timbre (2011) from Carlos De Carvalho on Vimeo.


Gawper: Great character design and walk variations

Gawper from A Large Evil Corporation on Vimeo. Funky: Nice example here