Walking (Adobe Character Animator Tutorial)

The Walk behavior lets your animated characters walk, slump, sneak, run, and more. In this tutorial, we'll look at the differences between simple and three view walk rigging, and then go through a step by step process rigging a PSD file to get it up and running (literally). We'll also show how to customize your walk parameters to match the style to your puppet's personality, and show some examples of how users are using the Walk behavior for everything from runway fashion to bouncing musicians! Finally, we'll end with some tips and tricks with things like making the background and foreground move, or how to get a quadruped to walk.
0:00 Walk Behavior Overview
3:47 Simple Walk Rigging
7:27 Customizing the Walk
9:25 Three View Walk
11:39 Tips And Tricks
Download the free Eliza puppet at okaysamurai.com/puppets
How to add foreground/background movement: • Character Animator Tip...
Tiffany LaBelle: tiffanylabelle.com
Worker Studio: workerstudio.com
Download Character Animator: www.adobe.com/products/charac...
Download free example projects and puppets: adobe.com/go/chexamples (official adobe pack) and okaysamurai.com/puppets/ (okay samurai puppet pack)
Check out the official forums: adobe.com/go/chfeedback
Share your creations online with #CharacterAnimator!
Subscribe on KZbin: kzbin.info_c...
Twitter: / okaysamurai
Website: okaysamurai.com
Track: Outer - KV [Audio Library Release]
Music provided by Audio Library Plus
Watch: • Outer - KV | Free Back...
Free Download / Stream: alplus.io/outer

[@ChrisHoffmanHoffmangler]

You always seem to know the parts of my project that I'm struggling with and post a relevant tutorial. Thanks!

[@emilbrothersmedia2533]

I just want to thank you Samurai - I stumbled upon one of your videos and since I am already using the creative cloud I immediately installed the character animator. Since then I watched nearly everyone of your videos twice and can't stop playing with this amazing piece of software. Your tutorials are in my opinion amongst the best tutorials for any software ever. They cover everything you need to know, they are perfectly suited for beginners and provide you an easy acces to the character animator capabilities. Awesome !! Thank you so much for everything you're doing and I hope you will continue it for a long time :)

[@curtispyketech]

Fellow tutorial maker here - and I must say, your tutorials are top notch. Well explained and thorough. Big fan.

[@neoblackcyptron]

Your team is really spearheading an amazing product. Good job. This is one of the best well designed well written pieces of software ever created. It’s intuitive and these video tutorials are excellent.

[@houseofsugars]

Another winner!! Thanks so much for these. And I LOVE what Tiffany LaBelle has done !!

[@extremesegaa9239]

I wish every youtuber had great step by step explanations and clear speaking like you do , keep it up

[@ktroofficial56]

ExtremeSega A i agree with you

[@hansendesigns]

He works for adobe. He gets paid. :)

[@laovoly6988]

Thanks to your great tutorial, I was able to make an animation, too. DAVE, You are my great teacher.

[@ganapathysubramaniam]

character animator via these wonderful videos has opened up a portal for me! Thank you!

[@CloakedMan71]

Thank you Dave so much, this was exactly the tutorial I needed.

[@laurabelpiano]

Thank you so much for these wonderful lessons!

[@MaverickVersusEverything]

Bringing heat! Mav flips out when he watches. --Mav's Underlings

[@SLOPPEWALL]

Yay! I did it. Thank you for the well put together tutorial.

[@ScaryStoriesNYC]

12:56 BRILLIANT!! I've been looking for something like that to use in music videos that I had to put n the back burner because they just weren't working. I was thinking of animating them in 3D, but this trick should save those projects. THANK YOU.

[@udittatisar5336]

Keep doing this great work bro ! May Shiva bless you with whatever you want 💫

[@goetzvideo-filmmaker]

Awesome video! Thanks for all the hard work!

[@shariqmanzoor322]

It’s too detailed and easy to learn, thanks dear

[@LanguageHelp]

Thank you for your tips and videos.

[@user-mg1lk6fp9b]

Man you’re doing perfect job ❤️ Wish to have my own work soon

[@KnockemOrLockem]

The Samurai has 85K subscribers and still answers all of our questions 👍🏻🙏🏻❤️

[@heroesofcolor]

This was incredibly helpful!! KZbin School is the best. Thank you Dave!!

[@codygarcia1783]

Thank you for sharing your knowledge dude!

[@gogoanimation]

Great Job - Many,many thanks!!!!

[@kailashrajkhowa9418]

Thanks a lot! I was struggling a lot to do this

[@RicsiDy9]

Well.. you know... you are a hero. You just gave me some new skills, and a new job as well. I can't even say how grateful am I. If you will be in Hungary sometime, i will definitely give you a bottle of wine or something. Thank you so much!

