Animation Tips & Tricks

How Do You Mix Snappy Animations with Non-snappy, Realistic Actions?

2009-11-09T15:03:00.000-08:00

I would like to know about how to mix snappy animations with non-snappy, realistic actions. How do you time out when to put snappy actions and when not to?

You should use snappy animation as a contrast to more realistic animation to keep movement and timing interesting... thus keeping your audience engaged in what you are doing.

Be careful, you can go too far..... you don't want to destroy the sense of realism say in a creature because you push the snappy aspects of its motion too far.

Make sure you maintain a sense of weight and watch your spacing so it doesn't get so your individual frames don't start strobing on you.

Try putting snappier actions where greater forces or impacts happen... Also use them to show a light fleeting character, say a squirrel or sparrow....

Remember how your character moves says a lot about there physical as well as mental states.

Guest blogger David Breaux

Do You Need a Formal Education to Get Work as an Animator?

2009-11-05T10:05:00.000-08:00

Do you need a formal education to get work as an animator? Does it help if you have a college degree?

Note: A college degree can be very helpful (and often essential) in securing a work visa when moving from one country to another. The below article is primarily meant for animators looking for work in their home country, or countries where they are free to work. :)

I hear questions like this a lot, and usually tend to avoid answering them on the blog because the answer sounds so self-serving as a co-founder of an online school, but I hear it so often that I guess it deserves a spot on the ol' tips and tricks blog...

First, I'll say this: having a college education is great. It sure doesn't hurt you in any way, may open your mind to new artistic avenues you may not have found otherwise, and a degree does at least show that you have the tenacity to finish a challenging task that you started.

I have nothing but the utmost respect for college graduates.

That said, at least in the US and at most major animation studios worldwide, your chances of being hired as an animator are dependent entirely on your demo reel, your interview, your reputation, and your geographic location for certain countries or studios.

I would say that 95% of the time, the recruiters and animation supervisors couldn't care less where you went to school or if you finished. What they care about is that your demo reel is jam-packed with jaw-dropping animation and that you will be easy and fun to work with.

Some schools enjoy a very strong reputation which does help recruiters stand up and take an extra bit of notice, and I'm proud to say that Animation Mentor has become foremost among them. Having AM or another well-respected animation school's name on your demo reel can help get that reel into the right hands or get the recruiter to pop it into the dvd player, just as a strong credit-list on a resume will help move your reel to the top of the pile. However, there is no school you can put on your resume that will even slightly overshadow poor animation on your demo reel.

It's really ALL about your demo reel.

I would say 90% of whether or not you get a job is based on your reel. The other 10% is your reputation, interview, and geographic factors. I would say your college degree will affect the job position at major animation studios in the US by roughly 0%.

Which I guess brings up the question of whether or not you can learn animation without a formal animation education at all.

The answer is yes - you can learn animation without going to school for it, but you better be remarkably naturally talented, heavily plugged in to a lot of animation resources, and willing to spend three or four times as long learning this stuff. It can certainly be done, but without a mentor or solid animation curriculum being taught by very experienced animators, it's going to be slow-going to the point where most people will give up before reaching their goal.

Animation is unbelievably intricate, to the point where a lifetime of study will still only scratch the surface of this stuff, so if you have the option of attending a school, I'd strongly recommend it as long as their animation program is well-respected and you will have teachers and mentors with a lot of experience actually working in the field.

If that is simply not an option, then the next best thing would be to plug yourself into some online animation communities such as CG-CHAR, the 11-second club, and so forth. Find people who you can get feedback from (and give feedback TO, which is JUST as important to your education!). Pick up some great animation books, find some free characters you can work with, and create a disciplined schedule for yourself that will push you and give you the time and opportunity to practice, practice, practice!

At the end of the day, that animation job is going to based almost entirely on whether or not your demo reel knocks their socks off, and they most likely won't care a bit whether or not you have an official college degree.

You can take it from me. I'm a college dropout.

Yup, that's right - I don't have a degree either. I saw that my college wasn't teaching me what professionals were telling me I needed to know in order to work as an animator, so I got the heck out of there, found a mentor (thanks Wayne!!!!), and got to work learning this art the way it's meant to be learned.

Anyway, if you want to be an animator, you know what you really have to do? Animate. That's it. Everything else is just helping you do that one thing better and better, but the key is to sit down and ANIMATE. Bring a character to life, and then do it again, and then do it again, and then do it again. Each time, the character should feel more and more alive, as you learn from your mistakes and successes.

I won't pretend that trying to do this on your own will be easy or fast, or that Animation Mentor wouldn't accelerate your learning by an incredible margin, but there are self-taught people out there who animate circles around me, so it's certainly possible!

Whatever you choose to do, know that you don't have to spend a fortune on a degree to succeed in this business. What you need is a demo reel that will stand out above the crowd with perfect body mechanics, dynamic scenes, emotional and communicative acting performances, and entertaining and memorable scenes!

There are many paths that can lead to that demo reel, and it's up to each of us to find the path that best fits our own needs and time-frame. For some of you, spending the next 6 or 7 years learning on your own is a fine pace, and that's great for the few of you who are naturally gifted enough and disciplined enough to pull that off! For others, you need something more immediate and guided, such as one of our experienced mentors eager to pass their knowledge along to the next generation of animators.

Each of these are merely different paths, hopefully leading eventually to the same result.

Wherever you guys happen to be on that path, best of luck, and I hope you're having half as much fun as I am with this animation stuff! :)

Shawn :)

My Shot Is Giving Me Trouble and I'm Getting Frustrated. Any Tips on What to Do in This Situation?

2009-11-03T14:37:00.000-08:00

Those pesky, meddling shots!! No matter how long you have been animating, we all have those weeks when we just aren't feeling it or we are dealing with a shot that makes us feel like we are losing our minds. The worst thing to do is to get frustrated and to beat yourself up about it, although that is usually my first response.

When I'm dealing with a headache inducing shot, I will put the shot aside and work on another shot. Getting some time away from a troublesome shot is good. My frustration may have been fueled by my jumping into the shot too fast. Some time "away" allows me to think it through a bit more, to clear my head and to return to the shot with new eyes.

Other times I will have a buddy check out my work, letting him know where I'm stuck. Fresh ideas from a coworker is a good way to get your creative juices recharged, because let's be honest, animating is very taxing on the creative juices.

In the movie Meet the Robinsons, I really liked that they applauded failure, because as they say in the film, if we don't fail we can't improve. We all want to be the best we can be, but we can't be afraid to make mistakes. Every shot we do, we learn a little something new, even if the shot was a huge success or massive failure.

Guest Blogger Ray Chase

What’s Been One of the Most Challenging Projects You Worked On?

