Transcripts
1. Trailer: Animating over
video is real fun. It infuses your imagination
into live footage, creating delightful
interactions, and giving a unique personal
touch to every frame. Do you want to rediscover
your city with new eyes while exploring the features of
procreate dreams? I'm Giulia, a
professional animator, film director, and storyteller. In this class, we'll embark
on a creative journey to turn ordinary city scenes
into animated masterpieces. Get ready to explore your city, capture its essence, and bring it to life through
quirky animations. This class will provide
you resources and tips for different types
of animation on video. I'll be using Procreate
Dreams on my iPad. Anyway, keep in mind
that the skills I'm teaching you
can be applied to other animation tools
as well. if you are a creative who wants to dive into the new Procreate
Dreams app with me, and at the same time go on a mission downtown and make
some animated postcards, then this class is for you. I'm looking forward to
seeing you in class.
2. Animating on Video: Welcome to the class
where we'll go on a mission to animate the
charm of your local cityscape Using procreate dreams. During this class, after an
introduction and a brief, we'll go outside to
gather material. Then we'll be back
in our workspace to animate and work
with what we found. Get ready to rediscover
your city and create three animated postcards
that capture its essence. Today we're diving
into the concept of creating animations
over video. A technique that merges real footage with
your creativity, adding a personal touch of
magic to everyday scenes. You'll be amazed to see how this technique is used
in various contexts, from social media
posts to commercials to bring scenes to life. By the end of this class, you'll have three
beautiful clips ready to share with friends, family, and even clients. During this class, I will be
using Procreate Dreams and my iPad to demonstrate
the animation techniques. But I want to reiterate that
the skills that I'm showing you can be applied to other
animation tools as well. Good, let's get started!
To kick things off, I've created a
Pinterest board filled with inspiring examples that showcase the power of animation
in real-world settings. You can find the link to the
board in the resources and follow along. As you
browse through the board You will notice that the key
to impactful animation on video lies in its ability to interact with
the surroundings. You can let your
animation flow under a bridge or sitting on
top of a skyscraper. The possibilities are endless. Additionally, incorporating
elements from the fantasy world into real-life scenes can add
an extra layer of charm. Imagine a tentacle monster emerging from the
windows of a building. Or colorful creatures
jumping on the clouds. In this example, we can see how the artist added musical
instrument to this group of statues and turn them into
a band. I love this one! Most of those
examples are static, But keep in mind we will
be working with video to make the animation even
more interactive and fun. We can see how the colors we
pick for the animation are important as they
need to pop and be visible on top
of the footage. You can notice the color
palettes are usually quite minimal and the color
white is very often used. I don't know about
you, but for me, just browsing through
those examples gives me a lot of ideas. Now that we've explored
some inspiring examples, it's time to start brainstorming some concepts for our
own city animations. Let's get those creative
juices flowing as we envision the unique stories we want to tell through
our animated postcards.
3. Brief & Brainstorm: This is the time to start thinking about your
class project. In this lesson, we will
prepare to go on a mission to capture the essence of our cities through
animated postcards. Get ready to explore
your surroundings with fresh eyes and envision the stories you want to
tell through animation. As we begin, take
a moment to gather inspiration and brainstorm ideas for your collection of
animated postcards. This is also an
opportunity to look at your own city with new eyes and rediscover the
most special corners. Think about the
unique aspects of your city that you
would like to showcase. Whether it's iconic landmarks, hidden gems, or quirky details, let your imagination run wild. For example, I've been
living in Zurich, Switzerland for
several years now. There are a few
features of the city that I find particularly
intriguing. The beautiful lake and
river, for instance, are a constant source
of inspiration for me, and I cannot wait to incorporate them into
one of my postcards. Additionally, the charming
trams that crisscross the city center offer great possibilities for
interaction with animation. Last but not least, I think
that a big skyscraper is the perfect location for a scene straight out of
a blockbuster movie - If you know what I mean.
