There are many ways to achieve this effect. Here are some suggestions based on my experience...
I use both 2D and 3D in my work, but I'll sometimes cheat 3D in Moho when I feel it will be easier and just as effective as using real 3D art/animation.
It requires understanding how perspective and parallax work, and how the effects can be simulated using 2D techniques...which, of course, any good traditional artist should be familiar with. After that, it's knowing how to apply Moho's tools to get those effects in animation.
For buildings, lay out some perspective guidelines in a separate vector layer. Now you can draw elements in another vector layer, just like you would traditionally. From here, you
could draw everything in perspective, but that wouldn't necessarily lend itself to
animation. Fortunately, Moho has tools and techniques that make it easier to animate 2D to appear 3D.
For the art, you can use quad shapes in Perspective Mode to warp images to have true perspective. To get Perspective Mode, the curves need to have only four points and not be attached to other curves. If you don't follow the rules, then the shape will work as a regular quad deformer without the perspective effect.
Ideally, the element that will be warped should not have perspective itself, but should be drawn flat like decals. This will give you more flexibility for warping. (Note: Creating everything as a flat decal could be overkill when the animation is going to be minimal, but that's up to you and the requirements of the scene.)
The images for warping can be vector art, photos, paintings, or pre-rendered Moho vector drawings. When using vector art, you will need to draw it in a way that makes deforming it optimal. Personally, I often find it easier to pre-render it to a bitmap. There are pros and cons to this, but bitmaps typically give me better results for warping. Again, this depends on the degree of warping you intend to apply. For simple perspective shifts, it probably doesn't matter.
After you have the images for warping prepared, use the quads to fit the images to the perspective grid. To animate them, grab the corner points for the quads and animate them appropriately. If it helps, you can animate the perspective grid first, and then match the quads to follow it.
For added realism, you can add elements in separate layers, adjust their z-positions, and create true perspective by moving the camera. Hmm...actually, that could get messy because you're trying to sync fake 3D with real 3D effects. It should work, but within reasonable limits. Again, it depends on the scene.
If animating this art is something you expect to do frequently, and at varying degrees and speeds, I suggest using Smart Bones for this animation. (Tip: If you're new to Smart Bones, our next tutorial video,
Endless Nachos, Part 3, will be all about different ways to use them.)
I haven't looked lately, but there are probably other tips and rules in the manual, so I recommend reviewing that. (I should review the manual myself because it's been a while since I looked through it, and I'm sure there's newer stuff I'm missing out on.)
Anyway, applying 'real' perspective animation effects in 2D is fairly easy to do in Moho. It just requires planning ahead to do it well.
The other option is to use
actual 3D in Moho. But, to be honest, if you're going that route, it's easier to do this using a dedicated 3D program (like Blender), and it will look better, too. Then, you can composite the Moho elements with the 3D elements in a compositing program (which could be a program like Moho or Blender, but I prefer using After Effects or Fusion).
Hope this helps. If you need more info, let me know, and I'll think about making a tutorial on the subject with visual examples.
