Year2 Assignment1: Examples of simple shape animation

i really wanted to make some pieces which where beautiful and visually stunning. just because i now have to make something that is alot more simple it dose not mean that i can not do that. here are some examples and great simple animations i have found.

i found this great example of that is just the sort of thing we have to produce. it also covers a few of my ideas which i have had http://www.peepshow.org.uk/animation.php#ColourPicker

this next one is really great and i could see myself doing something very much like this.

i was also thinking that alchemy a open source thumbnailing program i have would be great to use to get shape idea for this project.

another thought i have had is that although not as cool doing all my projects in 2D will make it alot easier for me to complete things in the time i have for this project. maybe i can fake a 3D effect like the clouds animation i've embedded in this post.

Year2 Assignment1: Ideas evaluation.

Here are all the theme ideas i have had so far. i will colour the ones which i can no longer use in red and the ones which i could adapt in green. then i will talk about how i could possibly use the green ones. edit: my blog dose not like the colour so i will bold the ones which work.

• rockets & space
• pose to pose animation of famous works of art
• heavy use of shadows
• replicate a cutout animation style
• aerial technical drawing, ordnance survey maps & contour lines
• White on white
• going over the lines with the colours and replicating print heads that are out of sync
• Retro games
• patterns
• Illusions
• kaleidoscopes
• Shoaling/swarm/flock
• Water, Ripples & Drops
• underwater
• microscopic stuff
• subatomic particles
• Bubbles & Balloons
• Speakers and sand experiment

i added an amber colour as i'm not sure weather these are still applicable, i will explain later. i said that i would apply SHE to these points but i don't think i need to do that as i can just think of fresh ideas as i do not have any strong ideas which lie within the specifications of the brief.

rockets & space

i can still take the location and items that are found in space for this project but i should be wary of being to obvious. i can display space and planets purely by having coloured circles on a black background that has white spots on it to represent starts. my ideas of turning a planet scene into a game of pinball would still work but i would need to rethink the story so more focus is on motion principles.

aerial technical drawing, ordnance survey maps & contour lines

i will need to be careful with this one as it will be very strong stylistically. i think just using small parts of this in my animations would be a much better idea than basing a whole piece around it because it will get complicated very quickly. i saw this animation which used technical drawings. i think i could emulate something like this but i would need to have much less focus on the walls and objects in the rooms, i could even get away with just using the colours. i could use this idea as a set to show the impact of the action that are happening e.g. there is a circle could thats about to shout and the camera cuts to an arial view of the ball and when he shouts the whole world around him shakes.

White on white

this is a very basic idea which i could apply to anything where i will have to be carefully is using this when there are very few elements on screen as it will make it harder for the audience to pay attention to the motion principles if they have a hard time trying to make out the shapes. now that i can not make strong use of shadows using white on white will be even less visible.

Retro games

the concept of retro games will still work for my ideas of pinball and dominos because they can be represented with very basic shapes and there is an interaction between the different elements which allows me creative use of the animation principles. however i should stay away from more complex ideas such as Mario or Tetris because there is much less interaction between elements in these games and they animate in a blocky style that dose not use the more obvious principles.

Shoaling/swarm/flock

the difficulty of successfully animating a swarm and the end result of it i belive is enough to ofset the complexity behind it. it is also a very good way of animating the followthrough principle. as i am still quite keen on complexity and don't want to let go of it i think i may incorporate a swarm into one of my ideas to allow me something to work on to keep myself motivated throughout the project.

Water, Ripples & Drops

i can combine water and Ripples into animation in the same way that this clip from sesame street dose at 18seconds.

because it is an animation i do not need to follow the laws of physics at all times and can do whatever i like to make my animation interesting.

drops are alot easier to have in my animation as they are just a shape so there are not restrictions to them at all. i just had an idea how i could use them in my animation. i could start with a drop forming and getting bigger until it drops then out of the splash it causes something could happen.

underwater

just like water and ripples i can have underwater happen at anytime. it can simply be introduced by having the right sound then changing the physics that apply to them.

microscopic stuff & subatomic particles

i put both of these in orange because i know that i can use them but there is not much i could do with them giving the limited time and animation that we are doing. what i can use them for however is inspiration for shapes and movement if i'm trying to make things more natural.

Bubbles & Balloons

this is also another idea that is just shapes so it can easily be applied to a more simple style.

Year2 Assignment1: Brief clarification

in todays lesson we clarified what the brief actually wanted us to produce and it turns out i have been thinking of making it way more complicated that it actually needed to be. our focus should be on motion principles and sound. we should stay away from textures and patterns. the marks from this project will come from creative uses of the motion principles to create naturalistic and engaging animations.