remember to focus on the interesting or
quirky aspects of your surroundings that
make your city unique. Whether it's the
vibrant street art, busy markets, or
scenic viewpoints. I'm sure there is a lot of
inspiration to be found. Maybe you are going to focus on buildings or maybe
on small details. Maybe it's the view from
your favorite cafe. I cannot wait to discover your
cities through your eyes. Now that we have
brainstormed our ideas, it's time to plan our mission. Make a to-do list of
the shots you want to capture and decide on the
format of your videos. Will you be shooting them
horizontally or vertically? Consider the platform
where you will be sharing your postcards
to guide your decision. I will make mine
vertical so that I will be able to share
them on social media. Before you head out
on your mission, make sure to have all
the essentials packed. Your phone or iPad should
be charged and ready to go. And consider bringing a
tripod for stability, I will bring this
gorilla tripod with me. Don't forget to stay
hydrated and bring along any notes or references you
may need for your shoot. With your mission briefing complete and your gear in hand, it's time to hit the streets and bring your city to
life through animation. Let's go capture some magic!
4. On a Mission!: Let's go! follow me
in my mission. Today I'm going to take
a tram and then I'm going to walk
around the city center. If you have the possibility to record in 4K
with your phone, consider this option, as it will allow you later
to do zoom-ins. Today is a beautiful sunny day, It's a perfect day
for this mission. It's important to
keep an eye out for interesting scenes
and moments that will make our postcards truly
special. Variety is key. Let's aim to capture
a diverse range of scenes to ensure we have plenty
of material to work with. Remember, it's better to have more material than too little. Don't hesitate to take a couple of extra shots here and there. Don't be afraid to improvise
ideas on the spot. Sometimes the most
magical moments happen when we
least expect them. It's important to
find inspiration and make the most out of
our surroundings. Keep your eyes peeled and your creativity flowing as we
explore the city together. Now as our mission
draws to a close, I think we capture enough
material to work with. Let's add back to base and bring our animated postcards to life!
5. Digital Gathering : Now that we're back
in our workspace, it's time to roll
up our sleeves and start organizing our
collected footage. The first step is
to watch through all our footage
and if necessary, rename the files for
easier identification. Sometimes, especially when
I have a lot of material, I like to create folders to keep everything neat and tidy. In my case, I've
selected a few clips that I think can capture
the essence of my city. Let me show you what I got. I have a charming scene of the river with a
boat gliding along, which I think will be perfect for a cool animated interaction. I also have another version of the same video without the boat, just in case the
interaction with the boat is going to
be too complicated. Then there are two shots
of the tram passing by, which I find particularly
captivating. Finally, there is a shot
of a tall skyscraper. Now it's your turn to
select your three clips and start envisioning the type of action you want to
animate on them. Let your creativity run
wild as you imagine the possibilities for bringing your city to life
through animation. If it helps you, you
can sketch on paper or digitally your ideas or write down a list of
possible actions. Now, a quick note on color. When considering colors
for your animations, think about your brand colors, if you have them, and how colors can complement the footage you're working
with. A minimal palette, with a pop of color can
help your animation stand out, while maintaining
visual cohesion. Picking the same
two or three colors for the whole collection of three animated postcards will also help making
them look cohesive.
6. Stabilizing a Shaky Shot: In Procreate Dreams,
we have the option to trim our videos directly
within the software. There is no need to worry about editing the videos beforehand. You can simply select the
clips that you want to use for your animated postcards
and we're ready to dive in. But before we do, let me add a note about stabilizing
the footage. I told you earlier to bring a tripod along to get
nice, stable videos. I did the same. When I
was on the road, though. I realized sometimes
it was hard to use it, especially when I
was in the middle of the street waiting for
the tram to pass. I try to keep my hand
as stable as possible, but of course, some of my
shoots are a little shaky. That's okay. It can work
for our class project, but I want to give you here an extra tool to
stabilize your footage. Maybe for some
animation you will need or want to
stabilize the shot. Here is how to stabilize your
footage on After Effects. I just stabilized this
footage of the skyscraper. Now I'm going to
import a new one and show you how to do
the whole process. Import file, I'm importing
here this tram scene. I'm dragging it
into the timeline. As you can see, the
shot is a little shaky. We're going to need this tracker
panel here on the right. If you don't have it, simply
go on Windows and Tracker. Now that we're here, we
want to stabilize motion. We're going to click
on that, and Position. Then click on
Options and check if the options are
the same as mine. In order to start go to the
beginning of your timeline. We're going to need to
position this track point. For this, you need a high
contrast point like this one. Once we've done it, from the beginning of the
timeline, press play. The software is going to run
through the whole sequence. It's going to take
a little while. And once it's finished, if there are no errors, simply click apply and okay. As you can see now the
shot is a little better, a little more stabilized. We can notice it's not
completely in frame. We have some black on the sides. In order to fix that, we are going to increase a little bit the size. Here is where the
4K would come in handy. We zoom in a little bit, just enough to allow the
video to be in frame. I put a red solid in the
