advice/ tutorials on animating a bird images wings?

[Michael Szalapski]

Is this an American Red-Breasted Robin or a European “robin”? Their wing rythms and flight patterns are quite different.

– The Great Szalam
(The ‘Great’ stands for ‘Not So Great, in fact, Extremely Humble’)

No trees were harmed in the creation of this message, but several thousand electrons were mildly inconvenienced.

[Jon Iverson]

American Robin. Thanks

[Jon Iverson]

American Robin

[Brian Charles]

I can’t contribute any information regarding the authenticity of the wing flap of an American Robin, however there are several tutorials on-line about animating butterfly wings.

The method requires a minimum of 3 parts for the animation: body, left and right wing.

Make all 3 layers 3D.

Move the anchor points of each wing to the appropriate edge.

Animate a single wing’s Y Rotation with the following expression: 60*Math.sin(10*time)

The numbers refer to amplitude (60) or the height of travel of the wing, the other number is the frequency of the wing flap.

Use the pickwhip to tie the Y Rotation of the other wing to the Y Rotation of the animated wing and add a minus sign in front of the expression so it reads something like this:

-thisComp.layer(“right wing.psd”).rotationY

Now parent both wings to the body and you’re done.

To control the wing flap you can use expression sliders for amplitude and frequency rather than hard coded numbers.

[Filip Vandueren]

I usually cut up the birds wings in 2/3 sectionsand parent them together.
Then animate rotation by hand.
Wasn’t going for realism though.

[Michael Szalapski]

American Robins tend to fly rather low to the ground (probably because they’re so fat [that’s not an Americans Are Fat joke, American Robins just look fat…okay, it’s sort of an Americans Are Fat joke.])
Anyway…low to the ground and in bursts of flapping. Fluttery-fluttery-fluttery- short glide, fluttery-fluttery-fluttery- short glide, fluttery-fluttery-fluttery- short glide, etc.

– The Great Szalam
(The ‘Great’ stands for ‘Not So Great, in fact, Extremely Humble’)

No trees were harmed in the creation of this message, but several thousand electrons were mildly inconvenienced.

[Walter Soyka]

[Michael Szalapski] “American Robins tend to fly rather low to the ground (probably because they’re so fat [that’s not an Americans Are Fat joke, American Robins just look fat…okay, it’s sort of an Americans Are Fat joke.]) Anyway…low to the ground and in bursts of flapping. Fluttery-fluttery-fluttery- short glide, fluttery-fluttery-fluttery- short glide, fluttery-fluttery-fluttery- short glide, etc.”

Is that laden, or unladen?

Walter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
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[Andy George]

Is that laden, or unladen?
Well that’s ridiculous. It’s a simple question of weight ratios! A five ounce bird could not carry a one pound coconut. A European Robin maybe, but of course European Robins are non-migratory 🙂

-Andy George
Senior Editor
http://www.chiselindustries.com