Learn How to Rig and Animate a Character and Create your Own Odyssey Day 1

Final Product What You'll Be Creating

In this massive 2 part tutorial you will learn how to rig and animate a character using a combination of Illustrator, Photoshop and After Effects and create an incredible, cinematic odyssey piece.

Part 1 covers pre-production techniques, workflow overview and creating and rigging the character. It also covers creating the star field background and creating the eye close-up.

Tutorial

Download Tutorial .flv

File size 351MB

Requirements:
Adobe Illustrator (download trial version here)
Adobe Photoshop (download trial version here)

Optional:
Trapcode Particular (download trial version here)

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Discussion 56 Comments

  1. Greg says:

    love the flying dude. Nice work!

  2. Alj says:

    nice one i really like it

  3. Rafi says:

    dude! the preview looks awesome! what song is that? sounds like a “The Great Gig in the Sky” remix ;)

    take care!

  4. Shadowzproductions says:

    Holy..

    That’s amazing. Reminds me of the I Am Legend Survivor sketches.

    Looking forward to part 2. :)

  5. JayDee says:

    Great job, and the timing is perfect: I was about to start animating a “ghost” and your tut will be a great help.

  6. eric says:

    that’s out of this world – literally

  7. Owca says:

    Awesome!

    Greetings from Poland ;)

  8. mike says:

    why my explorer cannot load the tutorial?
    the tutorial video turns to be blank.
    plz,anybody could help?

  9. m says:

    absolutely horrible! wow a waste of my time!

    • B says:

      I have to agree with m. This thing sucks!

    • Max says:

      Why don’t you show your stuff if you’re so hot?

    • Shawn Bridges says:

      I agree. Really cheesy. What’s with the talking at the beginning of the it…just pile on the cheese. Yikes!

      Sorry Max, I don’t think that “M” said he/she was hot.

    • Rami says:

      BTW I work with this M kid and his motion/video work is top shelf.

      • Max says:

        Well, M should show his work and be opened to comments that are as rude and not constructive as his.

    • Jon Draper says:

      sort of agree….was hoping for more of a fully rigged character not….err…this.

      Different though….more of a tutorial to create a heavily stylized animation, than a tutorial to learn a technique that can apply to lots of work, corporate/music video/film etc etc.

  10. das_borg says:

    Marcin!
    your timing is impeccable, i’ve had something in pre-prod for sometime, and lost my mojo somewhat… thank you for this amazing introduction to what will ultimately, kick tutorial ass and motivate mine again!!

    M83 – good choice!!

    peace.

  11. JohnM. says:

    What!? This is ILL!! Really excited for this one :D

  12. Hooper says:

    Finally!
    Something cool and fun!

  13. Alex McCabe says:

    That is beautiful, I couldn’t help feeling the finished video wasn’t long enough, I wanted to watch more =D

    Very well done

  14. Shane says:

    Thanks for this. I am looking forward to the second part.

  15. Hadi says:

    It looks awesome, hope to see them done in the tutorial
    Thanks

  16. Orlando says:

    Hi this awesome coll tutorial
    hey where is the second part?

  17. Rafael Braga says:

    Oh man ,,, I can’t believe that finally we’ve got a nice tutorial and this stupid internet at work doesn’t let me download the file … =(

    I’ll check when get home.

    Thanks for sharing Marcin.

  18. Rami says:

    It has a nice kinda of 70′s or 80′s tripped out vibe but ….
    I’m gonna have to say that its got some things that work but a lot that don’t.
    It feels too much like a beginners work or a students first project.
    Sorry man just MHO.

    but keep at it ..

  19. Max says:

    Looks great! It makes me think of “The Fountain” movie.