background just for me to see better where the shot is moving and where
I need to fix it. You can see how these eight* points move. That's the stabilization
we did so far. The shot is in frame and
it's a little bit better. Okay, now it looks good, but we still need to
fix some movement. We're going to reuse
the tracker panel, but this time it's going to be not for the position
but for the rotation. In order to do the
second tracking, we are going to
precompose the video. Right click, precompose,
I'm calling it tram precomp. on this pre comp, we're going to apply
the tracker again. Stabilize motion, but rotation this time for the rotation. We have not just one
track point, but two. Find two points with good
contrast, as I'm doing here. In this way, after effects
is going to measure the rotation movements and
stabilize those as well. Clickon Play. It's
going to take some time. Once we're done, again, if there are no
errors, click Apply. As you can see now the shot is much better,
much more stable. There is no shaking, and
in this case. I don't need to scale it even
further. I'm quite lucky. I'm zooming in to
check. The rotation, doesn't bring more
red background out. But if it's the case for you, you should scale the
precomp a little more. That's it. Then
you can export it and then import your stabilized footage on Procreate Dreams.
7. Tram Scene Animation: In this lesson, we are
animating the tram scene. I imported my stabilized footage of the tram into
procreate dreams, dragging it into the stage. First of all, I
want to play with the movement of the tram
entering the scene. And I want to add
some text on top of the tram so that when it
passes the word appears. I'm going to write
the word "Zurich", which is the name of my
city. On a new track, In drawing mode, I
write the text by hand. I then enlarge the frame so that it lasts for the entire
duration of the movement. Now, I will need to set two
key-frames to decide what is the initial position
and the final one. Here, when the tram is off screen, I move my text out of the frame and I set
my first key frame. I go ahead on the timeline in the point in which I think the text should exit the frame, and I set a second keyframe moving the text on
the other side. By tapping between two frames, you can set all easings and decide if you want a
linear movement or not. For my animation, I don't want the text to accelerate
or decelerate. I set it to linear. Let's check the motion. I want the text to be fixed
on the roof of the tram. I need to tweak the
position of my key poses on the timeline to avoid the text sliding on
top of the roof. I move the final keyframe
a couple of frames ahead, And that's better.
now it works nicely. But to make it look
even more blending to this video and really
sitting on top of the tram, I need to mask the
buildings so that when the tram disappears
behind the houses, the text will do the same. To do so, I create a new track. In drawing mode, I
pick a visible color. It doesn't matter
which color you pick because it will
become our mask. Just choose one color that you can clearly see against the footage. I go in the portion
of the video in which the text is supposed to
disappear behind the house. I'm zooming in for
more precision and I'm filling the area where the building is, so that the text will
slide behind it. I then enlarge the frame
across the whole timeline. Now I can go on
the other point of the timeline in which the text appears
from the other side. This side is, for me, a little trickier
then the other. As you can see, the
buildings are not just a simple straight line and we also have a
street sign to mask. Here we go. Now it's time to make this
track into a mask. Tap on the track >
mask > layer mask. As you can see now it's
mask in the wrong part. We have to invert the mask. Tap again. Mask
invert. TADA! Pretty cool! It really looks like my text is passing through
with the tram. Now I want to add a couple of graphic clouds
running in the sky. I draw three clouds
on the same track, but because I want to animate
them with different speed, I duplicate the track and then delete some of the
clouds so that I have two clouds in one track and the third
one in the other one. Again, I enlarge the frame
across the whole timeline. In fact, I'm not going to
animate them frame by frame, but with keyframes, as we
did for the text. To do so, I tap on the track
motion > moving scale And I position the
clouds where I want them to be at the
beginning of the clip. Then I move at the end of the clip and I move
them a little bit, not too much, because clouds
usually move quite slowly. Tapping between key
frames on the timeline. You can set all
easings and I choose linear because I don't need the clouds to speed
up or slow down, but simply to move
at a constant speed. Let's see how it looks. I add a blending mode to the track so that the
clouds are a little transparent and part of the picture even more
as a blending mode, I choose soft light. Now I add a new track to
mask the clouds as well, because as you can see, they touch those buildings
towards the end of the shot. Exactly as I did
before. I draw my mask. I enlarge the frame
across the timeline and I set a layer mask inverted Super. Now I will do the same
for the second cloud. In this case I need to mask also the bell tower because
it's in the way. Notice that this mask trick works best if the
footage is stabilized, otherwise you might
notice the mask moving. Last but not least, I added some ye lights effects around the windows of the
Tram as it runs by. I simply let a white line run across the outline of the
windows frame by frame. When I reached the
end of the tram, I let them disappear like a
trail left behind the tram. I like how it looks, and in this particular shot, it plays with lights and
shadows and creates an effect. If you feel like your
straight ahead animation, frame by frame is too fast, you can add a frame simply going in drawing mode,
tapping on a frame. And then in the end, I ended up flipping the video horizontally and
redoing the animation, because I prefer the
tram entering from the right for an
easier readability. I think I'm done with
this first postcard. That's my final result. In the next lesson,
I'll show you other tricks and possibilities
to animate over video.
