Tips on Smooth Key Framing in Animation

The concept of key framing is one that has evolved with the animated medium. Historically, animation was created as frames in sequential order, (a throw back to film), but traditional animators began to explore ways in which to break down the execution of a shot into a system more agreeable to creating performance. Thus, the idea of using single frames to denote important parts of a scene quickly become the most elegant way of planning and staging.

Should a character go from happy to sad within the course of a shot, then it is possible to create just two drawings that may then describe this complex change of emotion fairly simply, absolutely spiffy for an initial stage of production. The great thing about working in modern computer animation is that this process is applicable to our digital puppets, so that we may benefit from all the the advances in animated acting and planning that have been done by our traditional peers. So for the sake of this little rambling discussion of mine, let's take key framing to be the significant poses/attitudes that define a shot, rather than the software definition of a value of a variable at at one frame in time. (It's a bit confusing, but to the computer, every knot on a curve is a key frame, but we're way more creative that that.)

Key framing has many advantages over the straight ahead, layered approach. What are they, I hear you ask? Well, I'm about to tell you!

As was mentioned above, key framing allows us to plan our work in broad strokes. We can consider the emotive or physical beats within a shot and define them, either by quickly thumbnailing/reference or at the computer/drawing table. If we can create strong, effective key poses, then they should be able to accurately communicate to an audience just what the shot will eventually feel like when it's complete.

Another advantage, and this is huge for professional animation, is that with only a couple of keys it is possible to begin a dialogue with peers or creative superiors. Working to deadlines means that it is imperative that ideas be conveyed quickly and clearly in order to get feedback, so that the shot can progress. The layered approach suffers here, as it is impossible for a director to judge the success of the animator's vision if, (for example), they've only completed some beautifully moving hips and legs, leaving the arms and face for later. Also, should we head off in the wrong direction, it is really easy to go back and rework key poses to be more in line with creative direction. Everybody wins!

The second question in the heading there is a bit of a technical consideration, I think. While it's important to the final polish of a shot, within the context of this discussion I believe the question should be more about good key framing rather than smooth.

Good keyframing comes from the ability to analyse the intent of the shot and distil it to its essence. This could be a subtle gesture or a big, broad action, the process is the same. Once we have this essence we may explore it to come up with suggestions as to how we may convey the intent of the shot in as appealing and simple a way as possible through our poses.

Getting in character, be it by acting or looking at reference or doodling on a scrap of paper is central to finding these keys. This is because empathy brings results! I find that I usually have an abundance of ideas simply by attempting to go through the same experiences to those of the character I am trying to portray.

So now we've learned a little about what key frames are, and how to find the tricksy little scamps. By empathizing with our characters and mimicking their thought process, we can stumble across cool animation choices that would otherwise be hidden to us. Questioning these choices can then help us whittle them down to the best key poses we can add into a scene to most clearly convey our intent to our audience.

It's an exciting and creative time during the creation of an animated piece of work, this 'ere keyframe selection process. Let's go and find some!


Guest blogger Kevan Shorey

By: Unknown On 12.12

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What Makes an Acting Shot Shine?

In many ways, this is quite a subjective question we've got here, for the success of a character is the result of a subtle relationship between the performance and its audience. What choices an animator makes helps to inform and develop that relationship, leaving the audience with a good handle on the personality we wish to portray. It's quite cool, really!

Since it is subjective, I can only talk about what works for myself, sitting in the audience, (probably eating something unhealthy), but maybe this will provide an some insight into what we can all work on to better connect with the me's out there.

For myself, the most important part of an acting shot is that the character stays true to itself. Every important acting decision made should be followed by the question, "Would the character do this?". This is a great way to self-evaluate and begin to dive deeper into the nuances of the character. Just this one simple question will allow the formulation of new ideas that would otherwise remain undiscovered, particularly if the pressure is on to jump into producing footage. When acting out a scene in character, a skilled performer is able to live inside this question and be spontaneous and it is this that makes the performance compelling to watch. Going out of character is a quick way to losing your audience, which is not what we want at all!

This brings us on to being interesting. Our ultimate goal is to engage the audience and provoke an emotional response from them. By exploring the performance we can come up with a bunch in different in-character ideas and then pick the ones that work best. Sometimes It could be a small detail such as the way a finger moves through a gesture, or maybe a broader, more goofy comic choice. Either way, we've just come up with something no one else have thought of, and which has just given depth to the character, making it seem more real! Well done, us!

Now we come to the animation stuff. The technical bits and bobs that go with making our scenes work. By this I mean the application of the principles of animation, composition, staging and so on. Watching beautiful, fluid animation can of course be spine-tingling, but see how it's lower on my list? Admittedly it's a three part list of all important stuff, but you know what I mean. You can have the most technically brilliant animation in the world, but if the performance is flat or out of character, then you have missed your chance at adding to the illusion of an independent entity. It's probably also true, to some extent, that people will forgive some minor technical imperfections if the acting is right on the money. Polish is nothing without substance, but there is no reason why we can't have both, so let's do that!

