I am working on a hang glider animation. It’s just going to fly around for a little bit. But I am having trouble with the animation. Particularly the timing. I can’t really put my finger on it, but it’s not good enough for me to feel happy about it yet. Hopefully another set of eyes can point out some key animation flaws.
I animated this using curves, simply following a path. So any tips/tricks there would be useful too.
It’s not that bad , the glider seem a bit stiff but it kinda work for me
What is the end goal of the video ? make a “movie” shot : it must be impressive / tell a story ?
Or you want to make a video like an 'amateur" filmed something ? (eg : fake shots of UFO made with cellphone)
For animation you can use a curve but you’ll loose some control over some stuff. Animating all without curve can lead to a better result but it will be far more complicated to manage.
You can try to add a little soft body to the wings so they bend just a little bit, that can help make the glider look less stiff.
I"m a bit curious about the mountain ? is it a drone shot ? some photogrammetry ? can you share a bit more about the technique behind it ?
Hi, thanks for the response.
First, I want to go for a cinematic look. I want to make something like a movie trailer, so I only need quick and pretty shots. Obviously, the whole scene needs a lot of work before it gets there, but for now I’m mostly focusing on the animation part of it.
Second, the landscape has come completely from photoscanned assets. I’m not too worried about that since I’m basically kitbashing. The assets are available here:
It’s a great collection, if you’re interested in drone-scanned landscapes
Thanks!
Looks like a good start… To add to sozap’s suggestion for soft body on the wings… i would slow down the glider when it is flying up/inclining and i would have the camera just panning up and down slowly (maybe slightly side to side) and not have the camera follow the exact movements of the glider. Following all the movements of the glider kind of makes for jerky movement and really is enhanced by viewing the ground in the shot. Hope it helps.
Cool idea! I’ll second the suggestion of adding some flex to the wings and maybe some ripple to the fabric, particularly at the most dynamic parts of the loops, as well as SidewaysUpJoe’s suggestion of slowing the glider during the climbing part of the loop and speeding it up when it’s descending.
I’m not sure how realistic you’re looking to get with the flight physics, but something else to consider is that in real life, gliders need to dive before they loop (to gain the necessary momentum) and the apex of their loop can’t be higher than they started unless they are in a mass of very quickly rising air. This makes the first loop look really out of place to me since it seems to be looping up really high starting from level flight. If it entered the scene already in a fast dive, it would be much more convincing. The second part of the animation where it dives into the canyon and then makes a wing-over/loop is more realistic.
Right, okay I totally get that. I did kind of ignore that part of the physics equation.
Now that you’ve got me thinking, I think that’s the same idea that applies to the whole animation. I’m just not carrying the momentum through to the next movements. Maybe I’ll have to exaggerate everything more.
Obliviously the choice is yours.
Im new to Blender and animation so take this with a grain of salt…
If it was me, id go with the path for your glider like you have, but in the current state i would add a key frame at the bottom/start of the incline and then add another keyframe at the top of the incline, then i would slide the top keyframe father down the time line (towards the right) so it takes longer for that section and in-turn it will move slower. As for the camera, i would give a shot at manually keyframing that or maybe there is a trick to have the camera follow the same path but having it smoothed out or something, dont know.
For what its worth… just an example slapped together…
In the “glider” (plane) timeline, if you delete the two middle keyframes (80, 160) you can see how it effects the speed of the glider while it inclines.
Good luck…
Yeah, you’re definitely on-point with all of that. Timing is definitely my struggle right now. I’ll have to start looking up different references.
I’m using a Follow Path Constraint. Are you able to add keys to that? Or convert it to key frames? I know there’s like an evaluation time equation you can add to the anim graph, but I’ve never done that before.
Any suggestions?
How realistic do you want this to be? Do you really mean hang glider or is it to be a sail plane, wing suit, bird, or toy? If you really want it to look and act like a hang glider I will ask a friend who is a hang glider pilot to give advice.
I was going for something almost like a bird. Not necessarily flapping its wings, just lots of control of its own motion. I want it to be playful, but still believable. Right now it looks choppy. I think timing and momentum are what really is holding me back.
Probably don’t need the support of a pro-hang-glider, but if you have any good reference footage that would be awesome.
Thanks!
Here is a video of a hang glider and paraglider event. I’m not sure there is reference footage but there are many launches, some landings, and behind the scenes ground stuff. Most launches start a little after 9 minutes into the video. Fly In Another One
Few hang glider or paraglider pilots make many interesting maneuvers. In some cases they would be considered reckless and have a bad reputation. (Probably while also being envied ) Birds or crazy wing suit flyers could be better references.
it can stay a bit like this (the camera fly with the glider) then the glider get more speed and finally goes in the set as you’ve done. It will give a better sense of depth and it split the shot in different informations to give to the viewer :
1/ the set (we see the set without the glider)
2/ the glider (we have a close shot of the glider)
3/ the glider in the set ( having the glider starting close to the camera and end-up quite small in the frame give depth and scale to the set).
This is incredibly helpful thank you. I don’t know too much about cinematography, so this is a great explanation. Do you know of any good cinematography resources? Any good books or websites to learn more?
Hey, sorry for the long delayed answer, I get carried out elsewhere…
I’ve seen the final shot, it’s looking much better ! Congratulations !
It’s quite a wide subject, it’s all about telling a story that is clear to understand and pleasing to follow. That involve a lot of different things put together, and it’s half theory half feeling.
) Birds or crazy wing suit flyers could be better references.