[@okaysamurai]

I'll take it! :)

[@geotiempo-investigacionydo1224]

Good channel! I've activated the bell and following you. More than uploading tutorials, you are really contributing to the society :D Nice job.

[@aaqililham5802]

Bless you Dave!

[@TheEbble]

This is so so helpful!! Thank you so so much!!!!🤩🤩🤩

[@tiffanylabelle]

Brilliant as always Dave. Thank you! It's interesting what workerstudio did, I also used the walk cycle on my lady playing the piano and all my scooter and people on bikes too with very low settings... :)

[@okaysamurai]

Thanks for letting me share your examples! Awesome work!

[@theshapeofart8536]

youre the best teacher!

[@Marion0142]

thanks. very helpful😊

[@MegaRazac]

Thanks to your great tutorial

[@PaperbackFilms]

You're the best! Thank you so much!

[@shegun]

Thank you!

[@KiKiArtWorks]

I love your videos!

[@dhruvrajsinhjadeja-vfxarti3085]

Thank you very so much for this video sir :)

[@okkiwibird7151]

hey SO helpful love your stuff

[@RobertsReviews]

Thank you

[@sobhansoori3122]

thank you very much I appreciate your help infinite thanks .

[@wagnerjunior9434]

Amazing!

[@bibleventures]

Just finished making my first video that used character animator (previously used simple key framing in fcpx) and my rigging is a mess with extra limb iks and walk behaviours on every limb to make them function! Still - it was a start and allowed me to make a video in a very short timescale. I shall have to make use of the videos to sort my puppeting out, ensuring they don’t revert to a scrambled mess every time I drag them newly onto a scene). Still - it’s making a big difference in what I do, so thanks to you and the team.

[@okaysamurai]

If you're banging your head against the wall please please post a screenshot, video, or File > Export > Puppet (.puppet file) to adobe.com/go/chfeedback for more direct help!

[@bibleventures]

@@okaysamurai thanks - I’ll bear it in mind if I don’t get things resolved but it’s not a significant problem at the moment, it’s just that I needed arms behind legs, thus splitting the arms from body group and so on and didn’t have time to work a better solution so bodged it lol. Thank you though and if I struggle to sort things I’ll let you know, 😊

[@scott285]

@@okaysamurai I'm starting to bang my head against the wall with this problem. :) I got my 3-view puppet to walk but when I added the limb IK to the front view so he could jump, squat etc, he then quit walking. Do you have any suggestions from having this happen previously?

[@sezginderin9571]

Men you are the best, your videos help me A LOTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT Please share more videos, thank you.

[@JR-ci3dh]

you are a king

[@woodya1829]

Awesome tutorial! Very thorough and helpful. Do you address animating a character riding a bike in any of your other tutorials? I have been trying to find something but have not be able to. Thanks!

[@okaysamurai]

I haven't tackled that yet! I'm not sure I've seen a CH character doing that yet. Might be a good one to explore in the future...

[@oyku_owl]

thank you so much I love you

[@hitogramastreaming6580]

thx,, really helpfull!!

[@zavankan4796]

Hi Dave, for Eliza, are we able to change the color of her shirt and pants? I did not see a layer for shirt and pants. I just finished the "create your own puppet" tutorial and noticed it had a group for pants. Also her hair, I was able to change the color for the right and left side of her hair, but not the middle. How would I be able to do that? Thanks.

[@okaysamurai]

Yes, I believe if you go into Eliza's legs and torso in the PSD file you'll find the elements you're looking for. Her pants parts are more spread out because she needed walk functionality. Same with the hair and dangling - just go through the PSD and turn layer visibility on/off until you find the right ones!

[@contaoutravez]

i´m in love.

[@ChrisOVEMERY]

hey Dave thanks for an amazing tutorial. I have a question, and sorry if this is covered but I simply missed it somehow. Say you have a rigged and tweaked standing puppet. You just want to add the left and right profiles and do the whole walk thing. Immediately when putting your your whole character in a folder (standing) all the rigging disappears and needs to be re-done. Is there a way around this?

[@okaysamurai]

Unfortunately no - CH has a hard time keeping track of the rigging if things get shifted around into different folders. Anytime there are major structure changes, which is usually folders being added / moved / renamed, it can break the rigging. Sometimes CH is smart enough to figure it out, but not all the time. So for a walking character I try to add that stuff ahead of time before I get into any heavy rigging.

[@ChrisOVEMERY]

@@okaysamurai alright! thanks for answering!

