A Light Intro
to Adobe Character Animator
SHALIN HAI-JEW
SIDLIT 2022
JULY 27 – 29, 2022

Presentation Overview
If it has seemed difficult to make talking characters for videos, the Adobe Character Animator
might be just the software app for you. This tool offers a variety of rigged puppet characters—
animal, human, object—that can be animated through movements of a webcam…and can
emulate mouth motions linked to speech (visemes, sound). These are glorious “shallow fakes,”
but they are eye-catching and lots of fun. The various motions and sounds may be exported as
individual keyframes for usage in video sequences and other applications (including live-
streaming in character).
Adobe Character Animator originally came out in 2015.
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Pedagogical Uses of
Character Animations
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Pedagogical Uses of Character
Animations
Learner attention capture and maintenance
Learner entertainment
Stress relief (such as through humor)
Learner motivation (such as through expression of encouragement)
Aesthetic design for digital learning object (DLO), slideshow, module, or course
Pedagogical agentry and learning supports (cognitive scaffolding)
Direct teaching and learning
Information sharing
Demo-ing
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Basic Elements of
Animated Character
Storytelling
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Basic Elements of a Performed Scene
Adobe Character Animator Terms Everyday Terms
Performance capture characters (rigged digital
puppets)
Actors, personas, characters
Backgrounds (also known as “puppets” in software
app)
Locations, contexts, physical spaces (in 2d)
Recorded audio speech / dialogue / sound effects Interactions, event descriptions
Action Sound effects, narration, dialogue, puppet
movement, and location (including movement)
Story, narration Beginning, middle, end; rising action, climax,
resolution; others
Sequence of events, episodes, stories Series
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A Gallery of Performance
Capture Characters
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Digital Puppet Types
Puppets are royalty-free ones, including some
made by third-party sources
There are various types of puppets:
◦ Cartoons
◦ Anime-style puppets
◦ Clay animation puppets
A generic “placeholder” puppet with the
various labeled elements that are editable in
Photoshop or Illustrator
PuppetMaker options
You on camera…come to life
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Elements of a Digital Puppet
Appearance (all editable)
Gestures (varying levels of puppet body motion)
Voice (pre-recorded, live)
◦ Built-in visemes [mouth shapes used to form particular sounds (in animation); speech sounds that look
the same in terms of the mouth form]
In-world physics (designed behaviors and various parameter settings)
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Rig View of the .puppet
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Properties Panel to the Right
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Puppet Controls in Layers
Puppets with various built-in body motions
Autonomic eye blinks
Walk sequences
Jumping, dancing, running, punching and kicking, and others
Props like “poofs of smoke” “grabbable crystal ball” (unique to respective characters)
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Props in Action
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Using Body Position
to Move the Digital Puppet
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Data Collection via Different Inputs
A core driver of the puppet’s animations and speech is through the in-computer camera and
microphone, for real-time animation (facial expressions, body movements, arm and hand
gestures, and others) and real-time voicing
◦ “Body tracking” enables even full-body capture if standing sufficiently far from the camera to capture
whole body
◦ “Body tracking” enables top torso movements, too
◦ The camera has to be calibrated, so the person is in a central starting position (rest) or the 0-0 position
on the x and y axes
◦ Apparently should turn off Zoom or other apps that might also need the camera
Other inputs are via mouse and touchpad
Another input medium is through the keyboard
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Setting up a Lip-Sync from an Audio File
People may pre-record audio and then set the digital puppet to lip sync the visemes from this
audio file.
Import an audio file (.mp3, .aiff, or .wav, and others)
Drag the audio file from the project panel into the scene or the timeline
Select the character to activate it.
In the menu above, select the timeline. Then select “Compute Lip Sync Take from Scene Audio.”
One can click on the puppet and re-record new movements.
For any changes, one can smooth the intro and the outro to each new added piece.
The visemes timeline can be edited with different sounds input…and / or silence (in chunks) may
be introduced.
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Editing the Timeline
As long as something has been recorded once, one can right-click in that timeline and add
variations. One can also edit anything that has already been laid down.
