After working through the previous 2 books and using the tips offered by the author (the fundamentals of animation) I went back to the library and searched for books about animation guidelines, animation help and how to animate. One book popped up on all 3 searches that I figured was worth a read. "Timing for Animation" was a reprint of a 1981 book of the same name by Harold Whitaker.
Inside the book the readers are shown illustrations of animation cycles with important frames numbered as a guide for the aspiring animator on where they should mark movements. It also has a small section devoted to storyboards that helped me to decide how in depth I wanted to go into the pitches storyboard segments.
The author mentions that, "The important point is to convey an idea of the flow of the narrative and to explore the visual possibilities for additions of drama or humor." This description gave me a clearer idea of what was expected to be in the storyboards for the pitch but also what I wanted to put into the storyboards later when it came to full pre-production.
Another useful section of how storyboards can be used was where the author described that, "Live action film makers from Cecil B De Mille to Steven Spielberg, have relied upon storyboards to anticipate potential problems and grasp the impending production issues of a film." Again, this extract was useful for me as it showed the functional sides of storyboards and how they are necessary to pre-production.
One chapter that was almost perfect for my piece was heavily focused on emotional response and displaying emotion on a character with animation. The author goes on again to say that, "Human reactions and human actions must me exaggerated, Sometimes simplified and distorted in order to achieve a dramatic or comic effect in cartoon." Although this particular extract was referring to 2D animation I felt that it caught what I wanted to show on the robot and in the scene.
A final quote that i found extremely useful in the planning of my piece as well as inspiring was in the emotion section described by the author as, "the moods of depression, dejection, sorrow, etc. depend on slow timing for their effect, whilst the moods of elation, joy, triumph and so on depend on quicker timing. Other moods such as wonder, puzzlement and suspicion may depend on facial expressions and body posture." The quote was the closest to my idea that I could find in writing and was surprised when i first found it in a published article. I also loved how it described the emotions as a tempo which is one of the main sections I was hoping to include.
The book also had numerous examples of emotions that i decided to use as reference.
Next blog, SOUND!
Bibliography
- Whitaker, Harold. Timing for Animation. London: Focal, 2009. Print.
After some feedback on my original robot design I noticed that although it was as simple as i had originally planned it to be, It was going to take alot more than what i had designed to make it work and would take lots more research to get the job done.
So after speaking to my tutor about this he recommended "The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation" to further look at how Disney develop characters and also to show the research I am undertaking with model sheets.
Before changing the design of the robot I first looked at the Disney book and what they go through to create characters with real emotions as well as the techniques they use to create the link between animation and emotion.
The opening section of character development contains a quote from Walt Disney that I found useful as it gave me more of an idea of what i should be doing rather than what i had done with the character design. Walt mentions that, "I think you have to know these fellows definitely before you can draw them. When you start to caricature a person, you can't do it without knowing the person." this was helpful to me as instead of designing my robot to show emotion I went for a simple design so that modelling would not take an excess of priority or time.
Another quote from the character development chapter relates to Dopey from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and how he was changed from his original sketch. Walt said that, "Dopey isn't cute looking in these drawings. His body should be longer and his legs shorter. You should have the feeling about him that he is wearing somebody's cast-off coat, not as though he wore a big gown or something." and that "When anything happens, Dopey runs as fast as he can and gets ahead of the other dwarfs". Both of these appealed to me as i wanted the new design of the robots body to be a gentle giant approach. He would look more fierce than he is but when he hears a track he changes to the music and gives in to his new found emotions.
I also had a look into another book called "The Fundamentals of Animation". Essentially the book is a report on different types of animation and shows examples of how they have been used and gives a small description on each. A particular chapter that i found interesting and useful was a small section called "The Animator as Performer" which shows examples of how animators have used humans as a basis for characters in films. One of the focus areas was the popular antagonist from the Lord of the Rings franchise "Gollum" who was created with a "combination of a motion captured performance by Andy Serkis, and an extraordinarily nuanced use of computer-generated animation." The chapter also has a top ten tips to make your characters act which are:
- Thinking tends to lead to conclusions; emotion tends to lead to action.
- Your audience only empathises with emotion, not with thinking.
- It is good for your character to have an obstacle of some kind.
- A gesture does not necessarily have to illustrate the spoken word. Sometimes a gesture can speak of a different inner truth (study Gollum in The Lord of the Rings).
- Animate the character's thoughts. All of them. The more specific the thoughts are the better it will be. (Look at The Iron Giant scene in which the giant eats the car in the junkyard. You will count something like 13 different thoughts in a 12-second tune frame.)
- A character plays an action until something happens to make him play a different action. In other words, there should never be a moment when your character is doing nothing.
- Definition of acting: Playing an action in pursuit of an objective while overcoming an obstacle.
- Scenes begin in the middle, not at the beginning. You want to enter a scene as late as possible.
- Dumb people and dumb characters do not think they are dumb. They think they are smart.
