DUIK Angela | Rig & Animate your Character Without Keyframes

hello everyone in this video, I want to talk about how to rig and   animate a character using the Duik Angela script and along the way you will learn how to prepare   and design the joints of the character how to skeletonize it  how to rig the skeletons and in the end how to animate it   with the help of walk cycle tool automatically and create a walk cycle for it which doesn't   require keyframes or tweaking the graphs and for those intrigued by character   rigging and seeking a comprehensive Foundation  encompassing character preparation rigging and   creating different poses for the character I can't stop recommending this course but before I begin I advise you to  watch the video until the very end  so once and for all you will learn about the  process of rigging and animating the character   using the Duik Angelo and walk cycle tool  and more importantly you will learn about  the problems you might face in this process  and how to solve them as well because I talked about these   problems and their solution throughout  the video especially at the end  and if you like more of these videos don't  forget to subscribe and be sure to like so   that YouTube can show you similar  videos from my Channel or others OK without further Ado let's get right into it alright the first thing that I need to know   is how to download The Duik Angela script how to install it and how to properly use it  okay to download Duik Angela  just Google the name first  then click on download Duik Angela which  will take you to their official website  scroll down and click on this option on the following page you can download   Duik Angela by clicking on this button once you've downloaded the file simply extract it  navigate to the scripts folder  and then to descript UI panels  and copy The Duik Angela file from here next go to your After Effects install location  and open the scripts folder followed by the  scripts UI panel and finally paste the file here after that go to the edit menu then in preferences  select General and here click  on scripting and expressions  enable these three options to make sure  your scripts and plugins work perfectly fine  after the installation under the Windows menu I simply enable Duik Angela  as you can see it appears here but if the panel is floating just drag  its name and place it wherever you want alright as we take a closer look into the Duik  Angela script we can see a variety of panels  for example here is the bones or structures panel here we can see a set of tools for rigging  here are the controllers this is automation which   includes tools for creating different animations  which at the end of this video I'll be using   the walk-run cycle tool and create an automatic   walk cycle for the character the next one is the animation   panel which is for controlling the  keyframes graphs and interpolations  then the camera and the tools panel and the command lines panel which   offers a set of very useful tools for us okay to make the tutorial not very long  I'll get back to the job and I will only explain   the tools we need in the process of rigging and animating the character during the tutorial  alright the next thing that you  need to know is how the character   that you want to rig must be made and designed so you won't face any problems while doing so the first and most important  thing you should know is that   the joints of your character should be circular let me solo the hand layer  so you can see it better as you can see I created a circle for this joint and place the Anchor Point of the  arm layer in the center of the circle  so that when the character's hand rotates  will not have any problems in animating  this part too as you can see as I  rotate this nothing goes wrong with   the elbow because it's circular and this one too the same thing happens to  the layers of the leg too  and for the shoes I've separated  the shoe into two parts  and as you can see I've put the Anchor Point of   the toes part right here and it rotates like this if you want to learn how to prepare a character   for rigging step by step from scratch just watch this video because I've   explained the preparation process  for rigging in detail in this video  now let's work on creating  the bones for the character  let me disable this option so the paths of  the masks and shapes wouldn't be visible  okay first skeletonizing the  character we can do it in two ways  the first one would be I  head over to the OCO panel  and here I open the humanoid option  and double click on human simple as you can see this tool creates  a full skeleton of a human  and then after that you have to match  each one of these bones individually   with each part of this character which  is pretty time-consuming and difficult  I hit Ctrl Z I go back to Duik Angela and here there  is another option called human advanced   which creates the same skeleton except that it creates several   more bones which will help you have  more control over your character let it be created to better understand what I mean as you can see in this skeleton  there is a new bone for the shoulders  a few bones are added to the spine and another new bone for controlling the toes  again I hit Ctrl Z because I  don't want to use these skeletons  after all not only it's going to be time  consuming but also doing it manually is   better and more professional well I go to the bones panel  and here I use the hominoid option I left-click on it and in the beginning,   I want to create a skeleton for  these three parts of the hand  for that I select the arm layers and make  them solo so I can work on them easily  I click on hominoid and I open the arm settings  and here I need a bone for the arm another one for the forearm  and another one for the hand so I check the three bones that I need here  I don't need any bone for the  shoulder so I unshake the box  and I need these bones for the right arm so  I come here and click here and set it right  once that's done I click on arm button  as you can see it creates three bones and I  have to match these three bones to the arm  previously for doing this we're using the  snapping option and put the anchor point of   this one on the Anchor Point of the arm layer for the next bone we're doing the same  we had to find the Anchor Point of the layer  and