monster hunter is a series like no other many have attempted to imitate it but in terms of design and animation it has no rivals while the newest entry monster underworld and its ice-born expansion are lauded for their realistic visuals this series has always excelled when it comes to animating fantastical creatures rather what world achieves is congruent 'el effects and monster animation that doesn't just create believable encounters but a believable world as well hello and welcome to the canopy effect this is a studio spotlight on the team behind monster hunter world I spawn [Music] at the heart of any monster design is functionality before anyone has begun to consider what the creature will look like they first have to consider will sort of challenge it must pose then they consider the environment how will this monster move about in this way they're literally thinking about animation before considering the initial design itself because of this monsters always moving away that make us think hey that's natural despite them being freakish dragons like with all animation reference material is key these monsters have some basis in reality mirroring real-life creatures or objects and their movement patterns for instance while zinogre is clearly based in a wolf's lejiana was based on an airplane with all of its wing detail allowing it to deeply control the way it moves in the air this requires a ton of study with the design and animation teams having made plenty of physics to zoos in aquariums over the years to understand how these creatures move at the same time this is still a fancy creature and so the animators will start sketching ideas of what sort of animations they'd like to see from this monster so for instance Glavine s is essentially a big dinosaur with a bigger tail but one of the early illustrations of it was this one from the Monster Hunter generations animation staff where they decided before anything else that Glavine s was going to have a move where it bites his tail and they decided on what it would look like when it shoots fire often the model of the actual monster isn't complete so they're eager beaver's on the animation team will use a different model of a similar looking monster to show off their ideas then they'll go over to the technical animators it's these guys job to work on the rig essentially the skeleton of the monster that determines how it can move and together they'll work on getting these animations into the game in a way that fits the model of the creature animator Mitsuru Yamamoto actually mentioned that when he's working on a monster he's thinking of all of the different ways he can beat the hunters almost like a dungeon master he finds that he'll constantly be trying to find ways to make his creations stronger until someone else has to come and dial it back so the Hunter's actually stand a chance one of the biggest considerations in monster hunter is weight and this is something that was particularly important for worlds in world and ice born it's important that the weight of the monsters is constantly addressed through the effects animation when they hit the ground through the camera shutters and through their turf war animations in the past on real-time monster gameplay in monster under titles was animated by hand and motion capture was mainly used for hunters but for monster hunter world they've started animating the monsters with motion capture during battles the idea is that someone performs the movements of a monster in a motion capture suits that data will then form the basis of the monsters movements which an animator will then go over and adjust the concept seems silly for recording someone's movements on all fours is a good way of improving efficiency while also establishing how gravity affects weights for instance moving back to Glavine s it is a creature with a massive tail and so you can imagine its center of gravity is a mess this is something that the animation team paid close attention to even before trying out motion capture in worlds if a Glavine s is tugging at its tail building up pressure and about to swing it around what happens when that tail is heavier than the rest of the body yeah the body gets drags along with it but what constitutes for a good animation also means a great gameplay opportunity since now we have an opening for hunters to attack [Applause] [Music] even monsters that seem similar can have drastically different animations depending on how a monster balances its own weight vel Khanna ice bonds flagship monster who repeatedly jab at hunters with its spear like tail but because the tail is much lighter than the body after each jab it needs to either swing or twist it back to regain balance however if you look at raffle offs and rathian also dragons their tails are much heavier and because of this they can't really move their tail independently therefore if they want to swing that barbed tail at you they're going to have to move their entire body sometimes even flipping upside down just to land a vertical swipe in the 12 principles of animation this is follow through and it's a massive part of wants to hunter animation realistic dispersion of weight is a key part of Monster Hunter but it does mean there's some drawbacks for instance although Monster Hunter world has over 50 monsters to fight all the skeletal structures are in CG terms rigs are roughly based on each other I'm not just talking about how bear todas is basically just an ice version of Dura todas but that to keep things efficient rigs for each monster are derived from another monster and thus motion capture data is applied in the same way this is quoted as one of the reasons we aren't seeing insect like monsters like an ass killer return since their unique way of moving with six or eight limbs would have to be made from scratch and motion capture data would be useless [Music] from films to games animation is personality in the same way that character animation in an anime gives characters personality the animation team at Capcom is doing the same for the monsters I mentioned that each of the monsters skeletal structures are based on each other but it's something that we just don't notice naturally even seemingly obvious similarities like t-rex and bury off feel worlds away when you see them animated it even gets to the point with the announcement of variant monsters like the recent furious Raja and raging Braca die offs are big deals purely because of the additional animations there's something seriously intimidating about watching a brackety ops beat the ground desperately to fill the cavern with lava back during the betaf monster hunter world's many players remarks and how bad they felt hunting the monsters after you've dealt a certain amount of damage most monsters will start limping away exhausted back to their nest at which point you end up blowing it up or capturing it but the fact that players felt a pang of regret during a series that has always been about hunting down monsters is a testament to the skill of the animation team the game's art director Konami Fujioka mentioned that as the animations become more realistic they feel that it becomes more important to emphasize in the story that these fights are necessary for survival [Music] Monsanto worlds was something that animation staff were looking forward to in generations the team had a hard time trying to make monsters feel as if they were truly living in these worlds and having an effect on their environments animators at Capcom generally don't stay in their Lane they will go out and chat with gameplay planners environment artists and designers so just remember behind every Rathalos shooting a fireball or nergi ghonte swiping its claw is an animator desperately trying to send you back home in a cars [Music] thanks for watching the canopy effects I should mention that this video is just about the monster animation team but the rest of the crew are just as worthy of praise at the start of production they divide the animation staff up into the player team and the monster team the player team do a great job at making short each of your attacks have impacts regardless of what weapon you're using and they're also responsible for the cute palico chef animations so one animation team is finding new ways to kill you while the other is finding new ways to delight you but before we go I'd like to thank these incredible people for supporting the channel on patreon in particular I'd like to thank Austin Hardwick Dedham eat frog cone Jakob Bosley gr Pictures Mike tamborelli my own mother Nolan saga she she and that yuan artist if you'd like to join these role models in supporting new animation spotlights please consider visiting patreon.
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