Magnets (Adobe Character Animator Tutorial)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 16 มิ.ย. 2024
- A new feature added in the latest version of Adobe Character Animator CC are the Magnets behavior and tag. Basically, if your puppet has a magnet behavior, any things tagged as "magnet" will be attracted to each other. This video walks through a sample project showing simple magnet attachments (a hand and a coffee cup), triggered magnets (catching and releasing a fish), and an advanced example using replays to create a magnetic field (magnet and ABC blocks).
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Oh WOW thanks for all the unlisted tutorials, I really need those! You guys are beyond awesome.
Love the new in-depth format!
Thanks. Yeah trying to cram everything into one video would have been insane with this release. Glad it seems to be working!
Awesome! You killed it!
So great!
Your videos are very informative! Thank you! I have a character that is walking from a side view trigger and I want him to hold something as he walks. The object and the character are two separate puppets. Is it still possible to have them magnetized? Whenever I switch from recording the object to recording the character in the timeline, the character always drops the object.
Hmmm not sure - in all the cases I've ever done, I've included both in the same puppet, I've never tried separately. If it's possible to include them together I think that's your best bet. But if not and the two character thing isn't letting magnets work, maybe add a draggable or transform behavior to the object and manually move it with the hand instead. More painstaking, yes, but a possible workaround. Hope that helps!
That's a beautiful feature. It would be great to have the magnet strength and range be animatable (kind of like AE FX values).
A great tutorial by the way. Watch at 1.5x and it's still pretty great but you save some time (not saying it was slow but it just helps)
If you arm the magnet strength and range parameters, you can animate them over time - any changes you make during recordings will be saved! Funny about the speed - most people say I talk too fast!
@@okaysamurai Not at all you speak very well in your tutorials so keep it going!
I've yet to play with a lot of stuff in Animator but it is very powerful and I can't wait to dive deep into it.
Thanks!
The magnetic hinge effect would wrk if you needed a gun slinger to twirl his revolver...if you didnt watch 'Tombstone' check out Val Kilmer scene with cup
Loving the tutorials. Are we able to attach a hand to a stationary prop like a door or swinging from a pull up bar?
The door I don't think so - you would probably want to animate that separately via keyframes and line the hand up. For the pull up bar, under LimbIK there is a twirldown menu called "Pin" - if you set the hand draggers to "Scene" they will stay in place while the rest of your character moves. So if you added a draggable on the neck or something and moved the character that way, the hands would look like they're attached to the bar.
Fantastic...!
When I used magnet 🧲 it’s work on the scene but when I export the video, it’s not given any reaction there 😕, why ??
Hmm seems strange. Magnets are a simulation so it's possible there's some variation in the final render. If you could post the video to adobe.com/go/chfeedback we can take a closer look...
@@okaysamurai Hi I have only just started to use magnets it works fine in the recording, but the in the exported with alpha the objects are no longer connected
Thanks for amazing tutorials. May I know which font style did you use for this hand written style text. thanks
Thanks! That was all handwritten in my own handwriting using a Wacom tablet!
Looks like adding a fixed collide object in front of the magnet would work nice. Unless you do it later in the video :P
Me: "Ohhhhhh... that makes so much sense! Brilliant!"
My Office Mate: "Let me guess. You're watching an Okay Samurai video."
Thx!
Just a thought for anybody trying to make this work. the easiest method i found was having a magnet on an arm. then have the strenght at 40 or so. go into the scene and set the strenght to 0, make a replay and trigger for this. then you can hit the trigger and the object is released from the hand. way easier and controllable.
Great tip! Love it!
This is going to make so many things possible I feel like. I can't wait to experiment with this. Will this update be out soon?
Out right now!
Just refreshed my creative cloud. I see it now. Thanks :D
lol i caught that cut near the end there x3
I have a question : The prop has to be in the same group of levels (here called Magnets) and the scene down in the timeline has only Magnets as unique part of the scene with all the characters and stuff inside or it's possible to place everything on the timeline to create levels?
Yes, unfortunately everything has to be local to the puppet, properties are local to the puppet. Some things may be better served as triggers like th-cam.com/video/yPoNQ4ihtAs/w-d-xo.htmlsi=nwjx1egsdLn42G3m&t=332.
Could some sort of "null" invisible object be tagged as dynamic and serve as an in-between for two characters to hold hands?
Hmm, very interesting idea. Maybe! We don't have nulls in CH per se, but there's probably a hacky way to do this (invisible or blended group)...
Is there a way to make it so you can completely hold another character? like maybe a magnetic hand to the origin of another character?
IIRC currently magnets don't work very well between characters - we hope to fix this in the future.
