I had no place to learn, but thank you for consistently uploading videos. Thanks to you, I became a UA-camr with 1 million subscribers. Thank you so much, Dave
I have a question for character animator: What if I want to use pixel art puppets but with smooth animations? What I mean is, the characters and the backgrounds would be pixel art, but the resolution of the video should not be. What if I'd import low-res puppets, rig them, and then upscale them in the scene? Them holding their hands diagonally would make a smooth diagonal line using the scene resolution, or redraw them with sharp pixels based on the original puppet resolution? I know upscaling the puppet beforehand would solve this, but I want to save GPU while working, hence the small puppets and backgrounds.
Yeah, even with pixel art characters I would probably still make them high resolution, otherwise you may run into blurring and artifacting that you don't want. I'm playing Octopath Traveller 2 right now and they do a great job of this, where the pixel characters are detailed to look good no matter how zoomed in/out. I wouldn't worry about the GPU stuff as much, you can always view things in a low GPU "preview mode" on stuff like After Effects and Premiere Pro.
Is it possible to download the puppet artwork from the Adobe Express puppets (specifically Truffles, Gertrude Claus, and Aspen) and work with them in Character Animator? I found only Bluster to download among that particular pack. Am I missing something or are they just not available to download? -Thanks so much for all that you do! It is truly inspiring and helpful for other creatives trying to get into this field.
Thanks! I think Truffles and Aspen were made for the web only, but Gertrude comes from a puppetmaker template called Bearie: pages.adobe.com/character/en/puppet-maker. Yeah, several characters were only rigged for the web and unfortunately were never brought them over for the desktop.
Hi Dave, just a quick question. I'm trying to find some of the character puppets in Adobe Express (Horoscope animals) to use in the desktop version of Character Animator but are those exclusive to Adobe Express? Would love to know how to use them in Character Animator, or who made those particular puppets to contact directly.
Forgive my dumb question, but how did you import the puppet from Express into Ch? I have only been able to download an mp4 from Express, not a Puppet file.
Hi! I have this problem: I have a character made in illustrator with all the layers in right ierarchy order. But when I try to rig it in character animator panel, I can't see the legs of the puppet. When I select "modify original puppet" in the panel and I come back to my puppet in AI, I see the legs and everything is correct in the ierarchy order. But in CA legs there aren't. Actually, the legs layer doesn't show any sub-level. Can you help me please???
Thank you very much for your dedication. I’m new to this platform, and I'm struggling to animate a circle character (similar to Footy). Could you please provide a video link or tutorial on how to animate a character like that? Thank you, and good luck!
Check out the head + body rig in the Intro to Rigging video, I think that should help be a good guide: ua-cam.com/video/hK-DjtiPzRs/v-deo.htmlsi=euHH5Xt5D80tVmq1&t=5585
Express and desktop Character Animator aren't interchangeable. What I'm trying to show in this video is how to achieve the same kind of animation on the desktop, but you can't upload your desktop characters to Express.
The Goat character was for Express only I think, I don't believe there's a public desktop version for him. In general, pages.adobe.com/character/en/characters is probably the best place to go for characters.
Hello David, your channel is so interesting !!! I want to animate an image, is that possible with this software? And I'd like to use Stan's voice from South Park for talking, is that doable? Thanks!
Yes, both are doable with Character Animator on the desktop. You would need to break it into layers in Photoshop or Illustrator, and rig and animate it in Character Animator. You can import any voice to do the lip sync, so if you had an audio clip of Stan you could import that and do the same Timeline > Compute Lip Sync Take From Scene Audio command I do here.
I have one issue. i have my lip sync working great. Then I wanted to change the audio file. The new audio file is longer than the old one. I stretched everything out. Now when the animation is run, the lip sync stops where the old audio file ended. The new lip sync works but only up to where the old one ended. I tried everything I knew, and I still cannot get the lipsync to go the full distance.
