Task Ten: Jump Animation
This task was the most demanding of them all, since it required several steps and a number of animation principles (the original 12 principles and some of the more recent principles) which I have identified some below, and you can see how some of them were applied in my Progression Reel below.
The task was demanding, but with some help from my teacher, I was able to keep a consistent pace and rhythm. We began with Stepped Curves to see only the key frames, then transitioned to Spline Curves to have the animation breakdowns filled for us. Afterwards, we focused on polishing the animation, then expressing a narrative around that jump.
I found the Stepped Curves portion of the task relatively well paced and clear to work with; but the major challenges I faced after Cleaning Up the Spline Curves (Part 9) were my character’s motion arcs, and polishing the animation.
In Parts 8 & 9 (Polishing the Head and Legs) I created Motion Trails to visualise the overall direction of the Head and Legs. According to Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston, Arcs are incredibly important for natural movement, and my Motion Trails were unpolished. I continuously kept trying to polish the arcs: I was successful on a majority of them, except for the translations of the character’s legs when they were in the middle of the jump. The Arc could have been polished, however it would directly work against my character’s Solid Posing.
After completing Part 10 (Secondary Animation Polishing), I spent a fair amount of time polishing my animation before going into storytelling. I spent a large portion of my review time focusing on polishing the jump, I eventually had to bring myself to stop or I would not be able to meet my deadlines. I think if I had a longer period of time, I would polish my jump further. Even when I was working on Storytelling, I was still making slight changes to make the animation cleaner.
For Storytelling, I evaluated the pose and found it to be a “Casual” jump. I had a range of ideas, but one stuck out to me: jumping over object(s) in motion. I found an interest in Trees, so I decided rolling logs would work. As I created the assets, I made the man a Woodcutter who knows his work and knows that logs roll over all the time. I modelled an Axe and Stump with several Trees made of simple shapes.
I am extremely happy with how the Jump Animation turned out; but as I previously mentioned I would spend more time on polishing the pose. I believe a finished imperfect project is better than an unfinished perfect project.
Principles of Animation Recognised: Appeal, Strong Design, Staging, Acting & Pantomime, Keys & Breakdowns, Pose to Pose, Thumbnails & Planning, Timing & Spacing & Easing, Arcs, Primary & Secondary Action, Silhouette, Anticipation & Overshoot & Settle, Opposing Action, Breaking Joints, Follow Through & Overlapping Action, Exaggeration, Slow In & Slow Out.
Timed Poses
Alongside the Jump Animation, we did some very quick poses from a reference. Each timed, and every new lesson a minute would be shortened to capture our new pose of choice. We began at 10 minutes, and went down to 5 minutes. Each Pose helped me prioritize certain movements over others: choosing the legs and spine over the detailing of the fingers as an example.
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