LITTLE SUGGESTION FOR THOSE USING HEAD TURN BEHAVIORS I'd try including a "(mouth)" For each mouth layer. That way you can easily find the right mouth in rig mode in case you need to use each mouth as a trigger. Example call the "R" Layer "R (mouth)". By doing this you can find mouths more efficiently in the search bar in rig mode,
Just writing to say that I love your videos and, most of all, THANK YOU! Your work and tutorials inspired and guided me on my journey to create a youtube channel. In your tutorials, I learned how to create a host Avatar in character animator, record audio in Audition, and put all together and develop my videos in After effects... And now it is a reality!!! My "Cruising the world with Horton Novak" RU-vid Channel is live, and I believe it is the first Cruising and travel channel that features an animated character as a host (with English and Portuguese channel versions) ... and it definitely wouldn't be possible without your amazing tutorials, and love and dedication to Character Animator and the Adobe suite! Thank you so much, and keep up with the great work! 😉
I have no idea what I”m doing wrong! I’ve got the swap set going. Lip sync with Mouth activated is fine. When I trigger AltMouth, it shows the entire stack of mouth shapes with no lip sync happening. AltMouth is tagged as a mouth, I’m using the mouth sets from your website, I’m so lost! And this is the one shot in my current project that the change between mouths needs to happen on screen, otherwise I would make a happy mouth puppet and sad mouth puppet separate and go that way…
Strange. If you're seeing all the mouths, that usually means the Lip Sync isn't recognizing it as a mouth...but if you have it tagged, I'm not sure what's up. If you post a screenshot of rig mode or your File > Export > Puppet to adobe.com/go/chfeedback we can take a closer look and try to help out.
@@okaysamurai Follow up: someone in the unofficial Facebook group had the answer. The Talking group that had the two mouth groups inside of it was tagged as a mouth as well. Turned that off, make sure the two mouth groups are tagged as mouths, good to go! My "Star Wars Prequel Trilogy Behind the Scenes" animation is out tomorrow!
@@theseanwardshow I was looking forward that this comment will help me, but no. Still same issue. :( it shows the entire stack of mouth shapes with no lip sync happening.
Each set needs to be tagged as a mouth to work. I using call the parent group "talking" or "talkcontents" or something so it also doesn't get tagged as a mouth (which can lead to issues).
Perfect!!! I finally found the video with what I asked in the video you suggested. Thanks bro. May you make more of those psd files like the mouth. That's awesome
YES!!!!! I asked for some help with this on the CA feedback. Probably just a coincidence but THANK YOUUUU! Great tip about the top teeth... I have some work to do :) Thanks again - absolutely love this channel
Dear Dave. Thank you so much for all your work. I am finding the way to use Compute Lip Sync with different mouth sets. The first take of computing will take my default (currently turned on) mouth set. Do I actually need to do another take of computing then blend them in with the first? Million thanks!
Nope, the good news is you just need to do one compute lip sync, and then the mouth set is determined by triggers - no need to add any extra takes, you just need to trigger the mouth set you want at any time and it will use the same viseme data from the one lip sync take.
Quick question... How tight/sccurate should we expect our lip-sync to be, and how can we make it better? You'rs seem to be really good... are you only using the lip-sync or are you going back in afterwords to touch it up? Is it worth getting a better microphone? Speaking more clearly? A better camera than the default webcam? My guy just seems either laggy, or like he's just not as fluid as your guys seem to be. And THANK you SOOO much... youre vids are exactly what us beginners need.
So I'm using a USB condenser mic and play around with my OS input settings to get a nice, loud, clear signal. Microphone quality definitely helps in this department, as does OS horsepower. Also tweaking the preferences I show at 9:10 can make the mouths slower/faster to appear.
@@okaysamurai I did a few tweaks as you suggested, (found that stuff at the 9 minute mark, and it for sure helped) but it does look like doing a few final tweaks with the Visemes(sp?) made the last bit of difference!! Just looking for that Magic worry-free-less-is-more workflow!! Thanks so much!!
