Did anything in here in particular help you out? There's so much to cover with cameras, so please don't hesitate to come hang out and ask questions live on Twitch! :)
Great! Very helpful. But I wanted to ask a question about the building or buying a machine for 3d animation. Can I get your email to send my question so you can get back to me when you can?
hello, blender focal length can be edited when you select the camera and go to camera preferences. what you talked about was the viewport focal length 😅
@@novikovPrinciple correct me if I'm wrong, but most settings can be modified and saved in the startup file in case the default values don't work for you
@@quackers969 Yes can do that but not on a setting from an object (size, location and so on), because it's a removable thing, and when you add another on, it goes back to the default settings, wich are not defined by the startup file
adding those little blender notes visually just made me grin, thank you. i love being able to see what you can do with both side by side, just in case i ever have to use Maya, ill have a frame of reference.
Talking about not cropping the top of the character's head, while your head is cropped by the frame ... absolutely despicable. ( Man your channel is a godsend. Really hyped by your undying positivity ! )
A request, can you do a video about how to cope with animations that have very short deadlines? I refer to animations for entertainment or series, for example, where you just have 2 weeks for a full 5 minutes video, what to sacrifice and what to definitely keep in your animation to squeeze the most of it and have acceptable visuals in the end. I think there are a large number of animators that don't focus only on the cinema industry that may require such tips :)
Changing the focal length in Blender using the N key will only change the viewport focal length. To change the focal length for rendering, you must change the camera settings in the properties window
Great video, nice tips. For anyone interested, animating the camera on a feature film is a full time role for a team. Camera's and cinematography in very deep and a great skill, I've been doing just this for years, and I really enjoy it.
That is awesome! I am in love with camera movement in animations right now and I think its something I can do really well! What would be the proper title of someone with this job? Just curious so I know where to look
@@swiperguy9948 there are two parts to working cameras in feature animation. First is Previs/Layout. This is working closely with storyboards and directors to create the look and feel of the movie in 3d. Then there is Finalizing or sometime called Polish. This happens after animation have done their magic and cameras need to be tweeked to catch the action, better frame the shot.
@@alaahesham250 The name changes on VFX/Full CG projects and from Studio to Studio, but Previs and the Layout department/Artists are the key to camera work.
This was an excellent tutorial! Computer graphics animation may be a totally new technology, but the "science" of people sitting watching a sequence of actions on a 2D screen is a little over 100 years old. What you point out in this video is time tested to be the most effective and least confusing for the audience. With the technology being so readily available to the home hobbyist, the tried and true rules we learned in cinematography 101 is unknown by many. Well done.
a lot helped! the last piece of advice was great, plus all the general cases of when I would use certain shots and focal lengths. the bread and butter.
What I reccomend is to create an empty and then make a constrain to make the camera aim to it. When you are animating you don't rotate a camera, you just move the empty wherever you want the camera to face. Very handy.
What if you’re better at animating objects than moving around the viewport? The camera is a character in and of itself so wouldn’t it be easier to animate the camera as its own object instead of moving the camera around as the viewport?
@@fitzhugh7463 it shows you pretty clearly what the camera is looking at. And navigating the viewport is a skill that's nesecary anyways so they should be able to navigate. On top of that you can still move the camera as an object while having the view locked.
Something that can also help with realistic camera moves is attaching the camera to a jib rig. Then the camera is restricted to jib like movements that feel very natural and cinematic. I prefer this to trying to make the camera follow a curve in a natural feeling way. Blender has an addon with a jib in it.
Cameras in maya tend to have a mind of their own from my experience. I find it much easier to put the camera in an empty group node and animating the group rather than the camera itself.
I've been working in a small animation studio for a while as a tech director, and I can't tell you the amount of broken cams that are in the scenes of animators (obviously not the layout cam, but the one used to work on animation). Somehow the better the animator, the most cam duplicate and broken cam in his or her scenes. To this day, I still wonder how some of them managed to break like they did. Good tip!
