Standing and idle animations?

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Redeth
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Standing and idle animations?

Post by Redeth »

Eternal, Jetryl, great!

Now, since this is a very simple unit, I've been using it to experiment with standing animations, and I've found out that these, unlike death or attack animations, must consist on a rather significant amount of frames but with very little variations on the sprite from frame to frame... no more than 1 pixel of movement at a time, actually. This means they are fairly easy to make, but quite time consuming too...

The following animation consists of 12 frames (base standing frame plus 6 unique images, 5 of which are used twice). I'd like to know what you guys think.

EDIT: Changed the thread title to include idle animations, since that's what this is mostly about. -zookeeper
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spearman-standing-animation.gif
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Last edited by Redeth on December 24th, 2007, 6:41 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Jetrel
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Post by Jetrel »

The spearman has been committed.

As for the impaler, many things about his animations can be ripped-off from the rouser. Hint, hint.
Redeth wrote:Now, since this is a very simple unit, I've been using it to experiment with standing animations.
Image Very interesting. I'm currently undecided as to the direction standing animations will go, but please continue this experiment.

I ask that you make the following changes:
• Heavily reduce, but do not remove, the ear flapping. Let the ears flap a bit, but don't have them flap so far.

• Halve the speed, just for my own visualization.
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turin
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Post by turin »

With regards to the standing frame: I think it moves too fast now. When someone stands still, they don't bounce up and down that fast. I would say half the speed, not just for Jetryl's visualization but for the final version as well.
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Post by Stilgar »

If that's supposed to be breathing, I'd say the movement is too significant. It makes him seem really winded and gasping for breath.
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Post by tsr »

I do agree with your observations about the moving standing frame. But at least I see the gobling as a small, quite scared unit, so I don't think it should stand and breath as slowly/calmly as an orc or troll, etc.

(The ears are way to flappy)

It would maybe be cool if it would have a trembling kind of movement.

2 cents, tsr
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Jetrel
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Post by Jetrel »

Master Stilgar wrote:If that's supposed to be breathing, I'd say the movement is too significant. It makes him seem really winded and gasping for breath.
It's bobbing, it's an accepted convention of sprite videogame graphics:

Image Image Image

I don't think we should have it quite so pronounced as these examples, but we should have some of it.

I'm working on a proposal for standing animations, and these will account for one of the key types of standing animations. To make a long story short, these, which should include flags rippling, capes, swaying, etc. will provide the vast majority of screentime. Every once in a while, the unit should play some *other* animation, and actually do something (like scratching their head, spinning their sword, etc). But those are less important that the "90% of the time" animations like this.

We should also shoot for multiple, but very similar, variations of animations like this.
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Post by Stilgar »

Oh, like Street Fighter? I thought that was only done with big sprites, all the small-sprite games that I remember only had more subtle motion like hair or a cape that flutters, or blinking eyes, when they had anything at all. If there were a bunch of units on-screen all gyrating around in that "come get some" fashion, I get the feeling it would be distracting/irritating. Not that I'm any master of graphics.
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Post by Jetrel »

Master Stilgar wrote:Oh, like Street Fighter? I thought that was only done with big sprites, all the small-sprite games that I remember only had more subtle motion like hair or a cape that flutters, or blinking eyes, when they had anything at all. If there were a bunch of units on-screen all gyrating around in that "come get some" fashion, I get the feeling it would be distracting/irritating. Not that I'm any master of graphics.
Hence the "Some of that, but not such exaggerated motions".

Too much would cause the problem you just described.
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Post by Stilgar »

Well, Redeth's looks to me like "too much", though looking close it looks like the goblin is making a two-pixel drop, so I guess there's still a bit of room to tone it down if necessary.
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Redeth
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Post by Redeth »

Jetryl wrote:I ask that you make the following changes:
• Heavily reduce, but do not remove, the ear flapping. Let the ears flap a bit, but don't have them flap so far.

• Halve the speed, just for my own visualization.
Sure. The first one was 100ms/frame, now it's 200ms/frame. I reduced and randomized the ear flapping too.

To prevent these animations from becoming annoying, boring or repetitive, perhaps there could be the 'standing animations', extremely calm and subtle, for all the non active units, and the 'battle ready' animations, a lot more fluid and flamboyant, for the currently selected or highlighted one.
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Post by kshinji »

Hey, behind this goblin is another one hiding. You can see it, cause they are not synchronized. When the first one goes dwon, the other one can be visible for a short period of time. 8)
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Post by Darth Fool »

I think that the units shouldn't do much bobbing when standing, only capes and flags. my $0.02
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Post by Dragon Master »

I agree, maybe make the only things moving be the ones that can be affected by wind or an almost unnoticable bobbing. If we do get to making small personalized unit moves, like sword spinning or such, I've got loads of ideas :D
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Post by kshinji »

I dont like idea of all my army shaking up and down like a f**** jelly. :evil:
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Post by Dragon Master »

that is true to, it may be a bit early, but I think each unit should not bob up and down per se. Some units could do foot fires (please ask for explanantion if you don't know) or bob from side to side like they're transfering their weight from one leg to another. Maybe make certain units sit down/meditate/rest when they aren't selected. Units that stretch when they aren't doing anything would be neat too.
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