[@itchcreativestudio]

Hey there, loving this software and your tutorials. I have 2 questions. 1) Is there a walk setting to completly leave the arms idle? The only way I can find is to remove the elbow and wrist tags. And 2) I added a manual floor to act as colliding element. But when the walking starts it's tilt's along with the character. How to not make it move at all? Thx so much!

[@okaysamurai]

1. Yeah, your. best bet for the arms being completely idle is to remove tags so they don't get influenced by Walk's settings. 2. Make the background independent - or even better, ideally in a completely separate file like I show here that you drag under your character in the timeline.

[@yoyoemmyjo]

Awesome update to the Walk tutorial! Thanks Dave! I recently figured out one additional rigging step that's been critical to my puppets' walk cycles: Changing the attach style of the origin points on my walking views (e.g. the +Right Quarter and +Left Quarter walking groups) to "Free." Otherwise, they look like they're pinned to the background wherever that origin point is placed. This might only be relevant when your artwork is really big, though, because Eliza's are set to the default Weld style and she moves quite freely.

[@okaysamurai]

Great point. We hope to fix and do this automatically in the future, but great tip.

[@DavidMichaSilva]

Hi Dave! I am implementing this tutorial into my own personal short animation, I even built my own persona on top of this PS file of Eliza. But somehow, when I walk back from right to left, the figure gets a bit compounded or squashed. Not much, just enough to annoy the hell out of me. And I can't figure out why! Is it a body property? Something to do with the waist pin? I've tried moving off centre to the back of the torso, and that did help in the movement from left to right (right profile), but it doesn't work for the left profile. Help! Any help is (truly!) appreciated!

[@okaysamurai]

Hard to diagnose here - for more direct help, please post a screenshot, video, or File > Export > Puppet (.puppet file) to adobe.com/go/chfeedback. Walk can be a little mysterious sometimes why something squashes or not, given all the different possible character types. If I see this, I usually play around with moving tags / origins and seeing if it makes any difference. Eventually I figure it out through trial and error! If you post on the forums we might be able to help quicker though.

[@jacquelinewilliams747]

Can you separate or regroup segments? if there is no body section, leg, or torso? One of my puppets I was trying to get to walk had all of the elements under 'Torso'

[@okaysamurai]

I would do that in the original PSD or AI file, which may require some surgery to cut out and correctly organize the necessary parts. Typically you want your original art structure to be a good as possible before importing to CH.

[@sinafuchser3403]

Good Afternoon, that's another very helpful rigging tutorial. But we have a question about the walk of the characters. We drew a character with 3 views like the puppet in your video. Our problem is, that when we do the rigging exactly like you in the video, the character is a bit smaller while walking. When it stops, it grows up and the character is bigger again. Is there some special rigging that counteracts this? Thank you for your answer!

[@okaysamurai]

The sinking/lean you might see is a bug. Try aligning the toe and heel tags at the same horizontal level and see if that helps. If it persists please post an example video at adobe.com/go/chfeedback and we'll try to help you more.

[@neoblackcyptron]

Hi Dave, I think this might be an old question. But is there a way to make walk cycles for a puppet with 4 legs. The one approach I can think of is to make 2 puppets with 2 legs each, and have a 3rd puppet with a head and torso, combine all 3 to create my 4 legged creature. But I think, there might be a better way which I am not aware of. Thanks I figured it out saw another video where the user maps the same puppet leg tags to more than one leg. So it is possible to have a one to many relationship between the puppet tag and the different parts of the vector art.

[@okaysamurai]

I talk about it at the end of this video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/nafCY4imq9mgY68. It's not great but it's the best workaround I've found so far.

[@neoblackcyptron]

@@okaysamurai Thanks. I'll check that out. BTW the new IK for the arms and legs in the BETA version is really useful. Thanks for pointing me in the right direction. It really made a difference in my episode2 which i released last week.

[@meghandaharwal5179]

Hi, I'm trying to set up a walk cycle. I've watched the video and copied each step for hours, repeatedly and its still not working. The issue seems to be that none of the handles I'm tagging are being used by any behaviour. Its weird because I even downloaded Eliza and copied every step thats visible but it just doesn't work. Please please please could you help? Thank you so much!

[@okaysamurai]

If it's not working then yes, most likely the Walk behavior isn't seeing the tags for some reason. For more direct help please post a screenshot, video, or file > export > puppet to adobe.com/go/chfeedback and we'll try to help diagnose what's wrong.

[@manaalacademy9534]

@@okaysamurai hey sir im using ch and i wanna make my own story using ch animation then upload my youtube so ist problem?

