This week George showed us a cool gif that explains and shows examples of the 12 Principles of Animation:
- Squash and Stretch
- Timing and Motion
- Anticipation
- Staging
- Follow-Through and Overlapping Action
- Straight Ahead and Pose-to-Pose Action
- Slow In and Out
- Arcs
- Exaggeration
- Secondary Action
- Solid Drawing
- Appeal
George mentioned to think of the solid drawing more as solid posing when it comes to 3D Animation.
We also watched a video about using spheres in more complex shots to break down motion arcs, and how tracking over existing shots with high visual appeal with spheres can show how simple it can be to create such appeal. The breakdown of the shot from ‘Brave’ was my favourite, as when viewing the shot alone it was easy for me to get overwhelmed when thinking about how the animator managed to create such satisfying movement in the characters, and while the overlay of the spheres doesn’t discount the animator’s talent it does make it seem much more achievable with practice and understanding.
George advised we do some post sketching, focusing on anticipation, lines of action, and clear silhouettes. I went to the V&A museum to sketch some of the statues, and also used the Bodies in Motion site to sketch some still frames of interesting poses. I sometimes focused only on the silhouette, sometimes only drew a stick figure representation, and sometimes sketched out the full or nearly the full pose. I also tried to draw over some with lines of action so I can translate this understanding of them into my 3D animations.
For the practical work, we animated a pendulum shot today, with extra focus on learning the ‘Follow-Through and Overlapping Action principle.
We also got feedback on our bouncing ball animation from last week.
My bouncing ball animation:
My feedback:
- Have more of an arc on the entrance drop of the ball
- Have the stretch come in a little later and make it more extreme
- On the later bounces, track how low the ball is and make sure its height at the frame before impact is getting lower each time
- Drop off the squash and stretches sooner
- Have more rotation on the last few bounces and as it rolls
- Add a few more frames to the end to give it time to come to a halt