Learn Blender's NLA editor in 3 minutes | Blender 2.9 Animation Tutorial

[@AlfredReinoldBaudisch]

It's crazy how basically no one talks about this. I have more than 20 paid Blender courses and ZERO of them mentions this. Amazing video, man!

[@researchandbuild1751]

Because the NLA is unintiuive hot garbage...its never been ezplained very well until this video

[@fluffehpancakes1102]

bro paid for blender courses 💀💀

[@ChernobylComedyAndWings]

@@fluffehpancakes1102 paid for the "effective art of rigging" no one has been able to infuriate me this much in years. I want to reach through my screen and choke this guy for making everything so F-ing convoluted.

[@tidy5156]

@@fluffehpancakes1102 for *20* courses

[@pearlabyssal]

@@ChernobylComedyAndWings tbf paying to get a peek into a workflow that you like is more understandable than upfront information found everywhere.

[@playererror4044]

Okay what the hell is this, Been using blender for years now and never understood half of what the action editor could do or how to do it... you just explained in few minutes something thats had me stumped... I... Thanks man this helps, a lot

[@SupaKoopaTroopa64]

I just discovered this menu today, and I've been using Blender for over 7 years!

[@Necrocidal]

FINALLY, I understand how to use the NLA, after however many tutorials. This one was simple and to the point.

[@NeonStorm5]

Most others take 15 mins to give a list of what each of the buttons do without really explaining when and why to use them. You showed how, when, and why to use the tools as part of an effective workflow in less than 3 minutes. Incredible.

[@asadd2]

2:35 oh my god thank you! I couldn't find a SINGLE tutorial that told me how to edit those strips, I've been looking for that for such a long time. This makes working with NLA strips way more practical

[@ygypt]

bro i have been racking my head trynna figure this program out and you just plugged my mind into the matrix and loaded 5 years of animation experience into it. thank you SO MUCH

[@mary_chase]

underrated tutorial, short and simple, thank you!

[@fadhil4008]

When a 3 minute video explains better than any other with 25 minutes or even more

[@simonw.1223]

So first wevimprtwn our character thwn we make a pose [5 minutes] and now we come to the mehical trick...

[@EnricoPacu]

When a 3 minute video explains better than bigger experts

[@DodaGarcia]

This was so so so needed, it's amazing how little there is on KZbin about the NLA editor, especially for 2.8 and up.

[@sunnyb13xo]

This is GAME CHANGING!!

[@Myzelfa]

Bless you. This has everything I need. I'll probably have to watch it multiple times before it settles in my brain, but at least it's not a 30-minute tutorial that talks about everything tangentially related to what I need to learn.

[@genraw5137]

I was searching for a year to get my head around nla editor and here is a video explaining it in 3 minutes? So many thanks man!

[@SupaKoopaTroopa64]

I've been using Blender for over 7 years now, and I JUST TODAY found out about this! Edit: 9 years now! Edit: 10 years!

[@socialfreak6900]

litterally same, been using blender since 2.59 and just now figured out how to use the nla editor

[@GloriaTheAnimator]

i feel you man

[@SupaKoopaTroopa64]

@Kittikun Kongsin You will be able to manage complex animations easily and efficiently.

[@creativestudio101]

So True, I had been using Blender for a few years till I found out about this. Incredible. Blender truly is such an insanely complete app - almost oo much packed into one single software

[@OhiloSwapnil]

edit again

[@jaredlincroyable5448]

Kudos for a clear, concise enjoyable tutorial. This is what the fans want.

[@WalterGordyCanada]

I've been using blender to make crappy animations for little games for years. I literally had no idea this exists and it's amazing and life changing!

[@klintlirio8484]

Out of all the tutorials this is more convinient and more faster way to learn how to loop ur animations

[@Janfon1]

Working with NLA is like walking in a minefield, there is so much that can go wrong if you don't monitor and carefully plan out every step in advance. Thanks for helping me grasp the fundamentals

[@TheDuckCow]

Yes, it is fair to say it can be a little more nuanced and when things get out of alignment, it's not trivial to undo. Tradeoffs one way or the other, definitely a power feature once you can wrangle it to your advantage!

[@gonzatoto]

Excellent tutorial! Straight to the point. In 3 minutes you've explained what others do in 40!