I think you would need to recompute the longer lip sync with Timeline > Compute Lip Sync. But if you made changes to the existing sync and only want the end, split the audio file (Edit > Split) so you separate out the end, mute the audio track you've already done, and try the compute command to get the new lip sync duration. You may also need to select your scene in the project panel and make the duration longer in the right properties.
Depending on your browser or device you might see it in different places, either a text link or a button, but it should be there - I just checked and see it in Chrome on a Mac.
how to solve "waiting for camera" issue in character animator ?, while camera is properly working in all apps, also system is showing that character animator is using the camera please help
Check the official forums, they have a ton of troubleshooting methods about this. community.adobe.com/t5/forums/searchpage/tab/message?advanced=false&allow_punctuation=false&q=waiting%20for%20camera
Next step in this automation using adobe express and character animator. Teach us how to add our own puppet to adobe express so we can quickly create a video. Currently I am recording on GarageBand exporting as .aiff, importing the audio into character animator and once I’m done in character animator then moving it back to adobe express. Why can’t I add my own puppet to my list of characters?????
Custom characters on Express is the #1 request we hear. Hopefully it comes one day, but for now, this tutorial is the best alternative. While it requires the manual step of adding triggers, you could do that relatively quickly. But agreed, full automation like Express would be nice.
@okaysamuri, I have been having trouble getting my FIVERR crew to rig my puppets the way you explain in your video. Can you please refer me to someone who can rig an Adobe Character Animation puppet as you described in your video - Roddie
Yep! Check out this Fresco tutorial which talks about importing a character drawn in another program: ua-cam.com/video/eOUkhY7vhc4/v-deo.htmlsi=WyVabA72py-NTzGz
@@okaysamurai I've done the practice according to the tutorial, but when transferring the results from AI to CH the mouth layer doesn't work. Sorry sir. Im super beginner hier.
Hard to diagnose here - If the problem persists, please upload a video or screenshot of your issue to adobe.com/go/chfeedback and we'll try to help you out.
Not sure about comments, I only delete spam and non-constructive comments. There is no puppet grouping per se, but you can add two puppets to a timeline and then drop that timeline in another timeline, but you won't be able to do much with it. Typically I would recommend doing this kind of stuff in After Effects with imported CH recordings.
@@okaysamurai ok thank u how can we do pencil draw illustration on character animator? Like I have a graphics tablet and a pen and I want to make a cartoon teacher drawing on the board. But I've been so puzzled on what to do. We only have draggable no pen effect
For that I would watch the Fresco tutorial: ua-cam.com/video/eOUkhY7vhc4/v-deo.htmlsi=BhozS6X-jsYhP8do. You can follow those same guidelines for any digital illustration. You could also draw with a physical pencil and paper and scan, but digital artwork is going to be easier to organize and rig.
I had no place to learn, but thank you for consistently uploading videos.
Thanks to you, I became a UA-camr with 1 million subscribers.
Thank you so much, Dave
Amazing work! Congrats!
Thank you so much!!! I have been waiting for this I’ve been animating long form content which takes a week, this is a game changer
Fantastic! Going to practice this workflow at the weekend... thanks so much Dave!
I have a question for character animator: What if I want to use pixel art puppets but with smooth animations? What I mean is, the characters and the backgrounds would be pixel art, but the resolution of the video should not be. What if I'd import low-res puppets, rig them, and then upscale them in the scene? Them holding their hands diagonally would make a smooth diagonal line using the scene resolution, or redraw them with sharp pixels based on the original puppet resolution? I know upscaling the puppet beforehand would solve this, but I want to save GPU while working, hence the small puppets and backgrounds.
Yeah, even with pixel art characters I would probably still make them high resolution, otherwise you may run into blurring and artifacting that you don't want. I'm playing Octopath Traveller 2 right now and they do a great job of this, where the pixel characters are detailed to look good no matter how zoomed in/out. I wouldn't worry about the GPU stuff as much, you can always view things in a low GPU "preview mode" on stuff like After Effects and Premiere Pro.
Thanks fort the workflow walkthrough and puppet breakdown, Dave!
Thank you for your tutorials. My channel is what it is because of your help.
