In this exercise, you will practice keyframing, animating the camera, and creating deformers. Level 1 students will create a simple demonstration of basic animation and camera movement. Level 2 and 3 students will create an animation inspired by tetris.

Learning Resources

Tutorials: Levels 1, 2, and 3

Animation Tools
Lynda Tutorials: Maya Essentials 5: Animation Tools
Digital Tutors: Camera Animation

Tutorials: Levels 2 and 3

Principles of Animation
Digital Tutors: 12 Principles of Animation

Steps to Completion

Choose a either level 1, level 2, or level 3 to complete based on your prior experience with 3D tools. If you are a novice, choose Level 1. If you have some experience, choose Level 2. If you are very experienced with 3D tools, choose Level 3.

Level 1 Steps | Level 2 Steps | Level 3 Steps

Level 1:

  1. Watch the animation tutorials from Lynda and Digital Tutors.
  2. Create a new project folder called animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L1, set your scene to the project folder, and create the sub folders by choosing File → Project Window → Accept.
  3. Create an animation with the following:
    • The duration of the animation should be 600 frames.
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    • Create a centered cube parented to group1 in the Outliner.
    • Create a sphere parented to group1 in the Outliner. It should be at least 10 units away from the cube, and revolve concentrically around the cube. (HINT: Their pivot points should be the same location)
    • Animate pSphere1 to rotate concentrically in the y-axis around the pCube1, twice(720 degrees).
    • Animate the group1 to move from 0 to positive 20 units in the y-axis direction from frame 0 to 300, and move back to the origin from frame 300 to 600. (The sphere should follow the cube as it moves up and down because they are both in group1.)
    • Create a perspective camera slightly above and looking at the cube. Include persp1 within group1 so that it can follow the cube as it moves up and down.
      image alt text
    • Go into the Graph Editor and make your pSphere1 rotation tangents linear.
      image alt text
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    • Your sphere should now loop seamlessly with the beginning of the animation.
  4. Save your scene as animation-YOURSTUDENTID in the scenes folder.
  5. Compress the project folder once you’ve completed the tutorial and rename it animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L1.zip.
  6. Upload the .zip file to the submission dropbox
  7. Ensure you’ve included everything properly. Failure to ensure that you’ve uploaded the file will result in your exercise being graded according the grading criteria.

Example Level 1 folder structure


animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L1.zip
|
└── animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L1
    |
    ├── sound/
    ├── scripts/
    ├── scenes/
    |   |
    |   └── animation-YOURSTUDENTID.mb
    |
    ├── renderData/
    ├── particles/
    ├── movies/
    ├── images/
    ├── data/
    ├── clips/
    ├── cache/
    ├── autosave/
    └── assets/

Level 2:

  1. Watch the animation tutorials from Lynda and Digital Tutors.
  2. Create a new project folder called animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L2, set your scene to the project folder, and create the sub folders by choosing File → Project Window → Accept.
  3. Create an animated scene inspired by Tetris. It must include the following:
    • At least 8 moving pieces
    • Camera movement
    • Easing applied to keyframes of moving objects (non-linear tangents in graph editor)
    • Camera shake
    • At least 10 seconds of animation at 24 frames per second (240 frames)
  4. Save your scene as animation-YOURSTUDENTID in the scenes folder.
  5. Compress the project folder once you’ve completed the tutorial and rename it animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L2.zip.
  6. Upload the .zip file to the submission dropbox
  7. Ensure you’ve included everything properly. Failure to ensure that you’ve uploaded the file will result in your exercise being graded according the grading criteria.

Example Level 2 folder structure


animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L2.zip
|
└── animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L2
    |
    ├── sound/
    ├── scripts/
    ├── scenes/
    |   |
    |   └── animation-YOURSTUDENTID.mb
    |
    ├── renderData/
    ├── particles/
    ├── movies/
    ├── images/
    ├── data/
    ├── clips/
    ├── cache/
    ├── autosave/
    └── assets/

Level 3:

  1. Watch the animation tutorials from Lynda and Digital Tutors.
  2. Create a new project folder called animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L3, set your scene to the project folder, and create the sub folders by choosing File → Project Window → Accept.
  3. Create a creature animation using only primitives inspired by Evolved Virtual Creatures. It must include the following:
    • At least 2 creatures with 3 moving pieces appendages
    • Camera movement
    • Easing applied to keyframes of moving objects (non-linear tangents in graph editor)
    • Camera shake
    • At least 10 seconds of animation at 24 frames per second (240 frames)
  4. Save your scene as animation-YOURSTUDENTID in the scenes folder.
  5. Compress the project folder once you’ve completed the tutorial and rename it animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L3.zip.
  6. Upload the .zip file to the submission dropbox
  7. Ensure you’ve included everything properly. Failure to ensure that you’ve uploaded the file will result in your exercise being graded according the grading criteria.

Example Level 3 folder structure


animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L3.zip
|
└── animation-YOURSTUDENTID-L3
    |
    ├── sound/
    ├── scripts/
    ├── scenes/
    |   |
    |   └── animation-YOURSTUDENTID.mb
    |
    ├── renderData/
    ├── particles/
    ├── movies/
    ├── images/
    ├── data/
    ├── clips/
    ├── cache/
    ├── autosave/
    └── assets/

Grading

Your grade will be assessed according to the Exercise Grading Criteria.