AmeerBashaK/claude-skills

Clay 3D motion

Clay 3D makes digital work feel touchable: soft rounded forms, matte material with a little light passing through, and small handmade imperfections, shot like a tabletop miniature. There are two motion flavours:

• Smooth clay (claymorphism): 24–30 fps, bouncy, soft-body squash and stretch. Brand and UI reels.
• Claymation (stop-motion): on twos (12 fps), held poses, the surface "boils" between frames. Handmade, charming, Aardman/Laika feel.

Pick one per piece. Don't mix them.

Pair with: cinematography-for-ai (lenses, miniature camera), design-principles (colour, hierarchy), layout-composition, higgsfield-generate (style frames, image-to-video). Design hero frames as finished stills first ([[motion-is-graphic-design]]).

References:

• references/blender.md: modelling, clay shader, lighting, camera, stop-motion setup, render; Python for the blender MCP.
• references/after-effects-and-ai.md: compositing passes, posterize, grain, and Higgsfield prompts.
• references/history.md: claymation history, studios and sources.

1. Visual language (every hold frame must pass)

Element	Rule
Form	Chunky, rounded, inflated. Big bevels, no sharp edges. Simple primitives (spheres, capsules, rounded boxes, noodles).
Proportion	Cute and toy-like: big heads, short limbs, thick parts. Thin parts break the clay illusion.
Material	Matte clay: high roughness (0.55–0.75), low specular, a little subsurface scattering. Never glossy plastic.
Surface	Subtle imperfection: soft lumps, faint fingerprints, tiny noise bump. Smooth claymorphism keeps it nearly invisible; claymation shows it.
Colour	Pastels (claymorphism) or saturated playful colours (claymation). 4–6 hues + a cream/off-white. Avoid pure black and pure white; use deep navy and cream.
Colour variation	Slight hue/value variation across a surface, as real clay is never perfectly uniform.
Light	Soft, large light sources, gentle contact shadows, ambient occlusion in creases. A cool fill against a warm key.
Set	Tabletop miniature: seamless curved backdrop (cyc), a floor the objects sit on, props at the same handmade scale.
Camera	50–85 mm, slight high angle (20–35°), shallow depth of field for the miniature feel.
Type	Rounded, chunky faces (Fredoka, Baloo, Nunito Black, Cooper Black, Recoleta) built as 3D clay letters or flat type on the comp.

Starter palettes

• Pastel clay: cream #F6EEE3, peach #FFB8A1, butter #FFE29A, mint #A8E6CF, sky #9BD1F9, lilac #C9B6F2, navy #2B2F4C.
• Playful claymation: tomato #E8503A, sunflower #F6C744, grass #5BB55B, ocean #2F7FD8, plum #7A4E9C, cream #F4E9D8.

2. Motion principles

Both flavours

1. Weight. Everything has mass: it eases in and out, lands with a squash, and settles.
2. Squash and stretch, volume preserved. Stretch along the motion, squash on impact. When Y scales by s, X and Z scale by 1/√s.
3. Soft contacts. Objects press into surfaces and each other, then recover. Nothing clicks rigidly together.
4. Overlap and jiggle. Soft parts (ears, bellies, blobs, toppings) lag and wobble 2–6 frames after the main body stops.
5. Arcs and anticipation. Wind up before jumps and throws; travel on arcs.
6. Tabletop camera. Slow, steady moves, like a motion-control rig on a miniature set. No impossible flying cameras.

Smooth clay (claymorphism) 7. Bouncy timing. Inflate pops (0 → 115 → 92 → 100% with squash), elastic settles, playful but readable. 8. Blob morphs. Shapes melt and merge into new shapes (metaballs, remesh, shape keys). 9. Smooth 24–30 fps with motion blur.

Claymation (stop-motion) 10. On twos. 12 poses per second (hold every pose 2 frames at 24 fps). Fast actions can go on ones; slow holds on threes. 11. Boil. The surface detail (fingerprints, noise, colour variation) changes on every pose, so the clay looks re-handled. 12. Micro-jitter. Tiny random position/rotation offsets (0.2–0.5 mm scale) per pose on objects and camera; tiny exposure flicker (1–2%). 13. No motion blur, and holds stay mostly still apart from the boil.

3. Signature moves

Move	How
Inflate pop	Object grows from flat to full with overshoot and squash.
Squish land	Drop, squash on contact, rebound, jiggle settle.
Press and stamp	A shape presses into a clay slab, leaving an imprint (logo reveal).
Noodle draw	A clay noodle (round curve) extrudes along a path to write a word or line.
Blob merge	Two blobs merge into one, then reshape into the next object.
Roll in	Ball rolls in on an arc, squashes, unrolls into a character or logo.
Replacement face	Claymation: mouth and eye shapes swap per pose.
Tabletop push	Slow dolly or slider move across the miniature set with shallow focus.
Hand-made wipe	A clay slab or rolling pin flattens across the frame into the next scene.

4. Build process

1. Look frame: generate or build 1–2 hero stills to lock palette, form language and lighting (Higgsfield prompt in references).
2. Model: primitives with big bevels and subdivision; inflate 2D logos and type; noodles from curves. Save .blend files in Cluads Work Folder\clay\.
3. Shade: one master clay material with per-object colour (and a small colour variation); add fingerprints and lumps to taste.
4. Light and set: cyc backdrop, soft key/fill/rim, AO, shallow DOF.
5. Animate: blocking poses → splines with squash, stretch and overlap. For claymation, switch keys to stepped/twos and enable the boil.
6. Render and finish: Cycles (or EEVEE for speed), then composite in AE: grade, grain, posterize for claymation.
7. Check: pause on any frame. It should look like a photo of a real handmade miniature.

5. Critique checklist

• Does it read as clay, not plastic? (Too shiny → raise roughness, lower specular.)
• Are there any sharp edges or thin parts? Round and thicken them.
• Is the surface too perfect? Add slight lumps and colour variation.
• Is it too dirty? Fingerprints should be subtle unless it's deliberate claymation.
• Do impacts squash, and do soft parts jiggle after stops?
• Is the volume preserved during squash and stretch?
• Claymation: is it really on twos, with the boil changing per pose and no motion blur?
• Is the camera behaving like a real tabletop rig, with believable depth of field?