8. Skyscraper Drama: In this lesson, we are working
on the skyscraper scene. I'm choosing a vertical
preset for social media and I import my skyscraper footage that I previously stabilized. First thing I'm going
to sketch in white on top of the footage
on a new truck. To visualize the composition and the space that my animation
is going to take, I want to draw a big gorilla clinging from the
top of the building. I tried a couple of gorilla designs before
I found the one I liked by deleting the parts
that go behind the building. We make the illustration, interact with the live footage
and part of the scene. I then elongate the duration of the drawing across
all the timeline. We will animate
the gorilla later. Now I want to move to the
next element, helicopters. On a new truck, I design a simple helicopter
without the propellers. Then on a separate track, I make a simple loop
of two drawings of the propellers spinning
like this. That's our loop. For a better timing, I'm duplicating every frame. You can also elongate
the duration of each drawing by dragging the
frame on the timeline. I group these two trucks, that's our helicopter loop. In order to let the animation go for the whole
duration of the clip, I duplicated across
the whole timeline. In the end, I group all the
groups into a bigger one. Until now, we have
been duplicating the group to make the
loop last longer. This time I'm duplicating the, not the group because
I want to make a second helicopter.
Here we have it. I flip it horizontally and I move it to a different
place on the frame, Changing also its scale. Now we have two
helicopters flying around the gorilla's head
and making him nervous. Be sure to put the anchor point in the center of
each helicopter, especially if you want
to scale them easily. You can also change
the rotation of one of them to give
them a different look. In this way, they look less
like a copy of each other. Feel free to adjust their scale, rotation and position
until you're satisfied. As you can see, our
helicopters are at the moment, static in the air. Now we're trying
a cool feature of procrate dreams, the
performance mode. By clicking here, we
enter Performance mode. Procreate is going to
record the movement of your finger or pen and
create key frames for you. The moment your finger touches the stage, the recording starts. I am moving the
helicopter around with my finger to make it wiggle
around the skyscraper. As you can see, this creates
key frames under the track. Remember, you can then tweak the frames one by
one if you want. Now, I'm going to
do the same for the second helicopter,
and here we go. Now we have two helicopters
buzzing around the gorilla. Next I will be adding
some simple effects to describe the anger and the
surprise of the gorilla. I'm animating those three lines. It's a simple frame by frame
animation that we can make in drawing mode using the
flip book and the onion skin. We saw this effect
on a previous class. You can find tips and the
animation sequence of this effect animation on the other sister class,
dynamic headshots. Animate your video portrait
with procreate dreams. Afterwards, I'm adding
a lightning effect. Here is the first drawing
of the lightning. If you don't want to
animate it frame by frame, you could try using
key frames to animate, for instance, the scale
or the warp effect. Simply set the first key
frame and try maybe using the performance mode again to modify the size of the
image across the timeline. After some tests and tweaking, you could obtain
something like this. But today I want to animate this lightning
frame by frame. I'm going to redraw the
effect a couple of times. I stretch and squash
the lightning, like four drawings might be
enough for a quick loop. I then group the frames of the effect so I can
move the group around. Scaled and rotated. I'm adjusting its position here so that it
doesn't interfere with the helicopters time to
go back to the gorilla. For most of the
duration of the clip, I will use the boiling effect. We talked about this effect
in previous classes. Go check that out
for tips and tricks. Basically, I'm redrawing
the illustration a couple of times to make the gorilla
boil and look alive. I'm thinking about
a simple animation. I don't want to animate
crazy movements. I'm trying to keep
this simple and quick. You could even add
a blink in here, but in my case, the gorilla
already has closed eyes. What I'm going to animate today is a change of
facial expression. The gorilla goes from being confused and surprised
to being angry. I draw the second
expression first. Then I start
thinking how to move from one facial
expression to the other. At this stage, I use
a rough animation, which is an ugly set of drawings To envision
the movement. I want the character to stretch and squash to get into
the new position. It's almost like it
does a micro jump that makes him transition
from one mod to the other. The rest of the body
stays almost the same. The shoulders are also
stretching with the head and the fur gets a little more
spiky in that moment. Note that this time I
draw on the same track of my Raf and I simply create a
new layer inside each frame. To clean up the frame, I set the Raf to a lower opacity and I
proceed with the clean up. But pay attention,
