Video Training: How to Make a Head Turn with Actions PART 1

DarthFurby · Post by **DarthFurby** » Mon Apr 09, 2007 3:15 am

Alright, the training video is about 35 minutes long and it covers most of the major techniques that I use to create traditional style animation with Actions. I finished recording over 10 hours ago but the file is taking a LONG time to render. The encoding is currently at 17%. After 10 hours.

Also, this video is Part 1. I tried to do everything in one shot but it just wasn't possible. Part 2, which will likely be at least an hour long, will go step by step thru the process of creating my side view head turn, from character construction to final animation, but that won't be ready for at least a couple of weeks. However, a thorough understanding of all the topics covered in Part 1 is necessary before proceeding to Part 2, so hopefully some people will use that time to get acquainted with the prerequisites.

There are a ton of interesting things about Actions that aren't covered in the manual, and I did my best explain everything as it relates to creating traditional style animation. I'd especially like to hear feedback from people who speak English as a second language. Am I talking too fast, making sense, using clear language, etc... This will help me prepare for the next video.

Anyway, I have one small problem.

The file is probably going to weigh about 300 to 400 megabytes, maybe more. There is no way I can host that on my site. I may upload to YouTube but a lot of detail gets lost in compression, so if anyone out there is willing to host this file who can afford a potentially large hit to their bandwidth, please PM me so we can discuss.

Thanks!

A very big special thanks to ulrik for hosting the file, and Touched for compression. I hope everyone enjoys Part 1 of "How to Make a Head Turn with Actions."

Smallest version(20mb):

http://darthfurby.com/tutorials/as/headturn1.mp4

small version(56 megabytes):
http://musikboden.se/animestudio/headtu ... 1small.mp4

large hi quality(160 megabytes):
http://musikboden.se/animestudio/headturnpart01.mov

Watch Part 2 here:

viewtopic.php?p=40812#40812

Watch Part 3 here:

viewtopic.php?t=8867

byanfu · Post by **byanfu** » Mon Apr 09, 2007 5:50 am

I'm very excited to see this. I haven't used Youtube but I thought that it had a 10 min limit on clips.

heyvern · Post by **heyvern** » Mon Apr 09, 2007 7:54 am

I think for an instructional video youtube is acceptable quality.
You will have to break it into smaller chunks though. I am pretty sure they have a limit.

-vern

jahnocli · Post by **jahnocli** » Mon Apr 09, 2007 11:55 am

Stick it on a CD, and sell it via PayPal for postage & packing plus a few dollars...I'd buy it (as long as p+p isn't too prohibitive -- I live in England...)! This makes a lot more sense than 300 meg downloads...plus it is then a permanent reference, and you've made a little money for your efforts. I don't think anyone would begrudge you that...

Rhoel · Post by **Rhoel** » Mon Apr 09, 2007 12:06 pm

Sorry, but you didn't state the current file format or the frame size.

On "Machine Masters". I converted the uncompressed .mov file to the flash video format FLV - the reduction is about 1000:1 depending on the sound. I used the free Riva encoder (google it) and try it out.

Once you have a FLV file, you can either use a stand alone player on the web page (a SWF file) or build it into another flash page. Both work well. YouTube use FLV for their videos - at 300M. no-one is going to download it - on my server, downloading of the Machine Masters 8M file (and some time-lapse files) killed my monthly bandwidth allowance of 1Gig.

Normally, you can't download a flv from a page - however, you can get around this by posting the file directly, together with the link to the Riva player.

As for YouTube, I cannot officially get that here as the Thai authorities are censoring the site - seems some mischief makers posted videos which were demeaning to the King - insulting the King here carries a maximum 75 year jail term, so not a good career move: A Swiss guy here in Chiang Mai last month got 10 years for spray-painting over a King's poster. Dumb does not even get close to describing his actions.

I digress - can you post the file format, frame size etc so we have a better idea of the task.

Rhoel

Genete · Post by **Genete** » Mon Apr 09, 2007 3:07 pm

Perhaps you can use a P2P thecknique (BitTorrent for example) to share you video. With two initial mirrors you can have several users giving its upluad bandwith to your service. I know some linux distributions are downloaded in this way (700Mb)

Waiting excited your video tutorial.

Genete

cribble · Post by **cribble** » Mon Apr 09, 2007 3:57 pm

Surely reducing the resolution a little and using a decent distributing codec (say mp4, divX?) and compressing the sound must be a good solution? Have a play around, exporting a small 30 sec chunk at a time.

DarthFurby · Post by **DarthFurby** » Mon Apr 09, 2007 11:40 pm

The file is ready. Only 160mb. Whew! should be up soon.

Bones3D · Post by **Bones3D** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 12:52 am

Hmm... that seems a bit on the large size there, furby...

You might want to try encoding it as h.264 using an app like iSquint to reduce that down. You should be able to take some liberties with the audio (22KHz, Mono is typically good for voice) and video (8 - 12fps usually works well for screen capture demos).

You can also reduce sizes further by making the movie one half to one quarter the original capture area with it still being relatively usable.

Hope that helps.

DarthFurby · Post by **DarthFurby** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 3:05 am

The video is ready for download. Link updated in my first post.

http://musikboden.se/animestudio/headturnpart01.mov

If someone is willing to compress the video that would be great. I didn't want to keep everyone waiting this is the original master high quality video file.

DarthFurby · Post by **DarthFurby** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 3:14 am

Also everyone thanks for the positive comments and advice.

To Jahnocli- I realize I could've charged something, but this is my way of honoring the people who helped me without any expectation of a return. Much thanks for the support tho.

Touched · Post by **Touched** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 3:17 am

I can compress it to .mp4 with H264 compression for you...that should help it, and the Quicktime player plays that format so it should be pretty universal.

DarthFurby · Post by **DarthFurby** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 3:24 am

Thanks Touched that would be great. I used the H264 codec.

DarthFurby · Post by **DarthFurby** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 3:27 am

Rhoel - The file is quicktime mov format, at 1024x768. Hopefully a more bandwidth friendly version will be available soon.

Touched · Post by **Touched** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 3:37 am

Hope you don't mind if I shrink it to 640x480 in the process. I notice the audio's also in stereo, which isn't necessary for a single voice over, so I'll change that to mono.