Role Summary
A Animator plays a supportive role in bringing characters to life, adding personality and flair in line with the project's vision. Entrusted with crafting animations, they are responsible for animating characters and cameras in both stylized and realistic aesthetics, using motion capture data, keyframe, and facial animations.
They collaborate closely with a team of designers, coders, technical animators, and other professionals, contributing to the game development process. In essence, a animator supports the realization of the game's design and creative vision, contributing to the visual and animated elements of the game.
Requirements
Awareness of the 12 Principles of Animation (Squash and Stretch, Anticipation, Staging, Straight Ahead Action and Pose to Pose, Follow Through and Overlapping Action, Slow In and Slow Out, Arc, Secondary Action, Timing, Exaggeration, Solid Drawing, Appeal) and foundational elements, such as body mechanics, timing, and spacing.
Animator has a basic understanding of keyframe and motion capture techniques, essential for natural and dynamic animations.
An understanding of fundamental game mechanics, including character movement. This includes knowledge of basic actions like walking and running, as well as maneuvers such as climbing and interacting with objects.
An awareness of the physics involved in movement, including gravity and collision detection is also desirable.
Animator recognizes industry-standard animation tools, including Autodesk Maya and Motion Builder.
Keeps up to date with the latest industry trends in animation, though not necessarily an expert.
A foundational understanding of techniques used in game visual effects, such as texture mapping, lighting and shading and motion graphics.
A basic understanding of implementation of animation into a game engine.
Tools Used
Most Used:
Autodesk Maya
MotionBuilder
Good to Know:
Nuke
After Effects
Unreal Engine 5 and Niagara
Cartoon Animator 4
3DS Max
Xsens
Toon Boon Harmony or Animate CC
Jira or Trello
Slack or Microsoft Teams