Blender is a free 3D and 2D animation software to do anime. Darling in the Franxx (By Trigger Studio) anime style along with other top AAA+ production styles, can be accomplished using Blender 3D. How do we work on 2D pencil animation with a 3D software? Here´s the tutorial and setup.
Foreword about 2D animation in Blender
Blender is an open source software free to use for any purpose. The official version is downloaded through the Blender Foundation (click here to download) The latest version is 2.79b (as of March 29, 2018). Download it and install it. This tutorial will be focusing on Blender 2.8.5 (which is still not the official release until October 2018) but we can enjoy many future benefits such as GREASE PENCIL today. This "future official" release can be downloaded now through Graphicall.org. Click here to download it
You will get a folder for Blender 2.8.5 Grease Pencil branch, unzip it and double click BLENDER.EXE. Since you already installed the latest OFFICIAL release (2.79.b) all your libraries, paths and dependencies will be ready and working (minimum requirements a GTX 550 card / CUDA supporting CL 3.3) other models of graphic cards are supported as well, check the list on Blender.org
How do we work on 2D pencil animation with a 3D software?
Proper (entire) workflow will be addressed in next tutorials. This post will lead you to the first basics of Grease Pencil... because the above question is as broad as asking "How do I make an architectural visualization realistic?" -We are going to walk on this step by step... so what we will do is FIRST is configure Blender 2.8.5 for a Grease Pencil proper workflow. But, in a nutshell: we will set our tools and lock our camera view to FRONT view to have an orthographic (iso) view in a 2D plane (in Blender would be Z and X axis). Yes, Z is "up" in Blender. Also, we will learn how to create layers, color palettes and effects for the vector strokes on the screen (drawings).
Let´s configure our workspace:
1. Press and hold "D", then drag your mouse to draw in your 3d view, this will get you into Grease Pencil workspace. (Yes, you can draw or make annotations in 3D space, but more on that on another tutorial).
2.We need to configure our workspace and save it to work in future sessions.
3. On the "T" panel select "Tools". Let´s configure the pencil: Choose any of the pencil presets. Give it a name: Anime pencil. Radius 25, strength 0.6. Strokes>input samples: 0, angle 5º. "Check" post processing settings.
4. Hover the 3d viewport. Press 1 on the numpad. This will set your front view. Press 5. This will set your view on orthographic view (check it is not on perspective).
5. Now, press CTRL+ALT+0 (zero on the numpad) > this will set your current view (front) to your active camera view. You are now looking through your camera. Everything you do will be rendered in this view only.
6. Press "D" and hold while dragging your mouse to make a "draw stroke" on the screen. To erase it press CTRL (in case you´re using the pencil, ctrl does a toggle back and forth from soft eraser). Erase any line.
7. Press "N" Go to Grease Pencil Paper. Choose the color 0.92 for RGB color. Set the opacity to 0.9. Uncheck Display grid (or check it if you´re doing perspective background drawings, if this is the case I recommend setting it to: 220x170). If you don´t want to see the native 3d grid, uncheck it on: Display>grid floor.
8. Change your lens view to 35. Open another window and press shift+f9 for outliner. Press F5 over the lower menu bar, to make it an upper menu. Then Select COLLECTION. Now click select your camera. It´s selected because it´s got a little circle on the camera icon. Go to properties zone. Change the lens to 35, and on "display" of your camera parameters you can choose visual guides by checking: Center, Thirds, Golden triangle A,B to suit your perspective / environment drawing.
9. Draw a simple smile emoji: Circle and 2 eyes. This is just a test drawing. If you need to rotate to your right, press SHIFT+Numpad 6; to your left SHIFT+Numpad 4. Notice the axis in your left lower part of the screen will indicate how you´re oriented.
10. To "zoom" just roll your mouse wheel up/down
11. Add a background PEG image (any image/your studio peg format): Select your camera on your outliner. On your properties zone, go to background image. Check FRONT to have it display on your FRONT ortho view. Select "FIT". If you don´t see it, you may select camera instead of FRONT. Play with the options.