Creative uses of simple principles and techniques was a key factor in the previous year and even though it dose not state it in our brief after talking in lesson today i believe that this is the key.

the problem with this is that it pretty much negates the ideas and visuals that i have had in my mind so far. i currently do not know if i can emulate the styles of some of the more complex artists i have been looking at such as Joan Miro as they contain too much detail. i will however still use them as inspiration for general composition and colours.

Right at the start of the project i had a few initial ideas which would fit this simplistic style, these where;

• Circles having boxes dropped on them and reacting in different ways, such as, popping, bouncing the balls back, rolling, not moving
• Circle rolling along a line (like a basic rollercoaster)

i will go through my old ideas and see how i can apply John Maeda's S.H.E (shrink, hide, embody) technique to them to create ideas which are more valid.

i had been looking a lot at animations and art styles and i noticed that complexity and detail are used heavily and i was trying to apply complexity to my ideas. now however i am not sure that this is what my lectures are looking for so i will keep things simple but have it in mind that i can expand my pieces with additional detail if needed.

the importance of sound is going to be really key to this as now there will be less distractions on screen. our brief dose not say we can't used copyrighted music but we have been shows some animation which exclusively use sound effects so i think i will have at least 1 animation that dose not use music. for those that do use music i am going to have to start with the soundtrack first and produce dope sheets with my storyboards so that everything that happens on screen related to the piece.

i'm going to re-embed the bupa advert to stress the importance of the simplistic style

however from our discussion i felt that we should try have shapes which connote location backed up by sound which denotes it.

looks like its back to the drawing board!

Year2 Assignment1: London Trip & Inspiration

image by Mário Sousa Pinheiro

yesterday we went on a trip to London. we went to Tent London which had some incredible pieces but it spent to long looking around and had to rush about 1/2 of it. and then we went to the Tate Modern to see the Exposed exhibition which i could not afford so i instead went round the rest of the gallery looking for inspiration for this project. i took down the names of work that i like in Tent London and the Tate Modern. here is the list i compiled. i may blog some images/work of each of theres but the list is alot bigger than the one i had for my thoughts and inspiration and that took me ages! i have linked to these site and to the pieces that inspired me where possible.

Tent

• Zachary Eastwood
• Chae yong kim
• Justin Marshall
• _BigDog Interactive
• Mário Sousa Pinheiro
• Jes Hunt
• Laura Callaghan
• Roisin Lafferty
• Michael Siney
• Miller Goodman
• Alex Randall
• Joe Bichard and Jack Cunningham

Miller Goodman animation



joe bichard and jack cunninham Mars! animation






Tate Modern
at the moment i am just going to link names & movements. i will add images for a few at the end.

• Arte Poveva and Anti-Form
• Iwan Puni (Jean Pougny)
• Piero Manzoni
• Robert smithson
• Giuseppe penone
• Robert Morris
• Vanessa Bell
• Bridget Riley
• Albert Gleizes
• Abstract expresionism
• Joan Miro
• Paule Vezelay
• Propergander
• Julian Trevelyan
• Richard Artschwager
• Frederic Bruly Bouabre
• Victor Pasmore
• Barnett Newman
• Roy Lichtenstein
• David Shrigley
• Josef Albers
• Agnes Martin
• Ben Nicholson
• Mary Martin
• Helio Oiticica
• Charles Biederman

Joan Miro, click image for larger version
the styles of some of the paintings by Joan Miro & Paule Vezelay would be well suited to the idea of Microscopic life.

Robert Morris, click image for larger version

Bridget Riley, click image for larger version

i also thought of a few more themes and idea while out on that day. they where

• rockets & space
• pose to pose animation of famous works of art
• heavy use of shadows
• replicate a cutout animation style
• aerial technical drawing, ordnance survey maps & contour lines
• White on white
• going over the lines with the colours and replicating print heads that are out of sync
  

We had been given a few artists to look at and i had also thought of a few during the lesson on Monday. these where;

• Oscar fischinger
• Fernand leger
• kasimir Malevich (whos work i also saw at the Tate)
• Piet Mondrian (i also saw his work at the Tate)
• Lyubov Popova
• Hans Hoffman
• Patrick Caulfield
• Saul Bass (Graphic designer not artist but i thought of him on Monday)
• Cubisium
• Constructivisum
• Screen printing

Year2 Assignment1: Inspiration & thoughts part 2

part 2

Water
another movement in nature that i love is that of water. both waves and flowing of rivers create incredible shapes which i think could animate to look really great. Great Wave off Kanagawa by Hokusai is an example of a visual style i could do use.

click image for larger version

this animation by Alexander Petrov based on Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea has some amazing scenes of the sea. the book is also a really incredible story and i suggest reading it!

ripples

the ripples you get in water look incredible. i was thinking i could use them to suddenly change the viewers perspective on what there watching by rippling the screen upon the impact of one of the objects in the animation.