Is there a step by step tutorial somewhere?
I can do the trigger magnet but for some reason it does not let go of the item no matter how far I throw it, the settings for strength are the same as in the video. Drag on "left hand", magnet on "open hand", other 4 triggers have no behavior
Unfortunately I don't have another tutorial on magnets other than this one. You can check Heather from the CH homescreen, who has a magnetic orb she can grab - that's a better example of a single character doing this. For more direct help, please post a screenshot, video, or File > Export > Puppet (.puppet file) to adobe.com/go/chfeedback.
Hey. Can you set the magnet up in character animator and the use it in after affects? Or does it all have to happen in character animator? Thanks
Magnet recordings should carry through to After Effects.
In case no asked...can you make it so I can set the magnetic polarity to negative or positive, so we can attract or repel objects? if this is in the video above I apologize i am watching it and it came to mind...thanks
Polarity is not available (yet).
No poblemo, there is still plenty to learn and master! Keep up the great work!
Are we able to use the magnet through a replay?
like using a replay of a hand gesture to hold a cup.
I don't think I've done this but yes, theoretically it should!
So the prop that you want to pin to the character's hand has to be in the same puppet as the character? Also, I've gotten the magnets to catch, but when I try to record the animation, it doesn't record. Everything was armed.
Yes, magnets only currently work within the same puppet.
Not sure about the recording thing, it should work - if the problem persists, please upload a screenshot, video, or your File > Export > Puppet file to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
@@okaysamurai Thanks for that. On deadline, so I don't have time to mess around with it right now. But hopefully someone else who has the issue can figure it out. I'll keep checking back in! Thanks again!
lets say I have a character with a side view and holding a thin object. I want him to hold it with his BG hand like the guy with the mug. I would obviously use a magnet. What would have to be done to have my characters fingers wrap around the thin object? Would I have to make a special layer to accomplish this for the characters hand holding the object have, or can it be done via triggers or it automatically does this hand change upon contact with the magnet?
One Idea I had was eliminate the object once picked up by lowering opacity.
Great question. There is no automatic state for magnets to change, so the best way I can think to do this would have the fingers as part of the mug and manually trigger it. I would also check out Pickupbot on okaysamurai.com/puppets for another possible way to do this.
@@okaysamurai that could work as well. Thx
Will definitely be giving this a try
maybe if we can name each object like posetive or negative we can make specific magnets to attach to specific parts...
This seems like a natural evolution of this, agreed.
A newbie question, can this kind of effect remains as a website background? like a flash file? not so sure.. but seems really cool! keep the good works thanks!
If you made it into a video and embedded it, yes. But not anything interactive like you see here - that can only happen inside CH itself.
@@okaysamurai sorry what is CH strand for?
Character (Animator)! That's our logo - see the upper left corner of any of the video thumbnails.
@@okaysamurai ah okay! Thank you.
Magnets another great tool in the Character animator arsenal. Today I’m going to see if I can open a character animator project in adobe animate. Just to see if it’s possible.
Correct, you can't go from CH into AN. There is a way to get a character from AN to CH: th-cam.com/video/sv--jURQOGc/w-d-xo.html. Also this might help and is coming soon - th-cam.com/video/QVIztxynnm4/w-d-xo.html
@@okaysamurai Wow the limbs IK is an awesome add on. In my next upcoming episode I wanted my character to bend and pick up some objects on the ground. This Limb IK behaviors really is going to come in handy. Thanks. And it is a relief that I cannot go from CH to AN. I prefer CH as it is more intuitive and less work than AN. Less work for me :) .
I've been playing with magnets. My puppet layout is a bit different. I have my main character as a separate puppet, and I have a bucket with stones as another puppet. I setup magnet behaviours for each puppet separately. Now my character is able to pick up a stone, based on a cycle layer+key trigger (latched). However when I press the trigger key to deactivate the latch. the stones are still sticking to the main characters hands. Is it a necessity to have a global puppet, under which all layers should exist for the magnet behavior to work. Or will it work with magnet behavious assigned to individual puppets/across puppets.
Hmmm I don't remember for sure (I don't use magnets too often) - but I believe it works best when everything is within the same puppet.
@@okaysamurai Thanks. I might have to try it out with everything in the same scene in a different project. But for now I found a quick workaround. I used keyframes to change the strength of magnetism to 0 once the character was ready to drop the object. This helped me achieve the intended result. for now.
dave my problem is having my magnet items not picking up and I cant hold it when I move my arms. What do I do?