2009-10-29T10:04:00.001-07:00

The single coolest thing about working in the animation business is that every project is jam-packed with its own set of challenges to overcome. Every sequence in that project has its own group of characters and performances and obstacles. And each shot within that sequence is overflowing with its own dizzying array of decisions, choices, and difficulties.

As such, this job never gets boring. Not even a little bit! You're constantly learning about new things that apply to one scene or another - be it dance, kung-fu, acting, car-racing, or how airplanes work. This is a career where you are basically signing up to be a student of EVERYTHING for the rest of your life, so buckle up for a nonstop adventure of new ideas and topics to research!

That said, if I had to choose one project as the most challenging, I think I'd have to pick Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen. I worked a lot on a character called Devastator, and figuring out how he was going to form together, rise up, and head off to rip down the pyramids was easily the most complex thing I've had the chance to work on, but also one of the most fun things I've ever animated!

Luckily, ILM has some absolutely incredible creature rigging geniuses (a word I don't use lightly) such as Kaori Ogino and Keiji Yamaguchi. Kaori rigged the creature, probably the most complicated rig ever done in CG, and Keiji was instrumental in helping animate some of the actual transforming geometry of the tractors coming together to form our big baddie.

Of course there are a lot of other people who come together to create something like Devastator, it certainly wasn't just the three of us, but I really felt the pressure on that character, both internal and external (I wanted it to be as cool as possible, just like everyone else did!) and as such, I have to say it was the biggest challenge I've faced.

But how cool is animation as a career when the biggest challenge is also the single most fun experience you've had in that career?

Man... sometimes I really love this job.

Thanks for the fun question!

Shawn :)

What Are Some Tips on Creating Effective Key Poses?

2009-10-27T14:42:00.000-07:00

A strong line of action through the character would be one of the first things to work into the pose. Avoid the dreaded straight up and down torso, you know, the torso that looks like there is a metal rod going up the spine. Work in C shapes and S shapes, to give some curve and interest to the spine. This will help you start to build weight into the character. Oppose those hips and shoulders, and get some bend in the knee(s), position one shoulder lower or higher than the other. Chances are, if the weight is not working in the pose it won't work once you start splining.

Look for contrast between your poses. Unless the acting is very subtle, the character won't be in the same shape for the shot. Use reversals in shape, as well as moments of compression (squash) and extension (stretch)to add texture.

Remember, the key poses are your main storytelling poses. Be sure that they support the key beats of the shot. They may signify a change in the character's emotional state or a change in posture or screen position. And they must be clear.

Say you wanted to find the keys poses from a scene starring Tom Hanks. You get out your scissors and slice up the film, as doing this to a blue-ray would be extremely hard. Now you search through all the frames looking for the extreme moments that tell the story of what the scene is about. These will be the frames that are the most clear and readable. And most of the time you will probably be looking for the extreme change in facial expression or body posture.

The face is super important, when we go to the movies we aren't watching Woody's left arm. But let us not forget the importance of body language. When I block a scene I key the character from top to bottom, including the facial expression and phoneme. I want the pose to be a complete picture of my intent for that character at that point and time. Often times however, before I add the face I will focus on the body alone. Is the body communicating my intent effectively? If I watch my blocking with no facial animation of any kind...is it working..is it clear? Once your character has strong, clear body language, the facial animation is the icing on the cake.

Guest Blogger Ray Chase

Reader's Question: How Do You Figure Out the Correct Timing of Your Work Just on Paper?

2009-10-22T09:58:00.001-07:00

Personally, I use thumbnails and Flipbook during my planning stages. I quickly explore the poses and breakdowns I want, not worried about drawing mistakes and only concerned with how clear it reads. Flipbook just helps me experiment with the timing of the poses I've figured out on paper, and it's a more intuitive alternative, at least for me, than shifting around that thin red keyframe mark in Maya. Once that's down, I pretty much use that information to transfer into Maya.

How would you go about figuring out the correct timing of your work just on paper? I usually never know until I've seen it in a sequence of some kind, and that's where Flipbook plays its hand. So, something that I think may only need 5 frames on paper, may possibly need more or less. How can you ever be sure when you haven't seen any kind of playback?

Again, this is a personal workflow choice that may change as you gain experience. Animators determine their shot timing using a variety of methods, the most common is using video reference. Your reference will give a good basic idea of the timing of actions and poses. Just remember that as an animator you are exaggerating life, not copying it directly (rotoscoping), so don’t use the exact frame count timing of your reference. Instead, use it as a guideline. Dialogue shots also make timing easier because you have audio timing on which to base the actions. For example, you know that you have 10 frames between the time the character says “You are..” and “…the plague” so you base the character’s “hits” around those 10 frames.

Many animators use the blocking pass to determine their timing. In the same way that you may adjust a frame hold longer or shorter in Flipbook you can grab a blocked pose in your 3d software and shift it left or right in the timeline and playblasting it. You stated Flipbook is more intuitive which is why this is a personal workflow choice, there is no one right answer! Use the workflow that accomplishes the goal in the shortest amount of time! You don’t need the “correct” timing established before your begin blocking (or possibly first pass of splining) your animation. You should have a good idea of the timing but there is nothing wrong adjusting your poses 1-8 frames in either direction during your early passes. But, if you have to adjust your poses 20+ frames to fix the timing, then either you have a really slow shot with no movement or you don’t have enough poses blocked! Again, don’t spend too much time determing the “correct” timing in Flipbook if you are only going to adjust it again in Maya as you move from blocking to splining.

Finally, timing is something that is learned with practice and experience. In the beginning, you may use Flipbook to plan your timing but after a few years you may just know how many frames it takes to move a hand/foot/etc to the pose you want!

Happy Animating!
Animation Mentor Staff

What Should a Young Artist Do to Prepare for the Professional Animation Industry?

2009-10-19T10:35:00.000-07:00

With so many blogs and web sites devoted to animation, there is a wealth of information available. I run through my list every morning to stay up to date on the many happenings.

When preparing your reel, it's a good idea to know a bit about the studio to which you are applying. Under the umbrella of the "animation industry" there are studios working in fully animated feature film, television, FX for live action, games and internet. While there may be some cross over, many studios have specific things they look for on a reel.

Speaking of reels. Never, ever, ever put work on your reel that does not belong to you. It seems like common sense, yet I have heard of it happening more than once. It can be quite frustrating to get rejection letters, I know, I have my own pile. But your reel represents who you are and what you can do. To try and pass another animators work off as your own, is fraud. Don’t do it or the animation gods will become most displeased and frown upon you for a thousand years….or even longer.

