Need some help understanding animation

hello everyone so i wanna start animating and i seen a few lego ww2 animations

my question is how do they make em like i know how to animate budt i dont know if they render 5 sec animation and then switch the camera view to a new angle and make another 3-4 sec video
i cant really find eny video tutorials that explain how to make a fully animated film on 5 minutes or 6 minutes also how do they add sounds voice talking and muzzle flash do they do that in another program for editing hope someone could explain and maybe link a video tutorial on how to make a fully animated video i do know how to use blender :slight_smile: im not a beginner just a beginner in animation ty all

here is the video i talked about https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fw-Igv8vB4&t=185s

That’s a lot of things to explain for a short comment, but I can maybe clarify some things and give you some stuff to research.

Blender actually has a feature for switching cameras in an animation. You can add markers to the timeline and then bind cameras to those markers. That way, you can have multiple cameras in your scene and they will auto-switch while you play or render the animation.

Though, you might want to use separate scenes in some cases if there is a complete change in scenery.

If you know how to make and render a short animation, then you mostly know how to make a longer one.

The rendering is going to be a bit different. With an animation this long, you can’t render directly to video, because the rendering process is going to be too long to do it all at once. Instead, you render to images and then assemble those images into a video in a video editing software. Blender’s own sequencer can do this process, though It’s a bit basic compared to specialized software.

That would be done in the video editing software, after you have rendered the animation.

If you need to do lip animation for a talking character (or anything where the sound needs to be in sync with the video), you need to have the sound/voice ready before you animate. Then, you can import and place the sound in Blender’s sequencer, which will give you audio while you play the animation in the viewport, allowing you to synchronize the animation to the sound (don’t forget to set the timeling to “sync to audio”).

You can make some effects like that in the editing program, or you can make them directly as a part of the 3D render if you know how. The choice is yours, based on your set of skills and the look you are after.

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One very(!) important to think to think about is: the role of the "film editor." (Yes, there’s a reason why that’s an entirely separate category at the Academy Awards.)

Filmmakers “on the set” shoot the raw material, “shot” by “shot.” (As do you, when you are rendering “a shot.”) But this is only the first step in the overall process.

"The Movie" is then constructed by “slicing and splicing” pieces of all these various “shots” together into a meaningful sequence – leading to the so-called “final cut.” Dialogue and sound-effects are then added. The director gives his or her final approval, and “the movie” is prepared for distribution.

Blender includes a video editor that is actually quite good. But there are other open-source options as well as commercial ones.

Now, when you are contemplating a CG movie, you can start applying the “video editing” principle very early on, using “stand-in footage” in an idea that’s been called: “edit, then shoot.” In this way, you avoid laboriously producing stuff that you won’t actually use.

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ok thank you do you know eny yotube tutorial that explains and shows how to do all that ? :slight_smile:

Well, I don’t want to blow my own horn, but I did make a short video that goes over the basic procedure for creating a 3D shot.

So for 5 mins, it’s pretty much the same thing, just repeated x number of times depending on the number of individual shots. Now of course that’s using my character, but replace it with Lego model characters and remove the hair/cloth simulation (since they don’t have any, so that makes things easier) and the process is as shown.

If you really want to go down this rabbit hole, then you may also find a couple of my other videos useful, like the Folder/File naming and organising ones, along with the 7 Things to Create 3D Animation.

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I can give you some tutorials for the specific topics I mentionned, but please understand I can’t just explain the entire use of Blender and the whole movie pipeline in a comment.

Switch cameras in animation:

render to image sequence and re-assemble in editing software:

Animate lip movements to match a sound loaded in the sequencer (sadly, I struggled to find a good tutorial on this topic, maybe a more general facial animation tutorial would be better):




The best way to learn how to make a movie, in my opinion, is by making one. Knowledge is gained by going through the process, solving problems as they show up and learning from any mistake.

Pick a short story idea that will serve as a learning experience and try making it. Make sure to have a good idea of what you want the final result to be like. What elements will you need to have to complete that project? Models, effects, characters, voice recordings?

Take the process step by step, if you try thinking about everything at once, you will get overwhelmed. Do you have the objects and characters, or can you model them if needed? If yes, that step is completed and you can think of the next step without looking back (hopefully).

Do you then need to rig the characters? Learn how to do it if you don’t know. When you have something that’s functional, you can go to the next step.

Then, animate the characters/cameras/effects and just make the whole sequence of events of the movie in the 3D scene.

Once that is done, then you can think about lighting and rendering. Then you can think about assembling and editing the final video.

When you encounter a step you don’t know how to do, you can google it or ask for help for that one step (and you will get a more useful answer than asking about the whole process).

Could it go wrong and you fail to make the project happen? Yes, of course, that’s why your first movie should be a short and simple one that you aren’t too attached to. Then, you will get a better idea of what’s needed to make a movie and what you still need to learn. After that, you can go into a bigger project knowing you can make it happen.

okey thank you that really usefull i think im more nervous if im gonna make it through :slight_smile:

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