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Animation – Cel, Flash, CG, stop-motion, you name it! I love most of it! I even do some of it! ^_^
To clarify, Cel animation is the traditional, frame-by-frame drawing, named after the celluloid paper they used to onion-skin the previous frame or layer multiple objects at once. I can’t do it though; I don’t have the patience. But I have a great respect for it. Examples of this are Disney movies from 1937 to about 2009.
Flash animation is 2D animation on the computer, where you manipulate vector graphics to move. This can be done either by frame by frame drawing, or by manipulating the vector graphics directly, either through armature or by the spline points, and keyframing the movements’ start and end points, with the computer interpolating the motion. I could probably do it, but I don’t have the software, the motivation to do so. Examples of Flash animation are most modern cartoons, E.G. Arthur has recently moved to Flash.
CG, or computer graphics, is the term used for 3D computer animation, where you move or deform 3D wireframe cages, with three or more vertices filled with a solid face. Usually, rigs made up of armature bones set up inside the character or object drive the motion, although sometimes direct manipulation of the vertices (known as shapekeys) is used, primarily in facial animation. CG can be used to imitate the other two styles as well. Keyframes are used for this as well, with the computer interpolating the motion between the poses. This is the kind I like to do. Examples of CG animation is basically anything by Pixar. CG animation is also used extensively as visual effects, as well, such as Transformers, Star Wars, etc. CG animation is also used in most modern video games.
Stop motion is moving a real-life object, taking a picture, moving it again, taking a picture, moving it again, taking a picture… You get the idea. It’s slow work, but not as slow as Cel animation, because you already have the object in front of you. You can animate action figures, LEGO Minifigs, clay sculptures, and even pastels. I want to get into LEGO stop motion, but it isn’t as easy as CG and is sometimes more restrictive… However, the restrictive nature of stop-motion may facilitate more creativity. An example of stop-motion animation is Wallace & Gromit. A variation of stop-motion is go-motion, developed by Industrial Light & Magic, where you take a picture while an object is moving, to get the motion blur.
So, yeah. Animation. Anyone else here enjoy it, whether watching, or doing it themselves? Anyone want their stories to be animated in any way, or want to write for animation? I sure do, on all three counts! 😀
@leumeister I definitely enjoy watching animation…the rest of it doesn’t interest me much. That’s super cool that you like it! (Nice alliteration in the title, by the way.) 🙂
A dreamer who believes in the impossible...and dragons. (INFJ-T)
Yeah, most people prefer watching it to actually working with it. 😛 Which is fair enough. It’s just not their niche. Although, I would that all would at least try CG animation *coughbecauseineedanimatorscough*, just to see how well they could do it. Then maybe more people would appreciate it more. 🙂 Just a thought though.
What’s your favorite style of animation? What’s your favorite animated movies? Do you have any stories you’d want animated, and in which style?
@leumeister I guess CG would be my favorite…hmm, I like the Despicable Me movies, Tangled, and Toy Story. I’ve never written a story with having it animated in mind…neat idea though.
A dreamer who believes in the impossible...and dragons. (INFJ-T)
Cool. I like that one best, too, but I appreciate pretty much all kinds of animation… Including live action…It’s all the same illusion, isn’t it?
Ah, yeah, I’ve enjoyed those myself. I haven’t seen Despicable Me 3 yet, though, but I want to!
A lot of the stories I’m writing nowadays I write with animation in mind. :3
@leumeister Animation has always fascinated me, especially the kind Pixar does. I’ve always wanted to try it, but I was wondering what programs to use and where to buy them? How much do they typically cost? Is it hard to learn?
@leumeister I also enjoy watching, creating, and writing things that are/will be animated in 3D. 😀 Although currently I only have ideas for games/movies/series that would involve animating things… I have started to work on a very few of my ideas, and based on those examples, I’m not sure if I’m exactly good at the modeling part… Of course in my defense, I think that the program I use is a bit glitchy.
I like some Disney/Pixar movies, like Inside Out, Wreck-It Ralph, and Frozen. But I also like shows like My Little Pony, Glitter Force, Glitter Force Doki Doki, and most shows and games that involve Sonic the Hedgehog. 🙂
Have you ever finished/published anything animated?
Yes, some 3D animation programs are pretty expensive, but Blender is just as capable as all of those, and is free! And open source, too, so that’s a plus!
If you want some entry-level animation work, I suggest Minecraft animation. There’s an abundance of character rigs out on the internet, and you can import Minecraft worlds (or, well, portions of them anyway) into Blender using special tools. MCPrep is a good addon for Blender with some nice rigs that come with it, and aids in importing Minecraft worlds and setting up textures! 😀
Blender does have a pretty steepish learning curve, though, but thankfully there is an abundance of tutorials on YouTube, Vimeo, and other websites that can help you! 😀 Animation is also quite hard. But you don’t need a university course to learn it. I just learned by doing.
Wow, cool! I’d love to see those things! What’s the program you use?
I liked those movies too. Even Frozen. I’m just over it. 😛
Not yet, but I’m pretty close. I did do a walking animation test with a mech about a year ago…
@leumeister I am interested in animation because my Dad is a computer geek! I understand the term “vector graphics,” because of him! I don’t know who else knows what that is XD Can you remind me what “armature” means? I can’t believe I don’t remember!
The only little animation I’ve done is stop-motion. I’ve done it with LEGOs, drawings, and even a stuffed animal once. So yeah, nothing fancy 🙂
You do CG?! Wow, I would like to see!
We also use Blender! For the 3D stuff anyway.
Why do you think CG is easier than stop-motion? Isn’t it a lot more complicated because of all the movements and animation and stuff?