- Don't start animating until you have your story set. Storyboard everything first. If a sequence lacks conflict or negotiation, try to fix it before starting the animation.
These rules were very helpful when it came to thinking through the schedule of my milestones and checkpoints. Tip 10 was my main focus as it showed how important the storyboards were towards the planning side of the production as well as highlighting when animation should begin. It also allows me to design the environments before modelling so i can get a better scope of what the robot will be experiencing.
So overall, Both books helped in similar ways though the Disney one was more useful in facial emotion and body language. For my next blog I am going to review a book devoted to the timing of animations with tips on the best ways to display emotions.
Till then!
Bibliography
- Thomas, Frank, Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas. The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation. New York: Hyperion, 1995. Print.
- Wells, Paul. The Fundamentals of Animation. Lausanne: AVA, 2006. Print.
So this is a rough guide of how the robot design came to be and how i came up with the look.
The first step was to find the correct human proportions to base the robots body on. I decided to use this book (mentioned in previous post) as it has a wide variety of medically accurate pictures that i could base my robot on.
I decided to use this picture in the end to base my robot on as (I have mentioned repeatedly) the proportions of a male human was my main point. After looking at it and working out where the center of gravity was i created a version to base the robot on.
To create a more brute look to the robot I made the chest wider and longer as well as shortening the legs to make the robot appear more stocky.
I also made the arms longer to give a feel of bio mechanical extension that a robot would have.
This is the final sketch that I plan on basing the 3D model off. Its simplicity means that the model will be low poly and easy to create. It also means i can spend more time focusing on creating the area and animation rather than spending all my time working on the model.
Ok then small change, the animation comparison will be done tomorrow and this post will be a pure biblio and review of the latest book that i have used.
My latest read was "Musculoskeletal Anatomy. A text guide for Dissection for students in the allied health sciences." I chose this book as it has great quality images of the human anatomy and the correct proportions and bone structure that goes into each person.
This was essential as (I have previously mentioned) that I wanted to build the robot using the human bone structure as a basis. The page that i found most helpful was the simple proportion guide for male and female.
Another reason I chose to use this book was that I wanted to show that I had researched all materials necessary rather than using Google images for proportions like I had done in previous years.
Bibliography
- Colborn, Gene L. and David B. Lause. Musculoskeletal Anatomy: A text and guide for Dissection: For students in the Allied Health Sciences. Pearl River, NY: Parthenon Pub. Group, 1993. Print.
I thought today would be a fine day to do a stream of blogs, This one is explaining my idea and what i hope to achieve from it, The next one will show some storyboard ideas and character designs and my final blog for today will be a comparison of different animation types and a small comparison of different animators and how they portray emotions.
Now for my idea, As i mentioned in my previous post the idea is generally a test for me to show emotion with animation as its something i've rarely touched upon but know that it would be needed in a industry job after speaking to a member of Jagex at the recent brains eden event. The emotion will be shown on a robot that will be designed using a human skeleton reference with alterations to add a level of surrealism.
The main story is that a robot has woken up from a long storage in a apocalyptic world. Because it has never been exposed to anything outside of its factory the main emotion i want to show is fascination with everything it finds.
After a brief walk it finds a CD which it scans and plays, When the music comes on it changes its walking and body posture to match the music playing. I'm aiming to show Happiness, Depression, Fear and Excitement with different music tracks and movements.
The animation will be made in 3Ds max and edited in a Sony Vegas as it is the most suited to add in the relevant effects needed for each emotion and editing.
Well thats all for now, Coming next update.... a currently un named robot with a bibliography entry :D
Well I suppose I cant keep it secret anymore on what this project will be about.
I have decided to create a short animated piece designed around a robot that changes its mood depending on what music it plays. The reason I chose this idea for my dissertation was to challenge myself to show emotions with animation and make and rig a complete model. I also felt that it would be a great piece for me to put in my portfolio to show my skills in animation.
To get a better feel of emotion and how it changes the way people move their body I decided to rent "The Book of Tells: How to read people's minds from their actions" by Peter Collett who is an expert on body language and sub-concious body language.
The book helped me to understand why people move in certain ways and how an individual's body language can represent an emotion or action. It also showed me the difference between controlled actions and indirect actions that I want to incorporate into the robot. For example in a section of the book describing Prince Charles the author mentions that, "he characteristically draws his hand across his body and reaches for the opposite cuff. This is Charle's cuff-link fiddle - he resorts to it whenever he's on display and in transition."
The way the author goes onto describe the emotions as if they were mechanical actions and traditional made them seem ideal for my project as I want to show the complexity of the robot.
Bibliography
- Collett, Peter. The Book of Tells: How to Read People's Minds from Their Actions. London: Bantam, 2004. Print.
Bi
This blog will detail the process and steps taken to complete my dissertation.
Feel free to give me any feedback as it goes and make sure to follow if you are interested.
Thanks!