Once you are at a studio be prepared for “crunch time”, that glorious time when everyone pulls together to finish a project. The length and severity of crunch time will vary by studio and project, but know that it’s rare for a production to go from start to finish without some sort of crunch.

Meeting deadlines is important in all industries and the animation industry is no different. Depending on where your working you may frequently have reasonable deadlines or ones that are not so reasonable. Regardless, you will need to get your work in on time. Being consistently late will certainly put you on the naughty list and who wants that? Practice good time management to help you stay focused. If you have a week to complete a shot figure out when you need to have blocking approved, when you must be splining etc, in order to hit your target date. Having your own mini schedule will keep you on track and make your coordinators very happy.

And finally…upon landing that first gig in the industry, don’t ruin it by being a jerk. People in the professional animation industry like to work with nice, fun, modest people. You don't have to bring in donuts everyday to win over the hearts of your coworkers; although if you want to, I like chocolate. Check any ego at the door, be open to learning, listen, ask questions, have a sense of humor, be respectful of varying points of view, be part of the team. Studios want to foster healthy, positive, team-building environments.

Guest Blogger Ray Chas e

How Do You Traverse the Fine Line of Always Creating New and Interesting Poses but Keeping the Actions as Simple and Readable as Possible?

2009-10-14T11:58:00.000-07:00

How do you traverse the fine line of always creating new and interesting poses but keeping the actions as simple and readable as possible? How do you know if you have done “too much” and need to simplify?

Interesting, exciting, emotional, communicative, dynamic poses should ALWAYS be your goal in every scene. That's the absolute core of what we do, so it's great to aim high and shoot for the stars when it comes to poses that will communicate the character's emotions and actions as best as possible.

However, you bring up a good point that it's SO easy to go overboard! Creating poses is so much fun that the simplest of actions can turn into the wackiest animation in history if we aren't careful.

The trick is learning how much is too much. How far is too far?

Truthfully, your sense of what will "read" best to the audience will continue to improve as you get more and more experienced with animation. However, there is one trick that you will always continue to rely on to some degree, and is the best rock-solid way to find out if you have pushed your poses and ideas too far:

ASK SOMEONE!

Sounds simple, right? You'd be surprised how many students and newer animators avoid this absolutely essential step in their animation process. Feedback is the key to not only learning animation, but excelling in it, and there really is no other way to know if your ideas and poses are reading clearly than to ask around and see what people think!

Remember, your animation is being created to be experienced by an audience of people with vastly differing backgrounds, beliefs, senses of humor, moods, etc. The eventual audience is completely unpredictable in their makeup. Because of that, there is literally no one who doesn't have a valid opinion on whether or not your animation makes sense to them.

Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston write in the Illusion of Life that they would sometimes even show their animation to the janitor if they were working late at night to get an opinion on the work. That janitor didn't know the first thing about overlapping action, squash and stretch, force, or arcs, but he sure could tell them if he understood whether or not the character was sad, or what actions the character was meant to be doing.

Anyway, when it comes to poses, I come from the school of thought that says to exaggerate something more than you think it should be exaggerated, and then double it! This has helped me a lot to push my ideas (particularly the timing and poses), but the reality is that it usually means I need to tone things down here or there in order to make things more clear or to fit the style of a project. Luckily, poses are always much easier to tone down than to push further, so it's best to go a bit too far than to have to shove your animation further in tiny incremental steps over and over until your supervisor is pleased.

So I would certainly recommend that you aim high when searching for fun poses, but be prepared to tone them down when necessary, and actively seek feedback from your peers, your family, your supervisor, or even the janitor, because every single one of them is an invaluable resource to find out when you've gone overboard!

Hope that helps - thanks for swinging by the blog!

Shawn :)

Is It Better to Animate Pose to Pose or Straight Ahead?

2009-10-13T13:12:00.000-07:00

In my experience it has been useful to use a combination of pose to pose, layered and straight ahead. I use them all!! Shall I explain? Oh yes, I shall. So when beginning a shot I will use pose to pose to map out the performance of the shot. I will use stepped keys to do this so that when the animation plays, it's popping through the poses. This allows me to focus on the key storytelling poses, to create nice silhouettes and to work on contrast.

I think of the pose to pose pass as the comic strip of my shot, telling the story through key images. After establishing my keys I will take another pass adding in breakdowns, all while staying in stepped. I want to make as many decisions as I can in stepped mode so that when I move out of stepped and into spline there is less chaos. Chaos is a noun -- a state of utter confusion or disorder, like when animation is taken out of stepped blocking too soon resulting in mushy movement of virtually everything on the character.

With the shot blocked out and broken down, I change into spline mode (I actually use plateau in Maya) and begin to work in a layered method. I like to work from the inside out, hiding everything on the character except the hips/torso since that is from where, all the movement is driven. Once I'm happy with the hips and torso, I will switch layers perhaps moving to the head or the arms.

Straight ahead animation is usually something I will only do on things like floppy ears, tails or clothing. Here I'm starting on frame 1 and steaming ahead through the shot. Since my straight ahead animation will be driven by the body animation, its super important to get the body working first.

That's how I incorporate all three methods into my work flow. I find my approach to be very efficient, however it may not be the ideal approach for everyone. Developing your own work flow, one that works for you, is an important part of the process.

Guest Blogger Ray Chase

What Are Some Extra Goodies to Add in Polish to Make the Animation Stand Out Even More?

2009-10-08T12:31:00.001-07:00

What are some extra goodies to add in polish to make the animation stand out even more (eg. head squash and stretch…)

For me, the single biggest thing is pushing my arcs into something clear, fun, and pleasing to the eye. There's nothing like some beautiful arcs on the wrists, feet, nose, props, etc., to really bring a scene to life and take it from looking acceptable to looking great!

Other than that, especially in visual effects animation, which is the medium I've mostly worked in (animating characters who need to live in the same frame as live-action actors), the key is subtle complexity. It's finding small ways to add little secondary things that bring the character more fully to life.

Things like having a character swallow, and the intricate neck muscle movements that go into a swallow, for example. Or putting in breaths into the scene - expanding the chest a bit, etc.

As you say, you can also get some great extra mileage out of squashing and stretching the head slightly, if the style of the film is appropriate for that. In a more realistic film, you could get that feeling out of squashing/stretching the fleshier parts of the face while keeping the skull itself more rigid, but it's the same idea - giving the overall character a heightened feeling of being organic and fleshy.

All of these sorts of things - micro eye movements, muscles flexing/relaxing, ear twitches on an animal, toes squishing against the ground, etc - these all can add to the overall complexity that will help the character feel even more alive without sacrificing the subtlety of the performance!

Shawn:)

What’s One Step That Is Often Overlooked in Student Animation?

