Howdy,

What software is best for learning animation for the human figure?
I have been trying to learn animation in DAZ Studio 3 for over a month. I am having a tough time because I have never done animation before. I also have Carrara 7 Pro, but this is to advanced for me at this time.
I have not tried Poser yet.

Any good tutorial sites?

Thanks!

I don't know any good tutorial sites for this (I'm sure there are lots, though), but I would really recommend the book "The Animator's Survival Kit" by Richard Williams. It's been around for a long time, and it's geared for traditional 2D animation, but it's a good resource for learning animation techniques in general that you can use anywhere. Weight, anticipation, follow-through, squash and stretch, all sorts of good things. I know at least one animation school, that mostly teaches 3D animation with Maya, that uses that book as a text. Another book I've found useful is "Timing For Animation" (again, a 2D book).

For human animation, a great tool is to study human motion. If you have a video camera, make a short clip of yourself walking across the room, or hunt around the web and see if you can find some short video to download (there are sites that will let you download from YouTube, for example). I don't know about DAZ Studio, but in Carrara you can import a video as a texture for a flat plane, so that every frame of the video matches each frame of your animation. From there, you can match the general timing of your figure to what's in the video, then tweak it make it smooth and match what you want to happen in the scene.

Convincing human animation can be a challenge, but I think it's pretty rewarding. I love to make animations, and I've been making an effort to do a little work on an animation every day. I'm hoping that they're right when they say, "practice makes perfect."

As you make stuff, please post your video and share a link back here, too. Lots of folks here who love animation, and if you feel like you're ever stuck on something, lots of people with experience who'll be happy to pass along suggestions.

Thanks for the info and encouragement Captain.

I don't see very many examples of animated movies anywhere, except for short trial ones, like on YouTube. Do you know where I can see more?

Gordon

 I totally agree with CaptainJack on the book and the video references.
Software is actually a secondary thing. If you know how to animate a human, you will be able to animate it in any software package you can think of, for those who can't animate, their resulting work will be no different if they use Maya or Poser, for example.

Any books on keyframe animation should get you started. 

Most people do small vids because of the render times.

Quote - Thanks for the info and encouragement Captain.

I don't see very many examples of animated movies anywhere, except for short trial ones, like on YouTube. Do you know where I can see more?

Gordon

An awful lot of animation on the web is "demo reels", which are short bits of animation done to show off what the animator can do. They're used as a kind of resume for job hunting a lot of the time. Animations that tell stories are fewer and far between. Very long animations (feature length stuff) is mostly made by professional studios because of the number of people that have to be involved.

The animation forum at CG Society has a lot of good work posted. There are a lot of demo reels posted there, too, but some people put up links to complete shorts that you can look at. Some of it is very inspiring stuff.

Pixar has a DVD (Pixar Short Films Collection) out of all of their animated shorts up to a few of years ago that's very good. Aside from the fact that it's very entertaining, Pixar often uses their short animation to try out new techniques, so there's a lot to learn in there, as well.

     Well I find that my music knowledge helps a lot in animation. I think of motions and how many beats it takes. A semi quick tempo song can be 120 beats a minute and that is what it takes for a brisk walk. A slow walk can be a slow as 60 beats a minute. so then think of motions is it one beat two beats. Think of things that happen on the offbeat  arm swing set in behind the beat. Other motions take a number of beats or quick ones are a half a beat.
    Each character has his own beat smaller characters are quicker larger are slower generally. So at 24 frames a second a brisk walk at 12 beats a minute will result in a 12 frame walk cycle a slow walk at 60 will be 24 a run at 180 will be 8 frames.

Try Blender. It's free. Its animation tools are on par with Maya, Max and friends. There are awesome rigs for it. It has a steep learning curve, but there are probably more tutorials (including video) for it then for any other tool out there...

Another option is to use learning editions of industry standard packages (for example, Maya PLE).

If you're interested in animation, Blender is too complicated, learning editions are too crippled and you're ready to spend some cash (roughly the same as ordinary edition of Poser), I recommend Hash Animation Master. I haven't used it for about 5 years now, but it has a well-deserved reputation of being both capable and user-friendly.

 The Maya PLE is not available anymore. Autodesk replaced it with the 30 day demo.

Well, there are Softimage Mod Tool based on Softimage 7.5 and Houdini Apprentice Edition.

Attached Link: http://www.projectmessiah.com/x6/index.html

Well for flexible animation program Messiah is at a nice price point. It has a lot of features and used in some feature and broadcast animations. You will have to model things seperatly and import them because it is not a modeler. I just use Wings for that. It is the most intuitive tool I have used for rigging and animation.

I would recomend Poser, I started with Poser4. The first time I picked it up I was able to animate with just reading a few pages into the book. Nothing great. but it is easy to get the feel. I definetly wouldn't spend a lot of money untill you can make every extream movement and know how to keep the cloths on so the body parts don't pop out. Not before that would I event think of a more expinsive Program.

Then when you think you are ready. I would start downloading The free downloaded program to try them out. Most all your major companies have a 30 day trile Period. Not enought to really know what your doing in these programs. But you will be able to see which ones fell most natural to you.

I have a head start in animating, as I have been a fine artist, and have played ever major sport their is. I didn't say I was the best. But I do know how the body moves. That may sound crazy, but I know by instinct how to go about moving the body.  The first thing to know about Computer animation is you Start with one pose, then another pose that is (say a punch) Start from the stance. Your next pose will be the end of the punch. Don't just have the arm sticking out. Pull the shoulder over the hips twist, all the way up to the head. And a hard punch you lean towards the Victom. Without knowing how the body moves your in dead water.

Watch anything from Movie DVDs or Television that might incorporate a movement you are wanting to do. If you have played sports, you can go throught the motion you are trying to recreate. You will be able to feel all the muscles that brought you from Point A to Point B.

The other part of Animation is Patients. I've done 2 full lenght movies and a number of 20min to 3 forths of an hour movies. I have a number lined up. As soon as I finsh the one that is winding down. So Patiece to get it right is a must once you lean to animate your charactures. 
Good Luck.