Squash and Stretch
One of the most important principles, it's purpose is to give a sense of weight and flexibly to an animated object. Much like a bouncing ball, it'll require and squash when gravity pulls down and a stretch for the force of the squash to make a bounce which shows it's flexibly. without the squash and stretch the object will appear solid like a bowling ball.
This is used to prepare viewers of an certain action that will take place within the animation. An example of this is a jump, if someone is to jump they need to bend their knee's and and show expression of power needed for the jump, without it, the audience is unaware of what is about to happen.
This is to simply show/highlight what the most important aspect of the scene you want your audience to focus on etc. This can be done in many ways through shadowing, framing or even the use of the camera.
Straight ahead action is what the editing of the animation takes places as you go through the actions in the animation, it flows to the beginning to the end, this creates a nice flow and everything appears to be spontaneous within the animation. Pose to pose an animated will set up key frames through out the scene in which they are creating. After this is done a middle frame is added in to help connect the animated poses making the animation perfect and well animated and consistent.
Follow through and overlapping action
Slow in and slow out
Arcs
Secondary action
This is when a character starts running not all of there aspects move at the same time, it needs a drag effect to help all aspect move to show a dragging effect, it's also perfect for a stopping or slowing down process within an animation. Example if someone starts running their hair will flow back as the wind flows through them, and their arms will swing more, when they stop running their arms will swing forward from the force of the stop, including same for clothing and hair. This shows a more natural and realistic approach, without it the character or object will just suddenly stop with no drag behind it.
These actions are often used to soften the animations. An animation of a man swinging a sword is a good example, the preparation for the swing of the sword will be at first slow as he prepares to swing, he speeds up because of the force driven behind the swing and then slows down as the swings comes to an end because or the muscles in the character to stop the sword and the force driven behind the sword slows down. Fewer drawings make the action faster and more drawings make the action slower. These are better used for shock scene and surprise effects, or even comic effect.
Arcs are used for natural movement, without arcs animation would just simply follow a straight line, making it look unnatural, by using an Arc a turn of a head, swing of a an arm, turn of a body can follow an Arc, making the movement natural and convincing. The arc is usually in a U shape.
These are extra animated features to help bring the scene to life, e.g. someone running with have their arms swinging, their hair will be bobbing and the clothing such as pockets with be moving along with the force of the animation, adding in these details to an animation really helps bring that natural convincing feel.
Timing is everything, if you want to create strong emotions in an animated character then timing will be needed. With the number used it can make a fast animation or a slow animation creating wonderful effect if used correctly. Timing can be translated into different emotions, such as moods, reactions, and even personality, for example a simple wave, if they are waving fast it appears to be a happy wave, speed it up it's a silly cartoony wave, slow it down it then appears to be an unhappy wave.
Probably one of the most useful aspects to use in an animation, being able to exaggerate your actions within your animations is the best way to make your animation more appealing and entertaining. exaggeration are done by fast speed, jumps, explosion, body language and facial expression etc, this all helps step away from that normal and realistic animation effect, helping your animation become watchable and enjoyable.
Solid drawing
This helps give the illusion of depth and solidity within your animation, to achieve this you need to be able to draw you animation with perspective and good balance, this helps bring out your animation without making it look flat, by using perspective a view can tell how big and wide the character or object is.
Appeal within a character can helps show they're personality and. This doesn't mean only the main character focus, this is everything and everyone as you need to make the viewer feel that the character is real and interesting. Examples making a likable character can be done by a simple baby-like face which tends to be effective. Characters with a hard to read face will lack appeal, like the joker from batman dark knight, but by using a captivating in the composition of the poses, or the character design the character can regain that appeal to the viewers.
Outcome: Understanding the 12 rules of animation is important to take into note when planning or creating an animation. These rules are there to follow and assistant me when animating to create the best type of character realism and animation within my work, depending on the style of animation I'm going for. e.g. cartoon comical or a realistic movement and animation scene.
No comments:
Post a Comment