[@paulartifice]

Thanks for all your helpful tutorials!!] Is it possible to add head turns to the right, left, standing postiions, so that a puppet could say, look back as they walk forward?

[@okaysamurai]

Yes! See the Brooklyn Buddies on www.adobe.com/go/chexamples for a great example of this.

[@paulartifice]

@@okaysamurai I actually figured it out after a few hours of messing with layer duplication. I created a separate group folder "head" for each body position and tagged them as independent. I don't know if you've done a video on it but I discovered some of the pretagging you did in photoshop of things like "origin" and "dangle" etc, and have found adding those in photoshop greatly speeds up my rigging time in CA. Might be something to do a video on. Anyway thank you. I have watched hours of your videos and used your puppets for reference and it has been super helpful. Been using CA for my band/art project, "Aktion Kat!" and very happy with the results! Happy New Year dude! 😺

[@andycrosier3541]

Hey, great vid! So, when you're tagging the shoulders and hips -you do that on the "body" section? And when you tag the arm -you only tag the elbow and wrist -not the shoulder? And when tagging the legs leave out the hips, because they were tagged "hips" in the body section? What if you tag something twice, like hips within the body and legs sections?

[@okaysamurai]

Yeah, so typically you just want to be consistent, so I recommend putting your shoulder and hip tags all on the body group. I think it still works if they're on the arm and leg groups, but I think they have more possibilities of becoming detached if you do this. When you tag things twice, usually CH just ignores the second set, but it's good practice to only have one set of tags. If the problems persist, 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.

[@andycrosier3541]

@@okaysamurai Ok, thanks!

[@akridiy]

Thank you for the video! Could you rework the default walk cycle? Almost every client says it looks jagged and unnatural.

[@okaysamurai]

It's based off of hand drawn frame by frame animation walk cycles, but as I say in the video, one size doesn't fit all, so it's impossible to pick a default that looks great for everyone. But thanks for the feedback - we are looking into ways to greatly expand the walk possibilities and we'll take it into account!

[@timothylitostansky1339]

Thank you for the tutorial! I'm struggling something pretty specific. While my character is walking I want them to occasionally raise their hand, point, etc. I tried the limb IK but they seem to fight each other. Is this possible in CA? Thanks in advance!

[@okaysamurai]

Yeah this is a tough one. Your best bet is to leave Limb IK off of the arms for the walking views and don't tag the wrist/elbow so walk won't take over. You won't get the benefits of Limb IK but at least you'll be able to move the arms. I unfortunately can't think of another way to deal with this because Limb IK and Walk both want those same tags.

[@timothylitostansky1339]

@@okaysamurai Thank you very much for the reply. That really is a huge bummer. Hopefully something like this will be fixed in the future.

[@MisterFrostee_NYC]

I cant seem to get a valid "origin point" to show up with the green dotted line- so I'm unable to fully attach like you are at the 5:18 mark.. I tried "reset layer" on the left arm for example that is crowned/independent and still nothing. Any tips? Also love the channel!

[@okaysamurai]

Make sure the independent layer has something non-independent to attach to, usually the torso layer below. Also in rig mode make sure the bottom left corner of the canvas area that the polygon icon is turned on (blue) to show this kind of stuff.

[@artistictreehgr]

Great videos they are super helpful. I have a character that has a skirt. I wanted to know how you go about adding dynamics to the skirt so it can collide with the legs as she walks.

[@okaysamurai]

Currently there isn't a great way to have cloth dynamics, what Tiffany is showing in the video is as good as we can do right now. You kind of just have to fake it. But there will be advancements made here in the future.

[@artistictreehgr]

@@okaysamurai I see. Is there a place I can suggest new features? I have a 3D Character rigging background and was trying this software for the first time and have several ideas.

[@okaysamurai]

Yes! adobe-video.uservoice.com/forums/911317-character-animator

[@kountrycabinetshomefurnish6631]

Why are some of the options greyed out on the Walk behavior? Also, I have 2 characters in the same scene. The one is a 3 view character that was created in the file before the latest 2020 update. The second is also the same thing but was added after I updated. The first one walks fine to the left and right with the arrow keys, but if I match all the settings on both characters in the walk behavior (except for the grayed out ones) the second character doesn't walk with the arrow keys. Any thoughts?

[@okaysamurai]

Things can be greyed out depending on some of your choices. So for example, change the dropdown to "position based" instead of "left and right arrow keys" and you'll see the position shows up with the ability to keyframe. If it doesn't walk still, there might be a rigging conflict or something. If it persists, please post a video, screenshot, or your File > Export > Puppet to adobe.com/go/chfeedback for more direct help.