Ah yes I should have said I do tweak everything I record. And if you have a script, even better: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-pOBM098PiAw.html
Thanks a lot for this tutorials ! respect. Why we need to use the panel to move an objects inside the sceen ? For exemple we need to manupulate the Y.and Z value to move the objects why its not like affter effects for exemple just grab the object and move it around ! Just to improve the CH . Thanks again
@@okaysamurai I love the illustration. I’ve got ideas cooking in my mind to use him for some internal videos. Can’t wait to hear about the new features.
Hi Dave! This is great. I'm wanting to trigger extra custom mouths beyond "smile" and "excited". So would the best way be to have all my special expression mouths in their own set? and trigger from there, I guess? Also, is there a way to have "Smile" only as a trigger, not from camera input? Thanks!
Yeah - check out Tull the Cat from the app homepage, who is a great example of how to have multiple mouths to trigger from. If you want smile to be trigger only, just remove the smile tag from it!
There is not any current morphing capability. But you can add cycle layers to any mouth shape like I show here, but you can also make them go forward and backwards to make everything less jumpy and more smooth. Take a look at the mouths of Stardust the unicorn on the app home screen example puppets to see this in action.
Great work Dave! Amazing videos thank you so much 💜💜 I just wanna ask why the mouth suddenly stoped moving !! 😭 Please Is their any tutorials about setting up the mouth regging step by step?
Hard to diagnose here - if it persists, please post a screenshot, video, or File > Export > Puppet (.puppet file) to adobe.com/go/chfeedback for more direct help.
Hi, anytime I say "Aa" the character making the "Oh" mouth. When I say Oh, I notice it does the Aa mouth and then an Oh mouth. Do you have any idea why that is and how I can fix it? I've been trying to figure this out all day :/ pls and thanks
If that keeps happening I guess you could always switch the tags and have Aa as Oh artwork and vice-versa. And/or you can always fix them in post recording. For me if I say "Avacado" I clearly see the Ah at the beginning and "Soda" I see the Oh. If the problem persists, please upload a video or screenshot of your issue to adobe.com/go/chfeedback and we'll try to help you out.
Hi again! Was wondering if you have a video or know or a way to switch the triggers for eg. “Sad” set after the lip-sync has been created from a separate audio file. Is there a way to trigger post lip-sync or would I just need to edit the visemes separately?
Yes, the visemes are completely independent of any mouth triggers. So if you add Sad later, that's totally fine - the visemes will stay the same and the sad mouths will just get swapped in instead.
So much info here that others make courses about! I love this video and the way you explain things. Is there a difference between importing the character from AI or Ph? Like will the character be vector if I use AI and pixles if I use Ph?
There is an option with AI to "Render as vector" inside CH - but it can come at the expense of some AI specific issues. So honestly I don't think it's that big of a deal - use whatever you feel comfortable in.
Sometimes I trigger my eyebrows with replays / button presses instead. Check out Willy on okaysamurai.com/puppets and watch the video in his description, that will teach you how to do it.
You'll need to put them all inside a Head group. Check out the example puppets for the optimal way of setting your characters up, or pages.adobe.com/character/en/resources has some templates you can check out.
Thank you so much! This explanation helped so a lot! We're experimenting with lip syncing to classical opera singing - it is the most hilarious things. :D It really has a special kind of comedy to it so we want to explore it more. One question: I noticed that some mouths I was looking at have more than one layer for the Uh or for the W-Ooh, sometimes even 3. If you would custom make your own mouth - what do they do and how do you set them up and link them correctly? I assume they are for a bit of vibrato? or the loudness?
Ha opera, that's awesome. So check out ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-sc9S65Zn9XQ.html where I talk about these mouths and the cycle layers behavior - basically if you're making them on your own I'd say just make the jaw drop for 2 frames for Aa and Uh, and a hole that gets smaller for W-Oo. The example mouths on pages.adobe.com/character/en/resources should be set up this way already!
