3D Animation Evening Class Returns 3 March 2025

Our 3D Animation Evening Class runs for 20 weeks on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, from 7-10pm, and is taught online by veteran animator Matteo Sanna.

Students start with basic exercises and build towards an industry-ready demo reel.

The 3D Animation Evening Class returns on 3 March 2025. 

20 Week Evening Class

Matteo Sanna

The 20 week evening class starts with the very basics - a bouncing ball - and builds towards a full understanding of character and creature performance in 3D animation. The course starts with animation fundamentals and builds up to complex actions and performances, and a professional level demo reel.

Where and when
3D Animation Evening Class is a part-time evening class, running online for 20 weeks from 7-10 pm, two nights a week.  It starts on 3rd March 2025.

Tutor - Matteo Sanna

The lead tutor is veteran animator Matteo Sanna, who has worked on multiple animation and VFX movies.

Software

Animation by Dave Novis

The main software we teach is Autodesk Maya, but we also regularly use the Adobe Creative Suite, including Photoshop and Premiere. 

When and Where
This is a Part-time evening class, running for 20 weeks from 7-10 pm via Google Meet, Zoom and Syncsketch, with video tutorial support at our Vimeo Tutorial Channel. 

Mode of Delivery
The class is taught online 7-10 pm.

Animation by Maria Robertson

Students will need a laptop, a robust broadband internet connection, and will need to download a free non commercial version of Autodesk Maya.

Module Information

Animation basics

• Week 1: General introduction to Maya - animation basics
  • Bouncing ball
  • Lamp hop
• Week 2: Animation locomotion - walks and character walks
  • Basic walk cycle with basic biped
  • Basic human walk
• Week 3: Advanced locomotion - runs, hops, jumps and skips
  • Basic run cycle
  • Human biped run cycle
• Week 4: Advanced locomotion - jumps
  • Basic jumps
  • Human biped jump

Animation Mechanics

Pantomime Shot by Chan Sagoo.

Week 5: Flexibility and overlapping action

• Foxy bouncing ball with tail
• Helicopter overlapWeek 6: Weight and balance
• Weight shiftWeight lift

• Week 7: Animation mechanics - physical actions
  • Person throwing a ball - use of live action reference
  • Person throwing a ball - develop and recap
• Week 8: Animation mechanics - physical actions
  • Lifting a heavy object - develop
  • Lifting a heavy object - refine

Character Animation

Character Animation by Jamie Floodgate

• Week 9: Character poses, including creating thumbnail sketches and creating character poses
• Week 10: Pantomime animation
  • Thumbnail sketches for pantomime animation
  • Pantomime animation
• Week 11: Introduction to character animation
  • “Phone Booth Person” - key poses for character on stepped curves
  • Add breakdowns to “Phone Booth Person” using Tween Machine
• Week 12: Introduction to Character Animation
  • Reaction shots - animate a “take” with basic biped
  • Reactions - animate a “take” with a human biped
• Week 13: More on character animation - building and blocking a shot; parenting and constraints
  • Very short dialogue shot with basic biped
  • Very short dialogue shot with human biped
• Week 14: Character animation - dialogue
  • Block medium dialogue shot
  • Refine medium dialogue shot
• Week 15: Character animation - dialogue and lipsync
  • Block advanced dialogue shot
  • Refine advanced dialogue shot

Character animation also delves into Body language, Text and Subtext,  Acting,
Analysing the face, breaking down lipsync and so much more.

Dinosaur animation by Eduardo Sartori

Animals & Creatures

• Week 16: Animal locomotion, trots walks and runs, including quadruped walk, and quadruped trots

• Week 17: Animal locomotion continued
  • Quadruped run
• Birds Week 18: Animals and creatures - using live action
  • Animal locomotion using live action reference

  

  Animation by Paloma Zhu

  • Animal locomotion using live action reference 
• Week 19: Animals and creatures
  • Spiders and scorpions
  • Vehicles and machinery

On this creature behaviour section the students gain a strong understanding of how to approach animating creatures for vfx animated films.

Demo Reel, Jobs & Careers

Week 20: Demo reel, website/blog, jobs and careers

• Assemble the first draft of demo reel. 
• Create a blog to host it
• Demo reel review, recap

The goal is to help students create work that they will be proud of and can showcase on their reel.

MoCap cleanup with Steven Lall 

Vimeo Tutorial Channel
To support the live delivery of this animation class, we have hundreds of tutorial videos at our Vimeo Tutorial Channel.

Official site
To sign up for the evening class, follow this link to the official site.

Escape Studios Demo Reel
And to see what kind of animation our students have been doing lately, watch our latest demo reel below:

The Escape Studios Animation Blog offers a personal view on the art of animation and visual effects. 

To apply for one of our courses, follow this link