[@faruqijeniri3174]

Hye there, I have question to ask. May I know where you create the background? Do we need to import it to Adobe Animate or Adobe After Effect?

[@okaysamurai]

I created the background in Adobe Fresco on the iPad pro. It's just a JPG image so yes, you can import it into any program you want!

[@betteryouin2418]

This tutorial has been on repeat 👌🏽 was just wondering is it possible to have multiple standing positions i.e a front facing profile and right facing profile. So that if your walking to the right, when the character stops working it will be facing the right or the front if you wish? 🤔

[@okaysamurai]

There unfortunately isn't an easy way to do this yet - you could have a swap set for the standing view where you can manually swap between left/right standing views with a trigger key, but ultimately I think you might be better off just saving two versions of the puppet and using whichever one you need for a particular scene.

[@AmandaDeSimone]

Fantastic tutorials! Any advice on how to animate a snake slithering across the screen in Character Animator? I've tried manipulating limb rigs from sample puppets on a snake's body but no dice.

[@okaysamurai]

I would probably add several draggers in the body and do a replay recording of them bending around. If you added a Walk behavior and Waist tag it should be able to move with walking left/right motion. But really this needs a full IK system to work really well, which we don't have (yet).

[@JohnMcMahan5]

With the 3 view walk, would it be possible to add 3 different standing profiles instead of one in the standing group and use a swap set to change the standing direction? That way, when the character stops walking, the character is still facing the direction that it was walking. This might kill the need for having separate standing and walking characters. Is that even a good idea or is it better to just have separate characters? Thanks.

[@okaysamurai]

Yep, this is totally possible! It may feel a little complex, needing to remember when & where to trigger the views, and if those extra views don't have view tags, you would need to manually add additional face / eye gaze / etc. behaviors. To me it's just a bit too much complexity to keep in my head, so I tend to stick to just the 3 view, but it's definitely doable.

[@JohnMcMahan5]

@@okaysamurai I see what you mean! It is totally easier for me to use a separate standing and walking version on the timeline than to rig, tag, and untag all the behaviors for one character. Thanks again!

[@seansiegler]

May I ask a question not really related to this video?! In the example puppet "Sticky" there are a number of different backgrounds available for use, all of which I see are pulling from a separate PSD file. Yet try as I might, I cannot figure out HOW that file is linked to the scene and the main puppet. Is there a part of one of your tutorials that explains this? Also, any attempt I have made to change said background layers (in photoshop) results in that layer being dropped by Character Animator. I would love to know what is going on so I can recreate this! Thanks!

[@okaysamurai]

IIRC, it's the Layer Picker behavior. Layer Picker is a pretty awesome behavior that you can add to any group and have multiple ways to cycle between them, including a slider control. I don't believe I've done a dedicated tutorial about this yet - good idea! I'll put it on the list...

[@seansiegler]

@@okaysamurai Thanks so much. I'll poke around with that. I'm finding that seemingly simple "Sticky" puppet has a lot of cool tricks in it to decipher.

[@DavidMichaSilva]

Hi Dave! Is there a way to resize the original artwork in PS or AI and NOT lose the position of all the rigging you have put in in Ch? And I'm not sure if stick tools can be scaled up or down… Can they? Many thanks in advance!

[@okaysamurai]

Unfortunately no - once you resize the original artwork, CH won't know where to put the rigging anymore - it will keep it at the original dimensions. Ideally you want to make sure you have the right sized character before rigging. Note you can also resize your character inside CH via Transform > Scale on the right in any scene.

[@DavidMichaSilva]

@@okaysamurai : Thanks for the clarification, it's much appreciated!

[@neoblackcyptron]

I have one question regarding the walk cycle. Is it possible to avoid the sudden jump when transitioning from the left profile view, to the front view, to the right profile view when walking back and forth on the screen. I have tried setting up the curves for the smooth transition from one view to the next. But the act of switching between the left, center, and right profile view still seems immediate. I might be missing something, that the software application already has to get this accomplished.

[@okaysamurai]

This is currently how walk works - there isn't a transition, it will immediately jump to the next view when triggered. I've seen some people play around with keyframing the parameters to slow down / speed up a walk at the beginning / end to ease into a standing position better, or use some transform keyframes to line them up better, but yeah, unfortunately right now transitions are always going to be immediate.

[@neoblackcyptron]

@@okaysamurai No problemo, this is already an awesome piece of software. I am sure the adobe folks will come up with some algorithm to give us this feature in the future. For now I am transistioning between left and right views, without hitting the Frontal view, that works better for my needs.

