Animation...

I apologize folks, but I might get a little philosphical on you here. Well, maybe not philosphical, but at least boardering on odd, strange, abstract and profound. What is Animation? Well, essentially, its movement, right? It also apparently means to be alive and active, but these dont really illustrate my point so lets leave them aside for now. Animation is movement. If something is an inanimate object, it does not move. Then how strange is it, that animation itself, is nothing but a series of still objects, quickily shown in order to create the illusion, get me code 5 italics on that "illusion", yes the illusion of movement. If you've read any of my previous blogs, you probably know I tend to anylsis things that really dont need to be looked at. I like to ask questions.

Alot of people find it annoying and think im being critical of them. Its quite the opposite. For someone who is interested in animation, I personally think it is absolutely nesscary to want to understand how everything works. Well, perhaps not how everything works, but how everything moves. You see, the beauty of animation is that it isnt about mimicing movement of the real world. You might think it is, but it isnt. Or maybe it is. Maybe im wrong. After all, no one has ever sat down and taught me how to animate, I've never really met any other animators and spoke to them on length about the subject (I have always wanted to, but I just dont really know many of them, and trying to discuss things like that on online forums tends to just lead to pointless arguments and penis-waving contests). But the way I see it? Animation is kind of like magic.


"Like magic? What the hell, this is some kind of Disney crap right?" Thats what you're thinking. No, im not going to go into a magical debate about the wonders that animation brings to the world and how we should treasure our friends blah blah blah. What is magic? Really? You've seen a card trick, right? How do they work? Well, I just said it. Its a card trick. It tricks you. You are generally led to beleive that something is happening, when actually, something else is happening. Animation is no different. Infact, if anything, its so much more simple (In theory) than a card trick, and no where near as exciting. The human eye. Well, any eye really, but the eye. The eye moves, right? The iris goes from one position to another, depending on where you want to look. But do you ever sit there and think "Hey, I want to look to the left, so im going to move my eyes to the left"? No. Even when you were a baby you didnt. Its a natural reflex. The same can be said of other people. Have you ever sat there and watched someone move their eyes around. Unless they were your boyfriend/girlfriend/stalkee then probably not (And if they were the later, they were probably asleep anyway). But you know what? If people dont move their eyes around, if people dont blink, it makes us really uncomfortable. Its weird right? Something we usually take no notice in, suddenly becomes that disturbs us. Its called staring.


Im not trying to confess to being a stalker or something. I've sort of taken the sceneic route in explaining this, just because I wanted to give you an idea about how much I've thought about this. So, back to the trick right. I think an image is best to illustrate this point.



This is a really simple .gif I made ages ago for a forum I used to frequent to use as an avatar. Its sort of supposed to look like me, whether it does or not isnt really the point here. Nothing in this image is moving. Look at the eyes. Obviously if you look at them for long enough, you notice they're not moving. But it feelsl ike they are, right? It feels natural. All that is happening is that a sequence of images with the pupils in different places are being shown.


Pupils move fast. I mean really fast. You dont notice they're movement most of the time. You know they've moved, but you rarely actually see them moving. Nor do you take notice. Animation is just like that. The little things people dont notice, those are the things you have to prey on to create the illusions of movement. Many other parts of the body are the same. Lip syncing for example. Its very rare for there to be a large amount of different mouth shapes to accomodate a conversation. Why? Because people cant keep up. Many animated peices will get away with 3 mouth shapes through an entire sequence. Its all about timing. Its all about tricking the viewer.


Animation is all about illusion. Animation is just like magic.



Problem is, once you realise these sorts of things, you tend to notice lower-budget productions faults. As always, I could go on, but I have a box of nachos calling my name. So let me summerise what im trying to get at here.


Im not an experienced animator, I've dabbled alot, and I enjoy it, but im not really in any position to give anyone any advice. But this project, which for most people is going to involve animation, is a great oppurtunity to just stop, stand and stare. Watch how things move around. Think about it. Take it all in. Hell, take notes and draw sketches if you're into that sort of thing (Im really not).


Then think about how you can trick people into thinking the same thing is happening in your assignment.


Excluding the bits involving Action Script and HTML, This is going to be a damn fun assignment guys!


-Joe