Such a good teacher! Thanks from France 🙏🏻
Just what I needed. We need a wahnto crank these out fast! Thank you!
Is it possible to download the puppet artwork from the Adobe Express puppets (specifically Truffles, Gertrude Claus, and Aspen) and work with them in Character Animator? I found only Bluster to download among that particular pack. Am I missing something or are they just not available to download? -Thanks so much for all that you do! It is truly inspiring and helpful for other creatives trying to get into this field.
Thanks! I think Truffles and Aspen were made for the web only, but Gertrude comes from a puppetmaker template called Bearie: pages.adobe.com/character/en/puppet-maker. Yeah, several characters were only rigged for the web and unfortunately were never brought them over for the desktop.
thanks Sir, from Zimbabwe 🇿🇼
Thanks Dave from North Africa. This is awesome.
Hi Dave, just a quick question. I'm trying to find some of the character puppets in Adobe Express (Horoscope animals) to use in the desktop version of Character Animator but are those exclusive to Adobe Express? Would love to know how to use them in Character Animator, or who made those particular puppets to contact directly.
Unfortunately I think those were made for Express only. :(
How did you split the poses? When I right-click and choose a new pose, it doesn't spit the pose; just changes the whole action.
I think it's in the Edit menu? I use command + shift + D as a shortcut to split.
Forgive my dumb question, but how did you import the puppet from Express into Ch? I have only been able to download an mp4 from Express, not a Puppet file.
Express is a separate system from CH Desktop, so you can only download videos. For desktop puppets, go to pages.adobe.com/character/en/characters.
Yo, Dave! Fresh video ❤
Hi! I have this problem: I have a character made in illustrator with all the layers in right ierarchy order. But when I try to rig it in character animator panel, I can't see the legs of the puppet. When I select "modify original puppet" in the panel and I come back to my puppet in AI, I see the legs and everything is correct in the ierarchy order. But in CA legs there aren't. Actually, the legs layer doesn't show any sub-level. Can you help me please???
Illustrator can be weird. Try custom naming all of your layers and they should show up in CH.
Thank you very much for your dedication. I’m new to this platform, and I'm struggling to animate a circle character (similar to Footy). Could you please provide a video link or tutorial on how to animate a character like that? Thank you, and good luck!
Check out the head + body rig in the Intro to Rigging video, I think that should help be a good guide: ua-cam.com/video/hK-DjtiPzRs/v-deo.htmlsi=euHH5Xt5D80tVmq1&t=5585
How can I insert my puppet in Adobe Express to animate from the audio process???
Express and desktop Character Animator aren't interchangeable. What I'm trying to show in this video is how to achieve the same kind of animation on the desktop, but you can't upload your desktop characters to Express.
I have a question. How can I design my own character and upload to adobe express ?
Custom characters aren’t available for Express yet. You can only make your own characters in the desktop version of Character Animator.
Hello! A noob question: How did you download that character? I use some character in adobe express that I can not use in adobe animator
The Goat character was for Express only I think, I don't believe there's a public desktop version for him. In general, pages.adobe.com/character/en/characters is probably the best place to go for characters.
Hello David, your channel is so interesting !!! I want to animate an image, is that possible with this software? And I'd like to use Stan's voice from South Park for talking, is that doable? Thanks!
Yes, both are doable with Character Animator on the desktop. You would need to break it into layers in Photoshop or Illustrator, and rig and animate it in Character Animator. You can import any voice to do the lip sync, so if you had an audio clip of Stan you could import that and do the same Timeline > Compute Lip Sync Take From Scene Audio command I do here.
I have one issue. i have my lip sync working great. Then I wanted to change the audio file. The new audio file is longer than the old one. I stretched everything out. Now when the animation is run, the lip sync stops where the old audio file ended. The new lip sync works but only up to where the old one ended. I tried everything I knew, and I still cannot get the lipsync to go the full distance.
I think you would need to recompute the longer lip sync with Timeline > Compute Lip Sync. But if you made changes to the existing sync and only want the end, split the audio file (Edit > Split) so you separate out the end, mute the audio track you've already done, and try the compute command to get the new lip sync duration. You may also need to select your scene in the project panel and make the duration longer in the right properties.