[@DinveMitoloji]

Hi, I need your help. I need to do my background in 'CA' instead of 'AE'. But if I use a camera in 'CA' my background is not working. I mean background has different X positions but when the camera is open positions aren't working. I will really be happy if you can help me with this subject. Because as I say i need to use both of them at the same time in the 'CA'. Thanks for your tutorial videos, they are really helpful.

[@okaysamurai]

Did you check out the sample Linden & Robot file on adobe.com/go/chexamples? That has a working background - if you do everything just like that it should work just fine. When you add a camera into a scene it affects all layers below it. If you're still having trouble please post a video of the issue on adobe.com/go/chfeedback and we'll help you more directly there!

[@haneyaljayar5164]

Great tutorial! I have a question; when releasing the arrow keys, the character snaps back to the standing pose which looks to the left of the screen. What if I need the character to walk to the right of the screen then stand with its face looking to the right?

[@okaysamurai]

Yeah, this is tricky because you're only allowed one standing pose. I would probably say use the Transform behavior and change Scale X to - 100% to send the character facing the other way. You could either start with your character flipped like that or keyframe it in later.

[@markelliot2994]

Great tutorial! Of course a question: 1) I have a 3 view Bumble Bee character-Standing, Left and right, (no legs, just cycle of wings and head with mouth and eyes)and I have the 'draggable' so I can move him around the scene with my mouse...Why do all 3 views show up all the time? I have designated the right view 'right' and left view 'left'. thanks again!

[@okaysamurai]

Walk is only going to work with the arrow keys, not the dragger - you want motion trigger! Check out the hummingbird on adobe.com/go/chexamples. Different behavior / tags.

[@markelliot2994]

@@okaysamurai I am indebted to you for answering what probably are the same questions over and over again...Never in my adult computer life of over 4 decades have received such outstanding support. I suppose it is inevitable that Adobe or some other company will recognized your gifts and passion and either promote you to a higher level or whisk you away, but until that time I am prayerfully thankful for you! If there is the ability to contact your 'manager' I would personally like to commend you for your efforts and kindness....

[@dannacoonen9555]

HI Dave, We are trying to learn this tutorial in my class and we are in version 2.1.1 is there a way to get the puppet so it works in this version? When we go to open it up it won't open. I am a student of yours from Adobe Max for two years. Now trying to do this with my class. Thanks, Danna

[@okaysamurai]

Hi Danna - I don't have a 2.1.1 rigged version, but the link should be a ZIP files that includes the unrigged PSD files that you can hopefully open and add the rigging to them. If you follow the steps in the tutorial it should only take a few minutes to rig properly!

[@WilliamCowper77]

hi, on character animator, do you know how to set a new starting position for a character in the same scene? i want my character to start in the middle, walk off screen, then, reappear walking on from the other side. However, it keep defaulting back to the first start position, so he never comes back on from the other side. Any tips welcome!

[@okaysamurai]

Are you using the keyframes method? That's probably your best bet. I'd keyframe one starting position, have them walk off with another keyframe, and then put two keyframes right next to each other - one offscreen, and the very next frame in the second starting position. Or you could Edit > Split the puppet into two separate tracks and record each one separately. Hope that helps!

[@vb7105]

Does Adobe have some sort of index that explains all the features and icons? I saw that the ninja puppet had a bunch of pawn looking icons next the heads?

[@okaysamurai]

This is your best bet: helpx.adobe.com/adobe-character-animator/user-guide.html

[@golord]

Hi Dave, how do you change the default profile from left to right? I'm working with Kaufman, and for most of the scene he will be facing left when standing.

[@okaysamurai]

Whatever the "standing" (non-left/right profile) view is will be how the character looks when standing. So if you want him to face the other way by default, just flip that layer around in PS. There are ways to trigger between left/right standing views, but most people keep it simple and only have one.

[@golord]

@@okaysamurai Thank you!

[@golord]

@@okaysamurai A user posted a great trick on the forums. Using Scale X, you can keyframe left/right swaps, even after the performance has been recorded! Working great so far!

[@saul_torres]

In the Walk panel, when I set keyframes in the Position-based mode to make the character move left or right. The character moves, BUT the legs stay still and the whole character moves as one object? Is there a setting I forgot setup?

[@okaysamurai]

If the legs are staying still but the character is moving, that sounds like the Walk behavior isn't finding all the tags correctly. In Rig mode, twirl open the Walk behavior and then twirl open handles - if you see 0s in there, it means Walk can't find the correct tags and you need to add them. If you see 1s then I'm not sure...I'd say post a screenshot/video/puppet to adobe.com/go/chfeedback and we can try to help more directly.

