Animating Cartoon Characters in Maya

Teaches simple steps to creating exaggerated cartoon animation in Maya, using principles such as squash and stretch, exaggeration, follow-through, and overlapping action.

Introduction

• Welcome
• Using the exercise files
• Rig overview
• Scene overview

1. Animating a Cartoon Walk

• Working out the basic timing
• Blocking out footsteps
• Animating the feet and hips
• Adding squash and stretch on the body
• Animating the arms
• Fine-tuning the animation

2. Straight Ahead: Creating a Jump

• Anticipating the jump
• The top pose of the jump
• Making a landing
• Follow-through and settle
• Adding secondary motion

3. Pose to Pose: Animating Changes in Mood

• Using character sets
• Blocking out basic poses
• Timing the basic poses
• Creating facial expressions
• Blinks to add more life
• Adding overlap and follow-through

4. Animating a Zip Out

• Creating the anticipation pose
• Moving within a held pose
• Animating a quick exit

5. Finalizing and Rendering

• Adding lights and background
• Setting up render options
• Finalizing render

Conclusion

• Next steps