I want to add something to the discussion of focal length, because it’s something that often gets overlooked at can result in a lot of misunderstanding. It’s important to note that it’s NOT the focal length that distorts, it’s the *distance to the subject* . In your demo of the different focal lengths, you were *moving the camera* in order to keep the subject the same size in the viewport, and it’s the moving of the camera that causes the distortion. If you have the camera far away and set focal length to 200mm, changing to focal length to 50mm will have NO EFFECT on the distortion of the subject - if you crop the rendered image to match the framing of the 200mm shot, they’ll look identical (apart from one being lower resolution of course). Think of zooming in as optically cropping the image. It’s also the camera-subject distance that causes the difference in apparent background size. When the camera is close to the subject, the background is relatively quite far away, so it looks small. If you move the camera back, the difference between camera-to-subject and camera-to-background is quite small, so the background seems relatively larger. I know this all seems a bit like splitting hairs, but it’s important when it comes to deciding on framing in a 3D space, because it forces you to think about near-far distance relationships *first* and only then decide on a focal length that gives you the amount of scene coverage you need for your desired composition.
🙄 Dude...they work TOGETHER! Long lense to flatten perspective. Long lenses used when filming explosions and actors. Dude is explaining this in the video!!!!
I have seen so many people roll the camera when showing technical animations like an animated Machine Demo or showing off a model. something I do enjoy where the camera rolls is stunt work. The Second Kingsman movie has some really good camera work including a full 360 roll during a fight scene. I will say that more often than not it's not used in a way that works well.
If you have many shots in scene/sequence (and you already know how it will move and will be cut later) it's also good to think about the speed of the cameras. If you're filming a conversation, like in this example, all the cuts might have pans, dollys etc. and it's good if these share the same (usually slow) speed. So you should consider changing to linear tangents in the Graph editor so the animation/movement becomes linear i.e constant. Even though you want the camera movements to look natural, and like a real person is holding the physical camera, it's important to use linear tangents so the camera animation doesn't start upp slow, then move at constant speed and then slow down. If you change the start and end keys to linear all the cuts will have the same speed from start to stop and it will look more natural in the edit. So you can use all the animated keys, from the shots, in the edit and you don't have to trim the beginning and end of each clip/cut. I haven't seen your Graph editor video; you probably mentioned it there. :)
Just some added information on focal range stuff for 3D cams: 1) 35 mm is the default focal distance in Maya. This is considered normal focal range as it depicts how humans interpret distance between objects with their own eyes. Full body (head to toe) shots should typically be shot in this range, as should shots involving multiple characters existing on different planes. Action shots involving lots of moving parts are also typically shot at this focal length as it's a wide enough lens to capture all the information that needs to be conveyed while maintaining the integrity of distance relationships between foreground, mid-ground, and background. 2) Some general rule of thumb stuff while always taking into consideration the distance between your planes: 18-24mm for establishing shots/extreme wide shots, 35mm for wide shots to full shots, 50-55mm for mid shots to medium close ups, 70mm for close ups, 80mm and up for extreme close ups. These are just base guidelines though. Focal ranges can be used as creatively as you need them to, provided you know what you're doing.
6:30 This is just the viewport focal length, to change the camera's focal length click the camera, and then on the right under the physics tab, there is a carea tab.
I made an entire short film. 32 minutes of animation. And characters are very zombie like. Minimum motion. Because I'm still bad at animating characters. What saved the short was my cameras. BTW it's called I'm Not Even Human if you wonder.
you can disable the keyframe menu that you dont like by going to the timeline and pressing keying aand in active keying set choose loc rot scale or whatever you are using and it will be like maya
great info! thanks sir wade. What would be the best way to showcase a basic walk cycle? No camera moves at all or should I rotate the camera a bit to show angles of the walk?
hey! thank you for the tutorial! great as always! have one question. is it possible to constraint a camera to a soft body? I am trying to create a scene similar to the plastic bag scene in the American Beauty.
Pose to pose is when you add in the key extreme poses of a shot before going back and breaking the shot down into more frames. Spline refers to the 3d program automatically creating inbetweens for keyframes
so if i wanna jump from 1 cam to second cam i have to use the camera sequencer? isn't there some sort of option to just tell the time slider to show 1cam and then switch to another 1?