Usually this means the magnet isn't on/active. I would try the exact same setup as the coffee cup guy here and see if that works. If the problem persists, please upload a screenshot, video, or your File > Export > Puppet file to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
sry to bother you during the holidays, but i'm kinda stuck. Have an animation which uses magnets to drag an object along. In CA it works perfect. In AE it used to be perfect too. But now suddenly the object is a bit to the left in AE. The magnet keeps working correctly but it's offset. Nothing has changed in CA or AE. What am I not seeing? Again, in CA it works perfect. Tried relinking, restarting etc.
I have seen AE sometimes runs into dynamic link render issues, sometimes cleaning the cache helps but it should always show exactly what you're seeing in CH. Another option is to export a PNG sequence + WAV from CH, import that into AE and see if it's happening there too. If it persists, please post a screenshot, video, or File > Export > Puppet (.puppet file) to adobe.com/go/chfeedback for more help.
I couldn't find this solution on any of your videos: I am rigging a coffee mug. The mug is filled with coffee (on its own layer) that I want to rock back and forth as the mug moves, like it's "sloshing", or gimballing around the center of the layer. Any ideas? (I've been playing around with dangle handles and physics settings, but, even with sticks, the coffee wants to slosh beyond the edges of the mug. If this helps, in photoshop, I have the back lip and a portion of the inside of the mug on one layer, the coffee on a layer above that one, and the rest of the mug on another above that.)
The only example I've seen of this is this: th-cam.com/video/XiNOeQSmuFo/w-d-xo.html. I believe he used dangle + clipping masks to get this kind of effect. (I've never tried it so I'm not 100% sure!)
@@okaysamurai Thanks for all you do!
do you recomend any tutorials where I can find more specific instructions about tranfering props from one hand to another?
I don't think I have anything specifically like that unfortunately. I would probably just make hand triggers and have the prop in each hand, and then do a manual switch when they're close together. An example of this in one hand is Sirr from okaysamurai.com/puppets, who has a stick that appears in one of his hands if you press a trigger key.
@@okaysamurai thank you!
Hi Dave, why cannot we download the example files in some videos, like this one? There's no download link for it.
The Magnets example is still up at okaysamurai.com/puppets/.
This is a great new feature! Is there a way to use magnets to create two puppets playing tug of war with another puppet?
Given that one magnet has to be dynamic, I don’t think this would work well (yet), but hopefully it’ll be better in the future.
Thank you for getting back with me :)
i think i am gonna use magnets for an aggressive puppet so when he raidsquit while gaming he throws his controller away
omg, I'm so confused I"ve been fighting with this for hours. The example doesn't actually have the structure of a puppet so even objects are just inside what would be a puppet? Like my puppet already has 4 other hand states, can I still then have the "holding cup" hand have two more states inside that for "on and off" and then those work as a trigger from within that hands trigger? this example assumes you have a single hand on your arm. It's not working with mine with many hands. Also when I use a table/surface it just follows the entire puppet movement all over; based on this example it has the table INSIDE the puppet itself and independent. I have it that way and it tracks with the puppet; even with pins and bones etc it always moves with the puppet. If it's not independent or its outside the puppet then the object just falls through and doesn't see the table. So frustrating. Is there an example puppet that holds and drops objects but also has an entire regular puppet structure? help!
On the home screen in the app, check out Heather the witch - she's got a crystal ball with a trigger that uses magnets for her hand to pick it up / drop it. She also has a desk/table in the foreground. Hopefully that helps - if you're still having trouble after that, please post a screenshot, video, or File > Export > Puppet (.puppet file) to adobe.com/go/chfeedback for more help.
Say what font are you using in 'demo' screens? I searched adobe type, but came up empty...thanks
The handwritten one? No font, that's just my handwriting. :)
*miracles, "effing magnets, how do they work?"*
When I do this the object will be pulled across the room to my characters hand but it won't stick to the hand it just sticks to the area where that layer is on my puppet, what am I doing wrong?
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.
you da best
Hi! Is it possible to use Magnets for a puppet to look at its cellphone, for instance? Maybe attaching its hand to Gaze? If not, how could you do it?
It is possible, but honestly most people just skip magnets and just put the phone in a hand trigger swap set. See Sirr on okaysamurai.com/puppets, who has a trigger that makes a stick appear in his hand - you could do something similar for a phone.
@@okaysamurai Thanks for the quick reply! That could be a way or maybe I could use a Replay, don't you think?
Yep! Either should work!
Sorry, Dave. Another problem. In your example of the horseshoe-shaped magnet and blocks, is there a way to create another horseshoe magnet on the other side of the screen and have both magnets "pull" on the same set of blocks? I couldn't figure this out. When I tried, I had both magnets set at 1000px range and 0 strength, then I tested each by increasing the strength. The blocks never wanted to react to the left magnet. Only the right. Even when I ticked the eyeball on the right one to eliminate it, the blocks only went to the right. Strange, huh?