You can pronounce it however you want.
Oh, and I just saw your walking robot animation. I loved the lighting and “camerawork!”
You can pronounce it however you want.
@leumeister Since Blender is free, does it have a lot of ads? Also, are there any apps for animation? Or does computer animation always have to be done on a computer? What is the simplest program for a beginner? Would a background in art help? How long does it take to learn animation? Sorry for all my questions. 😊
@Leumeister I’m pretty sure my eleven year old brother is headed this direction. 😉 He’s writer material, and has stories in his head, but has professed a deep hate of doing the actual writing (though he loves practicing his handwriting, which is a rather strange thing). So he wishes he had a movie-making program where he could just make his stories as movies and skip the writing part.
He’s an incredible artist, on paper and pretty good digitally as well, and he got a few nerdy digital art things/programs for his birthday. He’ll have a lot of learning to do now. 😛 He’s not incredibly serious about the whole doing stories thing currently—it’s still sort of a distant future thing—but if he gets really good at animation and still wants to do stories, maybe something will come of it. Hopefully. 😀 I think he’d do really well. (As long as he first learns everything there is to doing stories in whatever form well, which I intend to make sure he does. I know a place…)
XD Cool! Computer geeks are pretty cool, really! :j … Well, if you’re into that stuff, anyway.
Armature is basically “bones”. A lot of bones make up a skeleton, which can control joints, position, and drive values such as shapekeys (if you’re using CG)
Yeah, I do! I’ve got tonnes of ideas too… But a lot of them are beyond the scope of just one animator, who’s kind of a jack of all trades (I texture things, model things, sculpt landscapes, animate, light, render, post-process and composite things).
Yes! 😀 BLENDER! I won’t say Blender is the best, because that kind of mentality is somewhat arrogant, misguided, and more or less false, but I love it! ^_^
Yes. You can do pose-to-pose animation, and the computer interpolates the frames for you. With Stop motion you have to take a picture for every movement, and pose-to-pose keyframes are actually somewhat impractical for that kind of animation. For Cel animation, it could work though.
Thanks. I thought it came out pretty well, but there’s a lot of things that I could do to improve it. 😛
Oh, no, not at all. Ads would be too distracting from a production grade 3D app. It’s open source, and development is funded through donations, but many of the programmers working on Blender are volunteers, part of the community. So, no ads. 100% free. Free, and very effective. And fun, too if you’re into that kind of stuff. 🙂
There are animation apps. Like in the Touchpress app Disney Animated (only for iOS, I believe), there’s a simple but fully articulated rig for Vanellope Von Schweetz. It’s fun to use, and through that, I animated my first Disney character! XD There are 2D animation apps, as well, but I’m not sure tablets and phones can run fully featured animation programs, like Blender.
I don’t think there’s such a thing as a “simplest program for a beginner.” Animation is in and of itself a difficult art to master. I’ve been doing it for a couple years now, and I still haven’t mastered it. I’m learning a lot and loving every minute of it. I would recommend Blender for a beginner, though not because it’s the simplest. Far from it. I would recommend it for a number of reasons.
- It’s free. Autodesk Maya and 3Ds Max are obscenely expensive and are subscription based, and Maxon’s Cinema 4D and NewTek’s Lightwave aren’t much better.
- It’s got a huge community of artists, animators, riggers, and people who are fairly willing to help newbies out (but try to find what you’re looking for first before asking).
- It’s got an abundance of amazing resources, such as tutorials and asset libraries, both paid and free, and many people have created amazing animation-ready rigs, especially in the Minecraft animation subcommunity.
- It’s open source, meaning that development is done by the community. Many features requested by the community are eventually added.
- I use it. 😛 JK, but I’m a biased user, so of course I’d recommend Blender! But I tried to be fairly objective about it. If you have access to Autodesk 3Ds Max, Maya, Cinema 4D, Lightwave, or anything else (who knows, you may be related to someone in Pixar, who would let you use Marionette, their in-house software!)
A background in art may help, but I don’t really draw do any serious art of any kind. I did do some art stuff with homeschooling, but that was a long time ago. I basically visualize what I want to see in my head, and model (or write) accordingly. 🙂
Animation can take a while to learn. You could know it and actively do it, but still have a lot to learn, like I do. It took me months to nail down a passable walk-cycle.
Not at all. Your questions are much appreciated. 🙂 I’m glad I could answer them, and if you have any more questions, you know where to find me! 😀
Hey, that’s cool! 😀 That’s a shame about writing, though. And he needs to write in order to make the movie. :/ That’s weird about the handwriting, though. :S
That’s good to hear. 🙂 It sounds like he could do really well. Yeah, teach him to actually write the stories! XD 😀 Who knows? Once he actually starts, he may enjoy it! :j
@leumeister Thanks for being so patient with all my questions! I’m not sure if I’ll ever try computer animation or not, but it’s certainly something I’m considering. Blender sounds awesome.
Thanks again for your great advice! 😃
@Leumeister Well, he knows basically nothing about the actual craft of writing; he just thinks he wouldn’t like it. He’s tried writing his stories down before—starting, at least. Maybe when he actually knows what good writing entails, he’ll like it. 😉
And I’ve thought of asking you before (because you’re the animation guy) but just never did—do you know of any animated movie-making softwares? As in, a program that lets you make your own animation and then use it in a movie/video, all in the same program? That’s what he really wants, and I did a lot of searching for that kind of thing. I found a few free options we’re planning to try, but I’m not sure they’re completely what he’s looking for. I can’t seem to find one that lets you do your own art and use it to make a movie/video. I find those aspects separately in different softwares, but never together. 😛 I know next to nothing about digital art though, so I could be missing something.
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