The 12 ‘basic principles of animation’ originate in the book
‘The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation’, written by Disney’s Ollie Johnston
and Frank Thomas in 1981. Although Johnston and Thomas drew what they animated,
the principles they outlined are still useful and relevant my practice, and
indeed that of any kind of animation. In this project, I will be looking at
digital animation – animating characters and objects for use in a game world.
Squash and Stretch
The first of Johnston and Thomas’ principles refers to the
way objects change their shape in motion, without changing their overall
volume. A bouncing ball, for instance, will be squashed as it hits the ground
but will be stretched in other directions to accommodate its volume. If
exaggerated, we can induce a comical, slapstick effect. In animation designed
to resemble the real world the principle is still important; an arm must remain
the same length while moving around, and muscles squash and stretch under the
skin as body parts move. Johnston and Thomas believed this to be the most
important principle, and arguably it is: animated elements must convey a
consistent form to the viewer.
Anticipation
Objects cannot move out instantly, they must often be ‘set-up’
beforehand. For example: a figure cannot jump up before their knees are bent,
or throw a ball before first moving their arm backward.
In games this principle is frequently ignored. Players need
to see a result ingame that corresponds to their button press, any delay will
make gameplay feel unresponsive and ultimately unsatisfying. In ‘Deadspace’ (2008)
the player character will go from a relaxed posture to that of aiming a weapon
instantly, with no frames in between. This jars particularly if the player
chooses to aim behind the player character, an 180 degree turn will occur
instantly. The earlier example of a humanoid figure needing to bend their legs
before a jump is another example where this principle is regularly broken in
video games.
Other situations can warrant a similar purposeful lack of
anticipation: a sudden unexpected movement from a character can be amusing in a
similar way to an exaggerated squash-and-stretch. In the animated film Wreck It
Ralph, some characters based on NPCs move instantly in order to emulate the low
frame-rate of early arcade machine games.Lip-synching is still animated at a
conventional framerate, however.
Staging
Much like in theatre or film, the audience’s attention must
be directed to the most important part of a scene. As an animation principle, staging
is defined as ‘the presentation of an idea in way that makes it unmistakably
clear’. Placement of elements and the position of the ‘camera’ are important
here. Johnston and Thomas stressed the importance of minimising unnecessary detail.
Straight ahead action vs pose to pose
There are two distinct approaches to the actual drawing
process. We can draw each frame at a time, in succession, or plot out the key
frames first and fill in the remaining frames later. When working for Disney,
all frames would have had to have been drawn out by hand, however, in digital
animation intervening frames can be created automatically, rendering the
technique of ‘straight ahead action’ unnecessary. In fact just about all
animation software relies on a system of defining keyframes, with movement
between them calculated automatically. Fortunately for this project, I do have
experience in 2D digital animation, and so ‘pose to pose’ keyframe’ based
animating is something I already understand to a degree.
Follow Through and Overlapping Action
This principle refers to two closely related techniques
design to show movement more realistically. If a character stops walking their
arms or clothes may sway for a few frames longer than the rest of the body,
they ‘follow through’ with the rest of the movement. This principle of drag
must be applied to all changes in motion. Similarly, different parts of the
body move at different speeds/rates/rhythms: a human will breathe at a
different rate to the movement of their legs, and their eyes will blink
independently of both. Animation should reflect this to appear lifelike.
In Red Dead Redemption (2010) Rockstar San Diego we can see a
good example of ‘follow through’. The player character’s coat sways as he walks
and upon moving forwards from a stationary position, the tails of the coat will
remain stationary for a few frames.
Mass Effect 3 uses a series of ‘cinemagraphs’ (subtley
animated looping images) to mask loading screens. A clever tactic, it
replicates the feel of an establishing shot in filmmaking. The animations
themselves are very short, however, and as the entire image loops it is easy to
detect the joins after a few rotations. By making the loops longer and
animating different features in an overlapping fashion, this would have been
more difficult to spot.
Slow In and Slow Out
Moving objects do not immediately stop, unless being done so
by an external force. A figure running from stationary will take time to get to
full speed, and will need to lose momentum before becoming stationary again of
their own accord. In the commonly used bouncing ball example, the ball will
hang in the air as it transitions between moving up and falling back down.
As with many of these principles, ‘slow in’/’slow out’ is
important even in comparatively simple animation. In good kinetic typographic
animations the characters will ease into and out of motion. Although subtle and
barely perceptible, this will give the letters the illusion of weight, and
combined with motion blur mimics the movement of objects in real-life, giving a
simple text animation a slick professional feel.
Arcs
Non-mechanical motion normally follows an arc, be it the
movement of an arm in its socket or the trajectory of a flying ball. ‘Ragdoll
physics rely on this to give bodies a structure that is consistent even when
the body is limp.
If these arcs are ignored the limbs will ‘clip’ through
other parts of the body, and will not move convincingly. Taken to its extreme,
a body part that does not follow a logical arc may change in size dramatically.
Secondary Action
Johnston and Thomas noted that secondary details can breathe
life into a character, and should not be forgotten. They should, however not
detract from the ‘primary’ animation (framing). Secondary action (be it a
character’s expression, the flutter of their clothes in the wind) should
emphasize rather than draw attention from the primary action.
Taken into the context of video games, ‘idle animations’ are
a example of this. Even if the player character is not moving around they
should still be doing something – no human stands perfectly still (not for very
long at least). People shift their weight from side to side, fidget and look
around when standing on the spot. Idle animations can be the best place to
bring out the personality of a character, to present their inner thoughts on a situation
through body language.
In Final Fantasy XIII (2009) characters will shift into an
idle posture after a few seconds of inactivity, mirroring the way a real person
would shift their weight into a more comfortable pose after standing still for
a few seconds.
Another example of secondary action applied to video games
could be seen in a modern first-person shooter that animate minor details into
the ever present weapons.
Timing
Timing is obviously important in all animation if we are to
replicate the way that physical objects move. An unintended delay in a video
game can be particularly problematic if it causes the gameplay to feel
unresponsive.
Exaggeration
For Johnston and Thomas exaggeration was ever present in
their work. The Disney ‘house’ style was to ‘remain true to reality, just
presenting it in a wilder, more extreme form’. This ethos is followed today in
just about every animated film. Games vary in their style greatly, however;
many try to emulate real life as accurately as they can.
Solid Drawing
If we are to animate a figure, we must first understand
their anatomy. Life drawing is arguably important within all artistic pursuits,
but especially in animation. Although Johnston
and Thomas would have insisted every animator be a skilled draughtsman, this is
no longer as important within digital animation. An understanding of the
mechanical composition of a body (or other object, for that matter) is still
crucial.
In Spec Ops: The Line (2012), the player character is not
rigged convincingly, leading the bottom of the skull to bend far higher than it
should.
Appeal
The final principle of the 12 states that characters must ‘appeal’
to the audience, be they villains or heros. This principle is difficult to
define, as appeal is not always synonymous with likeability, villains are often
the characters with the most appeal.
An equivalent term used in acting would ‘charsima’.
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