Why does cloth animation look stiff, and how can I improve secondary motion?

[Ethan.W]

I’ve been trying to get better at animating natural-looking cloth and fabric, but I keep hitting this weird snag. My folds and movement just feel stiff and predictable, like I’m animating a flag made of wood instead of silk. I spent a whole afternoon just trying to get a simple cape to have a convincing secondary motion, and it still looks off. Has anyone else wrestled with this and found a way to make it feel more alive?

[BenjaminXM]

Yeah that exact snag happened to me I wanted silk level life and ended up with a cape that feels stiff The trick for me was letting the fabric breathe with the body rather than locking everything in place

[Isabella74]

A simple path is to tweak the cloth physics parameters The bend stiffness and damping often control how waves travel through the cloth and you can bias motion toward gravity and air flow

[PaulLC]

I suspect you are chasing a perfect secondary motion too early Maybe a stylized lift when the cape moves off frame or a quick tail to sell momentum is enough

[BrandonPS]

Consider reframing the problem If the goal is life like motion you can layer a few well chosen follow through frames rather than rely on a full sim For a cape a gentle curl at the ends can sell ease

[Ryan.M]

One thought is to capture real cloth in action with reference video Then bake that motion into the rig and focus on the key frames which often feels more human

[Kevin5]

Do you ever think about the idea that cloth is a texture not just a physics thing I mean sometimes a stylized approach makes the character read better