Drops

i was thinking water drops would be an interesting thing to have a go at animating as they make great shapes and the principles are very easily applied to them as water changes it shaped very easily



underwater

i really want to have underwater as the location for one of my animations. i am inspired to do this because of the colours and physics that are available to you underwater. i also like the little bits of dust and sea stuff that you see floating past the camera when filming underwater and want to replicate that. you can see in Studio Ghiblis Ponyo how incredible the locations can be made to look.



this animation by Lois van Baarle shows a great use of the lighting and physics underwater and if i were to do a underwater location i would draw my inspiration heavily from this.

Microscopic stuff

i have been reading lots about science and i'm currently really interested in it. i was thinking a good thing that i could animate which dose not need to be made up of very many complex shaped yet moves in a natural way would be microscopic life and cells.



the computer game Spore has a part in it where you play as a microscopic lifeforms. the visual style is a stylized cartoon version of the real thing. you can see it below.




this video contains some 3D animation showing how the flu virus invades the human body.



subatomic particles
im also interested in subatomic particles. as they are very simple structures and some are contradictory in there nature appearing as both particles and waves (the stuff im reading is a few decades old so im not sure if it still stands). i think it would be cool to try interpret them in an animation.


Bubbles&Balloons

again like lots of my other ideas i was thinking that balloons and bubbles would be interesting things to animate and i could apply the principles to them.





Speakers and sand experiment

the patterns that are generated when you do the sand on a speaker experiment are really interesting and there sudden change between one another are quite gripping. if i where to do something more abstract i could use this idea. it would also fit very well with the idea of kaleidoscopes

Year2 Assignment1: Inspiration & thoughts part 1

i have been compiling my thoughts on what i could animate and possible sources of inspiration in my note book while i wait to get my sketch book. so im going to post all of these and try find video and image examples of them. you will find alot of the ideas link together so im trying to put them in some form of order.

• Retro games
• Dominos
• Pinball
• patterns
• Illusions
• kaleidoscopes
• Shoaling/swarm/flock
• Water
• ripples
• Drops
• underwater
• microscopic stuff
• subatomic particles
• Bubbles & Balloons
• Speakers and sand experiment
  

Retro games

i thought of retro games because of the shapes and simple colour pallets that they have.

when i think of retro games i was thinking not only computer games but also toys and board games.

Dominos


the American express adverts which are on the tunes in London make me think that i could animate dominos in a similar style

click image for larger version.

Pinball


this would be a very easy idea to reduce to simple graphic elements and would allow me to use a large amount of the principles.

i have also thought of some music that i could use for a animation on pinball. the track samples noised from the windows pinball game

patterns

a friend of mine is studying surface design at LCC and dose a lot about patterns she has a large collection of pattern books and i have been looking through them for inspiration as to the textures i could use for objects and backgrounds.

Optical Illusions

when thinking of patterns i through of optical illusions as something that i can animate quite simply that would have a strong visual impact. the main one that i thought of was one where you move 2 ringed circles over each other and it looks as if they are moving

this could be used to give the appearance of complex animation but without having to do as much work. it would also be nice to then reveal the process by which it was done.

kaleidoscope

the strong colours and interesting patterns you get in kaleidoscopes made me think that i would something that i could possible use to create interesting effects during part of my animations.

Shoaling/swarm/flock

i am a big fan of shapes which appear in nature. one of the most dynamic is that of mass group movement such as shoals swarms and flocks. im my animation i was thinking that i would animate a swam to create a tranquil scene that was visually interesting to watch.

this would probably take a long time to animate but i could overlay some video of flocks moving and then follow there movement.

while watching videos of flocks i thought of doing some documentary style of camera movement to make it appear more real. the idea i was thinking of was to the the camera following the movement and react late to a sudden change in direction.