[@gurubhaitube]

man.......this is the best animation tutorial

[@marcoscarvalhodev]

you are a life saver!!!! I am animating a rig and I want making it breathing non-stop but I had been adding a lot of keyframes to the chest bone and it was mixing with other keyframes that I also needed for the chest bone... it was a whole mess but now you saved the day for me!

[@LightsJusticeZ]

Thank you! I had a bunch of scenes with prebuilt animations I wanted to view all strung together but importing the next animation would overwrite the previous animation. Using the NLA editor, I could plop down those animations into the timeline and have them play back to back! So much better than importing one set of animations, recording, and setting up the next animation to record, etc etc.

[@Clover501]

This is so cool, the possibilities are endless!

[@ProfJonah]

clear and concise with good examples in as short a time as possible, a perfect video my dude

[@jasperzatch610]

What a beautifully sweet and short way to make this make sense. Thank you!

[@LEHorge]

I'am a beginner in blender animation. That was the best NLA Explanation I´ve seen so far! Thank you!

[@almerbatti8586]

cant describe how much happy I am to find this tutorial !! Cheers man

[@delights-35]

WHAT?????? blender is truly one of the programes of all time! I didnt know about this feature like 7 months as i working with blender

[@delights-35]

oh by the way, is there any method to convert baked cloth simulation into keyframes, or there maybe a way to capture it in NLA editor?

[@ktmcharles]

ive watched so many, this is the best NLA video tutorial on youtube. thank you!

[@danielnorton9803]

Thanks for adding project files. Using the animations featured in the video was really convenient

[@curtiswindover4564]

That "oh hi mark" was unnecessarily funny. Thanks for the video.

[@guberNailer]

Perfectly summarized, thanks! My Blender skills just leveled up

[@blenderleague4124]

Thanks man. Loved this tutorial. Never heard of it. Opened my eyes to a whole new version of Blender that's been hidden under my nose. Loved every second of it!! Kudos!!!

[@VerendusStudios]

This tutorial was actually amazing, thank you!

[@dustinrolstad752]

I just found out recently that this feature exists and this tutorial really makes me feel like I could do it.

[@LittlePangy]

This was a super helpful, concise tutorial. Thanks and keep up the good work!

[@filmdon2475]

Can't believe you explained it in 3 mins. Thank you !

[@MicahBuzanANIMATION]

Learning a bunch from this, thank you!

[@VladMihailescu]

Jesus, I needed this like a few days ago and struggled to make sense of it on my own, thanks for such a perfect video short and full of good info!

[@dustloaf]

4:37 I've been wondering why when I press Tab my selected strip is not opening in the Action Editor - strip just becomes green and I had to manually select the desired action: the mesh is supposed to be selected in the main view! But there's more: When you press Tab to start editing the strip of the selected mesh you can immediately see the results when you play the animation even before you apply these edits to the strip - for some reason (ver. 2.92), when you edit a strip of mesh that is not selected currently, you have to apply edits pressing Tab in NLA Editor again in order to see the results of your edits in the animation.

[@TheDuckCow]

Thanks for sharing that nuance!

[@tarunviegas8481]

Really helpful I always wanted this

[@snovak1]

Wow.. really dense tutorial. Great job!

[@ronjadill2259]

Just what I was looking for!!! THANK YOU!!!

[@insidiousmaximus]

watching this just made everything click for me! what a great tool!! I have coded my own game in Unity but because the coding took me so long I have not maintained any blender practice. Now I am at the graphics stage and have to go back to basics! Massive help thank you...subbed

[@TheDuckCow]

Glad to hear it!!

[@musubi-bi]

Nice and sweet! Very useful workflow!

[@ScientObject40]

This is extremely powerful, thank you very much.

[@ZipSnipe]

Love teachers that are straight on point

[@unscenegamers]

WOW that's amazing stuff. Just quickly combining animations like it is nothing. Thanks!

[@RadovanHalir]

Woooow!!! thank you so much, this is an incredible explanation.

[@Birdistheword628]

Thank you so much for this! I took a course on blender character animation, but it didn't explain using actions very well, and even after asking directly I was still confused. Great video.

[@stephen285]

just press tab to edit - Thanks duckcow!!

[@WW_Studios]

I was missing the TAB!!! I could not figure out how to edit what I had. THX!

[@Larry3D]

Explained well and clearly so that I can understand. Thanks.