then put the Anchor Point of the bone on it  which this process was  difficult and time-consuming  however in the latest version of Duik  Angela we don't need to do all of this  the Duik Angela itself does  everything on its own automatically  you just have to pay attention  that you have to select your   layers based on the parenting hierarchy you made so at first I select the arm layer  then the forearm layer and then   the hand layer and then I click on hominoid in the arm settings I create the settings I want  and then I click on arm button as you can see the anchor points of the  bones are automatically placed on the   Anchor Point of the hand layers and I don't  need to waste a lot of time on matching them let me unsolo the layers since the character is inside view and   the other hand is in the same position I don't need to create new   bones for the left hand as well all I need to do is duplicate these bones  for duplicating this skeleton I  have to use the Duik Angela tool  because if I use Ctrl D and duplicate  them there is going to be problems  so I select the bones of the rights are and in  the bones panel I click on duplicate bones option  as you can see these new bones are created I change the label color of these  layers so they will be obvious to fix the name of the layers  as well I go to the tools panel then in the text option I hit on rename tool and  here I want to remove the last part of each name for that I enable remove the last option and then I enter the number of characters that  I want to remove from the end of the names here it was 5 characters so I type 5 here and after removing the last five characters I  want to add this phrase at the end of the names and then I hit rename as you can see the last five  characters are removed and then   the text they entered here has  been added to the layer's name once that's done it's time to  create the skeleton for the leg I solo the leg layers I select them from top to bottom I navigate to the bones panel I click on hominoid and go to the leg settings I set this to none these ones are for the   right leg so I set this to the right one and I need a bone for the toes as well so enable this and click on the leg button  after that I just tweak this bone  to match the size of the shoe then I select the layers of the  left leg and I make them solo I select them respectively I go to Duik Angela hominoids link it's for the left link and I need  these four bones and click on the link button now let's work on the body neck and head Parts I make them solo I need a bone for the body  and another one for the neck and also for the head  for that I go to Duik Angela I select the layers in order  first body then neck and then  head and then I go to Hominoid,  Spine I need a bone for the head  a bone for the neck and then a bone for the hip which I need to put it here  so I don't need a bone for the spine so I  set it to zero and I hit on the spine button I place this here I change their color as well okay once the bone setup is done let's parent each  layer of the character to their respective bones  for this I start from the left hand layer I click on this part and I scroll up the layers that have been as  their initials are the bone layers  so I look for the left hand and there it is  I click on it this is now parented to layer 18.  so the forearm should be parented to layer 19. and the arm layer to layer 20.  I keep doing the same for each layer and  parents into their respective bone layers well after parenting the  layers it's time for rigging  for that, all I need to do is click on select  bones so that all the bones are selected   and then click on the auto rig tool okay after that I go to Duik Angela in the bones panel I click on show   hide bones so the bones would be hidden then I select the bone layers and shy them also, I don't need the controller  of the neck so I hide and shy it for the body I open the effects  control panel and move it here   I do the same for the head as well I move it up so  it won't be on the controllers of the hand alright   to test if the rigging process was successful or  not I moved the hip controller and the character   should move like this which means the different  body parts should be connected to one another well   and there would be no problem whatsoever in the  joints and everything would be working normally if you noticed any problem in the recommend check  two things first The Anchor Point of the layer   should be exactly at the center of the joints and  the second one that you need to check is if the   problematic layers is parented to its respective  bone or not because in most cases the problem lies   where the layer is unparented to its specific bone  or it's parented to another bone and obviously   enough when you move the character it doesn't move  the intended way now let's work on animating the   character using the walk Cyclone tool let me  make the controller of the shoulder visible   and let me check if the name of the  controller is correct or not as you see   this is the controller of the left arm however  it's labeled as the right arm I gotta fix that well when I make sure that the names of the  controllers are correct I could drink and open   the Automation and expression panel and select  the controllers and open the workroom cycle   settings as you can see here every controller  is recognized correctly only the Torso and the   Spy controllers are empty and that's because I  haven't made any bone for the spine basically   and so logically there is no controller for  the Torso and the spine there might be times   in which the walk cycle tool hasn't recognized  the controllers correctly when that happens   you can easily click on this option and just  like the controller assigned to that option this is the right arm for the right  hand and the same for this one too now it's fixed after you define the controllers  just click on the walk run cycle button well I hide all the controller except for the body  so I can see the character better as soon as I   had to work cycle their appears a controller and  in the FX control panel I can see the Locker on   cycle effect I go to the computation section and  here you can see some information about the walk   cycle the most important one is cycle duration  which basically says the walk cycle happens in   how many frames right now it says 