I’m doing my second short animation and I would like to ask about the best workflow. In my first animation I did all manually (copying this and that…) and I would like to avoid the same errors.
The short is in one room with one character. I have created a scene with all props and rig linked, but I have doubt about the best workflow to create the animation. The scene has several cameras (points of view), so I decided to change the camera using Markers, but I’m afraid the scene get too complex (several actions and shots) and difficult to render.
What is the best option to separate the animation in several files, but using the same set? Specially, I’m afraid with scene continuity, for example, if I want to start second shot in the last position of first shot. If I have every shot in its own file, maybe the start position of second shot is not totally equal to end position of first shot, or worst, what happen if I decide to change something of the scenery or lighting in shot1, these changes must be replicate in all shots.
I would appreciate any idea to try to keep my project organized and easy to manage.
You are rendering stills first, aren’t you? Highly recommended that you begin your finished movie by rendering using an image format, which will give you a series of stills, NOT a movie format.
The continuity you are concerned about relies on the frame, which does not change with the camera. You can set the beginning and ending frame when you make your shot. Blender will save the image file with the frame number as part of the file name.
Sometimes, though, a transition from one shot (camera) to another looks better when there is some overlap. In this case, you will have to either change the directory you save the file in (so frames from one camera don’t get overwritten by another camera shooting the same frame) or you can add the camera name to the file name. I’d recommend adding the camera name, it is easier to keep track.
If you make any changes in lighting, props, sets, etc, you will have to render everything a second time. To avoid this (as much as possible) render a single frame from each shot and check it as carefully as you can for lighting, composition, textures, whatever, and make any fixes needed before rendering all the frames in the shot.
Yes, I render the film in PNG and join later in video format. I like your idea to include camera name in the PNG name, and I will keep in mind to create one PNG for each scene to verify ilumination before rendering final PNGs, great trick!
But, my question is more related to “how structure the Blend files”. For example, create a Blend file with all scenes and each scene in own blend file.
I don’t want to copy changes from one blend file to another.