- Each magnet had a magnet behavior applied
- The main "character" had a magnet applied
Good question. I've never tried this before, but I experimented today by adding a magnet behavior to the coffee guy's arm in the example project, and upped the strength and range. No matter what I tried, I was unable to create this kind of "float effect" with two magnets competing - it looks like it favors the closest/strongest field and that's it. I'm guessing this was some kind of limitation added in for performance or something. So unfortunately I'm not sure you can do this with two magnets currently, but you may be able to fake the effect with an invisible magnet in the middle to look like the content is floating.
@@okaysamurai Thanks, Dave. My intent is to have a spoon inside a coffee mug flip from one side to the other as the character of the mug sways while speaking. I'm close achieving this using collide parameters, but the spoon appears jittery when it is still. Also, I have to tip the mug way past 90 degrees to have the spoon fall onto each side of the mug. I was hoping that the magnet behavior would alleviate all this. But, as always, I'll keep experimenting. At least I know what to try with magnets if I ever want to "float" something. Again, thanks for your assistance, sir.
Can we use two characters at a same time like one character you've shown in this video a robot is giving a paper to another. How is this possible. 14:45
Yes, you can drag two characters into the same scene, and whichever one you have selected is the one you will record. However if you're trying to pass an object between characters it's probably better to just fake it with triggers. See Pickupbot at okaysamurai.com/puppets/.
Is there a way to get the photoshop or illustrator file, that would help me get a better understanding.
It's in the video description, go to okaysamurai.com/puppets/ - it's listed a few rows down there.
@@okaysamurai Thank you so much!
I try the magnet, what I dont know is, has the cup to be in the same PSD file or can the cup be an extra image file? I try something with a Santa and a sack, at least the arm of santa fell of and dont stuck on the body again. Can you please explain the magnetic more specific? That would be nice. :-)
Yes, extra image files work. So let's say I import two puppets - Santa and a toy. Put them in the same scene. Both will need the magnet behavior added to them, the toy will need to be tagged as dynamic and magnet, and Santa's hand will need a magnet tag too. That should work. If you still can't get it working please post screenshots or videos to adobe.com/go/chfeedback for more direct help!
@@okaysamurai Thank you very much for your quick answer. I will try. So I set the toy only on dynamic no collision? Meanwhile I have made a hand with a sack in it. :-) But I will try the magnet as you explaned yet. Thx. :-) If you want, I can send you my project file with images. Greats from Austria.
Dynamic with collide is fine too!
If i want to catch a cigarrette and leave it in the mouse when i dropt it. How could i achieve that?Thanks again!!
For that I might have a physics cigarette with magnets for the catch, and then trigger swap in another one in the hand/mouth/wherever when you need it. Relying on magnets for everything might lead to more issues.
@@okaysamurai Thanks i Will Try !!
i am using latest version . cant find dynamic and collide tags
I am seeing dynamic and collide tags in the latest version in Rig mode. If the problem persists, please upload a screenshot to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
Is there a current magnet tutorial?
This is still the most recent one. It's not a very widely used behavior currently!
my character is holding a staff, staff is fixed to the floor at the bottom. magnet is attached at character's hand, and the other at the handle. Works great until i move too much in the recording and the thing begins to vibrate. longer i record, vibration becomes more violent. Can you help?
goal: character moves slightly while the staff stays put, grip never loosens on staff. Character is just standing in place.
.
Hmmm, sounds like the magnet, fixed, and dragger tags are fighting each other. I wonder if changing the attach style to hinge or free somewhere might help? Or maybe avoiding magnets and just making the staff part of the character artwork (unless you need the magnet functionality to grab / let go).
Buen día, existe algún foro en español?
Actualmente no, pero usted puede probar los foros oficiales, podemos tratar de Google traducir cosas: adobe.com/go/chfeedback
Is there anything like repelling in character animator?
Unfortunately not yet. We want to get to this sometime, but for now you might be better at adding a transform behavior to those elements and keyframing them away.
@@okaysamurai Thank you.
Im trying to have my character pick up balls from a basket while counting them and moving them to the side. When using the magnets the balls are floating in the basket rather than stay put and wait to be picked up. When the hand picks up the balls and drops them to the floor they roll away, I want them to stay still. Please help! Btw: the balls and the character are in the same file but different layers.
I wonder if the magnetic balls are magnetizing to each other and that's what is causing them to feel like they're floating? Or are you triggering the magnet off when they fall into the basket? Magnet workflows can get pretty complicated depending on what's happening, and I haven't tried this particular one yet so I don't know the perfect answer. Maybe posting a video to adobe.com/go/chfeedback might help?