@@okaysamurai Thanks so much, now I also understand how you layer/number them! The mouth sheet was also helpful! We already ran tests with the standard mouth pack a couple of weeks ago and it was hilarious and worked quite well. Your tutorials are super helpful, I already learned a ton!
3 года назад
Man, you are my best partner while I’m currently building a cartoon show. Can you please create a tutorial for creating emotions using different types of eyes, eyebrows and mouths? It would mean the world to me. Great video! ✋😎
How to show more emotions is a good idea for a future tutorial. For now I think the advanced rigging videos about Willy and Sirr - both linked in the character descriptions at okaysamurai.com/puppets - show the best tricks to get more expressive emotions.
Hi, I have issue with my puppet. Lip movement is choppy. All the lips vanish for a second as there is no mouth on face. Kind of skipping... Please help, where I am wrong?
This usually means you are missing a mouth or have something tagged incorrectly. If the problem persists, please upload a screenshot, video, or your File > Export > Puppet file to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
Hi :) 2 question about this subject: 1. I speak Spanish, and is kind of different in terms of visemes... Do you have any advice for lip-sync in other languages? And 2. I did the 14 mouth as explained here, but for some reason my animation only gets 3 or 4 when I'm speaking... smile, neutral, ooh and Ee... the rest is kind of a no show. Is there a parameter where I can control how sensitive should the change be to how we see on camera? (Sorry the bad English)
1. The lip sync should work for most languages, as it is listening for 80+ different sounds - not English specific - to create the visemes. 2. Check the preferences at 9:20 and turn viseme detection all the way up. You may also want to play around with your OS volume settings to make sure you are getting a loud, clear signal. If the problem persists, please upload a screenshot or video to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
I don't think I have a tutorial about this, but I would either a) include a cigarette as part of each mouth shape layer, or b) make a separate independent layer, tag it as jaw and use the nutcracker jaw behavior to move it up and down. If you need help let us know at adobe.com/go/chfeedback!
Yes, you don't need a camera for lip sync, just a microphone. You can't do it directly in After Effects but you can dynamic link any Character Animator project into AE or PR to get it with transparency.
Ok, love your videos. You always give clear instructions and useful information. But I'm having a challenge. I've got several mouth sets, including Angry, Sad etc. in a head turning puppet. I've set it up so that there are alt mouths in all three views. In rig mode, the Rigging Issues panel flags these alt mouths with the issue Handle tagged as mouth is not being used by any behaviors. Then, the alt mouths I tagged as Surprised and Smile are flagged for Layer tagged as Surprised (or Smile) is not being used by any behaviors. I've no clue what I did wrong.
If it's working as expected, I would ignore those warnings. Basically the main behaviors like Lip Sync and Face look for the first instance of anything - mouth, eyes, eyebrows, etc - and ignore anything else. Head Turner should theoretically allow you to bypass those warnings if the heads are each tagged correctly, but with lots of extra mouths it's possible some things slip through. If things aren't working, please upload a screenshot, video, or your File > Export > Puppet file to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
Few basic things were missing here for me, how do I open the streamer mode in Character creator? i opened my character there as a new project, but the camera view isn't there/.
There isn't a direct stream option from the Puppet Maker feature, if that's what you're referring to. I talk about streaming more here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-0Va3_e-4bKE.htmlsi=oQV44Gn9MBHce-m8
Is there a way to disable mouth movements when using the camera to record Face for eyes, eyebrows, and head movements? I find that even with me not moving my mouth it will put random mouth movements in the recording. I know how to edit the Lip Sync that's created from the audio, but these mouth movements seem to be encapsulated within the Face Camera Input take and they make the lip sync look like it's not working correctly.
This only happens if the character has smile or surprised mouths that show up if the camera detects you making either of those shapes. Most puppets don't have these, and if they do, you can untag them in Rig mode to remove the effect.
Have a question about triggers for mouths. I set up a swap set where "mouth 1" has all the visemes and "mouth 2" is a surprised expression. When I trigger the surprised expression it seems to be overridden - and switched back to visemes - if there's are competing visemes (ie, if the character says anything). I am trying to make it so the trigger determines the action. Any advice?
