What’s the Most Difficult Aspect about the Animation Process?

That's actually a really hard thing to answer, because we each have our own strengths and weaknesses. What's hard for me may be easy for you, or vice versa, and sometimes that doesn't even have much to do with our different levels of experience. There are certain aspects of this art that you might always struggle a little harder with, and others that might come more naturally to you.

Judging from the vast majority of demo reels and animation clips I see, however, I would say that people struggle most with the body mechanics overall. I see a lot of clips that have interesting acting choices, or cool eye animation or whatever, but none of it matters because their weight and balance are all off, or the anticipations aren't there, or the hips aren't leading the actions, or the shoulders don't move, or the overlap and follow-through is wrong, or (most commonly) the arcs are a jumbled and confused mess with sharp angles on the paths of action of the limbs, etc.

Any or all of these (and many others, of course) can contribute to the body mechanics feeling wrong, and this is the main reason I tend to recommend that people avoid dialogue shots until they have really spent some time honing their physical skills, and have created a few really solid physical action tests for their demo reel. I recommend focusing on the "ing" for a while. Anything ending in "ing." Get some shots of kicking, throwing, punching, falling, dying, lifting, climbing, jumping, etc. "Speaking" is the only "ing" I would avoid for a while, until your other "ings" are rock-solid.

THEN, and only then, are you ready to dive into the giant quagmire that is "Speaking."

Thanks for writing in, I hope that was helpful!

Shawn :)

Animation Is a Never-ending Process, but What Are a Few Things Animators Are Expected to Know?

That's a great question!

You're definitely right that this is a never-ending journey of education. It encompasses darn near every conceivable aspect of life in one way or another, so there is just no way to "know everything" about animation.

However, there are certainly many things that any studio would expect an incoming animator to know. This would change a bit, depending on the level of animator they are hiring (they would certainly expect a much broader level of ability from an incoming Senior Animator than a new Junior Animator), but for the most part, they would be looking for different levels of experience within the same general skill set.

I would say that any animator looking for work should be expected to understand the infamous 12 principles of animation and how they apply to the medium that animator is working in. But that's only the beginning. In addition, the animators should be expected to understand how those principles all work together and interrelate. How they come together to explain and decipher "body mechanics" in general. How the concepts of internal and external "force" create momentum, and how those forces are more important to the creation of a dynamic pose than the actual body parts or "form" is.

Any professional animator should know how the body works. Period. What moves what, and WHY. Not just that the hips shift this way or the shoulders shift that way when you're lifting this or throwing that, but WHY those shifts and rotations are happening. This is key to being able to create these movements on your own, and understand how to fix your work when you get into a pinch and something just doesn't feel right.

Any junior animator should also have some understanding of acting, subtext, how to use blinks to create thought process and emotion, and how to communicate an idea through clarity, posing, and timing.

Finally, I think it's safe to assume that any studio looking for animators would expect them to be eager, easy to work with, and hungry to learn. For me, that's just as big a prerequisite as understanding arcs or overlapping action!

Hope that helps! I know that sounds like a lot of stuff to know, and in some ways I'm only just scratching the surface with the basics here, but as you say, learning animation IS a life-long journey, and you have to have a strong and solid and WIDE foundation of knowledge upon which to build.

For me, the stuff above is that basic foundation, and it's all essential stuff.

Thanks for visiting the blog!

Shawn :)

How Does an Animation Supervisor of a Big Studio like ILM, Pixar or Blue Sky Plan the Distribution of the Shots Done by the Animators?

How does an animation supervisor of a big studio like ILM, Pixar or Blue Sky plan the distribution of the shots done by the animators? By sequence, by shots, by continuity shots, by animator's abilities?

This probably depends a lot on the size of the studio, the size of the animation crew, and the diversity of experience levels on that crew. The smaller the studio, the less options available to the supervisor, and the more likely it is that the animators may be thought of as interchangeable artists.

However, you ask about the larger studios, and you're right that it's treated differently.

The larger studios have the luxury of a larger animation crew, probably with a somewhat diverse set of backgrounds and specialties. The process that you're asking about (handing out shots) is often referred to as "casting" at these types of studios, and that's exactly how many of these studios approach the process.

They often view the assignment of animation shots or characters as "casting" those animators in the role that they are most appropriate for. Someone who's shown great comedic timing in the past may be cast to work on a lot of shots that feature comedy relief, for example. Or someone who's shown that they have amazing body mechanics might get cast on a lot of fight scenes.

However, many other factors come into play with casting, and it's rarely as defined and simple as I laid out above. While the goal for any of these larger studios is to use their crew as efficiently as possible, many other factors are considered. Among these would be:

• What the animator is most passionate to work on

• What the schedule and budget allows or forces

• Scene difficulty level vs. animator skill level

• What the surrounding shots are

• Crunch time

These are all important factors, and in any good studio, all would play a role to some degree in the casting of shots.

Near the end of a project, though, crunch time and deadlines increasingly become the deciding factor in crewing a shot or sequence. The project has a deadline, and when it really gets into the final weeks or months of a project, the most important deciding factor in casting becomes availability. Who is free to work on this? If the Supervisor feels that their talent level is sufficient, and they are done with their other shots, they'll probably get thrown onto whatever shot is next in line, regardless of any of the other considerations.