[@saul_torres]

@@okaysamurai Thank You! I will do your recommendations :)

[@Marion0142]

Hi there. Thanks for you brilliant videos. Do legs have to be two different elements?

[@okaysamurai]

For this walk behavior, yes. They should each be a separate independent element rigged as shown, with the knees, ankles, toes, sticks, etc.

[@kelvin_darwin]

Are you guys planning on doing a front view walk cycle option soon? That will be a game changer.

[@okaysamurai]

No current plans outside of using cycle layers as shown for Wonder Boy in this video, but feel free to add/vote on it here: adobe.com/go/ch_wish

[@islamiccornerofficial9512]

Sir God teacher

[@anotherdayanotherdance8369]

Hello Dave... thank you so much for the help! Where can I find a video where it shows how to set up the three view step by step?

[@okaysamurai]

I'm not sure if I ever show it exactly step by step - but I do give a slightly different take here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/mGKqfZ6Ei7t4fc0

[@anotherdayanotherdance8369]

@@okaysamurai Thank you!

[@bellaboiz]

Ghaa I had the wrong layer tagged with the walk behavior, thank you!

[@DigitalDave]

is there any way to have character animator automatically flip the profile for standing view? like Eliza my Puppet's standing view faces left so even when walking right and stopping he instantly flips around again. Or is there any way I can get around this? thanks mate!

[@okaysamurai]

I think I talk about this in the video as a limitation - no, whatever your standing view is will be what shows up. The only way around this would be to either a) have your standing view be a more front facing view so it looks more in between the two profile views, or b) have a 4th view facing the correct way that you manually trigger. Honestly for me I would probably just keep things like Eliza and reverse her scale either in CH or AE if I needed her facing the other way...less complex that way!

[@DigitalDave]

@@okaysamurai thank you so much for the reply, yeah I did see you go over that in the video however just wanted to know if there is another way of achieving the same result, flipping the character using keyframes is a pretty good workaround. Thanks Dave!

[@kurmanbek]

Can you make more tutorials about enhanced animations like character carrying something, jumping or throwing or interacting with objects? How to link objects to hands and arrange layers etc

[@okaysamurai]

Yes, I hope to do something like this in the future. For now I would watch the magnets tutorial on this channel.

[@totlenmoingay]

Hi Dave, I want my character to walk but don't have that much time to illustrate and rig a 3-view character. Is there anyway to fix a ONE-VIEW character to the ground (not floating) one it stops walking??? Thank you and all the best, Tony.

[@okaysamurai]

Unfortunately no, because the legs need to be able to move and not pin to the ground. However, you could just duplicate your one view into 3, keeping the same illustration for each of them, and just rig it up that way.

[@totlenmoingay]

@@okaysamurai Thank you so much for the idea.

[@user-fs4di4oz7s]

hi, im having an issue where my character will walk left and right but when in the standing position it just reverts back to its original position, not the position it ended in when it walks. how would i fix this?

[@okaysamurai]

Hmmm, if you have left/right arrow keys and the Walk > Body speed is set to 100% it should move everything. Or if keyframes are used that should also work. I just tried this with the Walkbot example on the homescreen and it works. Note that when you click elsewhere, stop recording, etc - the walk simulation can "reset" itself, so if you want your character starting somewhere different use the Transform behavior to change that. 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.

[@user-fs4di4oz7s]

@@okaysamurai thank you for your reply! it seems to have fixed itself, im not sure what I did exactly. I just started from scratch, rerigged it and it seems to be working now :)

[@neoblackcyptron]

Is it possible to transition from walk to prance or strut style of walking in the same scene. I noticed whenever I record stuff in the timeline with one style of walking and then decide to change it to another walk style like prance or strut or run. Character animator seems to retroactively make changes on my prior recorded walk styles in the timeline.

[@okaysamurai]

Yes - to do this go next to style and click the little ... icons that appear and "enable parameter recording." This lets you record parameter changes, so if you record and change that mid-recording, the changes will save. We turn this off my default because too many dots is confusing and not used often, but you can do this to any non-keyframed parameter.

[@neoblackcyptron]

@@okaysamurai Thanks, I just got the parameter recording activated next to the walk styles. And it works. I can easily switch between these with the record parameter. I am going to explore the other hidden record parameters now. Thank you very much.

[@geoffreywade]

Following your tutorial at 7:27, I was able to get ElizaSimpleUnrigged to walk from right to left in "Immediate mode". Cool. At 11:10, the mode for Eliza3ViewUnrigged is set to "Left & Right Arrow Keys". Eliza3ViewUnrigged works as shown. However, if i switch to "Immediate" mode, Eliza3ViewUnrigged walks from left to right. Why is that the opposite direction of ElizaSimpleUnrigged. Am I doing something wrong?