Coalition of the Willing

i thought of Coalition of the Willing is an animated video about climate change created by knife party. it was animated by a large collaboration of people and studios and contains some great examples of animation. while at Offf i saw a presentation of this and how it was put together which was really inspiring.

the first 20 seconds could be a response to the brief. section 13 which starts at 5:39 is a good example of animated swarms as is the end of section 30 at 12:20.

what i really like from this film is the massive variety of styles and textures. it makes me think that using interesting textures is a important detail to give me animations a really visually stunning appearance.

section 10 starting at 4:36 shows good examples of how i can transition between multiple ideas.

section 13 starting at 5:57 would be another good response to the brief. although the animation is a little advanced for what we are expected to do.

im going to continue this post in a second part as its getting really long!

Year2 Assignment1: Animation Principles part 2

Follow through
is something that occurs in nature but if often exaggerated in animation. think of a golfer, taking a swubg at a ball, the gold club doesn't stop suddenly when it comes into contact with the ball, it follows through the same path and then gradually settles abd down to a halt. this is follow through. You'll also see follow through in situation like a cat flicking its tail. After the cat has flicked its tail a wave of action will follow through to the tip of its tail after the base of its tail has stopped moving.



ideas of uses of this in my animation.

• diving board effect when objects colide into other long thin objects
• mexican wave or toppeling tower of objects

Overlapping action
Overlap is when one action overlaps another. if we look at nature again, very seldom dose one action finish completely befor another starts. imagine at breakfast taking a bite of your toast and then having a sip of your tea. You my still be putting the toast back down on your plate with one hand whilst putting the cup to your lips with the other, these are overlapping actions. Animations look rigid and unnatural if you dont overlap the action within it.



i can cover this principle in my animation by doing something that is complicated and would have several things going on at once, or a larger object with multiple parts such as a person.

Staging/Exaggeration
Another great animation rule is the rule of exaggeration. Exaggeration in animation terms is used to emphasize whatever key idea or feeling you wish to portray. For example, if you create an animation of a dog smoking a cigarette whilst dancing, you would exaggerate the action that was most relevant to the scene.


You must remember that the viewer does not have the luxury of knowing what is about to happen in an animations so if something moves very quickly, they may not have time enough to realize what is going on, blink, and they’ll miss it! This is why it is necessary to set the scene for them.
Setting the scene (or staging the animation) involves attracting the viewer’s attention and focusing it on a particular subject or area of the screen. It can also set up a mood or feeling that you want the viewer to understand before the main action takes place. Examples of this would be having the subject move suddenly to attract attention or coloring/lighting your subject in such a way that it stands out from the rest of the scene.

while i can use staging for all of my animations to create more natural pieces, exaggeration can be used as its own piece by exaggerationg objects to the extreams. the great thing about exaggeration is that it can be used with any subject i would want to cover.

note:
i took the discriptions of the principles on the breif from a presentation provided to us by my tutor.

Year 2 Assignment1: Thought and libary books

in the breif it states

your animations exemplify the identidied motion design principles clearly and
creativly

i have been thinking about this and really think that this is the key to creating a good project instead of getting carried away trying to make it look pretty by useing textures or lighting like i had in mind at the start of the project.

i have also been to saint peters house to pick up some books about motion graphics to study and try find more principles which are needed. the books i got are

• Motion graphic design - applied history and aesthetics by Jon krasner
• Motion blur: one dot zero: graphic moving imagemakers
• Graphics in motion by John Halas
• Motion Design - moving graphics for television, music video, cinema, and digital interfaces by Matt Woolman
• Motion by Design by Spencer Drate, David Robbins, Judith Salavetz

hopefully these will give me more of a clear idea of what i can do with this project.

Year2 Assignment1: Animation Principles part 1

• i have already stated the inportance of the animation principles for this project, as it is designed to give us a good grounding motion graphics which will play a large part in this year.

we have been given a revised list of the 12 principles of

animation which our tutors think are relevant to motion graphics. the original 12 principles are;

1. Squash and stretch
2. Anticipation
3. Staging
4. Straight ahead action and pose to pose
5. Follow through and overlapping action
6. Slow in and slow out
7. Arcs
8. Seconday action
9. Timing
10. Exaggeration
11. Solid drawing
12. Appeal

Timing

spacing actions to define weight and size. heavy objects will generally take longer to pick up speed. They will also take longer to stop moving than light objects because more resistance is needed to fight against the heavier weight.

here is an example of timing when used in animation. the top end of the flag moves slower than the tip because there is more materiel to move.

ideas of uses for this in my animations.