This is totally normal. Many projects at many studios start out by casting long strings of sequential shots to one animator, but by the end, it's natural for the schedule to force a more scatter-shot approach in order to hit the looming deadline.


Shawn :)

Have You Ever Tried the Layered Approach with Something Where the Foot Placement Is a Little Less Flexible?

Have you ever tried the layered approach with something where the foot placement is a little less flexible? Like walking down stairs. Maybe it doesn't make any difference?

Generally, the foot placement in any scene is pretty well thought-out and planned in advance, but you're right that some scenes are more specific and others can certainly be more flexible.

However, the "hide the legs" layered approach isn't about just animating the upper body and then letting the feet fall wherever they may. You should pretty much know exactly where those feet are going to end up and exactly what your poses are going to look like. Where the layered approach helps more is with the TIMING of the feet rather than the position or posing. If the upper body feels correct in its timing, then that can help you know when to lift and plant the feet, but the actual posing of the legs should be something you've already planned out ahead of time.

Going downstairs is particularly exact, I suppose, but I think the layered "hide the legs" approach is something I would still likely use in a scene like that. I recently did a scene of a character climbing up something somewhat steep, and the foot placement was relatively inflexible, but the process seemed to work fine. It did require a little bit more back and forth than normal, though.

For something like going down a series of stairs, I would probably still hide the legs, animate the upper body going down the stairs until the timing felt correct, and then show and animate the legs. Most likely, I would have to readjust the upper body slightly here and there to accommodate the legs, so there would definitely be some back and forth, but overall I think it could still be useful, and certainly simplifies the blocking process.

And again, the "hide the legs" approach is something I would only recommend to those of you who have been animating for at least a few years already. You need the experience to be able to visualize ahead of time how the legs are going to be working, where the footfalls will likely be, etc.

Hope that helps!


Shawn :)

Do You Use the Same Workflow for Scenes that Are more Acting Focused vs. Scenes that Are more Action Oriented?

Do you use the same workflow for scenes that are more acting focused versus scenes that are more action oriented, or do you have a different process for each?

Fundamentally, yeah, the workflow is pretty similar because it all comes down to preparation. But in this case, I start by listening to the dialogue....over and over and over again. I look for anything that might give me a clue to the best way to approach the shot. I'll write down the dialogue and start marking where the beats are, the inflections, the pauses...any breaths, lip pops...anything that can add an additional layer to the character. This is also when I'll start some sketching and I'll rely more on my video reference initially to catch the subtleties that I wouldn't otherwise sketch out.

One thing that I've really come to enjoy is editing different pieces of video reference together to see how certain things in multiple takes play together. I'll shoot a minimum of 5-10 takes on any particular shot. There's always the possibility that more than one of those will have bits and pieces that I want to incorporate into the final piece. Looking over the video reference, I'll start to break down the actions, trying to find out what part of the body is the driving force behind the movement. More often then not it's the hips that are motivating the movement.

One of the things I do after I've gone in and done my blocking is to start splining out my hip controller. It helps me start to feel the timing and the weight. I also hide geometry that isn't needed on the character. There's a tool we have in-house that is a shortcut for "isolate selected" in Maya. If I'm focusing on the core of the character, I'll hide the arms and sometimes the legs so I can focus on the simple shapes of the torso, kinda reminds me of the flour sack animation tests. The thing I have to keep in mind when I'm "turning off" geometry is to make sure I keep in mind what those hidden parts are supposed to be doing. I have gotten to pre-occupied with what is on screen that when I show all of the character, things can feel somewhat unconnected. Once again, it all comes down to trying to have as clear an idea of what I want before I even start setting any keys in Maya.


Guest Blogger Matthew Russell

If You've Finished a Scene and Your Client Says They Don’t Like It, Do You Start Over?

One thing to remember is no matter what kind of work you're doing, you're doing it for a client. Be it your animation director or a company paying you for your freelance work. The first thing I do is find out "what" they don't like. If the client is an animation director or the film/show director they should be able to verbalize what it is they don't like.

Unfortunately, in a lot of freelance work the client may not know exactly what it is they don't like. Working with them to try and nail down a clear idea of what they don't like about the work can save a lot of time and effort on the back end. Sometimes it's can be a simple fix and sometimes it's not. If it's not, then you salvage what you can and go from there. Animators are artists but when someone else is footing the bill then we become "hired guns" and in the end that means doing what needs to be done to make the client happy.

Guest blogger Matthew Russell

Do You Have Ideas to Speed Up Your Work? How Do You Decide When to Sketch Things Out?

The one thing that is always key in my work flow is preparation...thumbnails, rough sketches, video reference. Taking the extra little bit of time to think through the shot or action needed saves tons of time on the back end when you're keying.

For me it's quicker to sketch out simple shapes to test silhouettes, line of action and reversals then trying to jump right in to the software. I don't use an exposure sheet but I do time out my actions so I have that written down along with my thumbnails. I go in and make notes on how I want the arcs to move in my transitions. Once I have this basic blue print I can go in and make a straight on pass. I try not to worry about editing myself until I'm done with this first pass and can take a look at it as a whole.