2009-10-05T09:24:00.000-07:00

The step I see missed time and again is that students transition out of stepped blocking and into spline too early. What was a nice blocking pass with some strong poses has now turned into a mushy pile of chaos. The poses are still there, but now the character slides and drifts from one pose to the next. Now it is possible to take the goo and mold it into something decent, however it will probably take extra time to do so with a lot of trial and error along the way.

Now, I understand the eagerness. The shot is mapped out...you have your keys....let's get it moving!!! Well slow down there skipper. Blocking IS animating. Take a look at those keys and how much room you have between them. Guess what will happen if you convert to spline now? Yes, that's right -- Maya, the goofball inbetweener, will fill in those gaps for you in the most literal and boring way possible. God bless Maya for wanting to help, but you are better off making those decisions yourself.

Once you have your key poses in blocking, take another pass adding some breakdowns. How will you transition from one pose to the next? Make decisions up front..you can tweak later if you must. The more decisions you can make while in stepped, the less mess you will have to deal with later.

Guest Blogger Ray Chase

Reader's Question: How Common Is It to Use a Flipbook or PAP to Plan a Shot?

2009-10-01T11:50:00.000-07:00

I was wondering about the software tools you mentioned. How "common" is it for an animator to use something like Flipbook or PAP to "plan" a shot before even touching the 3D character (Sort of like animated thumbnails, not necessarily polished hand drawn animation)? Is that way of "planning" realistic in a bigger studio setting, or do most animators stick to thumbnails on paper? I was also curious as to how you're supposed to figure out what poses happen on what frames, but using the "real-life" timing makes perfect sense.

Everyone has a different workflow and if you can quickly show your ideas using Flipbook or PAP then feel free to use them. Just don’t spend too much time in those programs where they becomes detrimental to the planning process. Your sketches should be a quick way to plan ideas without wasting too much time in software. With enough experience, you will likely discover it is easier to show all of your ideas on paper than spend the extra time (even if it is 30 minutes) animating them in a 2d software package. Plus, at many studios you already have 2d animated version of the shot called an animatic (essentially a moving storyboard) so it may not be necessary to recreate the shot in 2d with your own sketches if the animatic already shows your intentions.

Animation Mentor Staff

What’s the Importance of Clean Blocking? Can You Provide Some Tips on Clean Blocking?

2009-09-28T10:57:00.000-07:00

The importance of clean blocking comes back to why we block in the first place. To present a clear direction or intent, to the supervisors and directors. If you have done your job in your blocking, anyone who views your shot should be able to tell exactly what is happening. Should anyone ask “yeah so...what's he doing riiiiiight...THERE!” Well, then you probably weren't clear enough, pack up your desk and get out.....

No, no it happens. You thumbnailed, you shot reference, your blocking is clear to you, but we must be sure it reads to everyone else as well. That's why its important to show your blocking to fellow animators while your working; don't work in a vacuum...not that you could fit in a vacuum, unless it was one of those giant industrial kinds.

A question I will get a lot from my students is: How far do we go with the blocking...how much is too much? Again it's important that the blocking reads clearly. Sometimes two poses can tell the whole story. Other times you may need several breakdowns to make a particular pose change clear. Basically, you want to put in as much as you need to get the idea across, while at the same time, keeping it simple.

Often times student's dirty up their blocking by including too many ideas. So a scene that may only have two ideas...two beats, will be blocked with four or five ideas. It's important to make sure that the key poses are working with the key beats or phrases of the shot. Don't get all crazy with trying to cram in too many ideas. Some questions to ask when planning your scene: what is the purpose of the shot? ...what do I need to say to the audience?

When I block out a scene I will work in stepped keys, this way when I view my animation I am flipping through the poses. I key everything on the character for each one of my key poses, which keeps everything neat in my timeline. This way, if I receive notes from the supervisor or director, I can implement the changes quickly and easily.
Keep it clear and keep it simple.

Guest blogger Ray Chase

How Do You Find Reference for an Unusual Four-Legged Creature?

2009-09-23T09:28:00.000-07:00

I got a great question from Sergio, who wrote in to ask: "How do you find your reference for an unusual four-legged character and how do you do your planning for the movements?"

Hi Sergio! First off, thanks for the great question!

I know that's a tough thing that a lot of newer animators struggle with. You have to animate a dragon or a dinosaur or a centaur, but for some reason, there just aren't any centaurs to be found at the zoo.

Well, this is one of those times that you're going to have to put your animation imagination into overdrive, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't study any reference!

What you want to do is look for animals that have a similar physical makeup to the creature you will be animating. Sometimes this means studying multiple creatures.

An example that comes to mind was Eragon. When we were animating Saphira the dragon, we noticed that her body was very similar in proportion and design to that of a lion, and her wings were designed very similar to eagle wings.

We got right to work amassing a lot of great footage of lions and eagles and started studying the heck out of them, looking for concepts we should be using in our work, and studying how their body mechanics worked. When Saphira was on the ground, we tried to take inspiration from the movement of the lions, and in the air we animated her wings in an eagle-like pattern and fashion.

So just take a long look at your character, and see what it reminds you of, and start investigating the animals out there that might be similar. You can find great reference on Animal Motion Show (Rhinohouse Dvds), youtube, documentaries, movies, BBC motion gallery, etc.

The important thing is to base the movement (and acting) of your creature on REAL LIFE ANIMALS so it will have believable body mechanics that an audience can relate to and accept easily.

Hope that helps! Good luck!

Shawn :)

How Have You Learned to Match the Style of a Film?

2009-09-21T12:18:00.000-07:00

Concerning style, how have you learned to match the style of a film? In other words, how have you approached animating so that the film appears as if it was animated by one person?

Consistency is a big issue at Pixar, because we don't have Character Leads, in the traditional Disney sense. Pixar animators are assigned scenes, not characters, so any animator may animate any character at a given time in the film. This is one of the reasons that dailies are so important. We can all sit down in a room with the Director and Supervisors and see what's being done with the characters. The Director can decide what works and what doesn't, and further define how the character behaves. This helps us to all get on the same page and understand who the character is. Usually one or two animators will demonstrate a knack for a certain character, and their work will become a touchstone for the other animators to reference. These animators will occasionally give lectures to discuss what we've learned and give tips on how to approach a particular character.

We'll also develop model sheets (collections of images of the character in poses that are considered in-character on and on-model) as well as libraries of facial expressions that other animators can use as a starting point. Ultimately it's up to all the animators, Supervisors and the Director to police each other and work towards a consistent portrayal of the character.

Guest Blogger Victor Navone

Could You Please Explain the Animation Term Pendulum?

2009-09-17T09:53:00.000-07:00

Hi Drhuv! Thanks for stopping by!

