Critique my jump animation

[digi]

Hi everyone. I'm trained with a classical 2d animation background but am currently back in school learning Maya to make the transition over to 3d. Please check out my very first computer animation and give me an honest opinion about what parts are good or bad.

the assignment: make the character jump over an obsticle

please excuse the crappy textures and lighting... i just wanted to show the animation at this stage. i'll post the final version when i'm done.

Jump Animation (9 sec avi) (http://www.artofbob.com/images/tonyjump.avi)

[Mysen]

hey man.. great movement at the beginning.. but the jump itself... its like he floatts a bit ..

[Void24]

Great animation before he jumps, but I think the problem in your jump is that he seems to gain most of his velocity after his legs are fully extended.

When you jump you get your velocity as you extend your legs and stop gaining when your feet leave the ground. I think if you speed him up a bit sooner it would give him a little more weight.

Also you might check and make sure the top of his arch isnt flattening out. I really didnt notice if it is, but just guessing, that may be making him look light.

Looks very good overall, nice work.

[digi]

Thank you Mysen & Void24 for your replies.

i handed in the jump animation last week with the changes you suggested. My teacher was pretty impressed ;) hehehe

here's the clip I handed in...
Jump Animation (2.5mb avi) (http://www.artofbob.com/images/jump2.avi)
If there's any other critiques, I'd love to hear them. I want my computer animation portfolio to be as good as possible by the end of April (end of the school year) and the critiques really help. thank you

[mos667]

I love the improvement. You cut out the details that weren't needed, and you even made it look closer up. You also cut out the cheesy thumbs up ;). Nice job on it, your portfolio looks like it will be full of good stuff by April.

mos.

[Void24]

I like the weight you added, thats exactly what I was looking for. Very nice animation.

Maybe I am alone on this, but I liked the thumbs up.

[Erik]

Better in the second one but my feeling is he puts his legs forward too early in the animation. That way you can not gain the height required to clear the obstacle. Look at basketballers to see this.

Nice animation though

[digi]

Thanks mos667, Void24 and Erik for your comments!

After checkin out the animation again, I saw all these things that I wanted to tweek.

I made the jump slightly lower (but after looking at it this morning, I'm thinking that it should be lower still...).

I also changed the timing of the legs so that they landed one at a time.

Latest Version (avi) (http://www.artofbob.com/images/jump3.avi)

Sorry if this thread is a little dry. Thanks for your patience ;)