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Rolling your Own
W/ PUPPETMAKER
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PuppetMaker
Visual design (in Photoshop or Illustrator)
Rigging (in Adobe Character Animator)
Can click a “randomize” button for a “random” character
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Triggers and Controls
Puppets can come with or be empowered with various triggers
and controls
A “swap set” is a group of gestures that may be selected for a
particular hand or eye or other object
◦ Only one of the gestures is shown at a time (not a combination in most
cases)
Secondary animations show how various parts of the character
interact with the environment, such as how hair moves as the
head moves…as a form of in-world physics.
One puppet is a “ninja” and has some katas in the stances.
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Latched vs. Unlatched Triggers
A latched trigger is indicated by the filled-in icon to the left. This type of trigger is a toggle (on or
off).
For faster actions, one can go with a no-latch trigger. Here the effect occurs only as long as the
button is held.
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Non-Humanoid /
Non-Animal
Characters
There are also non-sentient and non-
human / non-animal characters.
One involves dangling balloons with
inverted gravity.
Another is “chicken blaster.” This is
depicted to the right.
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Staging
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Placement of Background and Characters
The background can be zoomed in or out
It can be moved along the x and y axes
Characters can also be moved along those same tracks
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Multiple Characters on Stage
It is possible to have two or several characters on stage simultaneously.
They can be recorded separately and piecemeal.
Timing is a challenge.
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Scenes
Scenes may be added from the character view by clicking on the clapboard icon at the bottom of
the character window. The frame rate and such may be set here.
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History
The history of the project is automatically saved and versioned. This can be deleted if desired.
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A Typical Work
Sequence
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Designing the Meta
What message do you want to convey? How do you want to convey that message? (meta)
What contexts will the video be used in, and what does that mean for technological outputs?
(meta)
◦ Will there be an informational “wrap” around the snippet? If so, what?
◦ Will the video still work as a stand-alone file if the wrap is not consumed?
How long or short should the video be time-wise? (editing)
How should accessibility be designed into the video? (editing, legal requirements)
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A Character
What character do you want to speak through?
What is that character’s personality? Style? Attitude? (script)
◦ How do you design the character to be memorable and of-a-piece? (novelty)
◦ How do you avoid stereotyping in any negative way? (social cautions)
What sort of spokesperson would this character be? (representing)
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A Scenario or Scene
What scene do you want to speak through? (background)
What (simple) action do you want to communicate? (character + scene + action + dialogue +
sound)
What special sound effect(s) would enhance the scene? (sound)
What genre would this be building off of? (cultural context, cultural practice)
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“Paper” Prototyping
Creating light elements of the designed (approved?) plan
Building the wrap-around to the video (if relevant)
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User Testing
Testing the prototype with users and acquiring systematized feedback
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Refinement
Re-recording and refining the final video
Finalizing
Going live
◦ Videos may be exported with frames exported as keyframes.
◦ The animations may also be exported to Premiere Pro and AfterAffects.
Continuing assessing
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Graphical User Interface
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Some Downloadable Resources to Get
Started
See more
https://pages.adobe.com/character/en/characters
Free downloadable characters
https://pages.adobe.com/character/en/third-party
Mouth pack
https://pages.adobe.com/character/en/resources
Blank Templates, Mouth Pack, Background Pack, Audio Pack
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How to Create a Story
USING ADOBE CHARACTER ANIMATOR
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A Character-Driven Very Short Animation
Fast trust of character and scene (through recognition)
Simple several-line talk maximum
A few gestures
Something witty
Something exciting
Something surprising
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Basic Required
Technologies
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Required Technologies
HARDWARE
For a basic recording, it helps to have a laptop
with an in-computer camera and microphone.
The equipment can be improved with wired or
wireless equipment.
SOFTWARE
There are add-ons and plug-ins that enable
additional capabilities.
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Contact
Dr. Shalin Hai-Jew
◦ ITS
◦ Kansas State University
◦ shalin@ksu.edu
◦ 785-532-5262
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