• heavy objects chasing lighter objects
• merging objects of different densities
• giving weight to textured objects
• subvert the weight and make things that should be light heavy to give a surreal feeling

Speed of change (Slow in and slow out)

spacing of the in-between keyframes to achieve natural movement. this can be seen in moving you hand to pick something up at first your hand moves slowly then as it moves across the space to the object it moves quickly then as it comes to the object it slows down.

ideas of uses for this in my animations.

• jumping
• ricocheting
• falling

Arcs

the visual path of action for natural movement. an image which was provided with a presentation we where given explains this principle very well.

it also applies to moving body parts for example is you move you hand down you do not move it in a straight line it moves with your elbow or shoulder as the pivot

i cant think of specific uses for this in my animations at the moment but it will be in all my animations as it is a very important part of making things appears natural.

Motion blur

to enhance appearance of motion. this dose exactly as it says. from what i understand of this it will be more useful for displaying depth and 3d things where there are distant objects that will be moving. it will also be useful for showing things that are moving very fast.

it can be seen in action in startreck when they jump to warp speed

ideas of uses for this in my animations.

• this can be used if i want to show fast movement between several places
• races
• sudden movements
• adding very subtle motion blur to objects that are moving my also give them a more fluid motion i will have to test this

Squash and stretch

One of the most important rules of animation is the squash and stretch rule. For an object to look convincing it must ‘give’ when external forces are applied to it. As the ball hits the ground it will squash, but did you know that it will also stretch as it falls and rises? The only time the ball should look perfectly round is at the top of each arc, where resistance is at its least.

Obviously a softer ball, for example a beach ball will squash and stretch a lot whereas a cannonball will hardly squash and stretch at all. You can use squash and stretch techniques to convey an object’s density and mass.

ideas of uses for this in my animations.

• i could center an animation around this principle very easily by exaggerating the squash and squeezes
• object bursting under pressure
• 5 ball pendulum

Motivation/anticipation

preparation for and action. Anticipation can be used to direct the viewer’s attention to part of the screen. It is often intermingled with staging (setting the scene so a viewer can understand context and situation).

However, there are differences which make it a rule unto itself. Some anticipation occurs naturally, for example, a mouse is about to hit a cat over the head with a mallet. Physically, the mouse would have to pull the mallet back before plunging it down, this is the anticipation moment.

By exaggerating this moment you can let the viewer know what is about to happen in the scene. There are other anticipation tricks which do not always happen in nature but are useful in animation. For example, in the old Road Runner cartoons, when the coyote falls off the cliff, he hangs in the air for a second or two before plummeting to the ground. Without the pause, the viewer would not have time to register his very fast fall to earth.

43 seconds into this video

ideas of uses for this in my animations.

• breaking objects
• collisions
• explosions
• an incoming disaster which influences the objects on screen (TNT plunger being pressed)

Year2 Assignment1: Three Easy Pieces

The brief

In this assignment, you will be exploring the key principles of motion design, and you will produce three pieces of animation which illustrate or demonstrate a range of these animation principles.

You will design, storyboard and make 3 pieces of animation which use shapes rather than complex drawings or recognizable objects. Given that the graphic objects are relatively simple drawings, the choice of colour palette is an important design concern. These animations will be between 15 and 20 seconds in length each, and you will vary the number of elements you are animating from one to many across the animation. Each animation must have a music or sound track of your choice.

Principles

Applying principles of motion graphic design to your animation work will make the motion you create more naturalistic, more appealing and more easily understood by the audience.

Motion design principles can be broken down into the following areas:

- timing: spacing actions to define weight and size

- speed of change: spacing of the in-between keyframes to achieve natural movement

- arcs: the visual path of action for natural movement

- motion blur: to enhance appearance of motion

- squash and stretch: defining the rigidity and weight of an object by distorting its shape during an action

- motivation/anticipation: preparation for an action

- follow through: termination of an action

- overlapping action: establishing its relationship to the next action

- staging/exaggeration: presenting an idea so that it is unmistakably clear

Questions

i asked a few questions when the brief was established and found out several key points.

• the animations should be related to the principles of motion graphics. focusing on showing certain ones of them in each animation.
• one of our lecturers suggested that he think characterization is something that they are looking for.
• the animations do not have to be linked.
• colour pallet is a very important part of this project.

this brief was inspired by the bupa adverts.

though we do not have to make it have a narrative and it can be purely abstract.

thoughts

• i want to establish principles that an animation will show before i think of the design and style of it.
• i would like to make use of textures and lighting, though as i say above i will not implement this for no reason.
• tv idents are my inspiration for the structure of the animations.
• i'm interested in doing 3 completely different visual styles.
• i need to keep things simple, as i only have 4 weeks to complete the project.