Blender 2.8: Bouncing Ball - Squash & Stretch Rigging and Animation

[@animeuwu8425]

After so many years and tutorial creators don't learn from this man. They want to extend a simple tutorial like this one and make it 30+ minutes long. Thank you

[@aliensoup2420]

Something different for everyone I guess. Thanks for watching.

[@nibblrrr7124]

This feels like a 90s mailorder tutorial VHS... ...and I _love_ it! :D Seriously, it's refreshing to see your clean & to-the-point presentation style, and I've learned quite a bit on how to make something look natural when animating by hand. Thank you for making this!

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks for the feedback. Yeah, I know my voice and presentation style is stiff and rehearsed, but I've always regarded myself as more of a technician than an artist. My focus is on delivering necessary information, as precisely and efficiently as possible. The viewer's time is #1. Unfortunately, it takes 2-3 weeks to create a 5 min video, including research, development, scripting, voice recording, screen recording, editing, and artwork. Others crank out a 1 hr. video in 1 hr. and I'm sure you understand the difference. Glad you appreciate it.

[@nibblrrr7124]

​@@aliensoup2420 Yes, I _really_ appreciate it when a videomaker puts in more time & effort, so that viewers have to spend less. It sounds like a pretty obvious goal, given a simple utilitarian person-hour calculation, but I guess this is made even harder by the YT algorithm & other factors apparently incentivizing quantity & regular output over quality. I can't judge creators for adapting to this, when they are trying to make a living based on ads & views; I'm still getting valuable stuff for free. And I can often still learn from & enjoy watching someone do something they are good at & talk about it in real time. (Which would probably include you - after all, if I want to learn a technique and not just copy some artists art, it makes sense to go to the technician! ;) ) Nevertheless, condensed videos like this are like gems. I haven't made any myself, but I think I get the rough idea of how much unseen work goes into making them. Anyway, I'll make sure to check out what you upload, whenever you find the time to make it, and whatever adjustments on the quality-quantity tradeoff you might decide on. Thanks again!

[@leroyian8836]

i realize it is kinda randomly asking but do anyone know a good website to stream newly released series online ?

[@axelarjun5111]

@Leroy Ian flixportal :D

[@leroyian8836]

@Axel Arjun thank you, I signed up and it seems to work :D Appreciate it!

[@melik5398]

For someone coming from Maya and learning animation in Blender, this video was PERFECT. I picked up quite a few very useful techniques. Thank you!

[@aliensoup2420]

Terrific! Thanks for watching and commenting.

[@WhosNiC]

Learned a lot more than just how to squash and stretch.

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks a lot. Glad it helped.

[@pikachufan25]

Best Basic Tutorial ive seen so far. every other tutorial I've seen has such a Slow pace this one just Gets to the point and with Just Enough Explanation. and a + teaching us another way of animating instead of using Physics Properties.

[@aliensoup2420]

Glad it was helpful. Thanks for the useful feedback.

[@davletshintube]

Wow!!! Ctrl+Tab, and using modifiers- - nice tips!!! Good work!!!!!

[@aliensoup2420]

aidar davletshin Thanks aidar. I was worried it might be too basic, so I included those extras to make it interesting. Glad it was helpful.

[@artsticflea3539]

This feels so much better then other tutorials. Thank you!!

[@aliensoup2420]

You can FEEL tutorials? You must have some awesome VR gear. Glad you enjoyed it. Thanks for watching.

[@gerhard2286]

Thank you so much!!! One of the best blender tutorials. :)

[@radovanhalirramos3638]

Outstanding tutorial for basic animation in just 7 minutes. Thanks!!!

[@aliensoup2420]

Glad it was useful. Thanks for watching and commenting.

[@EfrenPedroza]

Amazing tutorial! Honestly, much better than most out there.

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks. Glad it was helpful.

[@FilmSpook]

Many Thanks, sir!! You are a Gentleman. Much Appreciated. 🙏🏽

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks for the kind remarks.

[@aortaplatinum]

Oh my god yes, I was so concerned squash and stretch would be a nightmare to do in 3D but Blender has a straight up tool for maintaining volume. Thank you!

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks. Glad it was helpful. There are many ways to do it, but I hoped this was maybe the simplest.

[@elunicocalvo]

Perfect style of tutorial, 100% useful, no bs.

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks. Glad to hear it was helpful.