Guest Blogger Matthew Russell

How Fast Is a New Junior Animator Expected to Work?

How fast is a new junior animator expected to work? How much would he/she be expected to produce per week?

Junior animators do need to be given time like anyone regardless of experience to get used to a studios pipeline, procedures and rigs. But from a strict animation point of view, I'd say all animators speed are a more or less controlled by the supervisor or animation director. By that I mean they will kick off a shot (describe what needs to happen in the shot) with the animator.

After that the animator blocks the shot and submits for approval in dailies, this could then be approved or sent back for changes....sometimes the animator missed something or misinterpreted what was needed, other times the animation director sees that an idea didn't work as they thought so it just needs a change no fault of the animator at all. Then there are times an animator will do something, it gets approved by the animation director but turned around by the film director....so there are lots of things that can affect how fast a shot moves through the pipes.

After getting blocking approval from the film director, the focus shifts more onto the animators speed to finish a shot. Every day you attend a dailies session where the animation director, or animation supervisor will critique the work to a finer degree, timing, breakdowns, etc., as the animation moved from blocking to temp animation and on to final polished animation. The animators job is to address the fixes pointed out in these dailies sessions, generally if they are small tweaks that can be done by the end of the day depending on what time you have dailies.

Larger fixes can take a day or two... If you have a big change which would usually only happen if there is a direction change from the client or if you are working for a (client) film director who can't judge blocked animation but instead needs to see fully splined animation to make a judgement. It happens.... I've seen it many times.

Guest blogger David Breaux

What Is Your Favorite Part in the Whole Animation Process?

I don't know that I have one favorite part....it kinda all blends together for me.

If pressed though I'd have to say I enjoy the blocking of a shot as you get to work out your poses and experiment a bit but at a fast pace in sketches or sometimes on the rig itself.

Second, I like the polishing of a shot, where you get to add those little details and nuances that really bring something to life. Especially working on a lot of realistic characters as I do you could tweek and refine for days...or weeks... So sometimes its nice to do something more cartoony that is more stylized than realistic just to mix it up a bit.


Guest Blogger David Breaux

What Is Your Favorite Part of the Animation Process?

That's a hard one to answer. It may be easier if I start with my LEAST favorite part(s) of the process.

I really don't enjoy research and planning. This is a shame because generally I find that I do better work when I have researched and planned exhaustively. I find the process tedious, though, and I'd
much rather jump in and start animating! I liken it to broccoli: I
don't really enjoy the taste, but I know it's good for me and I'll be
glad I ate it when the meal is over. I'm sure you know the feeling.

Once my planning is done, I really enjoy blocking. Depending on what kind of scene and characters I'm working with, I block in different ways. If I'm doing an acting shot with humanoid characters, I'll probably block pose-to-pose with stepped keys. I like designing the poses and finding the best silhouette, as well as flipping between the poses to see how they flow together. I'm not worried about timing yet, just the sequence of ideas. I'm trying to hit the poses in my video reference or sketches with the 3D model, and adjusting as necessary to match the style of the film and the physiology of the character. If I'm going off video reference, then I'm probably pushing the poses further and simplifying them. If I'm going off of sketches, then I'm probably trying to push the 3D model to match the dynamic of the loose sketch. If I'm blocking in a layered fashion, such as with cars, fish, or robots, then I'm dropping keys on my root rotates and translates and pushing them around in the spline editor to find the timing and rhythm of the shot. Ideally I'm getting real-time playback from my models, and I enjoy fine-tuning the timing and arc patterns to suggest the attitudes and actions.

The other part of the animation process I don't really like is the transition from blocking with stepped poses into splines. Suddenly all my snappy timing looks like crap, and it almost feels like I'm starting over again. It takes so long to get the animation tied down to where the timing is right again. Luckily this doesn't last too long, and I have a pretty routine series of adjustments I can perform on the splines to get the shot in better shape. Mostly it involves adding more ease-in's to my holds, pushing my keys around to tighten or loosen timing, and adding in a few more breakdowns as needed. I don't start offsetting keys in time until later in my process, and I keep all my controls keyed on every pose.

After I've done my first pass on the splines, that's where the fun begins for me. I can put on some music and start massaging all my actions. I focus sweetening the timing by adding contrast, simplifying actions that are too complicated, adding little details that weren't in the blocking, and sculpting my arcs and spacing. This can be a very technical and procedural process, but I find it puts me in kind of a zen state, and the time just flies by.

Once I get to the final polish stage, I start to enjoy the process less again. Maybe it's because I'm getting tired of the shot and can't see it objectively anymore. Maybe it's because I'm ready to move on. Or maybe I just don't feel like overlapping any more pinkies! It's not such a problem on short shots, but lately on Toy Story 3 I've been getting whoppers – full-body human acting shots of 300 frames or more. These can really test my stamina, but I've enjoyed the challenge and can't wait to see them lit and rendered!

Guest Blogger Victor Navone