Thanks! great Vid, my question is...by default the cameras focal length is 35MM in Maya (Know that)....now aside from all the staging rules of composing shots & everything, do you always have to adjust the focal lengths (even minorly) for each shot depending on it's type, dramatic, comedic, etc. Or just once in while in certain instances?....like my demo reel I'm finishing, I have plenty of dramatic action death defying shots, teamed with comedic shots.!...should tweak my camera focal lengths a little? Is that what the pro studios in house animators do?.......I'm currently just finishing animating the first scene on my reel. Thanks, I started watching your tutorials with your IK/FK video and when to use the switches.
Not necessarily! You don't need to go back and make adjustments if you've already animated the shot to camera, because you'd have to change things. And there's no rule saying you have to use one focal length for a certain shot style, it's just a common occurrence due to the way environments and depth of field play into the vibe. But animation doesn't have to have either of those things either. It's something for you to test and consider for your next shot!
@@SirWade Nice........ I also used the camera shake node in Nuke, when my 100 Foot Mech robot turned the corner ready to cause havok...realized it intertwines with the depth of field so a balance must be established........now I will experiment with the focal lengths thanks!
Hi I wanted ask not dumb question when you watch a animation movie I get them using motion capture but do they use a traditional movie cameras or do they create the movie scenes in software thanks
Most 3D animated films don't use mocap for character animation, but they sometimes will use that tech in layout for the camera motion, yeah. Not always, but sometimes.
Select a camera, then in the top of the viewport where those menus are hit Panels then you can either select a camera from the menus or click ‘view through selected’
Do you mean your full scene/ a whole shot or per frame? Because if you need an hour to render a whole scene that's actually quite fast - at least if you also have some textures, maybe SSS, and a few lights :D What render are you using?
Great! Very helpful. But I wanted to ask a question about the building or buying a machine for 3d animation. Can I get your email to send my question so you can get back to me when you can?
@@SirWade Maya see's their demise coming lol. But for real, and im glad you made the change, otherwise I would never have found your channel, you're putting out great content 👍
Patrick Edwards I like that he’s doing both. I personally use maya but I’m glad he’s making his content accessible for all animators. After all, it’s not a competition lol
Did anything in here in particular help you out? There's so much to cover with cameras, so please don't hesitate to come hang out and ask questions live on Twitch! :)
Thx!
DOOO MOORE BLEENDER
Great! Very helpful. But I wanted to ask a question about the building or buying a machine for 3d animation. Can I get your email to send my question so you can get back to me when you can?
You should make a animation short film I will definitely watch it
could be in depth f.e. camera dolly movement and framing
hello, blender focal length can be edited when you select the camera and go to camera preferences. what you talked about was the viewport focal length 😅
The setting I personally have to adjust the most frequently is the clipping length. The default is annoying, to say the least.
@@novikovPrinciple correct me if I'm wrong, but most settings can be modified and saved in the startup file in case the default values don't work for you
@@quackers969 Yes can do that but not on a setting from an object (size, location and so on), because it's a removable thing, and when you add another on, it goes back to the default settings, wich are not defined by the startup file
you
Phyre you
adding those little blender notes visually just made me grin, thank you. i love being able to see what you can do with both side by side, just in case i ever have to use Maya, ill have a frame of reference.
Talking about not cropping the top of the character's head, while your head is cropped by the frame ... absolutely despicable. ( Man your channel is a godsend. Really hyped by your undying positivity ! )
A request, can you do a video about how to cope with animations that have very short deadlines? I refer to animations for entertainment or series, for example, where you just have 2 weeks for a full 5 minutes video, what to sacrifice and what to definitely keep in your animation to squeeze the most of it and have acceptable visuals in the end. I think there are a large number of animators that don't focus only on the cinema industry that may require such tips :)
Changing the focal length in Blender using the N key will only change the viewport focal length. To change the focal length for rendering, you must change the camera settings in the properties window
Great video, nice tips. For anyone interested, animating the camera on a feature film is a full time role for a team. Camera's and cinematography in very deep and a great skill, I've been doing just this for years, and I really enjoy it.
That is awesome! I am in love with camera movement in animations right now and I think its something I can do really well! What would be the proper title of someone with this job? Just curious so I know where to look
@@swiperguy9948 there are two parts to working cameras in feature animation. First is Previs/Layout. This is working closely with storyboards and directors to create the look and feel of the movie in 3d. Then there is Finalizing or sometime called Polish. This happens after animation have done their magic and cameras need to be tweeked to catch the action, better frame the shot.
