Weekly comments (Aghhh)

My week has been a bit wild and draining, but what can I say? Constantly driving the needle and dodging
bullets, inktober crawling up my back, sleep fading from my view. It’s clearly a work in progress, but it’s
turning out for the better. This week I learned that the Flour Sack exercise is a great way of expressing
emotion without features in mind, and I learned more about walk cycles. I haven’t started mine yet, but
I’ll push through it. I’d love to learn about lip syncing, since I could use some of that for some upcoming
animation ideas i’ve got. Something frustrating, yet again, was my failure to gauge my time use. The
waving tail animation was alright, it wasn’t as tough as I originally thought. I hung out with Cas for his
birthday today but i got all clammed up when his other friends got here. I’m really awkward around
people i barely know so I kinda just looked around a bit until they left?? The bike ride sucked because
it was so cold but I mean it wasn’t going to kill me or anything. Happy birthday, buddy.

Here’s an article about the subculture of Cosplay and the dedication and hard work that goes into it.

PoA Anticipation!

The second topic in the subject of “Principles of Animation,” we bring in “Anticipation.” The hallmark of
ability required to draw back the robotic mechanics of stale animation; this allows animators to give a
sense of motivation to their movements. Chris Hurtt gives any examples about what and what not to do,
using 3d models enveloping the differing types of anticipation in sync to show how to use it correctly.
The addition of Squash and Stretch with Anticipation brings an element of life to any animation, and
Hurtt explains that even a bit of anticipation can add to the “surprise” effect of something popping out.
This bit of info is explained as implemented so the audience can enjoy the movement instead of missing
it due to a lack of context. He then explains how most forms of anticipation come from broad actions,
such as a batter’s swing or a head turning in the opposite direction before looking somewhere. Adding
organic flow to your animations takes practice, but implementing differing types of anticipation in your
work will help you in succeeding in this aspect. This along with overlapping action and SnS will level up
your work. Hurtt explains that anticipation sells the idea of built-up energy and the combinations you
use will improve your ability to make the actions believable. Mastering this skill requires an
understanding of the materials going in to anticipation and a good trick to finding mistakes you may
have made is to play it backwards. Hurtt says if the animation appears stiff, it’s time to edit.

My thoughts about this subject are that anticipation have quite a large role in our lives. Without this
simple subject, we’d be a robotic cult of stick people, never knowing what would come next. The usage
of this in our work and daily lives attributes to the liveliness of our movements and the more organic
you can make it, the better it’ll work. Good luck with these.

-Ari J

What was I doing again?

To be honest,

I’m having a tough time grasping the concept of “Time Management.”

I’ve been ironically using the phrase to pass off my bad excuse of
procrastination ever since I’ve heard it applied to my work, and I’m
trying to actually do something about it? Maybe??

These last two weeks I began Inktober, and that along with my
animation studies have led me to conclude that I absolutely
cannot handle all the things I put on my plate. I mean that literally
sometimes too. My workload, although how easy it seems, is
overshadowed by my raging need of constant distractions. I’ve lost
my light of focus and I don’t know where I dropped it. The caverns of
Netflix? The endless scroll of Instagram? Or maybe the fridge? Who
knows- I sure don’t. In the case of study, I did learn more of the inner
workings of Physics and its relations to animating figures. The wave
animation was a tricky one, yet not tough enough for me NOT to slam
dunk it. My graded piece is /super/ lackluster, which is why i’m definitely
gonna revamp it for my portfolio. Who do we show our portfolios to,
anyway? Colleges?

What I’d like to learn is what would be discovered in a deep soul search
within my psyche. “Why can i spend 8 hours doing nothing and strain
myself doing all my work after I’m supposed to be asleep?” The world
may never know, it seems. I would say I’m excited to learn about
Keyframing, but it’s just another tool to utilize in our journey. I’m “pumped”
to try my hand with the walk cycle, and i had a ton of ideas in mind, but
that’s likely going to be scrapped and saved for extra credit resources later.

I was frustrated with my laptop this week. The fan gave out halfway through,
meaning I was out of commission the entire weekend. That anticlimaticism
along with my debilitating fear of focus led to an astringent waste of time. I
got nothing done.
~Hooray~

Aside from lethargy, my personal boundaries with other people are being
put into question. You can never truly know someone, or how they really
feel about you, so someone you may see as a good friend may see you as
the center of their world, or vice versa. It’s bad enough to wear your heart
on your sleeve, but to have these strong emotions put up for a beating takes
courage to get through. Some people are just those that could care less about
your feelings, and making bonds with those kinds of people is a long process
likely unworthy of your time. You can’t spend your life trying to impress
someone who doesn’t care for the outcome.

Some things that had brightened my week a bit were my evident growths in my
artwork. Inktober proves as a milestone for me, as the improvement is
earth-shattering to think about! The complexity of my art right now is something
I would’ve dreamed of a year prior, and I have my friends, influences and time to
thank for that. People always say “I wish I could draw like that” when in reality, if
they had tried and practiced they’d get there eventually. I applaud my friends who
are up-and-coming artists and I hope they don’t quit. If you believe I’m talking
about you, good luck.

The links of interest this week are of how children’s media online has evolved
to bear a nightmarish complexion. Two videos about this topic; one from Night Mind-
a good source for spooky content, and one from TED.

S&S in Our Media

The ability to utilize Squash and Stretch while animating is crucial to building a keen understanding
of applying physics and motion to your works.



 Squash and stretch are the key principles in which when expressing emotion or movement,
objects appear to, for lack of better terminology, squash and stretch. There are many factors going into maintaining harmony with the rest of the work while utilizing SnS, and one of those is keeping the same volume throughout. Without this, things seem unnatural and you lose the
illusion of movement and fluidity.



 All the technicalities provided, this is one of the easiest things to slip up on, and we won’t blame you for it. Applying these techniques without accidentally overdoing / underdoing it or sliding in
some volume change is nothing you’ll take to quite fast. Practice makes perfect, after all. 



As our local clown friend Annabelle stated in her blog on this topic; “There's nothing to think about,
only consume. These are the principles of animation, as written, and will remain as such.” These
statements hold true for likely all the principles of animation, due to how rigid the analyzation is.
You’re given a topic to analyze, yet there’s no room to explore because the content that’s in place
cannot be changed, influenced or molded by your hands. 



One statement I will make, however, is that in order to become a skilled artist, you need to realistically
study the rules in order to break them strategically.



Here's a video on line weight and how to use it to your best ability.



-Ari J✯