7. Fundamentals of Animation in Blender

Animation is more than just moving something from A to B. It's about achieving the illusion of life. And just like in life, it's not about where we're going but how we get there. To be clear, this is not a character animation course. Rather it is a course that will teach you the essentials of how to put character into your animation. Animation is intrinsically complex and its difficulty increases exponentially as you progress, so it's vital that we get the fundamentals right.

These fundamentals, while conceptually simple to understand, can be be quite difficult to achieve. Thus in these lessons we will use basic shapes like cubes and spheres that are pre-rigged so that we can explore animation principles like Squash & Stretch, Arcs of Motion, Overlap, and various other fundamentals of animation without being tied down to the technical constraints that would normally hold us back. We'll even take a look at the principles behind creating the rigs of this course. In short, we will discuss everything you need to bring your 3D creations to life! CC Music: "Harmony" by Robbero

WHAT'S COVERED IN THIS COURSE

Chapter 1: Animation Tools
Blender offers several tools and editor types for managing your animations. Learn about the "how" in this chapter.

* Timeline
* What are keys?
* Auto-Keying
* Auto-Keying Preferences
* Dopesheet
* Syncing & Markers
* Graph Editor
* Interpolation

Chapter 2: Animation Principles
Creating appealing movement is very much an art form. More than the "how", learn about the "why" in this chapter.

* Timing & Spacing
* Squash & Stretch I
* Squash & Stretch II
* Anticipation I
* Anticipation II
* Arcs of Motion I
* Arcs of Motion I
* Follow Through

Chapter 3: Rigging Retrospect
Rigging goes hand-in-hand with animation. In this lesson, Chris explains why rigging is such a crucial part of 3D animation.

* Rigging Retrospect

Licensing: You're free to use this resource in up to three classrooms and of course for yourself!