Graphics Reference
In-Depth Information
Animation made using the straight-ahead method often has more
liveliness to it, a vivacity that may not be easily achieved using the pose-
to-pose approach, but the latter does allow for more control. The term
pose-to-pose comes from the way animators make individual drawings
of the key poses with an action or sequence of movements, with the
intention of then animating from one pose to the next—thereby pose to
pose. Using such poses allows the animator to identify the key moments
in the action—hence the name of these drawings: keyframes . This
technique, developed for use with 2D classical animation long before
the availability of computers for animation, is now standard practice for
animators working in computer-generated imagery (CGI). Making such
drawings (or positioning models and images on a timeline in digital
animation processes) allows the animator to plan, in some detail, the
exact movement of either a single figure or object to multiple characters.
The positioning of these keyframes along a timeline allows action to
shift either backward or forward in time by the addition of frames or the
reduction of frames. This helps ensure that an action takes place on exactly
the frame on which the animator requires it to happen, allowing for a great
deal of control. It may be a useful method, but used clumsily, it can result
in actions looking a little wooden.
Consistency of drawing is much easier to achieve using pose-to-pose
animation because comparison can easily be made between keyframes,
ensuring that scale is maintained throughout the action. Using keyframes as a
guide, the inbetweens are far less likely to vary in size.
Many animators regularly use a combination of the two methods, straight-
ahead and pose-to-pose animation, within a single action or sequence.
This approach to using the technique most relevant to the demands of the
animation can result in more believable and fluid movements, an added level
of control allowing well-structured phrasing throughout the animation, and
complexity of movement and timing, and finally, it gives the animation a
liveliness that it might otherwise not possess.
Squash and Stretch
The term s quash and stretch describes the action of an object put under
certain pressures. Push down on a rubber ball and it will squash; pull a sheet
of rubber and it will stretch. However, squash and stretch does not simply
apply to rubber balls or rubber sheets; it can apply to everything, or almost
everything.
Most things in life possess a certain degree of flexibility. Certainly living
flesh has a great deal of flexibility, no matter how bony the underpinning
structure. The use of squash and stretch in animation allows for a degree of
flexibility in all animated objects and figures. When a person smiles broadly, it
isn't just the mouth that moves—the whole face animates and demonstrates
a high degree of flexibility. Everything from flexing an arm as it lifts a heavy
Search WWH ::




Custom Search