My First 3D Animation
Understanding the Viewports:
I hope you have tried getting the answer to the problem given in the previous module.
If you haven’t then please try it. Here is the problem again.
Problem: -
If an object has a circular outline when seen from the top, a square outline when seen from the front and a triangular outline from the side, what is the actual form of the object?
Check out the answer here: Visual_View
Download: Visual Exercise
If you can visualize the problem as the intersection of the 3 shapes i.e. the square, circle and triangle extruded along the 3 axes, you will get an object that looks like this.
It was not that easy to visualize, was it?
This is not the only solution though. So you may have come out with an object which looks different, but still is correct.
You can download this and a second solution for the problem and study it in your software. Download: Other Solution
See how different they look in the perspective viewport and the other 3.
Other solution:
This will make you hopefully appreciate that -
- Sometimes, while creating 3D objects, you may find it easier to visualize what you are doing in the perspective viewport and others in the appropriate orthographic viewport.
- Since shapes do not become smaller as they are further away from the viewer, the orthographic view is good for creating and modifying objects which are of a specific size that you desire.
- It is easier to get a feel of what is near and what is further away from you when working in the perspective view and you get a better feel of what the object would look like in the real world.
Navigating in the Viewports:
You will obviously want to move around in the viewports, see your scene from different angles and magnifications to create, modify and animate it. So before starting with animation it will be extremely helpful to understand how to do this. All software will allow some easy methods of doing functions, using icons and shortkeys, like pan and zoom in all the viewports and in addition, rotate or orbit around the object or scene in the perspective viewport.
Check this video to understand this better.
Video - Navigation in viewports
Find out from your software help about the icons and shortkeys for navigation in the viewports. Practice this well. Now that you are familiar with the software interface and navigation in the viewports, you are ready for the first step in animating using it - Creating objects.