Class 9 03/22/2017

In today's class, I splined out head turn animation showing how to add life to the character.

SPLINING

-Moving holds- adding slight moves or drift to the character to keep him alive.  You can see it in the graph editor at the beginning of the animation.

Keith Lango has a great write up on moving holds.  I strongly encourage you to read it.  Apologies for the outdated website.


-Moving eyelids- keyframing the eyelids whenever the pupils moved.

-How to use eye blinking

Carlos Baena's website about animators using blinks.

My selected note from this post
"That is after we looked in one direction for a while and get "enough" information from that, we blink and change focus of interest. By analogy, sometimes we blink to separate one thought from another in a thought process." "When a thought process is finished" "This is what I thought was interesting. Someone here told me about a book (sorry - can't remember the title right now) where a film editor discussed how he edits his movies. Basically, he makes the cut where an actor blinks or when
the viewer naturally "feels" like it's time to blink. His whole theory is that our brain is viewing a film whenever we are awake and that our eyes are the editors, and the blinks are our eyes "cutting" the "scenes." This is why we blink when our though process changes or eye direction changes," "Other stuff I try to do is to actually anticipate eyeblinks over a frame or two. Not that is very noticeable, but when you have closeups I really think it makes a difference. When we dart our eyes, the pupil eases out...I also noticed that with blinks. The eyelid doesn't close in a constant way, we have slows in and out of the open/close move"
Example in Moana:

-Smear frame- I attempted a smear frame on the character when he jumped backwards.  His face stretched into the direction from which he was coming from.  The stretch lasted for 1 frame, and reset over the course of the second frame.  By the 3rd frame the stretch was gone.

examples of other smears from frameXframe:
http://framexframe.tumblr.com/post/158068690763/disneys-the-fox-and-the-hound
http://framexframe.tumblr.com/post/32803534310/don-bluths-anastasia

-Added some offset animation - to the head and shoulders at the end.  The head has a delayed bounced while the shoulder happen one from apart from each other, instead of at the same time.  Do these things to add some variety and asymmetry to the timing and movement.  It will keep your character feeling organic.


Here are some extra materials on Head turns and splining animation.  This animator is not using stepped keys, which is fine.  But many of the concepts she talks about are very good.

FINAL

I outlined what I would like to see in your final assignments.  I showed more examples of Animation planning, and some videos that will hopefully inspire your ideas.  You will have the rest of the semester to work on your final, with it being due on the last day of class.  Each week's assignment will be to work on various aspects of the animation process.

Animator Acting reference:
http://i.imgur.com/UWmcpFk.gifv
http://i.imgur.com/mK9ZmYP.gifv

Every Frame a Painting. 
These videos give some ideas and knowledge about how you can use the camera to enhance the actions you are trying to show.  Remember, you do not have to be as elaborate as some of the examples shown here.  I just would like you to see all the possibilities that are available within the frame of the camera.

Drive (2011) - The Quadrant System from Tony Zhou on Vimeo.
Wolf Children (2012) - The Lateral Tracking Shot from Tony Zhou on Vimeo.

Animator Progression reels:

The last two videos for Ratatoullie, and Monsters Inc, I want you to pay attention to.  These two videos show very well many of the steps I would like you to do for your final.

Another source of inspiration might be the Frame X Frame Tumblr.  Surf this website, and see if there are any animations or actions that interest you.

Mr. Buttons

I've shown this animation before in class, but I will be happy to link you to it again, since it is a nice clip that meets the requirements of the final project.

Blind Date Animation (right click, save as)

AnimSchool Student Reels have great examples of the type of short animations I am looking for.

HOMEWORK

1) Finish Head turn animations.  Splined!

2) Final Project Phase 1:

-Please come up with at least two animation ideas.  It could be anything from a lip synch animation like the 11 Second Club, to an action, like dancing or fight choreography.

-Sketch out thumbnails of how you would animate these ideas.  If you are not sure what thumbnail sketches are, here are some examples:

-Essentially, the idea is to sketch out the most important points of your story, or action.  Bring in these images and present your idea for class.

-Bring in any material that supports your animation idea.  It could be the audio, video, or animation reference.  Like I said you could surf FrameXFrame for ideas, or bring in a video of a dancer for reference.

-Remember to pick an idea that really engages you!  It will make it that much more fun to work on!