I was unable to attend the Friday, so I did the first half of the day work at home which was the research of the 12 principles of animation and the animator research.
- Squash and Stretch – helps it come to life by showing the weight of it by gravity and the effects it would have on an item (flexibility) and example of this is when something hits the ground from a height it stretches as it falls, when it hits the surface compresses and then it stretches back up again. Tip to show this when stretches gets thinner and when compresses get thicker shows constantly.
- Anticipation – we as the viewer understand want should happen next like moving closer to the edge you will tilt off and fall. This is about making it realistic without falling actions through it makes it very lifeless.
- Staging – is making sure the focus is correct (composition), you use movement to draw attention to what’s important. Tips make the movement on everything else less than on what’s important which should have the most or more exaggerated movement.
- Straight Ahead and Pose to Pose – this is making two different poses fluidly move from one to another by drawing lots of frames to make it seamless that’s straight ahead. Pose to pose is drawing the beginning, some in the middle and the end frame then you go back to make it smoother this gives you a lot more control and increases dramatic effect.
- Follow Through and Overlapping Action – this is when there is dramatic motion and the nature lead through of a person walking the arms swinging as well after the step, it’s all about making it look as natural as possible and as seamless.
- Slow In and Slow Out – this is about momentum gaining speeding so moving quicker. If a car was starting and moving it takes time to speed up but when it’s going to come to a stop it will need to lose speed so this would mean more frames in the end and beginning to show it slower.
- Arcs – (laws of physics) when something is moving it will most likely be in an arc like when a ball is thrown through the air it will be moved in an arc.
- Secondary action – used to help the main action look better like someone walking with a bag the bag also swinging when walking.
- Timing – making sure everything is realistic with having correct timings like throwing a ball, it can’t be across the room in no time or take 2 minutes as it would be very unrealistic so timing has to be correct.
- Exaggeration – has to be the correct balance too much can make it very false but too little makes it boring to view. But exaggeration can add a lot to your animation and help it come to life and be eye catching.
- Solid Drawing – making sure the drawing is accurate, especially 3D with the way light works, its a cube was there and a firework went off beside the sparks bounce of the cube only on certain sides.
- Appeal – making it easy to follow, not overly complex make it easy to read, welcoming and engaging with a good character development.
Brenda Chapman – Director and Animator of Brave, Come Away and The Prince of Egypt. She won a BAFTA and Academy Award for Brave in 2013. She graduated with a BFA in character animation and worked for a while as a storyboard artist eventually going on to become the first female animation director. She went on to work on tons of movies, her biggest achievement being Brave as she was a writer and director of this famous and very successful movie.