Rigging and Animating 2D Characters in After Effects
In this After Effects tutorial, we will learn how to assemble, rig, and animate a richly detailed and dynamic character inside of After Effects. Software required: Photoshop CS6, After Effects CS6, Duik Tools ver.13.0.2, and FreeForm Pro Plug-in for CS6.
What you'll learn
In this After Effects tutorial, we will learn how to assemble, rig, and animate a richly detailed and dynamic character inside of After Effects. Throughout these lessons, we will see just how powerful After Effects can be when doing advanced character animation. We will venture well beyond the basic paper-cutout style of character animation that is often associated with this approach by breaking down the required steps. We will start out by reviewing the Photoshop file used to paint the character's layers, and then we'll quickly move into After Effects, where we will begin rigging the character using the puppet tool, null objects, nested compositions, basic expressions, Duik Tools for Inverse Kinematics, and FreeForm Pro for the 3D head. By the end of this series, you will have a thorough understanding of the many processes behind bringing a layered Photoshop character to life within After Effects. Software required: Photoshop CS6, After Effects CS6, Duik Tools ver.13.0.2, and FreeForm Pro Plug-in for CS6.
Table of contents
- Examining the Characters in Photoshop 8m
- From Photoshop to After Effects 9m
- Organizing Your Composition 10m
- Creating Arm Bones with the Puppet Tool 10m
- Refining the Arm and Making Cloth Cuffs 10m
- Copying One Arm Rig to the Other 11m
- Downloading Duik Tools 3m
- Rigging a Basic Cutout Character 11m
- Attaching the Arms to the Shoulders 9m
- Rigging the Cuffs to Respond Realistically 11m
- Controlling Hand Poses 8m
- Rigging the Shirt Collar 10m
- Rigging the Neck 11m
- Overview of Working with the Head 7m
- Placing Pins in the Face 10m
- Refining the Mesh of the Face 11m
- Building Sliders for Facial Expressions 10m
- Working on Teeth and Eye Brows 10m
- Making the Eyebrows React 11m
- Tightening the Facial Expressions 11m
- Rigging the Lips 10m
- Adding More Expression Sliders 9m
- Creating a Dynamic Jaw 10m
- Making a Bouncy Nose 12m
- Making the Nose Sniff 8m
- Facial Wrinkles 11m
- Cheek Wrinkles 8m
- Mouth Wrinkles 6m
- Fixing Unwanted Distortions 11m
- Tweaking the Face 10m
- Rigging the Tongue 13m
- Working with Animated Layer Masks 12m
- Refining the Blink Layer Mask 10m
- Directing the Character's Gaze 8m
- Adding New Eye Poses 9m
- Shading the First Eye 12m
- Finishing the Eye Poses 10m
- Importing the New Eye Poses 10m
- Adjusting the Eyebrows to Work 5m
- Fixing Shading Issues 8m
- Animating the Eyelids Dynamically 12m
- Making the Blinks More Real 9m
- Refining the Mouth and Lips 9m
- Troubleshooting Puppet Meshes 5m
- Transferring the Face Controls 11m
- Finishing the Face Control Transfer 9m
- Adding More Controls to the Body 7m
- Adjusting the Collar 10m
- Rigging a Collar 9m
- Making the Character Breathe 12m
- Setting up for FreeForm Pro 10m
- Reviewing the Scene Hierarchy 5m
- Making a 3D Head 10m
- Animating Displacement Maps 12m
- Linking the 3D Spaces 11m
- Controlling 3D Head Rotations 10m
- Controlling the Teeth and Tongue 8m
- Connecting Identical Nulls 4m
- Finishing up the Facial Controls 10m
- Constructing the Set 10m
- Adding Reflections to the Glass 10m
- Putting the Character in the Scene 8m
- Finish Building the Set 9m
- The Properties of Point Lights 8m
- Troubleshooting the Shadows 11m
- Casting Shadows on the Wall 12m
- Adding Dirt to the Glass 9m
- Animating the Camera 11m
- Finishing Touches on the Set Lighting 3m
- Adding Markers to the Soundtrack 5m
- Animating Breathing 12m
- Managing Your System Memory 10m
- Continue Animating 11m
- Refining the Facial Rig 9m
- Animating the Rest of the Neck 12m
- Animating the Nose 11m
- Animating the Torso 6m
- Animating 3D Head Rotations 5m
- Adjusting the Upper Lip 4m
- Faking a Stop Motion Look 7m
- Setting up Motion Blur 4m
- Fixing an Animated Mask Glitch 4m
- Discussing the Finished Animation 1m
About the author
Dan Gies grew up in Alberta, Canada, in the Kananaskis Valley at the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. His strong passion for drawing catapulted him into traditional animation at a young age when his dad, an inventor, put him in front of a computer and introduced him to Autodesk Animator. His mom, a painter, shared with him everything she knows about design, form, color theory and composition. He spent a number of years at the Banff Centre as the Film & Television Post Production & Editor Work S... more