I'm not sure if that's a bug that procreate
dreams will fix soon. But if you first set a lower opacity and then
create a new layer, the opacity will
be low and locked. Also in the new layer, you should first
create a new layer and only later set the Raufs
opacity to a lower number. Here is our gorilla animated. In the end, I duplicated a red lightning
effect a couple of times and moved it across the timeline and the
stage for an icy effect. This is the final animation
of this postcard. I hope you enjoyed
it and you're ready to move to the next
and final one. Before I do so, I export my skyscraper scene simply by tapping on the
project's name. Then share video.
9. River Monster Animation: In this lesson, we are bringing
to life a sea monster. Here we go with
the last postcard. After importing my
footage and trimming it, the first thing I do is to start sketching on
top of the video. To imagine the composition, I soon realized that the buildings are a
very busy background. I need to focus on the two empty spaces of
the sky and the water. I also decided to
proceed with the footage without the boat for
an easier interaction. This is a cute sea monster. My plan is to make
him emerge from the water and then
go back underwater. The water ripples are helping me to blend my drawing
into the video. I draw them on a separate truck and with a different
brush as well. Quick procreate tip if
while drawing your hand and fingers are accidentally leaving traces on the canvas. Now that you can disable this feature by going
on preferences. Gestures enable
painting with finger. Now that I'm happy
with my composition, I'm going to animate first the pose of the monster
outside of the water, the one that's going
to stay longer. On screen, I will
use a boiling effect for the creature and a loop
for the water ripples. I simply redraw the sea monster four times for a boiling effect. In only four drawings, I made the ripples going loop, redrawing them a
couple of times, gradually expanding outward
in concentric circles. Now I group those four
drawings in each track. And I check the motion. I find the water ripples
a little too fast. So I'm going to make them slower by making
each frame longer. Earlier I showed you with
the helicopter propellers that you can duplicate each
frame inside the flip bo. Another method is to drag and elongate each frame
directly on the timeline. This can be a little tricky, be sure to drag
with one finger and keep the finger of the other
hand fixed on the timeline. Now the timing works
better for me. I duplicate the monster
boiling effect to match the length of the water
ripples and create my loop. I will then copy and paste
this loop a couple of times to make the sea monster stay on frame for a
couple of seconds. Now that we have the loop
of the monster peeking out of the water in the
middle of our timeline. We need to animate how he emerges and later
how it disappears. With the onion skin activated, I can see the
position of arrival. I proceed with a
rough animation. I want his neck to come
up from the water with a whimsy movement and an
overshoot while the coils, or let's call it the tail, will simply emerge in a linear way for the two
portions of the tail. The water ripples will
also help me to anticipate the action because we can see the water moving before
the monster appears. This rough animation
works already gives me an idea of the
movement and its timing. I don't need in
betweens at this stage. That's why there are
some empty frames for the way the monster disappears and goes
back in the river. I'm thinking about
a different motion. The creature is going
to toss his head back and submerge himself
with a waving motion. Of course, in the end he
will create a big splash. The tail animation is
pretty straightforward. I'm simply going to draw
in betweens to make it emerge and then
submerge in a linear way. Now I'm going to clean
up the neck and head. I add some in betweens
and extra drawings here for the moment in which
he appears from the water. The neck is folded and very elastic and it will
flip up in a bendy way. There is one frame in which
the neck is very stretched at the top before the head settles into
the final position. In this over frame, even the eyes of the C
snake are stretched. The I get to the final position, the more precise
in between Sydrow, I also add some drops when the head emerges
from the water. And those drops turn
into movement lines and almost smears as
the neck flips up. Now let's check how the
animation is looking. Nice. It's time to move to
the final motion to bring this creature back
to the depth of the river. Here I made more rafts to better understand the wavy motion
and I free styled a bit. In the resources you
can find a reference for a wave or flag
animation sequence. One trick that could
help you is to draw a long wavy line like so and then key frame it to
move it vertically down. This can be a good reference
for the curves of the neck. Lastly, I add the final splashes and extra water ripples
that are missing. I love how this animated
postcard turned out. This little Swiss
ness is really cute. And I think it might be my favorite one of the
old collection. In the next lesson, we wrap
up the class and I give you some inputs to push your
animation skills forward.
