Conventions of Animation - Timing & Spacing

The theme of the lecture today was to take the rest of the class into the origins of animation which eventually led to the first animated device which has been debated by many historians for many reasons.

Last week the animation class were informed that they had to create a learning contract for the rest of the academic year. After going though the lecture slides the class were given a task to make an animation using a flick book or the online version. Ali chose to make a flick book online so he could test it out as he was use to making a flick book using a notepad . But the one advantage of using the online version was that he could easily post the hyper link on his blogger for people to view. After this task the rest of the class were given a research task to find a useful video on using a graph editor .

Everyone had to demonstrate their understanding of the graph editor by using it to control the flow of all four animations which were bouncing balls . Ali found this information from reading  a power point from his lecture , two books that were referred to him by his lecturer which proved to be very useful. These two books were "Animation The Mechanics of Motion" by Chris Webster and the other book was "Timing for Animation" by  Harold Whitaker  John Halas Updated by Tom Sito .

 The research the more he began to realise that timing is definitely the most important aspect of any animation as it allows you the animator to create an element of surprise , anticipation for the viewer. This creates the comedy element which is praised by a  big part of the target audience. Ali's interpretation of spacing is the distance from each individual pose as they drop to the ground then back up . Ali had three tasks to tackle using the 3D software Autodesk Maya. 

                                          

The real challenge was capturing a bouncing ball in motion from the moment you throw it towards the ground , during the descent , on the ground making it's way back to your hands. So you take the flick book principles into consideration & use them exactly the same way for any animation.

                                                    


The second task was to create a bouncing ball  that was exaggeration as it has to look as if it belongs to a cartoon animation .The Flip Book principles still apply as it is a pose to pose animation the only difference is the weight & the durability of the ball into consideration as it hits the ground then bounces back. If you look at professional examples of cartoons such as the famous coyote & Road Runner animation You will understand what Ali is trying to get across to you.  

                                      

 The way that both animations contrast from each other is the timing of each stage of the ball's descent from the diving board to the ground then back up again.As Ali has mentioned before this was due to the gravity , weight of the ball as well as the spaces between the balls as they descent to the ground.


The heavy balls bouncing will be the first one to drop the quickest due to the amount of  weight that is possesses. But it will take it's time to get back up whereas the light ball will take it's time to drop to the ground but it will go back up at a quicker pace as it possesses less weight .

1 Maya Exercise 20 min:     Animate two dropping balls cartoon / physics (same timing different spacing)

2 Maya Exercise 60 min:     Bouncing Balls Light Heavy (demonstrate weight)

Here is an example of bad timing in an animation as it lacks weight , gravity , etc . For example when the lamp hits one of the letters it appears to be out of time therefore it lacks anticipation.