[@mesarena5408]

Fantastic video, wanted to understand the nla editor because I having been using blender for over a year and had never heard of it until recently working on a project.....it's a fantastic feature 👍

[@bu5hm45t3r]

nice tutorial thank you, i have a question here, example there's a track called player.arma and for that how many action tracks i can add? because i can't add more than 4,if i add new action it is adding to the top most action track rather than on a new track

[@TheDuckCow]

Blender tries to be smart and only create a new NLA track if there isn't space, so if the track you're trying to "push down" doesn't overlap on the existing top track, it'll just push into that existing track. You can always create new tracks manually though, in blender 4.0+ you click the hamburger menu, then Add > Add Tracks

[@bu5hm45t3r]

@@TheDuckCow My saviour, thank you 🙏🧎🏻

[@Nevil_Tan]

Short and most advance NLA tutorial I ever seen

[@hameddesign70]

0:46 im trying to figure it out what does that "PLEASE" doing in middle of your video , are you begging someone to do something that is present ?

[@theostaschik6870]

Thank you, after hearing Sir Wade ranting about animation layers in Maya I had to find a Blender equivalent.

[@TheDuckCow]

Glad to hear it! Another KZbinr also covered that point of comparing to Maya more direclty if that's helpful, including another addon that polishes the experience a bit more (personally, I just go "vanilla"): kzbin.info/www/bejne/qoDbkIZ3fJyaopY

[@Liminally_ill]

Great and fast tutorial 🖤🖤🖤

[@TommyLikeTom]

this is great, thanks. The only thing I want to know is how to choose to not push down an action. Like I wish there was a third option other than stash or push down, just forget, because as soon as you select an existing action you have to either stash it or push it

[@trombocyt]

"Oh, Hi Mark!" xD

[@ZoraJones]

thanks so much!

[@adriansyahr8778]

Hello nice tutorial, can i ask some question but first sorry for my english i have 2 object and they have modifier, how to make to single NLA for export to unity? please help :( thanks

[@dillibahadurkatuwal6085]

What if we want to reuse the same animation after some time. Like: we need walk cycles mostly in an animation. So do we have to start it all over again?

[@TheDuckCow]

A great example of the use and power of the NLA editor! From file, append (or link), you can load actions (ie animation strips) saved in other blender files.

[@DodaGarcia]

No, you save the walk cycle as an action and just reuse it as needed.

[@socialfreak6900]

once you save the walk action to an nla strip you can duplicate and paste it wherever you need it in the timeline as many times as you want

[@kranz9377]

Yeah thanks you are really good at teaching and animating

[@adriansyahr8778]

Hello can you help me how to merge 2 NLA action from 2 object with one object use array modifier to single NLA Strip for use in unity?

[@WolfgangRechberger86]

Super fast but very informative. Thanks for clearing that mystery up for me.

[@LifeLess1999]

Yep You are my new hero!

[@MultiTommytomtom]

This tutorial is great, really helpful thank you!!

[@robfrydryck127]

This is my favoite tutorial of 2021 so far.

[@expertboy8120]

Why I couldn't find you before? Thanks man!

[@FinalMotion]

man NLA is so great. i always forget about blend option. i was using transitions (shift+T) but blending is much nicer, thanks!

[@byondent]

Sweet tutorial thanks for all the info. I'm having trouble combining my edits to my animations when I do the character gets all deformed. Any suggestions?

[@TheDuckCow]

Likely a matter of too many layers of "combine" instead of replace, as an offset or rotation will just continue around. I will admit that things do get tricky and hard to fine tune when you a large number of layers at once.

[@byondent]

@TheDuckCow seems like it may have been user error. I got it to work now, thank you for the tut once again. Is there any way to combine this with faceit?

[@leatherandpoemscharmyman5774]

hey there how to combine shapekey action (with drivers on it) + actions ? all combined in NLA ready to create different clips from my actions to export in fbx? thx

[@Sonu-hx9wx]

I have two different cube i added two different animation moving on them. the animation work fine in the blender but when ever i export it to unity as a fbx file only one cube shows it's animation how to fix it? (very urgent)

[@learning3d742]

Ultra useful tutorial. Thanks a lot! Truly game-changing stuff over here!

[@tomaslpg]

Woah! I had no idea about that, this is fantastic!

