Recording a performance in Adobe Character Animator is as easy as pressing the red record button, but this tutorial goes deeper with how to arm and disarm behaviors, blend multiple takes together, edit lip sync tracks, and create composites in Adobe Premiere Pro or Adobe After Effects.
Basic recording and editing
Get familiar with the basics of recording in Character Animator.
What you learned: Record a simple performance
- Arm a character in the timeline (turn the red dot on) to control him/her.
- Press the red Record button to record a performance.
- Performances appear in the timeline as individual take bars.
Dealing with multiple takes
Record additional takes and blend performances together.
What you learned: Add and edit takes in the timeline
- Arm and disarm behaviors to record one element at a time.
- Use blend handles to blend one performance smoothly into another.
- Add an extra Dragger behavior to see the right and left hands during recording.
Triggers and lip sync
Record and edit trigger and lip sync takes.
What you learned: Add and edit trigger and lip sync takes
- Triggers can be recorded by pressing trigger keys or icons in the Control panel.
- Right-click a swap set trigger to change it, or right-click a trigger take gap to insert a new trigger.
- Lip sync visemes can be trimmed, moved, or swapped to match the audio track.
- Use Timeline > Compute Lip Sync From Scene Audio to make a lip sync track from pre-recorded audio files.
More recording and editing tools
Use helpful tools like slo-mo recording and the work area bar.
What you learned: Refine performances with record & edit tools
- Physics and Transform are passive behaviors that don’t normally need to be armed.
- If a passive behavior changes, like a character changing his/her position, then you can arm and record a change for that parameter.
- The work area bar is helpful for isolating parts of the timeline for playback looping and editing.
- Speed controls can help with smoother recordings or easier playback editing.
- Character Animator projects can be imported into Premiere Pro or After Effects through Dynamic Link.