Usually this means the mouth isn't properly swapping off in a swap set. Check out Tull the Cat from the home screen, he has some single use mouths. I believe I had the mouth group, and alt mouth group, and then several single use expressions, and put them all into a swap set. If it persists, please post a screenshot, video, or File > Export > Puppet (.puppet file) to adobe.com/go/chfeedback for more help.
Is there a way to import lip sync keyframes FROM After Effects to Character Animator? For instance, if I want to use all the tools in CA, but I want to keep the AE lip sync workflow I currently use?
Hmmm, not that I'm aware of currently. There's probably some convoluted way to do it like export a PNG sequence from AE and import it into a PSD file, but I'm guessing that's more trouble than it's worth.
I noticed that the documentation has a mouth labelled Ah instead of Aa; the latter is in the mouth set. Can either notation work for the puppet in the AI file?
If this is happening, the triggered swap set is probably not set up correctly. Take a close look at an example character like Chloe and make sure your setup and tags are exactly like hers, especially in the "layers and replays" section below the triggers panel. If the problem persists, please upload a screenshot, video, or your File > Export > Puppet file to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
This is a soon-to-be-released character called Watts from adobe.com/go/ch_puppetmaker. If you want to download the beta he's available there, or wait until it comes out in the main shipping product!
Are you seeing a green bar under the webcam? If not, the mic icon is either off or not working...check out your CH audio preferences like I show in this video or system preferences. This might help too: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-G9DkEIYJ2lo.htmlsi=YK4lqVOr1_H9Su9o&t=93
Need new tutorial about how to move more than one thing Like moving some flies or bees simultaneously and makes it comes in&out of the scene. By the way great video as usual ❤️
Im having some issues with the Aa mouth. It's the only image that doesn't appear when saying Ah, it sometimes shows up when I say Aye? Not sure what the problem is. Every time I say Ah it shows up as Uh image. I made sure to check the rig and tick the Aa for the right image but it doesn't display. Is there a place in my adobe cloud where I can get some support with this? Thank you.
Sure, if the problem persists, please upload a screenshot, video, or your File > Export > Puppet file to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look. Aa and Uh can look very similar in many mouths; I would do something drastic like give Aa a green tongue or something and be 100% sure it's not showing up.
@@okaysamurai Hello again sorry to bother but is there any way to submit a ticket directly to adobe for help. Not really having success with my question on the public forum. Thanks!
@@okaysamurai I was able to find a workaround by changing the Lip Sync version from 3.4 (current) to 2.1 under preferences. It works for now but may be something to look into. Not sure if this is an isolated issue I'm dealing with or of it has something to do with the program. Again, thanks for directing me to the forum.
Sir, I imported my characters into rig section and began to rig them, but as soon as i go to the record section, it comes as a blank-transparent page. I can't see my character. Please help me.
Select a puppet in the project panel and click the new scene button below. If it's still not showing in the scene, most likely a trigger or behavior is causing it to disappear. If it persists, please post a screenshot, video, or File > Export > Puppet (.puppet file) to adobe.com/go/chfeedback for more help.
please provide the option to add our own mouth shapes and are recognised. For example Sh and B are not available as an option. If I create 15-20 visemes, when I open in Character Animator the extra ones get ignored.
Custom visemes has been a major user request for a while. I agree, it would be great. Currently you can manually set up individual shapes via triggers, but it's a tedious process. Hopefully we can tackle this in the near future.
I would keep it one layer, but stylized female lips usually have more of the upper and/or lower lip showing. Same technique shown here, just modified artwork. Check out some of the female examples on adobe.com/go/chexamples for some more ideas.
Hey Dave I was wondering if you have any tips on how to animate someone riding a horse or a motorcycle in character animator? Can this be done in character animator?
I would make the character and the bike/horse all part of the same puppet. For the motorcycle, I'd use keyframes to rotate the wheels around. For the horse, I'd use the 4-legged hack mentioned at the end of the Walking tutorial (ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-gv_2Upvtm-M.html ).
