The 12 Principles Of Animation

For this project the brief asked us to research into the principles of animation as I did not know what these were I thought researching these first would be a good way to start the project. After some initial research I found that there are 12 basic principles of animation that cover all the different aspects of animating.

The principles are -

1. Squash and Stretch
2. Anticipation
3. Staging
4. Straight Ahead and Pose-to-pose
5. Follow through and overlapping action
6. Slow in and slow out
7. Arcs
8. Secondary Action
9. Timing
10. Exaggeration
11. Solid Drawing 
12. Appeal

Typography

For my animation I decided to go for the retro style that I had researched and liked, such as the 1950's Looney Toons or the Skin you alive animation. So with my style being decided I needed a font that suited this style as well. Although I have little typography in my animation it is important that my typography fits in with the overall feel and theme, so I decided to go look for fonts that had retro, vintage feel to them. I narrowed my choice down to a few but finally decided that to go with Bellerose I decided to choose font for a number of reasons, first off I love the simplicity to the font. It is not big or flashy like some of other fonts I looked at and I think this will really work for the style I want to achieve.  As well as this it is readable and has a nice vintage feel to it. 

Visual Style - Lluis Fuzzhound

Whilst researching retro style animation I came across an animation which had a very unique style which was based around the 60's and you can see this from the similarities between this animation and the work of Chuck Jones for example. The animation had some style elements that I really liked and wanted to try out in my own work. 

The artists name is Lluis Fuzzhound also known as Lluis Sanchez, the animation is a music video for the song 'Skin you alive' and can be seen at http://vimeo.com/48997795. The elements I really liked from the animation is the drawing style, use of colours and textures. The drawing style is an illustrative style particularly for the background which just really works and also brings out the main elements such as the characters and objects from the animation.  These main elements have flat colours and this combines really well with the illustrative style textured backgrounds. 

The use of colours is also really good as even though it is done in a black and grey scheme it still looks pleasing and everything is coloured in a way that makes the parts stand out and get your attention. This is also helped by the black outlines around the characters and objects that might not even be noticed but really help the elements stand out.

Food Miles

After researching into possible topics for my animation I decided to base it on food miles for a number of reasons.

What are food miles - 

• Food miles (or food kilometres) describe the distance that food is transported as it travels from producer to consumer.
• In the UK, our food travels an amazing 30 billion kilometres each year. This includes imports by boat and air and transport by lorries and cars
• Food transport is responsible for the UK adding nearly 19 million tonnes of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere each year. Over 2 million tonnes of this is produced simply by cars travelling to and from shops.

Why I am basing my project on food miles - 

As I said there were a number of reasons I wanted to use food miles for the theme of my project. First off I initially liked the idea of using food as the theme but I had very little ideas around this, and ways I could make an interesting animation on this. After researching however food miles seemed like the right idea as it has an element of transport which I thought gave me more freedom to come up with ideas. 

The other reasons I decided on food miles as I had little knowledge on the topic and it was not something I had really considered. So I thought it would be a good topic to bring to peoples attention. 

Research Climate Change - Transport

I also researched into how transport affects climate change I looked at a number of topics such as airmiles and the idea of using eco-driving. For the animation I started to think of ways I could use these topics for my project. 

Airmiles - With airmiles causing a massive carbon footprint I could base my animation on ways to reduce this and cut down on airmiles in general. I could promote local holidays or possibly less holidays  but this may be a hard topic to promote and encourage.

Cars - Cars are a massive cause of co2 emissions and there are many ways I could promote to cut down on this. One possible route would be to promote walking and cycling where possible to reduce the amount of unnecessary car journeys. I could also promote using public transport where it might be cheaper or easier than driving. Finally I could make my animation about electric cars, using biofuel or the idea of eco-driving all of which would help reduce the co2 emissions that come from the use of cars.

Research Climate Change - Food

One of the themes that stood out from the brief was food and the way this effects climate change, I decided to research further into this and found some topics which would work for my animation. 

I used two main sites for my research - 

Environmental protection agency - http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/impacts-adaptation/agriculture.html

Sustain web - http://www.sustainweb.org//foodandclimatechange

The main topics I found whilst researching were - 

Food Miles - This is the term given to the emissions involved with transporting food, this includes the importation by boats and planes and the transportation by lorries and cars. Food miles cause massive CO2 emissions and food in the UK alone travels 30 billion kilometres a year. Reducing food miles could have a dramatic effect on reducing CO2 emissions and the impact the food sector has on climate change. The solutions to this include buying locally and in season as the food does not have to travel as far as well as growing your own fruit and vegetables.  

Impact on crops - The impact that climate change has on crops is another topic I could cover these effects include and increased CO2 concentration in a large amount of crops.  Higher temperatures can prevent the crops from growing as can droughts. For my animation I could highlight these impacts but I would also need to show a solution. 

Impact on livestock - The animals are affected by the heat waves caused by climate change as well as the droughts. Climate change may also increase the chance that the livestock will suffer from parasites and diseases. Similar to the impact on crops I could highlight these issues in my animation. 

Impact on fisheries - The fish are also affected by climate change as the oceans become warmer and more acidic. This threatens the structures of sensitive eco systems in the oceans as well as directly harming the fish such as shellfish. The temperature change in the Oceans could also affect the timing of reproduction and migration which could have an impact on the sustainability of certain fish. 

Food waste is also a massive factor in global warming however I think this has been covered and highlighted as an issue enough so I decided not to focus on this. 

Year 2 - The New Brief

Today I started my second year of the FDA course and received a new brief to start the year off, the brief is a project on Animation where I will have to create a 20 to 30 second long animation. The subject for the animation is climate change awareness and the brief lays out a clear message that the animation has to convey based on a few different themes. 

These themes are -  

• The General Message 
• Food 
• Transport
• Consumption/Lifestyle

The brief also gives and guide for how the tone of the animation should have basically saying it should positive rather than negative. Also the animation must feature a mixture of music, sound effects and a voice over. 

Like previous projects I will need to follow a design process including research the brief gives two pieces of research that must be done to start with these are the principles of animation and examples of existing animations that persuade and inform.  This is a good place to start and I think a strong understanding of animation will help me to generate ideas for that answer the brief. 

As well as this across the blog and sketchbook I must also show my idea generation, sketches, storyboards, mock-ups, scripts/music and an animatic. The Animation must be made in After Effects the artwork can be created in photoshop and illustrator.  

The pitch is on Monday 14th October 

The crit is on Monday 4th November

Final deadline Wenesday 6th November 

Initial Thoughts - 

Overall I like the new brief as I am looking forward to doing animation work and learning more about it as well as gaining some skills in after effects.  As far as initial ideas go nothing really jumped out as a theme I would like to cover in my animation, I think I will need to do some research into the themes and then make a decision. I want to find a subject that I find interesting and a clear message to convey. 

For animations styles I've had a brief look at 1940s-50s retro cartoons that I like the style of I think the artwork looks good and is a style I would be able to achieve. I also think the style would suit a public information video and would suit the tone as it's easy to be positive and comical in this style. However I will look at a few more styles before making a final choice on this.