  20. Miser Zerk says:

    well… AETUTS sucks… and the others too. PSD, VECTOR, AUDIO, CG…

    I was a great fan, but it’s over…

    En bon français, je dirais que ce n’est pas intéressant, dépassé et artistiquement maigre.
    C’est pas méchant mais ce site donne le mauvais exemple. Ce ne sont pas des tutos mais de simple suivis de travail. On y apprend rien : un vulgaire bricolage à la portée du premier curieux.

    bon courage, vous pouvez faire mieux… et je respecte ceux aimerons.

    • Max says:

      Qu’est-ce que tu veux dire par simple suivis de travail? C’est exactement ça un tuto. Je ne dis pas que ce tuto est parfait, mais si tu n’as rien appris, qu’est-ce que tu fais sur ce site? Tu devrais gagner ta vie comme designer graphique ou faire toi-même des tutos.

  21. Wesley says:

    final result looks a bit cheap

  22. Rev65 says:

    Really enjoyed the building the eyeball portion using AE. Overall would suggest you pick up the pace of things as it felt a bit too slow. Looking forward to Part 2.

  23. 72pixel says:

    COOL man~! So cool man~!

  24. Diego SA says:

    Nice preview! It remember the movie “The Fountain”!

  25. Dave says:

    That was beautiful stuff right there!

  26. sunil thapa (Nepal) says:

    he he too much good………. awesome……………. galaxy………..

  27. Jon Draper says:

    Hmm….all a bit too 2001….for my liking.

    Be great to see some fully rigged character tutorials. Where characters have walk cycles, running =, jumping etc using the puppet tool….?

  28. Love the work. I’m going to try to convert this tutorial into a flash pre loader.
    The site it will be for, is http://www.gibarbershop.com. use of your mind.

  29. kamran says:

    use the great technics dud

  30. matthew says:

    I love how we never see Billy in the more complicated tutorials

    Billy’s #1 fan
    -Matthew

  31. Billy says:

    I was just going through old tutorials seeing if there was anything I wanted to try out that I had missed…and I saw Matthew’s comment and just had to, well….comment.

    Matthew is a moron. Pretty simple why I don’t comment on the more “complicated” tutorials, Matthew…because they are good. They speak for themselves. Not seeing me is…what….in your small little mind? A sign of what exactly?

    I’m glad you are my #1 fan. I hope you learn something about having a critical eye to fx’s that work than those that don’t. I like your obsession with me. But, rest assured, your stalking adoration does not mean that I don’t find you a repugnant little troll. As I have said in other post threads in which you have commented on my critiques….let’s have it out. When you find a tutorial in which I have commented negatively and you don’t agree….feel free to reply intellectually and challenge my findings on a factual basis. Show me where I am wrong in my critique.

    I promise I will shred you.

    • Jonathan B says:

      Lol Billy, I’m your number 2 secret fan, I’ve read all your comments and lurked for ages, but I actually read your comments as a tutorial in themselves to help me evolve and to take note of things that need work on. For example, your critical responses open up a learning path for me to try to avoid those negative problems in my little projects.

  32. raymond says:

    Great job on the tut!
    I can’t believe some people still complained, this was an awesome job, it was very detailed step-by-step for a large project.
    He covered a lot,
    showed a unique way to plan a project using sketches in PS and bringing them into AE to help guide his project placement & key up his timeline/storyboarding;
    How to make & animate an eye in AE in a way I had never seen done before;
    How to make & animate a human figure;
    How to make & animate a galaxy using AE & PS;
    How to make & animate grass;
    A ton of different ways to use Masking;
    Tons of frame transitions;
    Tons of layering;
    How to use a ton of the functions & settings in AE;
    How to do this to a music track;
    This tut is HUGE being over an hour long, maybe the people complaining can’t grasp it because it makes them mad that their brain is too small and trying to fit too much in so little a space makes their head hurt.

  33. Chris says:

    wow only watched the first 5 min of this and 5 min of my life I wish I could have back. I will give credit to the actual work it is amazing but your tutorial skills very poor couldn’t understand what you where saying cause you just click around and not explain anything. Its like your translating what is in your head the dead air.

    Don’t make any more tuts please just design

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