@@KimAllenAnima-Saurus so can you mention the job title who is doing the camera animation /cinematography?
@@alaahesham250 The name changes on VFX/Full CG projects and from Studio to Studio, but Previs and the Layout department/Artists are the key to camera work.
This was an excellent tutorial!
Computer graphics animation may be a totally new technology, but the "science" of people sitting watching a sequence of actions on a 2D screen is a little over 100 years old. What you point out in this video is time tested to be the most effective and least confusing for the audience. With the technology being so readily available to the home hobbyist, the tried and true rules we learned in cinematography 101 is unknown by many. Well done.
a lot helped! the last piece of advice was great, plus all the general cases of when I would use certain shots and focal lengths. the bread and butter.
What I reccomend is to create an empty and then make a constrain to make the camera aim to it. When you are animating you don't rotate a camera, you just move the empty wherever you want the camera to face. Very handy.
N key, numpad 0, select camera, view->lock camera to view.
What if you’re better at animating objects than moving around the viewport? The camera is a character in and of itself so wouldn’t it be easier to animate the camera as its own object instead of moving the camera around as the viewport?
@@fitzhugh7463 it shows you pretty clearly what the camera is looking at. And navigating the viewport is a skill that's nesecary anyways so they should be able to navigate. On top of that you can still move the camera as an object while having the view locked.
Also this is very good, and very fast
ua-cam.com/video/a7qyW1G350g/v-deo.html&ab_channel=Polyfjord
Love that Calvin & Hobbes on the wall :)
thinking about the actual weight of your camera it's a great tip! Thanks so much for that! Love your tuts :)
Thank you soooo much! This is not a topic talked about often and it's really helpful!
Camera work has always been quite challenging for me, thank you for this video.
Something that can also help with realistic camera moves is attaching the camera to a jib rig. Then the camera is restricted to jib like movements that feel very natural and cinematic. I prefer this to trying to make the camera follow a curve in a natural feeling way.
Blender has an addon with a jib in it.
i Guess we will get Houdini tuts Next, as its written on Sir's T-shirt ,May be a hint 😁😁😁
I am a blender artist but learned a lot from this video.. Thank you.
Have you considered doing a video on camera rigs and how to use them?
Holy cow I was going to make some camera animation this weekend. This is awesome
Cameras in maya tend to have a mind of their own from my experience. I find it much easier to put the camera in an empty group node and animating the group rather than the camera itself.
I've been working in a small animation studio for a while as a tech director, and I can't tell you the amount of broken cams that are in the scenes of animators (obviously not the layout cam, but the one used to work on animation). Somehow the better the animator, the most cam duplicate and broken cam in his or her scenes.
To this day, I still wonder how some of them managed to break like they did.
Good tip!
I want to add something to the discussion of focal length, because it’s something that often gets overlooked at can result in a lot of misunderstanding.
It’s important to note that it’s NOT the focal length that distorts, it’s the *distance to the subject* . In your demo of the different focal lengths, you were *moving the camera* in order to keep the subject the same size in the viewport, and it’s the moving of the camera that causes the distortion. If you have the camera far away and set focal length to 200mm, changing to focal length to 50mm will have NO EFFECT on the distortion of the subject - if you crop the rendered image to match the framing of the 200mm shot, they’ll look identical (apart from one being lower resolution of course). Think of zooming in as optically cropping the image.
It’s also the camera-subject distance that causes the difference in apparent background size. When the camera is close to the subject, the background is relatively quite far away, so it looks small. If you move the camera back, the difference between camera-to-subject and camera-to-background is quite small, so the background seems relatively larger.
I know this all seems a bit like splitting hairs, but it’s important when it comes to deciding on framing in a 3D space, because it forces you to think about near-far distance relationships *first* and only then decide on a focal length that gives you the amount of scene coverage you need for your desired composition.
🙄 Dude...they work TOGETHER! Long lense to flatten perspective. Long lenses used when filming explosions and actors. Dude is explaining this in the video!!!!
@@rockon8174 caerphoto thought he was being smart lol
I have seen so many people roll the camera when showing technical animations like an animated Machine Demo or showing off a model. something I do enjoy where the camera rolls is stunt work. The Second Kingsman movie has some really good camera work including a full 360 roll during a fight scene. I will say that more often than not it's not used in a way that works well.