[@daleroska4971]

this is the best explanation I could find. Thank you very much indeed. I had been testing and they didn't fit so well. Your method is very good

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks. Glad it was helpful. My method is a quick solution, but not necessarily the best - it always depends on your needs and the end use requirements.

[@vizdotlife]

This is still a great tutorial, thank you. For anyone using Blender 4.1, once you're in the graph editor for bouncing you might need to change the "Interpolation" value from Linear to Bezier in the Active Keyframe section to make things look a little smoother. You can see these options in a menu on the right by pressing N in the graph editor section. On a different note, out of curiosity I started experimenting with the bouncing and squash effects using the sine function to see how smooth that looked....not nearly as good as this tutorial technique.

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks for the comment and the correction for v4. A procedural math function is too mechanical for this sort of animation. The fun of hand key framing is creating something organic and unique. The mathematical stuff has its purposes, but typically not character performance.

[@vizdotlife]

That makes a lot of sense. Yeah, I can totally see how this technique products a lot more organic and unique movements for characters. It's really cool. This is an area of animation where I can see a continued need to create organic movements by a human...at least to really make something stand out amongst everything else. The analogy I'm thinking of is around perfecting the "last mile" of delivery for tangible goods to a home by big retailers like Amazon or UPS . They have tried for years to figure out how to automate and perfect that last mile of delivery to a home, but it's continued to be the most difficult to automate. I guess what I'm trying to say is I can see a continued need in this area of animation by humans to create a unique character movement, irregardless of the technology that continues to change rapidly. Not sure if that makes sense. @@aliensoup2420

[@jugglingfair]

Best 👏👏 wants more like this. Maybe all principles of animation. 😍

[@CallMeSirPlease]

thanks for the great video, i can really feel the effort that went into the quality of keeping it so straight to the point, thanks alot for that, I know its temting not to do but there are alot of people like me who really appriciate it! Quick question for you: You dont seem to rotate the ball, something that I am trying to do, but if I were to animate the X rotation the ball moves around the bottem of the bone (which is not practical since it will be rotating through the floor :P) any tips or solutions to this? Since I am relatively new to Blender I dont really know.

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks for the comment. Glad the tutorial was helpful. At 2:12 and 5:07 I demonstrate how to rotate the ball. You must select the ball to rotate it around its own center. Use the bone to translate the ball in space, and squash/stretch the ball.

[@Gp_the_moron]

M8 u r so underrated, to me this is a great tutorial for squash and stretch when applying it to 3d animation

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks for the compliment and for watching. Glad it was helpful.

[@nongsandt8918]

Great Tutorial

[@staxeq576]

thank you so much

[@AmarjeetKumar-yh2sp]

Awesome superb tutorial🙏

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks for watching

[@hudmond]

This video was very helpful, thanks! :)

[@aliensoup2420]

Glad it was useful. Thanks for the comment.

[@ozero_animation]

Awesome tut, Thanks!

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks for watching and commenting.

[@yaraterveer6364]

Thanks a lot! This was very helpful!

[@ThroughLizna]

THANKS A LOT.

[@aliensoup2420]

You're welcome a lot. Thanks for watching.

[@shagovikov]

Thank you

[@learning3d742]

Ultra helpful. Thanks a lot!

[@aliensoup2420]

Awesome! Thanks for watching and commenting.

[@alina_tvorit]

it's really useful tutorial! thank you!

[@aliensoup2420]

Glad it helped. Thanks for watching and commenting.

[@spanoskon]

Hello your tutorial is amazing! One question: at 4.52 how do u make the z location line curved? Plus at 6.45 when i rotate the Location X it goes back (left) instead of right. Why is this happening? Thank you!

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks. The graph keyframes must be set to Bezier. You can change the keyframes interpolation in the Graph Key menu, or set an individual key type in the Properties Menu (N).

[@ccc5127]

This tutorial is really amazing and helpful! Appreciate it! Unfortunately, I have encountered a difficulty. I believe that I have followed each step in your tutorial. However, at 4:07, after I pressed Ctrl + Tab, I only saw smooth transitions at the summit of the curve. The smooth transitions wouldn't show in the in and out of the bottom keyframes. Why does this situation happen? Did I make any mistakes?

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks for the comment. I cannot say for certain what your problem is. It may be a default setting in your Animation Preferences, or possibly a change in a later version of Blender. Are you using v4 or v3? My keyframe settings default to Bezier. In any case you can select those keyframes and manually set them to Bezier using the "T" hotkey.

