In this Blender tutorial I will show you how I made a low-poly character animation in Blender and imported it into Unity
The first part of the tutorial series will involve modeling the low-poly character and rigging it
The second part of the tutorial series will be the animation and importing into Unity
This tutorial was requested by Canny
The keys I am using are in the bottom-right corner of the viewport
The first thing I need to do in pose mode is clear any movement and rotations
I can easily do this by selecting the rig and using ALT + G and ALT +R
I also rename the character to “characterMesh” and the armature to “Character”
In object mode, I select the character and the armature and rotate it so it is facing forward along the Y-Axis
and apply the transforms – this will help when I export it to Unity
I will start with the idle animation
I open the animation workspace, open the action editor, and the NLA editor
I select the rig and go into pose mode
I will make a new action named “idle” and make a fake user by clicking on the shield icon –
this helps to prevent any accidental deleting of the animation
I will begin the pose on frame 1 by selecting the root bone and bending his knees
I then select each arm and rotate them so they are down by his sides and slightly bent at the elbows
I select each of the pole bones and move them so the knees are pointed outwards
I also use the target bones and move the feet so he has a broader stance and move the left foot forward
I select the top of the spine and rotate the character backwards
I also select the head and rotate the head forward
I then select all of the bones and add keyframes for location and rotation
On frame 30, I will select the root bone and have the character stand up a bit straighter
I also raise the shoulders and rotate the arms back in toward the torso
I then select all of the bones and add keyframes for location and rotation
I copy the keyframes from frame 1 onto frame 60 to complete the idle animation
I change the end frame to 59 – otherwise the loop will have a repeated frame on frame 60 and frame 1
In the NLA editor, I push down the animation to make a track
The next animation I will make is a simple walk-cycle
I make a new action, name it walk, and assign a fake user
On frame 1, I use ALT + G and ALT + R to remove any movement or rotation data
I select the root bone and slightly bend the knees
I select the right foot and move and rotate it forward into the starting position
I move the left foot back into the starting position – making sure to bend the knee
I then move the right arm so it is slightly behind the body (since the right leg is forward)
I also move the left arm so it is slightly in front of the body (since the left leg is back)
I select all the bones and insert a keyframe for location and rotation
I then copy those keyframes onto frame 32
On frame 16, I use CTRL + SHIFT + V to copy the keyframes to the opposite side of the character
On frame 8, I choose the right-foot bone and use ALT + R to flatten the foot
I select the left target bone and move it so the left foot is pointed downward and the knee is bent
I move the right-arm back and the left-arm forward to show a bit of lag
I then select all of the bones and add the keyframes
On frame 24, I choose the left-foot bone and use ALT + R to flatten the foot
I select the right target bone and move it so the right foot is pointed downward and the knee is bent
I move the left-arm back and the right-arm forward to show a bit of lag
I then select all of the bones and add the keyframes
On frame 4, I select the right target bone, use ALT + R to flatten the foot, and add keyframes
On frame 20, I select the left target bone, use ALT + R to flatten the foot, and add keyframes
On frame 32, I select the right target bone, use ALT + R to flatten the foot, and add keyframes
In order to avoid any easing on the keyframes,
I select all of the keyframes and use the T-key to open the keyframe interpolation menu
I then choose “linear” for the interpolation type –
this will mean there will be no easing (or slowing) in or out on the keyframes
I change the end frame to 31
On the NLA editor, I push down the action to make sure it becomes an NLA strip
I am now ready to export the character and the animations as an FBX file to import into Unity
I select the armature and go to file > export as FBX
In the export window, I change the apply scalings to “FBX units scale”
Under the bake animation section, I make sure that “NLA strips” is checked
In Unity, I make a new folder for my character animation
I drag-and-drop my palette and my FBX into the folder
If I open the animation tab, I can now see all of the animations that I brought into Unity from Blender
I can select each of the animations and preview them in the inspector
I can now drag the FBX into the hierarchy
The character is actually facing the wrong way
To fix this problem, I select the FBX file in the assets folder and open the model tab in the inspector
I check “bake axis conversion” and click on “apply”
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