12. Press "0"(zero) on the numpad. This is your camera view, try moving only with zoom and drag (do not orbit on your view while you draw).
13 Press "N" uncheck "lock camera to view" and fit your viewport to the desired size while you´re on camera mode. Once you have the level of zoom and position you want, check "lock camera view" again. This will make sure whatever you do through camera view, will be your real displayed render on the end. Use lock/unlock to see your peg image or your background or whatever you´d like to draw over.
Now all your settings are ready! Let´s save this configuration.
14. Create a new workspace (the text space besides the DRAW sub menu at the top of the screen) Name it something like "Draw 2D. Press the "+" icon. This will create a new automatic workspace.
15. Let´s make sure Blender 2.8.5 grease pencil branch will always start with all these settings in place. File>Save Startup File. Confirm OK to save.
Let´s DRAW!
1. On your outliner select your grease pencil object. Draw something. Now, all of your object properties zone will change to reflect you are working with Grease pencil modifiers and effects. LAYERS represent what you´re doing inside the GP (grease pencil) object. You can have many Layers, create them with the "+" sign. Delete them with "-". You can also Duplicate the layers or merge them down. Right beneath there´s an opacity slider to adjust the level of transparency in the whole layer. Create (or rename the current layer) as "Sketch". So this layer is used to do all our roughs and drafts.
2. If your camera looses its center of focus, go back to object mode (press tab>object mode). Select the grease pencil empty and press "period . " on the numpad to focus selected. Now you can rotate around that object in case you need perspective from camera.
3. I would strongly recommend that in case that you occasionally (accidentally) move your camera on 2D view: the way to reset it back would be: PRESS "1" (front view), check if you´re on Ortho view (if not, press "5" on numpad), and press CTRL+ALT+"0"(zero on the numpad). This will set your current view (front ortho) to be your current camera view. This is how you "reset" your view.
4. To change the color of your strokes, go to MATERIAL properties. There you will have an active palette of colors. On your left side is the STROKE color, and your right side contains the FILL color. You control them using opacity: 0 (zero) means they are not active, 1 means they will be fully rendered. A default palette comes configured and the color coding is: Blue - Use for shadow definition, red is for highlights, gray is for roughs (background) and black is the default. I tend to use a purple blue tinted stroke at 90% opacity. But that depends on your needs.
5. Each layer you create is stored under the GP object. And also each palette is assigned to that object. The layer closer to be represented on camera is the LAST layer. While the layer that is far in the background is the FIRST layer on the list. FAR: First. CLOSE: Last.
6. Press "T" to have your tool panel active (if you don´t already have it) and now select your ANIME PENCIL to start drawing. Draw something. Now, on your T panel switch to Create to check out circle shapes and squares.
7. On the lower part of your 2D workspace there will be a button "colors" this is a quick shortcut to represent the colors you have created on your MATERIAL properties palette.
8. Draw anything on the screen with your pencil tool. To "toggle erase", press and hold CTRL : your pencil will switch mode to soft eraser. If you need to adjust the radius: go to the tool first, adjust the radius to your like, then go back to your pencil tool and then draw and if you want to erase, press CTRL while you drag to erase your pencil, you´ll notice now it has the radius you need.
Manipulate the viewport:
- Shift + Roll mouse wheel up/down(zoom in / out) (XSIMOD: Just roll the mouse wheel)
- Ctrl + Roll the mouse up/down (pans X or -X)
- Click and hold the mouse wheel (Blender Pan function: Shift+Middle Mouse Click hold) XSIMOD theme: Middle press wheel to pan
- Shift + (numpad 4) roll to the left, Shift + (numpad 6) roll to the right (rotate view)
- "1" numpad: Front view, follow and press "5" to make it ortho view. Follow and do a "Ctrl+Alt+Zero(numpad)" and this will reset the camera to current view (Front).
