Laurence Roper - 2D Animation

Laurence Roper - 2D Animation

For this module I created a range of 2D animations, initially I started out in Photoshop; a software I’m quite familiar with. It tends to cater quite well to my needs and gives a good range of graphic variety I could utilise. I used this software for the Crafty Friday brief, and the college logo animation – transitioning between the old and new logos for the college. For these purposes I found Photoshop was completely adequate and worked perfectly well. [Refer to PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE – COLLEGE LOGO ANIMATION and PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE – CRAFTY FRIDAY blog posts for more in depth evaluation on those animations] 

I ventured in to Adobe Animate later on in this module, first off experimenting with simple animations to get used to the layout of Animate and learn the processes, such as the bone tool and how to create and use symbols. Most of the layout is fairly similar to other Adobe products which made it a somewhat intuitive process to learn. I found exporting was a slightly different experience as it would automatically export as a .swf file which isn't compatible with most other programs, this wasn't hard to figure out. The Adobe Media Encoder could easily used by selecting export video instead of export movie which gives more universal exporting options.

My first animation was made by turning shapes in to symbols, creating a figure and making it step sideways. This covered some very basic aspects of Animate such as navigating the timeline, creating symbols, and selecting multiple frames. This was a fairly successful and easy introduction in to Animate.
The next small animation was taking the principals of the first in to consideration, and adding in some hand drawn aspects for a water splash. This nicely consolidated the process of using symbols.
I also explored the camera tool, made a bouncing ball animation, and a drawn flickering candle animation. The bone tool was an interesting experience, it made movement but honestly I couldn’t imagine using it practically in any animation; I found it distorted imagery and created an unappealing stiffness in the animation.
The next useful technique was the classic tween effect, this was used to create a simple multiplane panning effect. I could see myself using this in future animations, it creates a more dynamic, realistic, and interesting appearance for the background.

I also did a quick experiment with rotoscoping, overall it went smoothly. One of the key features I noticed was when I tried to emulate a motion blur effect, it came out looking a bit strange as I used wobbly, distorted lines similarly to how a camera picks it up. Not long after attempting this I came across a video by Aaron Blaise on YouTube that spoke about this topic and how to create a motion blurring effect. He referred to this as a ‘wipe’ where you take an image and stretch it in between the beginning and end location morphing the shape but maintaining a consistent line quality. This made much more sense than how I had initially approached it in my rotoscope and from his examples made a much more interesting and dynamic appearance. I would definitely try to utilise a similar technique the next time I try and animate something with a motion blur effect. The process for rotoscoping was quite simple, I simply had to import the video in to Animate and could then draw on a layer above the video frame by frame.

And lastly I decided to create a final animation in Animate to get an idea of how I might use it and how it works with my natural work flow. This was successful but I found it has a lot of aspects I didn’t find as natural as Photoshop. The vector style imagery is a bit of a problem for me as I have always preferred the natural feel of raster graphics. Vector just feels really limiting and inherently clean and digital. The limited brush is a related and very unfortunate additional point. It is very distinctive to Animate to the point where you can pick out an animation made in Animate just from the line work of the brush. It’s uncomfortable to work with and creates thick, unnatural lines; there doesn’t appear to be a size jitter option.

The selection tools didn’t allow me to create selections unless they already had imagery beneath them to select, it wasn’t selecting an area but rather a part of an image. This makes it quite frustrating when I’m trying to colour in a drawing. The solution I found myself taking was that I had to make a line drawing around the shape I wanted to create and then use the bucket tool to fill it. This worked to an extent but maintained the unfortunate aesthetic of the Animate brush. An alternative method of producing these shapes without the use of the brush would have been to fill an area with a flat colour, and then use the selecting tool to edit the colour beyond that to create the final shape. This process however feels like it would have been a bit too indirect and unnecessarily complicated. In future I would like to explore other 2D animation software, I’m particularly interested in trying TvPaint as that looks much better in regards to my software preferences.

The idea for this animation came from the process of figure and gesture drawings; how you could create an animation from the sheer quantity of figures one might produce while practicing. With this in mind I decided I wanted to create an animation where a drawing would come to life and interact with the artist in some manner. With this in mind I found some animations with a similar context; Dan Greaves Manipulation, and the Daffy Duck cartoon Duck Amuck. These animations both included the inclusion of the animator and subject, similarly to mine. I had come to the conclusion initially that the animator should assist the drawing, build it housing, clothing, generally improve its lifestyle in exchange for a living reference. However I found this idea would have been cumbersome to achieve, it also wouldn’t have been an engaging story and may have played out for too long. I changed the idea to the animator photographing the drawing after it reacts to being erased, and then uploading it to a social media platform. The life transfers over to the digital platform. This notably increased the pace of the animation and allowed for a slightly more interesting dynamic inclusive of a more modern subject.
I tried to avoid the use of any jump cuts and instead focused on trying to smoothly transition between shots. This was fairly efficient and allowed me to experiment with animated camera moves in a somewhat simple environment as I didn’t include unnecessary props or detail.
I didn’t want to leave any still moments, I decided to play with creating a continually moving animation; every movement flowing smoothly in to the next. To achieve this I avoided actions that would create natural areas of rest, like putting down a water bottle, or steadying themselves to take a photograph. It kind of worked. But overall I would say it was unsuccessful; it made it challenging to understand as there is never much time or information to properly understand exactly what is going on, I don’t expect it would be easy to understand upon the first viewing from an outside perspective. Additionally the information that is conveyed lacks in any real highlights, there isn’t any real twists or interesting focuses. Overall it’s somewhat bland. The other similar animations I mentioned earlier used comedy to create an interesting narrative. I didn’t want to take that approach but as a result I should have focused on directing my animation in a different and interesting way instead of telling the story in such a direct manner.

A few areas of rest in key scenes, or simply slowing down the motions, would have made it more impactful and easily understood, pacing is definitely something I could experiment with more and try to utilise effectively to create a more dynamic and comprehensive narrative.

The story didn’t particularly evolve much from the early stages, I hadn’t planned it out as well as I should have. Instead of storyboarding my initial process was creating story beats and then key frames, sketching within Animate. This wasn’t notably harder than storyboarding and allowed me to go directly in to creating a simple animation to figure out how it would look moving. However the problem with this approach is it didn’t have the usual separation between traditional and digital platforms which encouraged me to go directly in to animating instead of stopping to consider different possibilities. In future it would be beneficial to ensure I’ve considered a wider variety of narratives and possibilities before focusing on one to pursue.

Putting the animation in to After Effects for post production I added a simple title and adjusted the timing to see how I could improve the comprehension of the animation. Slowing some of the scenes was very beneficial to the narrative, it helps the motions flow more smoothly and creates a more interesting appearance. The only problem is that stretching the scenes in After Effects obviously slows the frame rate and makes those scenes look a bit jumpy and unappealing. This is less of a problem than the service it provides but it would have been better to consider these scenes in production and integrate them as an intended part of the animation from the start.

Overall this module has given me a lot to consider and focus on to improve my future animations.