TECHNIQUES

THE KEY FRAME.

Key frames are used at either side of a action, at the start and end. For example if a little boy was to swing a bat a key frame would be the first frame of the boy beginning to swing the bat, one as the bat connects with the ball, as this begins the action of the ball changing course, and one of the bat coming to a stop. Key frames are normally of a higher quality than in other frames.

THE OTHER FRAMES - THE INBETWEEN

An inbetween is a frame that comes between the key frame. Although more time is spent on the key frame, the inbetween plays a bigger role in holding the animation together. Without the inbetween frames the timing for the whole animation would be wrong and the whole look of the piece would be weak. Inbetween frames are drawn at varied spacing this is how the animations timing either increases or decreases

SQUASH AND STRETCH

The principals of squash and stretch can be applied to everything in animation from walk cycles, to bouncing balls. Squash and stretch indicated the weight of object is its heavy its going to compress more as it hit’s the ground than something that’s light with little weight to it. Squash and stretch also hints to the viewer what material the objects made from.
often in animation squash and stretch of over exaggerated for impact, comedy or to make the animation look real, in Disney’s case hyper realistic

DIGITAL VS PEN MY THOUGHTS

Personally I have struggled to convert to drawing things digitally, I’m so used to working on paper.
I find that it takes me two or three times longer to produce work digitally than it would for me to draw. There is obvious differences in the how work looks and I’m not sure I have a preference, each method of working has its own charm. However Rhubarb and Custard for example should have been left alone, recently a new computer version has been on television. The animators have tried to recreate the colour variations that were caused by felt tip pen and not being able to maintain exact colour, unfortunately it looks like they haven’t achieved the same charm that the hand drawn version had. I think this example illustrates that pen and ink still have a place in animation.

flip boom wee review

Wee review of Flip Boom

A few days ago I downloaded the trial version of Flip Boom, its almost like a over simplified version Toon Boom. Its very user friendly, its has large bright buttons for its various functions, which make it easy to navigate around the program. Some of its features are onion skin, draw behind, erase, paint, brush. There is a strip along the bottom for frames, it has a preview of the image on each frame, this adds to the clarity of the program.
The program is all about being user friendly, it’s a great piece of software for kids or just to mess around and have fun with. Obviously it lacks the full range of features that its big brother Toon Boom has like lip-sync, and being able to add sound.