[@ccc5127]

Thanks a lot for your quick response! Really appreciate it!! I have checked again and made sure that I followed each step but still encountered the same problem. I am using the blender v4. Thanks for you quick apply and suggestion again. I will try your solution later. Thanks a lot!

[@ccc5127]

@@aliensoup2420 I have tried the method you provided. I pressed the T hotkey and changed it to Bezier, but it seems not to be worked. I still can't see the smooth transitions in the in and out of the bottom keyframes. But still thanks a lot!

[@aliensoup2420]

@@ccc5127 I'm sorry, I don't know what is wrong. I don't have v4 so I can't look at it right now. It is not a complex thing so it should work. Blender defaults to Bezier and all keyframes should be smooth curves.

[@ccc5127]

@@aliensoup2420 It's ok, thanks for your helping! Highly appreciate it! I will try to figure it out.

[@KhalifahAnimation122]

This is the best Animation tutorial. Thank you so much!

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks for the comment and for watching.

[@monke3043]

1st principle of animation

[@Diyosh]

thank you!

[@asharticz]

I've encountered a problem in the Y rotation. My ball is bouncing like crazy! I've followed your instructions I wonder what went wrong? Suggestions will be highly appreciated.

[@aliensoup2420]

Not enough information. I suggest you restart from the beginning, and retrace your steps. Make sure you are rotating the Ball, not the Bone controller that performs the squash and stretch.

[@drm.ifal.3460]

excelent

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks.

[@softcrm8713]

i have a problem i dont know how to fix. When im using the bone to move the ball or transform it in any way, it will affect the geometry of my floor. Its just a solid plane but its transforming with the ball and the bone.

[@aliensoup2420]

@@softcrm8713 Sounds like the floor was also selected when you parented and assigned weights to the ball. Unparent everything and reassign weights selecting only the ball and the bone.

[@chrishall6609]

1 minute 39 seconds, it says change length to 2. Im using blender 3.0 and cant find length. I do have it in edit mode

[@aliensoup2420]

Yes, in Edit mode. Watch the video carefully.

[@chrishall6609]

@@aliensoup2420 i know its in edit mode, i said that in my comment, but its no there. I wish i could put screen shots in here to show you

[@elumiie]

I had the same problem and I found where length is. It's probably too late now, but I'll comment anyways for possible future confused people :). In the top right corner under the "Options" menu and to the right of the x y z thing is a tiny tiny arrow sticking out. If you tap the arrow the "transform" options with "length" will appear

[@aliensoup2420]

@@elumiie At 0:22 I open this panel, and display text explaining how to open it using the "N" key. The information is there, but you have to pay close attention. I don't explain everything on a beginner level because I don't want to take the extra time to make a beginner tutorial. There are already dozens of beginner Interface tutorials, so I'm not interested in repeating them all.

[@Tahsin3D]

That was fun

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks. Glad you enjoyed it.

[@93misterblack]

Straight to the point. A great tutorial, thank you!

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks. Glad it was helpful.

[@Phoenix-gz9xb]

Definitely might want to have the ball already to go next time.

[@aliensoup2420]

Just trying to accommodate absolute beginners as well. I include timestamps in the description so viewers can skip unnecessary content.

[@SembangAnimasi]

Thank you. very helpful

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks for watching and commenting.

[@Tre_Di]

Wow. I can't believe this was for free

[@elifceylan8324]

5:44 i couldnt open the modifier tab (I click the N but it didn't work) how can I do that?

[@aliensoup2420]

An object must be selected, and there must be a selected keyframe on a channel in the Graph Editor. The mouse cursor must be within the Graph Editor to activate the properties side bar.

[@addyklein-burtt4193]

i would have liked a little more detailed, but other than that, fabulous!

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks, I'm trying to find the balance between short and concise, and excessive explanation and boring.

[@sinuspi1]

Useful and to the point, but only when you really get to the animation. Spending a minute on texturing the ball seems rather unnecessary.

[@aliensoup2420]

Thanks. A good texture is necessary to see the rotation of the ball. I included the texturing to help the beginners. I also included bookmarks so the viewer can skip to the relevant parts. I do that on all my tutorials.

