thoughts on storytelling

Previously in this series on the basics of animation I've talked about how animation is about revealing character and how the animator only has three tools to do this . In the last article I talked about the first to: the pose , and now I will get in to the second tool: The timing. The timing is the time, or amount of pictures/poses between two key poses, or two breakdowns. The timing can also be the time the character takes to react to something. Or a simpler way of putting it: The timing is what creates the rhythm of the scene.

Previously in this series I've covered that we as animators always need to remember that our job is not to create movement, but to create life , and that we only have three tools to get the job done . In the animators toolbox the tool that is the easiest to grasp probably is the pose. The poses are the individualpictures in the animation. There are the "key-poses" (sometimes called "storytelling-poses") which are the poses that are the most important to communicate the message of the scene or WHY the scene is in the film, then there are the breakdown poses which are the most important poses needed to communicate HOW the character gets from key-pose to key-pose. Last but not least are the inbetweens, the poses in-between the others, the poses that creates fluidity in WHAT the character is doing. Although the inbetweens often are seen as the key-poses illegitimate younger brother, they are just as important as the key-poses and breakdowns.

Animation = to give life, as I wrote about in my last article . Saying this is one thing, doing it is a whole other matter. This article will cover the basics about how animation is done. When we first get in to animation, and have learned how to make things move, I think we all always try to take a too big leap forward. Instead of mastering the basics of our craft we start looking at small technicalities, like worrying about if the inner or outer part of an eyelid that moves first in a blink. Although we theoretically may know that we need to learn the basics, we yet often need to take these leaps to learn this on a deeper level and understand that we need to take a step back. But at times, instead of admitting that we need to learn the basics, we continue to work on things out of our reach. The irony here is that it is our fear of looking incompetent that keeps us incompetent. To develop as animators, and as people, we need to develop humility to see that we always have a lot m