[@okaysamurai]

I'm not 100% sure, but in general "immediately" should only be used for the single view walk characters. My best guess is that immediately picks the first walking view it sees and goes with that? Any time I do 3 views, I always do keyboard inputs or position based.

[@MFGroupChannel]

First I would like to thank you for this wonderful explanation, step by step And the question is ... Is there a way to make a walking movement for an animal with four legs?

[@okaysamurai]

I talk about this at the very end of the video. Yes, if you add multiple Walk behaviors you can get away with it, but it's a little hacky at the moment.

[@MFGroupChannel]

Thank you for your interest in responding ... I was able to make a walking movement for an animal, but there are some simple problems in controlling parts of the body to make it move naturally ... If you like to see it, I can upload it to KZbin ... I wish there would be a solution for the movement of an animal@@okaysamurai

[@Dincerssssss]

I wanna ask something about this. Can we able to make all characters walk like in this video? For instance I choose Kroegnar in Character Animator and I couldn’t manage to make him walk in any way.

[@okaysamurai]

Not all characters walk - they have to be rigged like I show here to work. Krognar doesn't have the Walk behavior or rigging, and his body is more front facing instead of to the side, so he's probably not an ideal character for walking.

[@Dincerssssss]

Thanks a lot.

[@islamiccornerofficial9512]

Very God Bro

[@mrchii4908]

Hi I appreciate a lot the work you are doing to teach us, I have one question may be a little bit stupid but in my case, the white screen is very small and I cant see my whole puppet or how can I make my puppet smaller to see my whole character, how can I fix that?

[@okaysamurai]

Select the scene in the left project panel and adjust the dimensions on the right properties panel. I go over this and a few other basics in kzbin.info/www/bejne/bXiudKpqm5aIqKs.

[@mrchii4908]

@@okaysamurai hahaha oh yeah I see it , it was pretty easy now I feel stupid , thanks man I hope to one day be as good as you

[@iamstonesteel]

Hi, I am using 2018 Character Animator, and could not open the Eliza Simple. Is it because she is made in 2020 version?

[@okaysamurai]

Yes - she is made in 2020. I think you should still be able to open up the included PSD files though?

[@Firegirlable]

Hi I am new to Character animator. Can this be done with my own artwork or would I have to use the puppets in the program?

[@okaysamurai]

Yep! Any Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator file works! Check out our "Community Spotlight" episodes to see what kinds of stuff people are creating.

[@johnashworth9628]

Is there a way to rig a character who isn’t upright on two legs? For example, a dog that is using all four legs on the ground? Will it work the same way in a walk cycle?

[@okaysamurai]

I talk about this at the very end of the video - it's possible, but very hacky in its current state.

[@alejandraemiliaarayasalaza2304]

I need help! I followed all the steps for make my character to walk but I get in the behavior that there are no handles. But when I put the behaviors walk in the body works it but it walks very strange. I have the character animate 2020. What would be the problem? I love your tutorials by the way

[@okaysamurai]

Hard to diagnose here, but for more direct help, please post a screenshot, video, or File > Export > Puppet (.puppet file) to adobe.com/go/chfeedback.

[@zed2960]

Can't you create a swap set for the standing view, and this way you could have two rest poses, one left profile and one right profile, and even maybe a third front facing view?

[@okaysamurai]

Yep you definitely could! But Walk will default to whatever is currently triggered. So it's not smart enough to know if you walk right to show the right view when you stop, and the left view after walking left - you would have to do that manually. But yep, totally possible!

[@zed2960]

@@okaysamurai Great, thanks for replying (as always! )

[@melvillebloom3838]

Hi Dave, can you please make the assets also available for download in your puppet. In this case, is it possible to share your background of the scene? Let me know and keep up the great work!!

[@okaysamurai]

Sure - I updated the ZIP file to include the street background as well. Enjoy!

[@8414darkness]

my character walks with a "right quarter profile" walking to the right side and a "left profile" walking to the left. How can I fix. Also, how is the starting profile selected?

[@okaysamurai]

The 3 view walk at 9:25 should go over this. You need to tag each side as Right Profile and Left Profile, not quarter. The starting position is the frontal view. If you download the Eliza character you will see this in action.

[@extremesegaa9239]

Is there a way to reset the workspace layout to it's original layout? I managed to mess mine up and is driving me insane trying to fix it , found it in window, workspace, reset record

[@extremesegaa9239]

Nevermind I found it in windows , workspace ,reset record for anyone having this issue