General recommendations:Always name your layers on your layer panel. Then on Material properties (which are to be thought as the COLORING palette) create the materials inheriting the LAYER name. For example: If you´re doing a HAIR layer, your colors for that layer should be HairSH (for shadow), or HairHL (for highlights), or HairBC (base color). This is a necessary discipline for your animation work is always in collaboration with other team members. Remember: your layers closer to the camera are the ones far down your list. While your far away from camera layers are the ones that are listed first. Blender reads last layer: newer: recent: closer to the camera.
Each grease pencil object stores its own set of layers and color palettes. So you could have environments on one Grease pencil object and you could have a main character on another Grease Pencil object with their own palettes and layers as well.
9. Check your "X" lock axis. This way you will only draw on 2D view on X axis. Because sometimes it can happen our canvas may move just a little and strokes and paint are placed far into "depth space". This lock axis will make sure you draw on your X plane. If you happen to be drawing and you don´t see anything is because the camera moved and now you´re drawing into depth. If this is the DESIRED action, uncheck lock X axis, set it to NONE.
10. While you draw some of your strokes could be misaligned to another plane (far, back, twisted) from your GP object. In such case you should enter EDIT mode (press tab) and select those strokes. Then go to Grease Pencil menu on the lower MAIN BAR and Transform>Reproject Strokes>Choose Axis/Planar/Projection (this function will Blender 2.8.5 experimental crash immediately, but this function works perfectly on Blender 2.7.9b official release). So I would recommend to have a little patience and let´s wait for full release on October 2018 along with other *many* nice surprises, presets, and effects.
Let´s animate
First, let´s configure our workspace to do animation. Then we will doodle some strokes to check where our tools and settings are. Once we get comfortable with those, we will go ahead and animate something.
1. Open a new window on your lower part of the screen by dragging the dented corner: up. This will divide the screen. Now on the icon of the timeline, press and select DOPE SHEET. This is the space that contains the sub menu "Grease Pencil" keyframe timeline.
2. Draw your first key frame. Then go to the "T"ool bar and select "animation". There, you have your basic create blank keyframe button and also create a new blank keyframe. The way you work with this is you first draw your key pose: this will automatically be setup as a keyframe on your GP keyframe dope sheet. Each element animated can be in it´s own layer. This is how you can animate many layers independently, or all of the elements in a layer directly on the same layer (though this will populate your animation with too many mixed elements and it´s not recommended). Next you move to another desired keyframe number and start a new drawing clicking NEW BLANK KEYFRAME or by duplicating the active frame. If you choose the latest then you need to erase and re-draw the part you´re interested in moving.
Click on this picture to view a short video on how to animate a hair strand
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3. Use onion skin and configure 10 or 12 frames past and future. Just mark onion skin from the MAIN menu area (underneath your 2d workspace) or from the GP object property zone by checking the box "onion skin".
Animation workflow notes:
Plan your animation breakdown first by doodling objects and shapes general forms. Don´t try to draw it all at once (unless of course you are a professional animator). When you plan your animation place your STILL objects in different layers than the MOVING objects. For example if you´re going to do a character´s face reading a book and blinking: The face, body and book could go into one layer (as they are in a still position) and the eyes, could be drawn in another layer. And so, you can lock your background still layer (body, face, book) and only concentrate in making key frames for your eyes on another layer.
I would strongly recommend you check out blender cloud open source project: HERO which is made with the amazing Grease Pencil tools described in this tutorial and also on the video to follow. (Click on the image to go to Blender Cloud)
URL Credits for this post: IMDB Wikipedia
Now that you´ve setup your workspace and you´re better familiarized with the user interface and where to look for your settings let´s check the video tutorial covering these and other useful factors when doing 2D animation in Blender. And if this posts gets 200 shares I will release all the grease pencil files you see on this tutorial (yes, even the mecha). Enjoy!
In case you can´t wait for the 200 shares, you can practice with the file downloading it now, from Gumroad:
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