[@lucchung4266]

how can I link the bone animation to the ball ,I want to delete the bone but I can't link it

[@aliensoup2420]

That defeats the entire purpose of using the bone to deform the ball. There might be some work-arounds using Shape Keys or a Mesh Deformer, but that is more complicated, and more work than necessary. Why do you want to delete the bone?

[@lucchung4266]

@@aliensoup2420 Tks, I don''t know that .I'm new at this

[@aliensoup2420]

@@lucchung4266 Well, it seems you are trying to run before you can walk, and you do not yet know what you don't know. Slow down and first learn what Blender can do before you try to ask it to do what you think you want it to do. Once you learn that, you will have a better idea of what it is you want.

[@lucchung4266]

@@aliensoup2420 tks

[@CookieMonster-mc9mq]

Thank u so much😊😊

[@aliensoup2420]

Thank you for watching. Check out my Oscillations tutorial...lots of good stuff there.

[@CookieMonster-mc9mq]

@@aliensoup2420 will do :)

[@mart7980]

When I tried to animate y rotation of the ball like the video it can not be animated , why ?

[@aliensoup2420]

I don't know. Are you selecting the ball only? Is it parented correctly? I just setup a rig from scratch in v2.92 and it works for me.

[@i3oi3osan]

​@@aliensoup2420 I'm a programmer and in process of learning. I'm actually very surpise that you can rotate ball geometry after skinned weight to the bone. There is probably transformation order somewhere between geometry and deformation. I probably need to dig in devtalk.blender. -I'm not sure if this can be exported to game engine because you key frames everything using armature and ball geometry object instead of a bone.- Edit: About the export process to game engine, Most game engine only read key bone transform. Some also support custom property which you can feed to game logic. So, The export just read bone transform from each key frame.

[@aliensoup2420]

@@i3oi3osan I don't claim or even pretend that this is the ultimate or best way to rig the ball for animation - it's just a way that is simple and direct. I can't tell you why it works as it does. It's just something I discovered that does what I wanted it to do. If you want complete functionality and compatibility with other processes, then there are numerous other methods that will provide that.

[@i3oi3osan]

@@aliensoup2420 All are good. I learn useful tip from your video. Our conversation also provide some insight. Thank for the video.

[@HenryKillian]

Could you just use rigid body?

[@aliensoup2420]

Yes, of course, but the point of the tutorial is to learn how to animate. But, with rigid body, you don't get the reactive squash-and-stretch that gives the ball character and life. You could get realistic squash-and -stretch with soft body physics, but the point of doing manual animation is that you have total control over the timing and character of the animation.

[@kenchen821]

TRUTH: This is not even a good animation, many things are off. Surprisingly people think it's a good tutorial. Hmmmm.. ok if they think so

[@aliensoup2420]

Please educate us. The point is to learn something of the mechanics of animation. Aesthetics is an open topic subject to individual interpretation.

[@kenchen821]

@@aliensoup2420 sorry to be picky. I think the tectonics you showed in your videos are good. But in my opinion you should at least teach people how to make a bouncing ball with gravity which means it will bounce lower and lower. Also the ball spins just too fast. It's like it has an engine to drive itself to spin. Also when it stretches it doesn't stretch vertically it stretches to the direction where it will land on the ground or at the apex in the air.

[@aliensoup2420]

@@kenchen821 You are expecting a strict physical interpretation, but ignore the possibility of an independent character interpretation. Animation is not only about imitating real world physics. If I wanted that, I could have used the physics simulation instead. When I make tutorials, I try to introduce methods and ideas that nobody else is teaching. I'm not interested in imitating what has been done many times already.

[@raptorswire7212]

how about explaining stuff instead of just telling us 1. do this, 2. do that, 3. do also this... ? by just blindly repeating what you are doing we are gaining exactly 0 knowledge

[@aliensoup2420]

Thats a valid point. The main reason is that I don't want to make a long-winded video that people don't have the patience to sit through waiting for the essential information. People are more inclined to click on shorter videos. Longer videos are more work, and I'm not getting paid to make them. Viewers have different needs, so I am serving those that don't want or need detailed explanations. Some people just want to know how to get a specific result. They can learn the why's somewhere else. I don't intend to please everybody, so just be glad you only spent 7 minutes to learn nothing. Thanks for watching and commenting.

[@rayne1944]

LITERALLY OML IM DOING THIS FOR SCHOOL AND HAVE NO CLUE WTF IM DOING LITERALLY BAWLING MY EYES OUT

[@nanicoco2566]

Z🍩