10. Postcards Showcase: Congratulations for
finishing this class. You have now three
animated postcards that you can send to
family and friends, share on social media, and definitely post in
the project section. Here is a recap of
the key learnings. Animation can transform everyday scenes into
captivating stories, adding depth and personality
to our surroundings. With this technique, we can make our everyday social media
content unique and personal, standing out in
the digital world. We saw how to make a series of three animated postcards
with a minimal color choice. We learned the
importance of having a stable footage and how to fix a shaky video
in after effects. We learn some tips and tricks
from procreate dreams, such as the performance mode, loops, easing, and masks. We learned how to export
and share those videos, and overall how
through animation, we have the power to infuse our creativity into
our surroundings. Turning ordinary moments
into special experiences. Before I sign off, I want to give you some
creative ideas to move forward. Animation is about practice. Go on and improve your
skills by creating more. This time we
discovered our cities, but we could use the same
technique to animate some holiday scenes or
other places we visit. We could even
surprise our friends with animated postcards
for their birthdays, anniversaries, or other
special occasions. Experiment with incorporating
unexpected elements into your animations to add an extra layer of
intrigue and quirkiness. I was walking down the
street, for instance, and I could not help noticing this weird tube play with
size and perspective. In this clip, I animated a huge character walking
on a bridge in Suri. If you're eager to explore
more about animation on video, you should know
that this class has a sister called
dynamic head shots. Animate your video portrait
with Procreate Dreams, where we learn how
to add a touch of animation to a short
video portrait. I am excited to see your animated postcards
and work in progress. Remember, your
creativity is limitless. Don't hesitate to push the boundaries and
explore new ideas. Don't forget to check
out my other classes on the platform where you can learn even more about
animation techniques. From creating a pack
of animated stickers, to mastering morphine loops. There is something for
everyone to explore. I encourage you to share
your work with the and leave a review to help others
discover the joys of animation. Don't forget to follow
me for updates on future classes and
creative inspiration. I wish you all the best with this class project
and above all, to enjoy the
creative process to.
11. Bonus: Hi, have you published
your project yet? If you need extra support, remember that you can write in the discussion section or you can publish a
work in progress. And I will leave feedback and
tips if that's not enough. Skillshare introduced
one on one sessions which are available to
anyone to find them. Simply go on my
Skillshare profile page where you can read
all about them. The best part is
that you don't need a Skillshare membership
to participate. During the one on one session, you can get a portfolio review, career guidance for your
creative practice, or a project. Deep dive to discuss a
skillshare assignment. Are you attempting
your first steps as a freelancer or are you stuck in thinking about a
pivot in your career? Are you moving to
a new country and a new market and you're
not sure where to begin? Are you unsure about your
portfolio and you would like to polish it and have more
chances on finding jobs? Do you want advice on a specific animated sequence or do you want a deep feedback
on a class project? If any of those questions
are bothering you, then this private session could
be the right fit for you. Epic Creating, and see you soon.
Giulia Martinelli, Animation Director / Illustrator
