Lip Syncing Suggestions

[AngelOfTheDark]

Hi, again,

I recently started a new project and I wanted some opinions. I'm doing a Spirited Away AMV, and I've finally made it to the editing part. Thing is, I'm doing a bit of lipsyncing for Yubaba/Zeneba. Those of you who have seen Spirited Away might realize that, yes, I am in fact crazy for attempting to get this PERFECT, as her speaking patten is not simple open-and-close mouth movements with everything else stationary, but her entire face and (often) head move while she speaks. I plan to be extremely meticulous in my endeavor to get the mouth movements to match up as best I can, but I thought I'd look for suggestions from more experienced editors, too. Does anyone have any suggestions as to how to get this project to look as good and as well-timed as humanly possible? I'm trying my best to get smooth, natural-looking mouth movements, as if it were animated that way in the first place. I'm not looking for short-cuts or anything, rather, if anyone has techniques that would improve the quality, I'll take as long as it takes to get it right. Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

[CrackTheSky]

I've never done it myself, but there are some general rules, like don't use just open-and-shut positions - add in half-open/half-shut positions as well, sound out the words to yourself and try to make the mouth look like that. There's a pretty nifty guide with a more in-depth look at it. However you decide to do it, though...it's gonna take a lot of work :/

Also, maybe check out any videos by viper1255 (especially 1000 Miles Worth Walking) 'cause viper's a lip-synching GOD.

[JaddziaDax]

have you looked at this?

http://www.animemusicvideos.org/guides/ ... psync.html

[AngelOfTheDark]

JaddziaDax, yes, thank you, I have actually read it several times over, but seeing as this is an nuasual character I thought I'd ask if anyone has worked on a project like this before or has any useful general strategies other than those mentioned here.

Crack The Sky, the problem with Yubaba is that her head isn't a "normal" anime head. Because of the complexity of the animation I can't simple go frame by frame using open, closed and intermediate mouth positions because practically her her entire head moves at any given moment and it makes the picture look jerky and unnatural.

Maybe a picture would make my problem easier to understand for those of you who haven't seen the movie. Here's the wikipedia entry on Yubaba: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yubaba . Scroll down the the picture of the woman with the absurdly large head yelling at the girl. The large-headed woman is Yubaba.

Thanks for the suggestions, though.

[Sierra Lorna]

JaddziaDax, yes, thank you, I have actually read it several times over, but seeing as this is an nuasual character I thought I'd ask if anyone has worked on a project like this before or has any useful general strategies other than those mentioned here.

Crack The Sky, the problem with Yubaba is that her head isn't a "normal" anime head. Because of the complexity of the animation I can't simple go frame by frame using open, closed and intermediate mouth positions because practically her her entire head moves at any given moment and it makes the picture look jerky and unnatural.

Maybe a picture would make my problem easier to understand for those of you who haven't seen the movie. Here's the wikipedia entry on Yubaba: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yubaba . Scroll down the the picture of the woman with the absurdly large head yelling at the girl. The large-headed woman is Yubaba.

Thanks for the suggestions, though.

Mask out the character's mouth so that you can lip sync it, but leave the head movement alone. Then track the mouth back onto the head movement so the mouth follows along with the head movement. You might want to use After Effects to do this, if you know how to use it. It can be done in Premiere too though, with a Garbage Matte and some motion settings.

[AngelOfTheDark]

JaddziaDax, yes, thank you, I have actually read it several times over, but seeing as this is an nuasual character I thought I'd ask if anyone has worked on a project like this before or has any useful general strategies other than those mentioned here.

Crack The Sky, the problem with Yubaba is that her head isn't a "normal" anime head. Because of the complexity of the animation I can't simple go frame by frame using open, closed and intermediate mouth positions because practically her her entire head moves at any given moment and it makes the picture look jerky and unnatural.

Maybe a picture would make my problem easier to understand for those of you who haven't seen the movie. Here's the wikipedia entry on Yubaba: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yubaba . Scroll down the the picture of the woman with the absurdly large head yelling at the girl. The large-headed woman is Yubaba.

Thanks for the suggestions, though.

Mask out the character's mouth so that you can lip sync it, but leave the head movement alone. Then track the mouth back onto the head movement so the mouth follows along with the head movement. You might want to use After Effects to do this, if you know how to use it. It can be done in Premiere too though, with a Garbage Matte and some motion settings.

Thanks for the suggestion, that does sound like it would work, but I have neither Premier nor After Affects. Currently I'm working with Ulead Video Studio 10+. I'll try and see if I can find a way to get it to work with it without looking weird. If not I'll keep doing what I have been doing so far. Mostly what I've done at this point is put in a scene that has as many syllables as I need, then I cut it where ever she completes a mouth movement and adjust the speed of the movement for each syllable, inserting still frames of closed mouths between them as needed to manipulate the speed of her speech as necessary. So far it's worked out well, but I wanted to see if there are other alternatives to this, just in case there's something better.

[JaddziaDax]

hmmm i thought that was covered in the "lipsyncing 201" part O.o

either way youre going to have to bring it down to frame by frame editing...


good luck

[JaddziaDax]

does "ulead" have a "cookie cutter" type of cut out? that can be used for "masking out the mouth" (thats how i cover lipflap in Vegas)

[AngelOfTheDark]

Sort of, but I think it's a little too limited to get just the right, complex shape of her mouth without bringing in another program (that I'm still looking for.) I used to have a nice off-brand photoshop-type program but I replaced my computer about two weeks ago and I can't remember from where I got the program. -_-;; So, I currently don't have one.

Yubaba's a very animated character (no pun intended) which leads to an entertaining, albeit challenging video. Between the movement of her jaw next to her body in combination with her head movements, and her nose covering part of her mouth, she poses some unique problems. It seems my two best options so far are either doing what I'm doing or going frame-by-frame. I might just stick to what I've been doing. So far it seems to be working pretty well and it's a bit more efficient than frame-by-frame for an effect that's just as good. If my technique doesn't work later in the song, then I'll try frame-by-frame, unless there's another useful suggestion. I suppose it depends on what works best for each part. But at this point, because of the way she moves I don't think masking is going to look very good for the scenes I've included.

[JaddziaDax]

was it GIMP? ive never used it but im told its a good prog and stuff