Walt - The Man Behind The Myth

Sometimes it's time to down tools and learn a bit about the history of animation. The pioneering giant upon whose shoulders all animators stand was Walt Disney. To understand why Disney was such a transformative figure in the history of the animation industry, watch "Walt – The Man Behind the Myth" -  a biographical documentary on the man who founded the Walt Disney Studios.  The documentary was narrated by Dick Van Dyke and directed by Jean-Pierre Isbouts.

Download Reference Footage at GetVideo.at

GetVideo.at 

Keepvid.com, the website that used to be very useful for downloading video from YouTube, doesn't work anymore, most likely due to copyright problems.

Animators download reference footage from YouTube all the time, not for the purposes of copyright violation, but so that we can step through the video, frame by frame, and study the mechanics precisely.

Now that Keepvid isn't working, there are a number of other sites that work well, including GetVideo.at - a very useful website for downloading video.

Tripod for Filming Animation

Photo-R Tripod

One of the best ways to get live-action reference for a piece of animation is to film yourself acting it out, capture the footage on your phone, and then import the footage onto an image plane in Maya.

But how you film yourself acting it out, if it's just you? Someone has to operate the camera, after all. The answer is - you need a tripod. We're recommending this excellent (and inexpensive) tripod, made by Phot-R, for mounting your phone/camera, while you do the performance.