Why I don't have option to "browse" audio when using the express version only "record button"?
Depending on your browser or device you might see it in different places, either a text link or a button, but it should be there - I just checked and see it in Chrome on a Mac.
@@okaysamurai thanks for the answer, I got the "browse" option now
Hi, how to animate a character's walking straight or up and down, instead of right and left sides?
You would probably want a cycle layers walk animation like ua-cam.com/video/gv_2Upvtm-M/v-deo.htmlsi=q4SwIfcB0zNIUNg8&t=282.
@@okaysamurai Thank you Sir.
how to solve "waiting for camera" issue in character animator ?, while camera is properly working in all apps, also system is showing that character animator is using the camera please help
Check the official forums, they have a ton of troubleshooting methods about this. community.adobe.com/t5/forums/searchpage/tab/message?advanced=false&allow_punctuation=false&q=waiting%20for%20camera
Next step in this automation using adobe express and character animator. Teach us how to add our own puppet to adobe express so we can quickly create a video. Currently I am recording on GarageBand exporting as .aiff, importing the audio into character animator and once I’m done in character animator then moving it back to adobe express. Why can’t I add my own puppet to my list of characters?????
Custom characters on Express is the #1 request we hear. Hopefully it comes one day, but for now, this tutorial is the best alternative. While it requires the manual step of adding triggers, you could do that relatively quickly. But agreed, full automation like Express would be nice.
@okaysamuri, I have been having trouble getting my FIVERR crew to rig my puppets the way you explain in your video. Can you please refer me to someone who can rig an Adobe Character Animation puppet as you described in your video - Roddie
Never mind. I decided to skip Graphic Mama entirely and use the free puppets and Animate by Audio. Saves me 100's of dollars😎
If can use Firefly to change the appearance of a character that will be great!
how about im using my own character (from my draw) ?
Yep! Check out this Fresco tutorial which talks about importing a character drawn in another program: ua-cam.com/video/eOUkhY7vhc4/v-deo.htmlsi=WyVabA72py-NTzGz
Oh, this is what I currently do, was hoping to get more speed up lol
amazing video
how to make animated animals in Adobe characters?
Depends on the animal, but I talk about 4 legged characters here: ua-cam.com/video/hK-DjtiPzRs/v-deo.htmlsi=GksJ2xkFC2BsRk95&t=5685
@@okaysamurai I've done the practice according to the tutorial, but when transferring the results from AI to CH the mouth layer doesn't work. Sorry sir. Im super beginner hier.
Hard to diagnose here - If the problem persists, please upload a video or screenshot of your issue to adobe.com/go/chfeedback and we'll try to help you out.
Are my comments been deleted here or what? I have been asking how to group puppets in the timeline
Not sure about comments, I only delete spam and non-constructive comments. There is no puppet grouping per se, but you can add two puppets to a timeline and then drop that timeline in another timeline, but you won't be able to do much with it. Typically I would recommend doing this kind of stuff in After Effects with imported CH recordings.
@@okaysamurai ok thank u how can we do pencil draw illustration on character animator? Like I have a graphics tablet and a pen and I want to make a cartoon teacher drawing on the board. But I've been so puzzled on what to do. We only have draggable no pen effect
For that I would watch the Fresco tutorial: ua-cam.com/video/eOUkhY7vhc4/v-deo.htmlsi=BhozS6X-jsYhP8do. You can follow those same guidelines for any digital illustration. You could also draw with a physical pencil and paper and scan, but digital artwork is going to be easier to organize and rig.
❤
I commented first!!!! lol love this channel
wow
The obvious next step is combining adobe express animations with desktop.
Hello !
Dave what the heck are you doing up at this hour uploading videos? Ha
Ha - it was a scheduled release for midnight PST so I was indeed asleep when it launched. :)
@@okaysamurai it all makes sense. I'm also on the east coast so it was 4am my time, so it was much later for me