[@drumboarder1]

This is so good that I'm going to open it on my phone to watch an ad

[@moviemaker310]

you did in 3 minutes what a 40 minute tutorial had to do

[@rhashadcarter2051]

When i scsle move or try to literally anything to a clip in the nonlinear animator it disappears.

[@jorgemanchola8432]

very valuable tips. Does this save location? Lets say I have a character standing on a map, and Action A takes place in one place of the map, and Action B takes place in another place. If I load the saved action, will it load the character in the precise location the action takes place? If someone knows, please and tnk u.

[@TheDuckCow]

Depends on what is keyframed. Generally, rigs have a "root" bone so it all maters where that is at the time the initial keyframed are made. But also, as this video shows, you can always add another NLA strip layer which just applies an offset to that root bone to get your character in the right spot (but for reusable actions, it's far better to just try and animate the character near the position of the root bone itself)

[@BlueBerryFTW]

Super helpful! Subscribed!

[@reedraw1917]

This just saved my hide, thank you so much for this video!!!!

[@thevfxwizard7758]

Dang, top notch tutorial! Do you know if there is a way to only push down selected keyframes and leave nonselected keyframes?

[@TheDuckCow]

Thanks! And not directly - but the workaround would be to duplicate the current action in the action editor (press the little number icon next to the name), then in one of them delete the keyframes you don't want to push down. Copy paste select keyframes also works fine from one action to another.

[@thevfxwizard7758]

@@TheDuckCow ok thanks!

[@prototype9000]

whatif we dont wantt o render it to a video and save it to the fbx

[@fullyleaded]

can you make speed ramps using NLA strips?

[@TheDuckCow]

Not exactly as you're probably hoping, ie not as flexibly as something like time remapping in After Effects. But you can cut an action arbitrary number of times, and scale the speed of each of this new strips individually to approximate the effect you want. Not terribly flexible, but can work in a pinch.

[@zyrhokenhernandez6882]

at 1:25 how do you do that to your rig? i can only mobe the position it doesnt show the other, im at pose mode

[@praveenb-xr]

Hi if am exporting, lots of useless animation clips coming with FBX inside unity why that happens? I want to create 3 animation for 3 objects (2 are transform, other 1is scale ) but it comes like 12 animation clisps with similar name what is the proper way to export.. Should I use NLA or timeline or which correction needed to proper export.. Could you suggest any video?

[@JustCurious-ou6gn]

It is a simple explanation but I can't see what I do wrong. I add the other action above one to combine it. However even if I didn't add it, it still is "action and keys" the character goes to another location which I don't want. When I put it above like you, it still does the same thing. Is there another solution?

[@tapikoBlends]

wow, thanks bro, you saved me, I was suffering, stuck on the animation

[@PeterSpiers]

Thanks for the brilliant and helpful video.

[@USBEN.]

Useful and to the point.

[@jayy9668]

What if my walk cycle is not in place and when I put the repeat up it just goes up and down?

[@Vertexvoyager]

how do i make my character walk forever because when i put repeat it starts from the beginning i just walk the walking to keep going

[@koxunarcadia]

How do you animate a character placing blocks or destroying a block? How to make a new block appear or one dissappear instantly?

[@XirRalphReacts]

Great video bro

[@PeteD]

FYI, S to scale does not alter the speed but rather the start and end frames of the clip

[@dillibahadurkatuwal6085]

Wow! Just learnt a new thing in blender. 😀😀

[@sebastianbarra4505]

How can I edit a spreadsheet?

[@NelsonArmstrong-l4f]

If I've gone too far to undo.. I've decided I don't want to use actions. How do I reverse the action strip and get my keyframes back in the timeline?

[@TheDuckCow]

You can delete all actions from the NLA strip, and then to recover some primary initial action, just have the armature/object selected, go into the action editor, and select it from the dropdown. It will then become the primary action and work like normal. It should show up still in the NLA editor, but with a differently shaded orange color than those action NLA strips which got "pushed down".

[@GrilledChickenRamyun]

huhuh u make it so easy. Novice here. Lots to learn. However, the inevitable lags and sluggishness are the main motivation downer

[@TheDuckCow]

There's a lot of things you can do to speed up your machine and defeat the sluggishness. Most of my animations were all created entirely (except perhaps rendering) on a laptop, there are ways to speed things up if you become mindful of what causes the slowdowns! Eg use collections, get used to solid mode, and isolate on one thing at a time.