There isn't any native lip sync system in After Effects. In Character Animator it's a core component because of the character focus! So personally I would always use CH for lip sync, even if it's just a mouth you're then importing into AE!
Hmmm, maybe because there isn't anything tagged as a jaw? But I was under the impression the jaw movement parameter was always on under lip sync. If it persists, please post a screenshot, video, or File > Export > Puppet (.puppet file) to adobe.com/go/chfeedback for more direct help.
I am using Character Animator 2020 but can't find the 'cycle layers' menu as shown in this tutorial (12:36). Just wondering, is it only available in the 2021 version? Thank you!
Cycle Layers was in 2020 as well. Make sure you are in "Rig" mode and the selected layer or group has the cycle layers behavior attached to it (as shown at 11:30).
Make sure all your mouths are in your Mouth group and tagged properly. The main reason you would be seeing the neutral mouth is it isn't being recognized as a neutral mouth so it doesn't swap. If the problem persists, please upload a video or screenshot of your issue to adobe.com/go/chfeedback and we'll try to help you out.
I'm a bit stuck with my file. It's not picking up more than 3 of my mouth shapes and I'm not sure why. There's a 1 by all of them too to show me that they're connected. All I did was edit the default mouths by resizing and recoloring them. Was wondering what the fix could be for this issue I'm having? Thanks so much, and I appreciate the tutorials!!
If you're only seeing three, and it's the smile / surprised / neutral mouths only, then that means lip sync isn't working, it's only picking up the webcam/silent mouths. If not, or if the problem persists, please upload a screenshot, video, or your File > Export > Puppet file to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
Neutral, smile, and surprised are webcam mouths and will only show up when nothing is being said, depending on your mouth shape. The others will show up when audio is heard and try to add the matching mouth shape. Personally I have stopped adding smile and surprised to my puppets and only have neutral so I don't have smile or surprise pop up unexpectedly.
@@okaysamurai thanks for the answer. about magnets. I want my hand to grab Bongo's puppet, but the gorilla doesn't move. although Chloe's puppet and other items can be grabbed. I want to create a scene where one gorilla grabs another gorilla. I created the behavior of the magnets in the puppet, in the group, put the magnet, dynamics, collision. but the gorilla is not magnetic. although the hand works and grabs other objects besides the gorilla. Please give advice. Thank you!
Magnets can be tricky and I know they don't work in all situations. If the problem persists, please upload a screenshot, video, or your File > Export > Puppet file to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
My Illustrator puppet has frame by frame mouth sets (ah, uh, etc) but in Character Animator rig mode they just have a single layer show up. One of two, or one of three. Not sure why or how to fix. Do you? Thanks.
Try giving each layer a custom name in Illustrator. Sometimes Illustrator artwork with default names will revert to a single layer to simplify things, but if you call them something like 1, 2, 3 then it should import as expected. Then just add the cycle layers behavior and you're good to go!
My two puppets are smiling when neutral is what I would expect. I have neutral at the top of the mouth visemes and with the "eye" on neutral and no other viseme. It seems set up correctly. Any suggestions to help with this? Thank you Dave.
Sad mouth too, shows up not neutral but rather as sad smile. I eliminated the mouth trigger and reloaded it and still smiles. Even with camera off and puppet deactivated. Odd.
Well, I figured at least how to end the smiling. I had had Face (Head) Camera Input with trigger on. And eliminated that completely. All working. I'm smiling now. Thanks for enduring this.
Glad you figured it out! Yeah the mouth can be tricky. Personally I have stopped adding smile or surprised mouths to my characters as they can accidentally get triggered by the webcam - better to make them trigger keys instead.
It's possible you are only triggering the webcam based mouths like neutral, smile, and surprised, which would mean your audio is too low or off. These preferences may need to be reset or tweaked too: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-sc9S65Zn9XQ.html. If the problem persists, please upload a screenshot or video to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
Hey Sensei its me again lol, so I did the mouths and I am happy but now I just noticed that the mouth is not moving with the head, its stuck talking on one place and it is kinda weird, how do I fix this..?