Cool video as usual! But What is the shortcut to change the camera from the outliner ? :O
Great video! This was exactly what I wanted to find out. Thanks!
great tips, very clearly demonstrated and explained.
If you have many shots in scene/sequence (and you already know how it will move and will be cut later) it's also good to think about the speed of the cameras. If you're filming a conversation, like in this example, all the cuts might have pans, dollys etc. and it's good if these share the same (usually slow) speed. So you should consider changing to linear tangents in the Graph editor so the animation/movement becomes linear i.e constant. Even though you want the camera movements to look natural, and like a real person is holding the physical camera, it's important to use linear tangents so the camera animation doesn't start upp slow, then move at constant speed and then slow down. If you change the start and end keys to linear all the cuts will have the same speed from start to stop and it will look more natural in the edit. So you can use all the animated keys, from the shots, in the edit and you don't have to trim the beginning and end of each clip/cut. I haven't seen your Graph editor video; you probably mentioned it there. :)
Sirwade, can you do a breakdown of some amazing shot? either from a movie or short animation video..
I agree. That would help a lot
Just some added information on focal range stuff for 3D cams:
1) 35 mm is the default focal distance in Maya. This is considered normal focal range as it depicts how humans interpret distance between objects with their own eyes. Full body (head to toe) shots should typically be shot in this range, as should shots involving multiple characters existing on different planes. Action shots involving lots of moving parts are also typically shot at this focal length as it's a wide enough lens to capture all the information that needs to be conveyed while maintaining the integrity of distance relationships between foreground, mid-ground, and background.
2) Some general rule of thumb stuff while always taking into consideration the distance between your planes: 18-24mm for establishing shots/extreme wide shots, 35mm for wide shots to full shots, 50-55mm for mid shots to medium close ups, 70mm for close ups, 80mm and up for extreme close ups.
These are just base guidelines though. Focal ranges can be used as creatively as you need them to, provided you know what you're doing.
men you are a great teacher
1:12 That's coool!
17:39 That be done in Blender too, but keeping it on the track is difficult.
Watching this video has enlightened my brain 🤓
I'm cutebrain
@@cutebrain I love your name omg
I'm surprised you didn't go over aim and aim constraints w the camera. it works really well with motion path. Super fun to play with :D
That’s a great point! I kind of just ran out of time while filming, but that’s a great idea for a part 2!
Thank you!!! Finding this topic for a long time!
Very helpful. Thanks!
Please do the camera sequence!!! learn so much on your video thanks for sharing
Camera Sequencer is interesting... is that a more recent feature? Reminds of the Camera Switcher and Track tools in Story in Motionbuilder.
Great video, thank you!
Thank you kind Sir
6:30 This is just the viewport focal length, to change the camera's focal length click the camera, and then on the right under the physics tab, there is a carea tab.
Awesome, Sir.
Thank you Sir wade! I learned from this vid! 180 rule!
love your videos!
I made an entire short film. 32 minutes of animation. And characters are very zombie like. Minimum motion. Because I'm still bad at animating characters. What saved the short was my cameras.
BTW it's called I'm Not Even Human if you wonder.
Nice shirt! Might we expect some Houdini tutorials?
I'd LOVE to get deeper into Houdini. Literal black magic
Sir Wade Neistadt,if you are next to hardware engineering blender with maya aren't you become a which so ever born quality teacher.
you can disable the keyframe menu that you dont like by going to the timeline and pressing keying aand in active keying set choose loc rot scale or whatever you are using and it will be like maya
great info! thanks sir wade. What would be the best way to showcase a basic walk cycle? No camera moves at all or should I rotate the camera a bit to show angles of the walk?
Personally I like split screen! Front / side / three-quarter views, and maybe top or a rotating camera as the last quadrant
@@SirWade oh sorry I meant to display on my Demo Reel not workflow in Maya or do you mean display all quadrants in the reel??
I love this video
Hey where are the graphics tablet recommendations?
hey! thank you for the tutorial! great as always! have one question. is it possible to constraint a camera to a soft body? I am trying to create a scene similar to the plastic bag scene in the American Beauty.
hey, how do you jump between cameras without going into the panel area?