A pendulum isn't really a "term," it's an object. A pendulum is basically a weighted object hanging from some kind of base. If the base is moved, that weighted object is going to swing side to side. Many clocks are pendulum clocks (such as "grandfather clocks") which you'd recognize by the swinging pendulum beneath the clock face.

We use pendulums in our animation exercises because the idea of a pendulum clearly illustrates the concept of "successive breaking of joints" and overlapping animation.

Let's simplify the idea of a pendulum and imagine a base and a weighted object hanging from the base, with two joints connecting the weighted object to the base. Well, let's say someone kicks the base. What's the going to happen to the weighted object? Well, nothing at all, at first! First the base must move, which will move the first joint hanging down. Then the next joint will get moved. THEN the weighted object will get moved. The energy needs to travel down that chain of events to finally reach its destination at the heavy object, right?

This idea is something that we use throughout the body when animating. The spine is, in a way, in inverted pendulum rising up from a "base" (the hips). The arms can be thought of as pendulums hanging from the shoulder in certain circumstances. The tail of a critter is kind of a pendulum hanging from their backsides. The way a tree sways in the wind might be like an inverted pendulum connected to the ground.

The pendulum movement teaches us about a wave action that happens in any multi-jointed or organic object, and that's why you probably see it mentioned around animation sites.

Hope that answers your question! Thanks for writing in, Drhuv!

Shawn :)

Behind the Scenes Webinar at Animation Mentor

2009-09-15T15:57:00.000-07:00

Dear Readers,

If you're interested in learning more about Animation Mentor, come learn what sets us apart from the rest! Hear CEO Bobby Beck talk to our Brazilian alum Ana Cunha and East Coast grad Kevin Worth about how this awesome online learning experience really works. You'll get a taste of what it’s like at Animation Mentor, and a chance to meet our staff and get some great tips on how to choose your animation school at this live webinar.

Thursday, Sept. 17, 2009
6-7 p.m. (PST)

Click here for more info on the webinar.

What Is Your Favorite Part of the Animation Process?

2009-09-14T10:05:00.000-07:00

That's a hard one to answer. It may be easier if I start with my LEAST favorite part(s) of the process.

I really don't enjoy research and planning. This is a shame because generally I find that I do better work when I have researched and planned exhaustively. I find the process tedious, though, and I'd
much rather jump in and start animating! I liken it to broccoli: I
don't really enjoy the taste, but I know it's good for me and I'll be
glad I ate it when the meal is over. I'm sure you know the feeling.

Once my planning is done, I really enjoy blocking. Depending on what kind of scene and characters I'm working with, I block in different ways. If I'm doing an acting shot with humanoid characters, I'll probably block pose-to-pose with stepped keys. I like designing the poses and finding the best silhouette, as well as flipping between the poses to see how they flow together. I'm not worried about timing yet, just the sequence of ideas. I'm trying to hit the poses in my video reference or sketches with the 3D model, and adjusting as necessary to match the style of the film and the physiology of the character. If I'm going off video reference, then I'm probably pushing the poses further and simplifying them. If I'm going off of sketches, then I'm probably trying to push the 3D model to match the dynamic of the loose sketch. If I'm blocking in a layered fashion, such as with cars, fish, or robots, then I'm dropping keys on my root rotates and translates and pushing them around in the spline editor to find the timing and rhythm of the shot. Ideally I'm getting real-time playback from my models, and I enjoy fine-tuning the timing and arc patterns to suggest the attitudes and actions.

The other part of the animation process I don't really like is the transition from blocking with stepped poses into splines. Suddenly all my snappy timing looks like crap, and it almost feels like I'm starting over again. It takes so long to get the animation tied down to where the timing is right again. Luckily this doesn't last too long, and I have a pretty routine series of adjustments I can perform on the splines to get the shot in better shape. Mostly it involves adding more ease-in's to my holds, pushing my keys around to tighten or loosen timing, and adding in a few more breakdowns as needed. I don't start offsetting keys in time until later in my process, and I keep all my controls keyed on every pose.

After I've done my first pass on the splines, that's where the fun begins for me. I can put on some music and start massaging all my actions. I focus sweetening the timing by adding contrast, simplifying actions that are too complicated, adding little details that weren't in the blocking, and sculpting my arcs and spacing. This can be a very technical and procedural process, but I find it puts me in kind of a zen state, and the time just flies by.

Once I get to the final polish stage, I start to enjoy the process less again. Maybe it's because I'm getting tired of the shot and can't see it objectively anymore. Maybe it's because I'm ready to move on. Or maybe I just don't feel like overlapping any more pinkies! It's not such a problem on short shots, but lately on Toy Story 3 I've been getting whoppers – full-body human acting shots of 300 frames or more. These can really test my stamina, but I've enjoyed the challenge and can't wait to see them lit and rendered!

Guest Blogger Victor Navone

Blinks in Animation

2009-09-10T14:42:00.000-07:00

I've been getting some questions about blinks, so I thought I'd reprint this ancient article, first carved into a cave wall way back in November of 2004 in one of our first newsletters, in case some of you hadn't had a chance to see it! Hope it's helpful!
=================

I feel like writing about blinks today. Why? I just saw a commercial on TV (name of product withheld to protect the innocent) starring a character who had a severe blinking problem.

Now, I don't mean the character blinked too much. I don't mean he blinked too fast. I don't mean the character's blinks were too far offset, too slow, or too few.

No, this character was plagued by a disease that has been running rampant through animation (particularly student work, though not AnimationMentor students, of course. Everything they do is perfect and wonderful in every conceivable way... Well, okay, that's not exactly true, but I haven't actually seen it as a problem in the school. Probably because we harp on stuff like this ad nauseum).

Where was I?

Oh yeah, the disease...

Let's call it "Randomblinkitis."

Many animated characters currently living out their lives on demo reels around the world suffer from this terrible disease, causing their blinks to feel random and meaningless. While some characters use their blinks to convey thought process and emotion, these poor Randomblinkitis victims are forced to slog through their daily existence unable to properly communicate their emotions and thoughts to each other, let alone to recruiters around the globe.

It's a tough life for them, folks, so let's do something about it!

See, the medicine for this heartbreaking disease is observation. It's easy to do, and it'll mean so much to your animated characters (and to the recruiters forced to have to try to communicate with your characters!) if you can just take a little time to observe the blinks of your friends, your family, your co-workers, your favorite movie star, and yourself before you start plowing ahead into acting scenes.

Listen, I know about the whole "I just discovered animation a month ago and must do an acting scene IMMEDIATELY!" thing. I know you all want to do acting scenes. I know you think they're the most fun. I know you think they're your ticket into Pixar. And I also know that for some of you, all the "honestly, spending six months practicing basic body mechanics and force will give you far stronger acting scenes than you'll ever be able to do without that foundation" advice in the world isn't going to keep you away from playing with some acting shots...