It's probably an independence issue, try turning the crown on/off on the mouth and see if that helps. If the problem persists, please upload a screenshot, video, or your File > Export > Puppet file to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
I'm making a character that I want the neutral state of the mouth to be open. But when this is the case, certain words, especially the ones that start with a lips-closed consonant like B or P, don't look right, since the mouth goes right from the neutral open state to the first vowel sound of the word. I know the M mouth is supposed to cover P and B sounds but it doesn't seem to be doing that effectively, even in the middle of a word.
I have only ever done mouths with closed neutral states, but sometimes I'll add a wide open neutral swapset trigger like an open "yell" or "surprised" or something (I think the example character Tull the Cat does this). If you do the cycle layers frame by frame trick I show here for the Aa mouth, you could maybe have the neutral slightly grow or shrink to make the transition smoother. I think with lip sync mouths it's always a trial and error process - make adjustments, see how it looks in CH, fix issues, try again, etc. As for the M not showing up for B and P sounds, if it's recorded you can of course fix those later, but if you're noticing another viseme taking over most of the time, you may want to play around with the lip sync preferences to be more responsive. If you're still running into issues, please let us know at adobe.com/go/chfeedback and we'll take a closer look.
@@okaysamurai Hey thanks for the feedback. I really like your videos with how clear and informative they have been in my learning process. I'm building an avatar that I want to use for live streaming on Twitch, so I can't exactly go back and fix a recording. Out of curiosity does the lip sync work purely by the audio input, or does it also take into consideration the mouth tracking on the video input as well (or some combination of the two)? If it's just the audio input then I would imagine it would be very difficult to have it detect if a word starts with B or P since they're voiceless phonemes. Either way I'm still happy with my results over all. One other thing I notice is if I whistle the lip sync will typically land on "Oh" where "W-Oo" might be more appropriate. Anyway, thanks a lot appreciate the help!
Ah yeah, if it's live then you're 100% right. The non silent visemes (anything except neutral, smile, and surprised) are only triggered by audio, nothing from the webcam. If things still look bad go ahead and post a video on the forums and we can try to give tips!
A flashing mouth probably means there are invisible or empty tagged layers showing. I would double-check that all your mouths are visible as tagged as expected, and compare them to a simple sample character like Chad from the homescreen. If it persists, please post a screenshot, video, or File > Export > Puppet (.puppet file) to adobe.com/go/chfeedback for more direct help.
Hi, I have created a new character which I deleted the mouth by following your example. I edited Zoey in AI and saved as Zoey2. When I import the character in my project the mouth moves independedly despite the fact that I have used the handler - pin tool. Any ideas?
Sorry, I repeated the process and everything work great! We are looking forward the full body interaction. When do you believe this update will be released?
can someone tell me how to put mouth handles? my character wont open his mouth unless I speak in the face behavior the handles for mouth is 1 and I cant add more
A standard character should only have a 1 next to mouth, and then a 1 next to every mouth shape you've included inside that Mouth group in your puppet. The mouth neutral will show up if you say nothing, and smile or surprised will show up if your mouth makes those shapes. Otherwise the lip sync mouths will show up when audio is heard. If the problem persists, please upload a screenshot, video, or your File > Export > Puppet file to the official forums at adobe.com/go/chfeedback so we can take a closer look.
Same as PS - Make a +Left Eye and +Right Eye group, and put the eyeball, pupil, and blink states inside each one. More info in this video! ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-5SxNChhm0jo.html
when i export my scene the head turn i have in place does not register in the final export but the playback in character animator has the turn. any suggestions?
It depends if they were made in Illustrator or Photoshop. When you select it in the project panel, you'll see a little PS or AI icon at the bottom indicating what type it is. But yes, you can always access the original artwork file.
I talk a little bit about how I deal with mouths and turning heads in the head turn and parralax video: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-g1wbw6-7zM4.html
