Creating Your Own Motion Data
So you may be asking yourself, "How exactly do I animate something from scratch? I don't really want to use someone else's work, I want to make my own stuff!" Well friends, that's what we will be discussing in our next tutorial!
Animating from scratch can be quite a daunting concept, and even I am no master when it comes to this. But I may know a trick or two that will aid you in becoming the next Pixar animator! Well... maybe not that good, but I will show you the very basics for starting real animation. Even though I started fiddling with MikuMikuDance back in 2012, I only started making things from scratch in about 2015. So I myself could be considered a newbie! I am telling you this now because I don't want anyone assuming that what I make is anywhere near perfect, and to take my advice with a grain of salt. These tutorials are more about how to animate within MikuMikuDance, rather than how to animate "well." I would definitely recommend downloading Blender and viewing tutorials for that program if you want to get more serious, but starting with something like MikuMikuDance is a great way to ease yourself into the world of CGI.
First and foremost, I suggest you see my MMD Basics tutorials before even tackling this subject. There I teach you about the program's interface and, you know, the basics of MikuMikuDance. If you do not have that knowledge already, animating might be even more difficult than it needs to be in this program. If that's the case for you, no worries, just hop on over to the MMD Basics page and read through the information I provide, and come back when you're finished. If you know the ins and outs of MMD and are ready to start animating, just keep on reading!
Animating from scratch can be quite a daunting concept, and even I am no master when it comes to this. But I may know a trick or two that will aid you in becoming the next Pixar animator! Well... maybe not that good, but I will show you the very basics for starting real animation. Even though I started fiddling with MikuMikuDance back in 2012, I only started making things from scratch in about 2015. So I myself could be considered a newbie! I am telling you this now because I don't want anyone assuming that what I make is anywhere near perfect, and to take my advice with a grain of salt. These tutorials are more about how to animate within MikuMikuDance, rather than how to animate "well." I would definitely recommend downloading Blender and viewing tutorials for that program if you want to get more serious, but starting with something like MikuMikuDance is a great way to ease yourself into the world of CGI.
First and foremost, I suggest you see my MMD Basics tutorials before even tackling this subject. There I teach you about the program's interface and, you know, the basics of MikuMikuDance. If you do not have that knowledge already, animating might be even more difficult than it needs to be in this program. If that's the case for you, no worries, just hop on over to the MMD Basics page and read through the information I provide, and come back when you're finished. If you know the ins and outs of MMD and are ready to start animating, just keep on reading!
Knowing Your Workspace
So I told you to view the MMD Basics page prior to going on with these tutorials to get to know the program better, but I would like to take some time to go over the parts of the program we will now be working with. In the previous tutorials, I skimmed over very key areas of the interface because they were not exactly necessary for what we were doing then. Now, however, we will be relying on them quite a lot.
In the following video I will be showing you the Frame Manipulation, Interpolation Curve, Model Manipulation, Bone Manipulation, Facial Manipulation, and Camera panels, while also discussing the Coordinate Axis and its importance.
In the following video I will be showing you the Frame Manipulation, Interpolation Curve, Model Manipulation, Bone Manipulation, Facial Manipulation, and Camera panels, while also discussing the Coordinate Axis and its importance.