So, if you absolutely must do some acting shots (or, better yet, are advanced enough to do acting shots properly), then please, give some attention to the eyes of your character.

We've probably all heard people say "90% of acting is in the eyes" or something to that effect. Shoot, some of us have said that ourselves. And I actually think that's true, and is great advice (aside from the fact that if you don't sell the acting with the body first, all the facial stuff in the world isn't going to save your scene), but when you hear that "90% of the acting is in the eyes," I know most people immediately jump to "eye darts" and "eye direction," etc., completely skipping over one of the most essential acting tools you have - the blink.

When I was in school, I was told that "animated characters should always blink every two seconds."

Well, that's just about the worst advice I ever got, other than some advice I recently was given during a trip to Singapore, which was "giant fish eyeballs taste really GREAT," but animation-wise, I think the "blink every two seconds" is probably the worst. Actually, both of those pieces of advice are equally true (or rather, equally completely-and-utterly-untrue!).

Look around. Do you see anyone who is blinking every 2 seconds?! (If you do, please report them to your government, because chances are they are some kind of android spy from Mars or something.) People don't blink on any kind of set time schedule anymore than giant fish eyeballs taste "great" (and for all of you out there who maybe think fish eyeballs DO taste great, probably because you have some kind of steel-reinforced taste buds like the Singaporeans I was with at that restaurant -- which I do admire and am completely jealous of, by the way-- then that's fine to like your giant eyeballs, but just trust me on the blink thing anyway, okay?)

People blink for a reason.

- Blinks are so much more than any kind of physical dry-eye response.
- Blinks are the key to selling many emotions. Fire up some of your favorite films and study the eyes of good actors.
- When do they blink?
- Why?
- What does it feel like?
- How does it make you feel?

Right off the bat, the number of blinks can affect emotion in dramatic ways. Rapid blinks can make a character feel shy, nervous, uncomfortable, relieved, or like they are about to cry. Not blinking at all can feel angry, stoned, dead, or super intense.

Check out Tom Hanks in Forrest Gump when he's meeting his son for the first time. As soon as he realizes it's his son, he stops blinking completely. He's transfixed. Tom Hanks holds back his blinks to communicate the idea that his character is THAT intense about what he's realizing. Then a blink, and boom - he's on to his next emotion, which is guilt. He feels guilty. Shouldn't he have been there to raise his son? Did he do something wrong? The blinks are coming fast and furious now, to indicate his discomfort, his worry. Then a thought occurs to him: "is he slow, like me?" He doesn't say it right away, but you can feel the exact moment that crosses his mind, because suddenly his blinks stop again, and he's back to that intensity, and finally he works up the courage to ask Jenny his big question: "is he smart, or is he...?" Huge eyes, locked on, almost afraid to hear the answer. "He's the smartest in his class." And the blinks are fired back up again, which communicates his relief.

That whole scene is amazing for eye stuff. He even asks "can I go see him?" using only his eyes! Sure, his head moves barely as well, but it's 90% just his eyes, and you totally know exactly what he's saying. He delivers a line without ever opening his mouth. And it feels so real. To me, that's a great scene, and something we should all aspire to in our work.

So your first set of big blink questions is this: "what's my character's emotional state right now? What are they reacting to? How is that making them feel?" And your second set of questions, just as important (if not more so) is this: "well, how do I blink when I feel that way? How do my friends blink when they're in that situation? How did my favorite actor blink in that amazing scene I saw the other day?"

Figure out the emotional state of your character, go observe that emotional state in as true a form as you possible can, and then study the heck out of those eyelids. Better yet, act the scene out over and over and over until you aren't thinking at all about what the actual dialogue lines are anymore, and all you're thinking about is the emotion you are truly making yourself feel, and the context/subtext of the scene, and videotape it, and study it!

OK, so blink frequency (how many) have piles of meaning all on their own, but what about the spacing of when those blinks happen? That's probably kind of random, right?

No way!

A good general rule of thumb is to never animate anything without a reason. Never move ANYTHING on a character unless you know exactly why you're moving it. So if anyone ever tells you to animate something randomly, unless it's the tiniest subtle "add a little 'dirt' to this movement so it feels a little less smooth" type of thing, then you should probably say, "No way!" Unless he's your animation director. Then you probably shouldn't say, "No way." That might be a really bad idea. You should instead say "Right away, no problem!" while you silently think "man, I wish my animation director would take some Animation Mentor classes..."

Where was I? Oh yeah - nothing is random. Well, neither are blinks.

The most important use of a blink is to show thought process. We do blink sometimes just to wet our eyes, and we blink on a rapid head turn, we blink on a major change in eye direction, and all those other "blink rules," but in my opinion the most important time is when we have a change in our thought process. When we're having an idea, or when we're switching from one emotion to another, or when we're realizing something. Those are the gold-mines in terms of blinks - that's when a perfectly placed blink will take a scene from being merely "good" and make it "great."

There's a great book called "In the Blink of An Eye," by Walter Murch, who is an amazing film editor, and a part of that book is about his theory that we blink to edit the film of our lives. We blink throughout the day to cut from one scene to the next to the next to the next. And he uses that theory in his film editing. He looks for when the main character blinks, and often uses that as his cutting point, figuring that it's probably the most natural-feeling place to cut for the audience.

As animators, we can hijack his theory and apply it to our own work and our acting. We can study the same phenomenon that he noticed, and we will all find the same exact result - people blink when their brain shifts from one thing to another, whether it's an emotion or a thought.

Wow. That ended up about 5 times longer than I thought it would.
Sorry, I get all excited about this stuff and can talk about it forever! I'll try to be shorter in the future...
(I keep saying that, don't I?)

Let's see, to recap:

1. Blinks Have Meaning!
2. Skipping a strong foundation in the basics in order to get to acting scenes quicker shoots yourself in the foot.
3. Never animate anything without a reason.
4. Don't say "No way!" to an Animation Director.
5. We blink to cut the "film of our life."

That's five tips for the price of one. I better start being stingier or this'll be a short-lived column!

Hope you found it helpful. See you next time!

Shawn :)

What Is the Best Way to Approach Editing Splines When Animating?

2009-09-08T09:00:00.000-07:00

What is the best way to approach editing splines when animating? Should we block-in and get overall motion for the whole body done THEN fix the splines, or should we add motion piece by piece and fix splines along the way?

There are as many different ways to block and animate as there are animators. There's no one right answer to this question; what's important is that you find a workflow that works for you. Something that is consistent, methodical, organized and clean. Once you have a predictable workflow that becomes second nature, animation is so much more enjoyable, because you can focus more on the performance and less on the technical issues of managing your shot.

