Unity Character Animation with Mecanim: A detailed guide to the complex new animation tools in Unity, packed with clear instructions and illustrated with original content in the context of a next generation zombie apocalypse adventure game

Jamie Dean

$19.99 per month

4.1 (10 Ratings)

Paperback Sep 2015 290 pages 1st Edition

Jamie Dean

$19.99 per month

4.1 (10 Ratings)

Paperback Sep 2015 290 pages 1st Edition

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Description

Game animation for independent developers has taken a giant leap forward with Unity 5's Mecanim toolset, which streamlines the import/export, retargeting, and many other aspects of the character animation workflow. Unity Character Animation with Mecanim is a great primer for getting to know the nuts and bolts of Mecanim and other character animation related tools in Unity 5. It offers you step-by-step instructions for preparing and exporting rigged models and animation sequences from commonly used 3D packages, such as Maya, 3ds Max and Blender. This book explores the new set of animation tools introduced with Mecanim in Unity 5. Approaching its subject matter through a typical genre–a zombie action game, character animation techniques are explored using real examples of player input and interaction, enemy behavior, and other aspects of game dynamics. As the book progresses, the reader will understand how these elements fit together in a small game development workflow. We will begin with a demonstration of the process of getting a rigged character into Unity 5 and setting it up to use provided animation sequences. We will also consider a few industry standard 3D packages and how these can be used to rig a humanoid character for use in Unity 5. We will demonstrate the retargeting capabilities of Mecanim’s Humanoid Animation type by adjusting motion sequences to fit disparate character types in our game. After this, we will look at Ragdoll physics and the implementation of this commonly used technique in a Mecanim workflow. The book culminates with a thorough dissection of the enemy character AI script incorporating the Mecanim elements detailed in the previous chapters. Unity Character Animation with Mecanim will provide you with a detailed exploration of the interaction between game development and character animation, and will broaden your understanding of the rich animation toolset within Unity 5

Who is this book for?

If you are a Unity developer looking to get to grips with the character animation specific tools, a 3D software user who is new to Unity, or a beginner game developer who is interested in character animation and interaction, this book is ideal for you. Some experience with either the Unity interface or basic 3D coordinates is recommended, but not required.

What you will learn

Learn how to prepare a rigged character model to receive animation within Unity
Acquire efficient techniques to refine and optimize motion capture data
Retarget animation sequences between different character rigs
Discover how to rig a humanoid character and export for use in Unity
Script character interaction for a First Person character model
Create dynamic animation sequences from scratch using keyframe techniques, in a variety of 3D software packages
Learn Project Management in Unity
Understand how to set up a complex facial rig for speech
Set up Animation Controllers with masked states and blend trees to create seamless and additive animation transitions
Construct a ragdoll game object and instantiate it in a game
Devise Mecanim animation integration for the player and AI driven animation for enemy characters

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Amazon Customer Nov 24, 2015

Unity Character Animation with Mecanim covers how to use the Mecanim tools to animate characters in a game. The book covers a massive amount of information quickly, yet manages to do so in a clear and easy to understand manner. Each lesson builds on what was covered previously so that by the end of the book, you have learned how to accomplish quite a bit of fun and interesting tasks to make your games more enjoyable and interesting.

Amazon Verified review

Raja Biswas Nov 17, 2015

All You need to know about character animation in Unity. This book does a great job explaining different animation techniques. It also shows how to use blend trees to control various animations, how to use ragdoll physics. Moreover in the last chapter it teaches about enemy ai and animation. Overall a good book to learn about animation techniques with mecanim.

Amazon Customer Dec 18, 2016

A thorough step by step guide to character animation book. Great for learning Unity.

Francis Oct 28, 2015

I read this book from a developer’s point of view. When developing a game project I tend to use developer art, which usually lacks the polish of assets created by game artists. This book provides the additional guidance I need to add the professional polish to the games I am working on, especially for 3D animated games using Unity.The book uses a game "Zombie Attacks" to demonstrate many 3D animation techniques that as a developer I was not familiar with. The author demonstrates rigging characters for Unity in 3dsMax and Maya which I have never done before but going through the examples provided a good bases for future development.From start to finish the book demonstrates using Unity to build a complete first person shooter game using sophisticated animation techniques and putting it all together into a Unity scene with scripts to control the AI of the gameThe chapter on using motion sequences was interesting since these bring your characters to life with realistic movements. I also enjoyed the chapter on Ragdoll Physics, that demonstrate how to apply physics to the zombie characters.The sample project the comes with this book (downloaded from the Publisher) provides a good basis for starting a first person shooter and the book provides the information on who it is all put together making it easy to make modifications.

Cristian Gradisteanu Oct 19, 2015

The book does a great job of explaining the character creating and animation with Unity engine. Starting with rigging in 3ds Max and Maya, re-targeting and controlling player animation, offering some insights of AI, this is a solid book on creating games with Unity.

Unity Character Animation with Mecanim: A detailed guide to the complex new animation tools in Unity, packed with clear instructions and illustrated with original content in the context of a next generation zombie apocalypse adventure game

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