THE 12 BASIC
PRINCIPLES OF ANIMATION Paraphrased below from the
"Illusion Of Life" by Frank Thomas & Ollie Johnston.(pp.47-69)
Look these up and read the original version for a more complete understanding. (I have rearranged the sequence of the principles to reflect the order with wich we deal with them in class).
Definitions borrowed from the Center for Animation and interactive media and the Illusion of Life:
Animations by Vincenzo Lodigiani
Definitions borrowed from the Center for Animation and interactive media and the Illusion of Life:
Animations by Vincenzo Lodigiani
12. Follow Through and Overlapping Action
PRINCIPLE 1. SOLID DRAWING:
Draftsmanship-Your ability to turn a form in space.
PRINCIPLE 1. SOLID DRAWING:
Draftsmanship-Your ability to turn a form in space.
The basic principles of drawing form, weight,
volume solidity and the illusion of three dimension apply to animation as it
does to academic drawing. The way you draw cartoons, you draw in the classical
sense, using pencil sketches and drawings for reproduction of life. You
transform these into color and movement giving the characters the illusion of
three-and four-dimensional life. Three dimensional is movement in space. The
fourth dimension is movement in time.
A live performer has charisma. An animated
character has appeal. Appealing animation does not mean just being cute and
cuddly. All characters have to have appeal whether they are heroic, villainous,
comic or cute. Appeal, as you will use it, includes an easy to read design,
clear drawing, and personality development that will capture and involve the
audience¹s interest. Early cartoons were basically
a series of gags strung together on a main theme. Over the years, the artists
have learned that to produce a feature there was a need for story continuity,
character development and a higher quality of artwork throughout the entire
production. Like all forms of story telling, the feature has to appeal to the
mind as well as to the eye.
Exaggeration is not extreme distortion of a
drawing or extremely broad, violent action all the time. It¹s like a caricature of facial features,
expressions, poses, attitudes and actions. Action traced from live action film
can be accurate, but stiff and mechanical. In feature animation, a character
must move more broadly to look natural. The same is true of facial expressions,
but the action should not be as broad as in a short cartoon style.
A pose or action should clearly communicate to
the audience the attitude, mood, reaction or idea of the character as it
relates to the story and continuity of the story line. The effective use of
long, medium, or close up shots, as well as camera angles also helps in telling
the story. There is a limited amount of time in a film, so each sequence, scene
and frame of film must relate to the overall story. Do not confuse the audience
with too many actions at once. Use one action clearly stated to get the idea
across, unless you are animating a scene that is to depict clutter and
confusion. Staging directs the audience's attention to the story or idea being
told. Care must be taken in background design so it isn't obscuring the animation
or competing with it due to excess detail behind the animation. Background and
animation should work together as a pictorial unit in a scene.
This movement prepares the audience for a major
action the character is about to perform, such as, starting to run, jump or
change expression. A dancer does not just leap off the floor. A backwards
motion occurs before the forward action is executed. The backward motion is the
anticipation. A comic effect can be done by not using anticipation after a
series of gags that used anticipation. Almost all real action has major or
minor anticipation such as a pitcher's wind-up or a golfers' back swing.
Feature animation is often less broad than short animation unless a scene
requires it to develop a characters personality.
This action adds to and enriches the main action
and adds more dimension to the character animation, supplementing and/or
re-enforcing the main action. Example: A character is angrily walking toward
another character. The walk is forceful, aggressive, and forward leaning. The
leg action is just short of a stomping walk. The secondary action is a few
strong gestures of the arms working with the walk. Also, the possibility of
dialogue being delivered at the same time with tilts and turns of the head to
accentuate the walk and dialogue, but not so much as to distract from the walk
action. All of these actions should work together in support of one another.
Think of the walk as the primary action and arm swings, head bounce and all
other actions of the body as secondary or supporting action.
This action gives the illusion of weight and
volume to a character as it moves. Also squash and stretch is useful in
animating dialogue and doing facial expressions. How extreme the use of squash
and stretch is, depends on what is required in animating the scene. Usually
it's broader in a short style of picture and subtler in a feature. It is used
in all forms of character animation from a bouncing ball to the body weight of
a person walking. This is the most important element you will be required to
master and will be used often.
Straight ahead animation starts at the first
drawing and works drawing to drawing to the end of a scene. You can lose size,
volume, and proportions with this method, but it does have spontaneity and
freshness. Fast, wild action scenes are done this way. Pose to Pose is more
planned out and charted with key drawings done at intervals throughout the
scene. Size, volumes, and proportions are controlled better this way, as is the
action. The lead animator will turn charting and keys over to his assistant. An
assistant can be better used with this method so that the animator doesn't have
to draw every drawing in a scene. An animator can do more scenes this way and
concentrate on the planning of the animation. Many scenes use a bit of both
methods of animation.
All actions, with few exceptions (such as the animation
of a mechanical device), follow an arc or slightly circular path. This is
especially true of the human figure and the action of animals. Arcs give
animation a more natural action and better flow. Think of natural movements in
the terms of a pendulum swinging. All arm movement, head turns and even eye
movements are executed on an arcs.
Expertise in timing comes best with experience
and personal experimentation, using the trial and error method in refining
technique. The basics are: more drawings between poses slow and smooth the
action. Fewer drawings make the action faster and crisper. A variety of slow
and fast timing within a scene adds texture and interest to the movement. Most
animation is done on twos (one drawing photographed on two frames of film) or
on ones (one drawing photographed on each frame of film). Twos are used most of
the time, and ones are used during camera moves such as trucks, pans and
occasionally for subtle and quick dialogue animation. Also, there is timing in
the acting of a character to establish mood, emotion, and reaction to another
character or to a situation. Studying movement of actors and performers on
stage and in films is useful when animating human or animal characters. This
frame by frame examination of film footage will aid you in understanding timing
for animation. This is a great way to learn from the others.
As action starts, we have more drawings near the
starting pose, one or two in the middle, and more drawings near the next pose.
Fewer drawings make the action faster and more drawings make the action slower.
Slow-ins and slow-outs soften the action, making it more life-like. For a gag
action, we may omit some slow-out or slow-ins for shock appeal or the surprise
element. This will give more snap to the scene.
PRINCIPLE 12. FOLLOW THROUGH AND OVERLAPPINGACTION:
Exaggerating the physics of matter catching up with the main body of action.
Exaggerating the physics of matter catching up with the main body of action.
When the main body of the character stops all
other parts continue to catch up to the main mass of the character, such as
arms, long hair, clothing, coat tails or a dress, floppy ears or a long tail
(these follow the path of action). Nothing stops all at once. This is follow
through. Overlapping action is when the character changes direction while his
clothes or hair continues forward. The character is going in a new direction,
to be followed, a number of frames later, by his clothes in the new direction.
"DRAG," in animation, for example, would be when Goofy starts to run,
but his head, ears, upper body, and clothes do not keep up with his legs. In
features, this type of action is done more subtly. Example: When Snow White
starts to dance, her dress does not begin to move with her immediately but
catches up a few frames later. Long hair and animal tail will also be handled
in the same manner. Timing becomes critical to the effectiveness of drag and
the overlapping action.
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