18:17 My little brother: ROLLER COASTER!!! :P
How do you switching between cameras so fast? By clicking on it somehow or what?
Standart method through panels-perspective-
is too long
Hey Sir Wade, can u explain and teach us about animation like pose to pose and spline? I don't really understand about that
Pose to pose is when you add in the key extreme poses of a shot before going back and breaking the shot down into more frames. Spline refers to the 3d program automatically creating inbetweens for keyframes
so if i wanna jump from 1 cam to second cam i have to use the camera sequencer? isn't there some sort of option to just tell the time slider to show 1cam and then switch to another 1?
I really like your shirt! Where did you get it?
Thanks! great Vid, my question is...by default the cameras focal length is 35MM in Maya (Know that)....now aside from all the staging rules of composing shots & everything, do you always have to adjust the focal lengths (even minorly) for each shot depending on it's type, dramatic, comedic, etc. Or just once in while in certain instances?....like my demo reel I'm finishing, I have plenty of dramatic action death defying shots, teamed with comedic shots.!...should tweak my camera focal lengths a little? Is that what the pro studios in house animators do?.......I'm currently just finishing animating the first scene on my reel.
Thanks, I started watching your tutorials with your IK/FK video and when to use the switches.
Not necessarily! You don't need to go back and make adjustments if you've already animated the shot to camera, because you'd have to change things. And there's no rule saying you have to use one focal length for a certain shot style, it's just a common occurrence due to the way environments and depth of field play into the vibe. But animation doesn't have to have either of those things either. It's something for you to test and consider for your next shot!
@@SirWade Nice........ I also used the camera shake node in Nuke, when my 100 Foot Mech robot turned the corner ready to cause havok...realized it intertwines with the depth of field so a balance must be established........now I will experiment with the focal lengths thanks!
i challenge you to make a short film in blender
I already getting motion sick, its a cool video though.😎
Yay you made a tip I like
Sir wade how do you make your own rig . I see that rig in the vidio called"My animation hates me '' hope you answer me and make a vidio about it
Sir Wade Neistadt, claps claps claps /// happy dreams to u !
I love animation someday I will be an animator
Is there an automatic way to create a handheld feel in a shot within Maya? Those micro adjustments etc.
Not a Maya user but I think that noise is your friend in this. Just add it to all location and rotation curves.
Plz if possible upload a camera tutorial for game for example taken 3 game
Hi I wanted ask not dumb question when you watch a animation movie I get them using motion capture but do they use a traditional movie cameras or do they create the movie scenes in software thanks
Most 3D animated films don't use mocap for character animation, but they sometimes will use that tech in layout for the camera motion, yeah. Not always, but sometimes.
cool T-shirt
nice
Hi...how do u change cam in viewport by selecting it? 😶
Select a camera, then in the top of the viewport where those menus are hit Panels then you can either select a camera from the menus or click ‘view through selected’
@@SirWade Thanks!!
how to move between cameras with one click?
was about to comment first, dang
Can you please tell me how to render fast in Maya please. Some of my scenes are taking about 1 hour to render
Do you mean your full scene/ a whole shot or per frame? Because if you need an hour to render a whole scene that's actually quite fast - at least if you also have some textures, maybe SSS, and a few lights :D What render are you using?
Houdini in your t shirt
What app is this
How can we make intro like Eddie hall video ???
When anime characters go insane 7:27
Nice Andrew price joke
Blender part 3
This would have gotten way more views if you had done it in Blender! ;)
True, but views aren’t everything, as long as you’re teaching people!
Great! Very helpful. But I wanted to ask a question about the building or buying a machine for 3d animation. Can I get your email to send my question so you can get back to me when you can?
What's 2 girls name?
Is she anna from frozen
Sup
My weakness TwT
96th
4th viewer
😂
I love how this guy has jumped on the blender bandwagon because the blender community on UA-cam is so much more massive than Maya
Or rather, I'm attempting to make content that's accessible and relevant to everyone in the long term
@@SirWade Maya see's their demise coming lol. But for real, and im glad you made the change, otherwise I would never have found your channel, you're putting out great content 👍
Patrick Edwards I like that he’s doing both. I personally use maya but I’m glad he’s making his content accessible for all animators. After all, it’s not a competition lol
Thank you, you are very helpful and I have crush on you.
Thank you!