@@okaysamurai Thanks for your reply. I do think you're right about the balls magnetizing each other. The balls are stationary (I would like them to be rather than floating) in the basket then I trigger then hand when it gets close to the ball. They attach and when I release the trigger the ball falls to the floor and rolls away. I'll post to the community to see if I can get some more feedback.
Bu fonksiyonun bulunabileceğini düşünen sadece ikimiziz dostum. Sen video ile kanıtlamış oldun. Dahi miyiz
I’m not understanding why or how magnets and triggers work together
A trigger basically will determine if a magnet turns "on" or not. If the trigger is active and has a magnet, it's on. All of these examples in the example file should show this.
How can I get and pass an object between two characters ?
Typically I like doing simple triggers to have objects appear/disappear between characters. See Pickupbot on okaysamurai.com/puppets/ on how to do this for one character, and then you could have two characters where an object in a hand can appear/disappear to give the illusion of being passed. Magnets could work too, but IMO they're a little more finicky and I prefer the precision of triggers.
@@okaysamurai 👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
I've set magnets on two objects in my scene and neither are reacting to each other. I'll keep experimenting
Take a look at the example file and make sure your assets are set up the same way - especially make sure you add the Magnets behavior!
Hi, Im having an issue with the physics wrking when I import file into After Effects. The item on puppets hand just floats away.
I just tried recording and dynamic linking into AE with the sample project and it worked exactly the same in CH and AE for me. Physics are a simulation, so it's possible something is getting lost in translation - one idea would be to export as a (more baked in) PNG sequence and WAV instead and see if that solves it. But it should always look the same in CH and AE, so it might be a bug - if it continues please post a video of what's happening to adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
@@okaysamurai thnks for quick reply..are there any draw backs to PNG export?
Only that it's baked in, so if you make an edit in the puppet or CH animation you would have to re-export the whole thing. Just a little more cumbersome.
@@okaysamurai So I import each individua PNG into After Effects? Thats a lot of files.
There's an option to import a PNG sequence into AE - just select one PNG and it'll bring in the whole sequence in a folder.
What are the specs of your computer/laptop?
I have a 2016 Macbook Pro. 2.7 GHz processor, 16GB RAM.
Okay Samurai what about the graphics card? Btw. I’ve been watching your tutorials like crazy and I’m working on something that I can’t wait to publish!!
What font are you using here?
The title is Whitney, but the hand-drawn stuff is just my own handwriting!
@@okaysamurai Thank you very much, thanks to your tutorials, I'm going to get started on Animator and see if I can use it to bring comic stills to life. I'm not an artist at all, but I thought maybe I could animate the art that I have available to help tell the story. Really appreciate all of your in-depth work. Gives me a lot of hope.
Oh and your handwriting should be a font, it's really cool!
You really didn't kill did you? Hehehe 😂😅
Hi bro
How to turn off the magnet?
If the magnet is on an active trigger, then when that trigger is turned off, the magnet will also turn off. The example project shows this in action with all of the examples.
@@okaysamurai Thank you so much for the answer. You're awesome!
why are my objects becoming smaller after i add magnets ?
Hmm that shouldn't happen, not sure. Magnets should only be attach points and not affect scale (like in the example project).
@@okaysamurai thnx for reacting it could be the physics tags 2..but after i attach al that is needed for magnet behaviour the object becomes almost 50% smaller
also is there a way to have more control over the object when using magnets..i am trying to make my character lift a jar and then poor something into another container..but its pretty hard keeping the jar under control ..when moving my arm the object kinda floats after and around it nad changing the range doesnt solve this also i would like some more control on how the jar is held...
right now im thinking about adding the jar afterwards in after effects to circumvent...i thought the magnets would save me al this work but maybe its not ready for such complexity....
love the program love your enthusiasm and vids...
its not perfect yet but its sure brings more life into my animations then before TY
I'm not sure why it's getting smaller, I've never seen that before. As for the floating, sometime making sure the attach style is weld helps. Pickupbot from okaysamurai.com/puppets/ doesn't use magnets but might be a better fit for what you're trying to do.
@@okaysamurai thnx i will check that out
i didnt understand it would you make it clear😪
If you're running into trouble, please upload a screenshot, video, or your File > Export > Puppet file to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
it don't work by me !!!
The example file doesn't work? Make sure you have the latest version of Character Animator. I just tested and it's working fine for me.
Die Deutsch sprachige Ausgabe findet ihr hier th-cam.com/video/hgQW3Ompo4M/w-d-xo.html