I myself have different workflows, and my way of working is always evolving. I will block differently depending on the characters and action in my scene. For example, I'm currently working on some naturalistic human acting animation for Toy Story 3. I find that blocking pose to pose with stepped keys, and doing lots of breakdowns (down to 4’s and 2’s) helps me to sort out the complex body mechanics early, while finding some appealing poses. Once I'm done blocking, I will convert all my keys to flat-tangent splines, and begin smoothing the root controls manually. I do constant playblasts and revisions until I get the timing and patterns right for the root, then I move outward through the rest of the body. For WALL-E and Cars, which are simpler, more stylized characters, I would work in a more layered fashion, starting with just a few root controls and shaping the splines right away to get my timing and texture early on. Then I would layer on other parts of the body as needed, until I have a full performance. Sometimes I'll work in a hybrid method, where some parts of the model are splined, and others are stepped-key poses. And sometimes I'll work pose-to-pose with copied pairs!

No matter how I'm working, I'm always keeping an eye on my splines, even if they're in stepped mode. Splines help me to visualize my eases and overshoots, and to make sure that my rotational values are not going crazy in between keys. I've gotten accustomed to analyzing, diagnosing, and even creating animation right in the spline editor, as you know about me if you've ever seen one of my lectures! But not every animator relies on the spline editor like I do, and that's OK. The important thing is that you do visit all your splines at SOME point during your workflow (especially near the end) to make sure the polish is there. I find that the sooner I visit my splines, the easier my polish phase is and the faster my animation comes together.

It really helps with arcs and spacing, too. Your mileage may vary.

Guest Blogger Victor Navone

Could You Explain the Animation Terms Cushion and Settle?

2009-09-02T11:48:00.000-07:00

Saral wrote in to ask: Could you please explain the animation terms cushion and settle?

Hi Saral!

These terms are used almost interchangeably, and mostly they just refer to how a character's movement is going to come to a stop.

Cushion is pretty much the same as "ease in" or "slow-in," animation terms used to describe the way a character will "ease" into a pose or "slow" into a pose. You could also say that a character should "cushion" into a pose - it's pretty much the same thing, as far as I know.

The point of those terms, by the way, is to help sell the organic nature of the character or object. Very few things in nature come to an instant stop on a dime, mostly things more in organic arcs and need time to "cushion" into the final position of their movement. For example, if you were walking quickly and came to a stop, no matter how hard you try to stop instantly, you simply cannot do it. Your body is going to have to recover from the movement and part of that is going to be easing into that final stopped pose (and probably going THROUGH that final pose into an overshoot, and then arcing and overlapping back into the final pose).

"Settle," to me, is very similar. I hear people use that term to describe all of those little overshoots and arcs that eventually run out of steam and lead to the character being still. Picture again someone coming to a stop. Well, their hips are going to keep going until their weight and angle of their body slows them down. The hips will probably sail right through that "stopped" pose and go a little too far before your body says "hey hips! Come back here!" The hips are then going to arc back and go into a bit of tiny spiral that will eventually get them into a stopped position.

Force and general body mechanics tell us exactly what will happen next, which will be a subtle wave action through the spine, causing overlap on the arms, successive breaking of joints going all the way down to the wrists, probably a bit of overlap on the head, etc. - all moving in related arcs in multiple axis, though offset from one another, and so forth.

To me, all of that "stuff" that is happening - all of that is the "settling" of the character.

Other folks might use these terms differently, but those are the ways I've heard them used around the studio. Hope that helps!

Thanks for writing in!

Shawn :)

What's It Like to Work at Pixar?

2009-08-31T11:03:00.000-07:00

I can't speak objectively, having only ever worked as an animator at Pixar, but I think it's pretty safe to say that it's the best place in the world for an animator to work. It's a very supportive, nurturing environment. We get to work on great movies that we're proud of, and we have lots of fun, even when we're working hard. There's a spirit of collaboration among the animators that I think is unique to Pixar.

There's a healthy sense of competition, and animators are always offering compliments and critiques on each others' work. Usually the best idea wins, no matter who came up with it, whether it's a note about story, or an acting idea. As for the culture, we've made a really fun place to work. You can take art classes at Pixar University, attend free screenings of current and classic films, and even participate in one of the many rock bands. At last count, I think there are something like 14 bars at Pixar; we work hard, and we play hard! I've never been bored with my job, and being surrounded by so many talented artists, I feel I always having something more to learn. I've been at Pixar for almost 10 years, and it can be easy to get complacent or find thing to complain about, but every once in a while I take a step back and remember just how lucky I am to work there, and I hope I always will!

Guest Blogger Victor Navone

Animating Eyes and Eyebrows

2009-08-26T11:25:00.000-07:00

I got a couple great questions regarding eyes from Christopher and Avner.

Christopher asks: Can you share more on the subject of eye darts and your technique to approaching them in relation to the social triangle and eye blinks? And Avner wrote in to ask: How do you animate eyes and eyebrows on giant characters like the ones in Transformers?

Those are both great questions and obviously related. As we all know, your eye animation is probably the most important single aspect of your acting performance outside of the general body language. People generally see the body first, then the eyes, then everything else, so you always want to first sell the emotion in the body, and then really hammer it home with the eyes.

"Eye animation" could include general eye shapes (emotional shapes), eye darts, pupil animation, blinks, and sometimes you might lump eyebrow animation into this category as well. All of these things work together to communicate emotion, thought process, and even unspoken lines of dialogue!

The main thing to keep in mind with eye darts, particularly in regard to blinks, is that you should not think of them as random movements that you throw into your scenes willy-nilly. You can use your eye darts strategically to show a shift in thought process or even to help sell an emotion (such as one person's eyes darting back and forth between the eyes of the person they talking to, searching for the truth).

Other general eye-dart tips:

1. They're fast! The eyes can really move quickly. Study your friends eyes and you'll see a lot of micro-movements as well as larger re-focusing movements. All of these movements will happen very quickly. Generally you're talking about one to two frames, in most cases, unless you're slowing it down for a specific reason.

2. Generally, eye darts are very quick and somewhat linear in motion. You could ease out of the first pose a bit, but you should hit that second pose really hard, almost robotically.

3. Plan your eye darts and use them wisely! Too many eye darts will feel spastic, freaked out, or electrocuted. No eye darts can very quickly feel dead (like doll eyes), but can also be used for effect (drugged, etc).

4. You need to give the eyes time to focus as well. Don't just have the eyes darting all over the place if the idea is that they are really focused on something. If they are focused, then only use VERY subtle eye darts that will help the character feel alive.