Ultimately an acting shot shines for the depth of character exemplified within it. Our goal is to provide the sense of a living, breathing universe that exists not only within the viewing frustum, but in its own little reality.

If we've got all this stuff going on in your acting shots, then we've certainly got the viewer's attention. I think our hero's going to be just fine in there. :)

Guest blogger Kevan Shorey

By: Unknown On 14.55

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How Do Animators Use Contrast?

Contrast. Working as an animator you hear that word a lot. It is far-reaching umbrella term that influences every other animation mechanic, and thus to crop up in conversation frequently when animators converge to dork out on the fundamentals of making things move. Contrast is our friend. Let's get better acquainted!

So this 'ere animation thing is all about change, (how insightful, eh?), as this is essentially how hunter-gatherer humans have evolved to perceive the world around us. Animators work to use this change to better communicate to their audience. Contrast -the heightened "difference between stuff," is the amplification of this change to better sell an idea the animator wishes to get across.

Let's check out a few examples to see what all this is about:

1) Performance. Cedric realizes his underpants are tucked in to his shirt (classy) and becomes frantic as he rushes to rectify this in front of a group of ladies. Top quality comedy, right here. It's already a funny concept, but we can awesomify it by contrasting the realisation with the action. If we play the realisation as a small or slow action and the adjustment of clothing as a large, quick one, now we've added visual interest as the audience is immediately going to focus on the broad movement as it is the visual element moving about the most. Woot!

2) Poses. We can contrast shapes within poses to add a more pleasing change. For example, Cedric bends forward to make a point then straightens up to his full height. We make the forward a C-shape, then move into a -straight, or maybe even a slight reverse curve like a ). This is fun to look at, since we are helping to describe a set of arcs that Cedric's body must move through to play out his action.

Nice! Now we know that we can play with our poses, timing and ideas in order to better amplify their impact on the viewer. This will help them to understand what we are trying to communicate, and thus give them a better sense of connection with our characters, making them believable entities in their own right.

Yay contrast! BFF!

Guest blogger Kevan Shorey

By: Unknown On 09.46

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What Is Twinning? When Should You Use Twinning in a Shot?

Today we're going to have a chat about twinning - what it is; what it isn't; and how to manipulate it in a character's performance! Twinning can mean a couple of different things when talking about performance animation, but in broad terms it manifests itself as one visual element appearing similar to another visual element, usually with a negative connotation.

It can take the form of:

1. A symmetrical shape made by a character when posed, or,

2. The timing of the motion used to get into a pose. It can also be both of these at the same time.

Is this confusing? Possibly, so let's imagine an example! Our hero Cedric wants to hit a striking manly pose from his normal standing-at-ease position. Bang! There it goes, and suddenly he's in a T-like pose, brandishing his muscles for all to see. That perfect T-shape has twinned the arms symmetrically through the shoulders, an example of shape twinning. Say Cedric begins and ends the movement of his arms from the one pose to another in a very similar time frame, then the human eye will pick up on the limbs seeming to move as one element and there we have temporal twinning, (that's sounds like science-fiction. Awesome).

Most of the animation theory one comes across propagates the notion that twinning stuff is always BAD, and if you have twinned actions then you will have seven years of bad luck, and shame will besmirch your good name. Why is it seen as bad? Well, it can be a holdover from people's blocking, or by paying little attention to the forces driving an action. Having Cedric hit his pose with all his twinniness(tm) going on makes him look mechanical - as if a robot control system were driving the movement rather than an organic brain operating body parts under gravity. The slower the movement, the worse twinned movements can appear, too. Yikes!

Now, the presence of twinning is not necessarily terrible, for like every animation rule or principle, it can be judiciously broken to the betterment of the performance if the animator so desires. A little sneaky study of people will show you that everyone twins gestures and poses all the time. Symmetry is a good way of adding force to an action to get a point across! What we want is to remove that feeling of Mr. Roboto whilst still retaining that sense of force, and then we're all good. How can we accomplish this? Well, let's go back to Cedric, who's still obligingly holding his Grrr pose for us.

We can prod Cedric about such that when he completes his move, he is not quite the T-shape he once was. Maybe raising one arm higher than the other would look better, which could then give us the idea of skewing his torso to one side to give us a nice little arc through the spine, reinforcing the arms and suggesting a nicer set of inbetweens. Better animation all round! Yay!As for the timing, if Cedric gets into this Grrr pose fairly quickly, then that is nice since it suggests force and strength. There are many different ways to break this up. Maybe we can anticipate one arm down before it comes up, setting the limbs a couple of frames apart? Maybe we could hit the Grrr pose at the same time but one arm could take longer to settle than the other? Maybe we can take a more flourishy arc between poses for one of the arms? Lots of options, and even the smallest little change can give the action a much more organic feel. We just have to know what to look for!

With these definitions firmly in mind, we can study a pose/action and make a few minor tweaks to better impart a sense of the organic, whilst still being mindful of the intent and force of the pose. We win!

- Guest blogger Kevan Shorey

By: Unknown On 13.41

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