Week 3: Character Animation

Breakdown of Work-space:
I thought that it would be a good idea to explain my workflow and the program that I am using for those unfamiliar with the program, below is a series of annotated screenshots that label how I created the animation.

The layout of the program is in a way a merge of both Photoshop and Toon Boom, two programs that I often use. In addition, the programs allow for files to be saved in both PSD, Toonboom and CSP files, allowing for cross-platform work.

I wanted to begin my animation with some of the harder animation sequences. I began with the roll sequence. Starting with the Key frames produced in semester 1, I used these as a basis for the animation and drew the in-between's at 12 fps. The roll in total took around 19 frames to complete. 

To help me be accurate in the in betweens, I utilised the programs Onion Layer tool. Most industry tools have this function, so I made sure to utilise it to my advantage when creating all of this animation, the only area that it won't really be useful is when colouring, but it would not really need to be used during this.

The completed and coloured animation. I changed the timings from the Animatic. It was originally going to take 24 frames (2 seconds), however when working on the final product, having these additional frames made the roll seem clunky and as if it was in slow motion, so they were removed to make the flow better.

I moved from the roll to the next part of the animation, chronologically. This part of the animation involved various lighting effects and moving camera angles, all that I would need to animate. To begin with, the animatic key frames were polished and neatened up. I needed to ensure the key frames of this part of the animation had a good line of action and sense of motion, to make the animation look as dynamic as possible, so some of the frames were redrawn in their entirety. For the lightning effects, I changed them from an orange to a purple colour, as the purple would better contrast her green hair, and also the antagonist's powers. Them being complementary should really help drive home the differences between the two characters.

I felt that perhaps the distance she was running like a little short, and this part of the animation was rather short. To combat this, I spliced in the running cycle I did during pre-production, as well as adding a few additional frames so it would flow better with the rest of the animation surrounding it. I feel that this helps give the action in the scene a little time to breathe. 

Once I had finished on the in-betweens, it was time to colour and do the in-betweens for the lightning effects.

Various WIP gifs.

Final Clip and Timeline

As the animation neared its completion, I added additional effects to give the piece more visual interest. I worked with multiple layers, allowing me to do non-destructive editing. The total length of this part of the animation was 72 frames.  

I didn't need to watch tutorials when creating this animation, I rather chose to use my understanding of the principles of animation, and studied real life, to hopefully to get a more realistically moving character and lighting effects. 

One of the most challenging aspects of creating this part of the animation was getting the character to move in a believable way to and from the character. 

I do plan to add shading to the animation, as well as composite backgrounds, but it is better to follow industry practices and, complete the character animations, before compositing in backgrounds. I also need to research on how to use layer types in the Clip studio animation suite, to allow me to shade non- destructively.