5. The further away something is, the less the eyes will dart when they are studying it.

6. If a character is tracking a moving object (such as a car), it's usually good to break up the eye movement with some darting movements that focus for a couple frames before moving on. With a slow-moving object, you can get away with a smoother eye-tracking motion, but as soon as the object has some speed, this will feel robotic and weird.

In regards to tying eye darts in with blinks, obviously the goal should be one cohesive eye performance, so you should really study what your eyes did in your video reference and see how that feels - and more importantly - figure out WHY it feels that way. Smaller darts won't necessarily have any correlating lid movements, but larger darts might, and the largest might want to have a blink happen as the eye shifts focus so far. People will almost always blink on a fast head turn, and the same generally holds true for large eye-shifts, but not always. I'll talk more about blinks next time, this is getting crazy long! :)

As far as animating the eyes of a character that doesn't have flesh and skin (robots, etc), you really should strive to recreate as identifiable performance as possible, no matter what. The design of the character can never be an excuse for you. Sure, some designs will work better than others, but no matter what character you are given, try to find ways to use that character's design to create shapes, movements, and ideas that the audience will recognize and identify with.

For something like Transformers, a huge goal for us is to strategically animate pieces on the face that will best communicate and "read" to the audience, so if you are working with a robot, my advice would be to look for pieces that can work as brows, lids, pupils, iris, etc.

Shawn :)

What Separates the Good Animator from the Bad Animator?

2009-08-24T13:38:00.000-07:00

Of course, we don't like to use the term "bad" in reference to animators, though we can all point to badly animated shots. Animation is both a technical and an artistic endeavor, and there are plenty of opportunities to fail in both those areas. The technical stuff is more academic and is based on real physics, and is therefore more easily taught and learned.

I'm relatively confident that you can teach anyone to animate basic physics, assuming they have the will to learn and at least an average intelligence. More complex body mechanics will take a stronger, more analytical mind and good observational skills. Acting and design are much more subjective, and they form the great divide. The artistic side of animation is much harder to teach, because it can be hard to quantify. We know what we like, but how do we arrive there? Where does training end and talent begin? I don't think that everyone has the capacity to be a great animator. You can teach people about design principles, acting theory, storytelling conventions and staging, and they will improve to a degree, but there comes a point where a certain amount of natural ability is required. You have to have good acting instincts, you have to have a natural sense of timing, and you have to know how to entertain and audience.

I think "good" animators have an innate knack for performance and creating appealing poses and actions. A "bad" animator either hasn't learned enough to reach his or her potential yet, or just doesn't have that natural talent to rise above mediocrity.

Guest Blogger Victor Navone

Describe Your Workflow When You Start Animating a Shot. Is There a Right or Wrong Way?

2009-08-19T14:25:00.000-07:00

I think most people will tell you that as long as your shot looks good, there’s really no right or wrong way and I completely agree with that. We all want to do great work. For me, I have a very different workflow depending on what type of shot I’m animating. If I’m animating a realistic shot, I’ll work straight ahead but for a character animated show, I’ll work pose to pose.

In the world of realism, I find diving in is the best way to go. Block in some strong poses as quickly as possible and define the most important actions in the shot. You want to make sure you lead the audience’s eye to the focal points, otherwise the shot becomes unclear and muddy. So, for a shot on Spider-Man 2 where Spider-Man and Doc Ock are falling and fighting, I choreographed the shot so it revolved around three or four very specific events. I knew for instance that they were in the midst of a battle to the death and it had to be violent. But if I’m not careful, the punches and kicks could all get lost if I don’t highlight them with clear silhouettes. So step number one was make sure the big moments of the fight were clear. I animated a simple translation as they fell down the building and animated some very clean poses along the way. I made use of contrasting poses as much as possible. So a reverse C shape on Spider-Man rearing back for his punch, then a C curve for the strike. Those shapes were posed to camera to get the most impact.

I also knew the tentacles needed to be active. One would grab and miss the building while others would engage Spider-Man. Finally, one would latch onto the building for a violent slam into the façade. I made sure to layer these elements in between the major fight actions between the characters, otherwise we wouldn’t know where to look. This was one of the most challenging elements of the shot, but it was a great lesson in how to be efficient with the staging of the fight elements. Once these elements were layered in and working in a broad sense, then I would dive into my finessing pass. I would toggle the visibility of the characters and tentacles on or off depending on what I was animating. I did this so my eye would never get distracted. Once Spider-Man and Ock were working, then I’d turn those nasty tentacles back on one at a time. After many, many (many) versions, I’d hopefully have an exciting shot in the can.

Now, what about using video reference for realistic animation? Personally, I try not to use it if I’m animating human characters. Insanity you say? Perhaps. But I prefer to act out what I’m animating and feel what’s happening as opposed to trying to visually match my performance. If you have to animate a character throwing a ball, repeat the action several times and pay careful attention to what your body is doing. You don’t have to look at yourself on film to feel your body and chest leading the action with the arm lagging behind. Then when you sit down to animate, you can apply that knowledge in a much more meaningful way. You’ll understand the full impact of the body mechanics on all sides as opposed to just what you are looking at from the camera’s perspective. Give it a try sometime and if you really get stuck, you can always break out the camera and tripod for troubleshooting.

My workflow for character work is pretty much the opposite. I usually just do a whole bunch of thinking in the beginning. I’ll listen to the dialogue over and over again until some very clear acting choices emerge, then I’ll start locking down some poses. In the beginning, I prefer to go with as few poses as possible on my first pass because that gives me more flexibility to explore new ideas. As soon as I have some poses running with the audio track, my mind starts finding new approaches. I point this out because I don’t worry so much about ensuring the whole shot is thumbnailed or blocked out before I start. It’s a very organic workflow and not for everybody. At the very least, I don’t run into the issue of having too much going on. Sometimes an animator will put so much into that first pass it ends up being hard to assess. This way, my shot builds naturally and I layer the detail on in subsequent passes.

Another technique I make use of is to avoid lipsync and facial animation on my first full pass. The reason is simple. I want to focus 100% on the poses. Do they reflect his mood? Are they strong and clear? A sad face makes a character look sad, but can you achieve that without the face first? If my poses convey the emotions clearly without facial animation, then I know the addition of expressions will only serve to augment my work.

Finally, I will add most the texture and finer detail to the shot at the very end. I guess you can call this the business of the shot. The reason I add it later is because I like to make sure the guts of my shot are successful. If I throw in a bunch of detail early on in my shot while I’m still trying to figure out the broader mechanics, then it can sometimes make it more challenging to troubleshoot. Also, it’s possible that you can put too much business in a shot. Quantity does not always equal quality.

Guest Blogger Chris Williams