25 which means  the walk cycle happens in 25 frames so I limit the   work area to frame 25 because from this point on  the water cycle just repeats well the first option   in the walk cycle is General motion with which you  can control the movement and some of the character   if I set it to zero the character stops and if I  set it to 100 it moves using the work option you   can create a walk animation and using the wrong  cycle let me set it to 100 you can create a run   animation and let me see the cycle duration is  16 frames so I go to frame 16 and hit the end   button and see the Run Cycle as you can see it  creates this kind of running for the character   which in my opinion it cannot create it very well  for now let's focus on creating the walk cycle   again I set the work area to 25 frames well  the first problem here is that the distance   and gap between each step are really small to  increase this Gap I head over to walk cycle   and increase the log speed I set it to 300 so  the gap between each step would be increased the next problem is that I think the swinging  of the body is too much so I have to disable it   to do that I open the body section  and I set the hip sewing to zero something to mention here is that when  the character is in this pose which is   the contact pose the body should be between  the legs and the legs should be straight   so I select the body controller  and adjust its position and also in the photo of the character is lifting   I think it needs to go a little bit higher  that's why I opened the log cycle settings   under the links and I said the fits High to 50.  so the foot goes higher let's watch the preview alright this caused an issue and that  is here the rotation of the angle is   too much so to fix that I decrease  the fifth rotation I set it to 50. I also think that the body should go higher a  bit so the link would be straight in the spots   let's see it's much better now the next problem  is that the arms don't move correctly because   when the right leg is in the back the  right arm should be forward and it should   move exactly in the opposite direction of the  leg which in the animation it's not like that   to reverse the swing animation of the arms  I go to the settings of the Walk cycle under the arms I change the arm swing  from 20 to -20 so it reverses the swing   and now as you can see the right arm moves  in the opposite direction of the right leg   I just have to tweak the rotation of  the arm because the arm moves to the   back more than it moves forward while  it should go back and forward equally to fix that I go to the animation data under  the right arm which should be for the right arm   oops this is for the left arm so I head over  to the left arm and I rotate it forward a bit   and now let's see how the animation is as you can see it's much better the  arm goes back and forth almost equally let me tweak the rest as well   and if you want the forearm to move up more you  can change the left forearm however you want but I prefer it like this I do  the same for the other arm as well   I make the layer solo so I can see it better well I changed the rhine's armor  attention to the back slightly so   the back and forth movement of the  left arm is just like the other one all right I think it's good but if you're planning  to create a more natural and realistic work cycle   for your character don't miss out on this video  which I explained three simple principles for   creating a walk cycle so you can create a  natural log cycle better well the animation   of the character is done just let me explain some  of the options so that later on you won't face any   problems under character by using height you can  increase and decrease the taking step speed for   example if I set this to 200 as you can see the  Cyclone duration is now 50 and the speed decreases and the more you decrease this height  the speed continues to increase for   example if I set it to 50 and you can  see the cycle duration is now 12 which   means every 12 frames the character  does one walk cycle or two steps I leave it as 100. the next important option  that you need to know is the walk cycle option   which if your character is walking toward  right this option creates this by default   but if your character is facing toward left  and you want it to walk toward live you just   have to put a minus before this number so  the movement gets reversed as you see if   your character was toward the left you can  reverse the movement the way I explained okay I hit Ctrl C the next option is the time offset  which you can set the first pose of   your character to start walking  this is the contact pose you can   for example set distorting post to  this one which is the passing pose let me make the background layers visible  and let's see how the animation turned out and for the last point if you want to use this  freaked character later for your animation or   if you want to manually create a walk cycle  for it you have to delete the what cycle tool   for doing so I select its layer  and press the delete button   after that by hitting on this magnifier icon I  get sent directly to the properties that have   errors in their expressions then alt click on  this stop watching so the errors get removed as   you can see from 16 errors only 13 remain I do the  same for others until all the errors get removed as you can see I've deleted all the Expressions  related to the walk cycle tool and now the work   cycle is completely deleted and to fix  the rotation of the arms you should go   to its controller FK and set these values  to zero do the same for the other arm too   and by changing the body controller you  can make the characters stand straight   and then you can start animating  from scratch thanks for watching

Channel: Jafar Fazel

Views: 38,380

Keywords: rigging character, character animation after effects, rigging with duik angela, duik angela, character animation in after effects, rigging in after effects, rigging character after effects, character rigging after effects, walking animation after effects, rigging character in after effects, duik angela tutorial, duik angela tutorial for beginners, jafar fazel, character rigging, duik bassel, rigging animation, duik ángela

Id: 66ytktbd7BE

Length: 26min 16sec (1576 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 10 2023