As we previously discussed, adding a virtual camera to a 3D scene in After Effects can give an entirely new dynamic quality to your compositions. Virtual lights can have a similar effect. The following simple scene is composed of four 3D layers: a red background “wall” layer, a yellow “floor” layer, a text layer, and a camera. If you were to just glance at the composition, though, you wouldn’t know the scene was 3D at all – you have to switch to one of the “Custom Views” to see how things are arranged.
We can make this scene more interesting by adding lights. Lights are created in the same way as virtual cameras and other kinds of layers: from the top menu, choose Layer>New> and then choose Light…. A menu will appear with several options, the most important of which is “Light Type.” The kind of light you create will completely change how it affects the scene. For each type of light, you can define the color and intensity. Additional parameters will be available depending on which kind of light is selected.
Parallel: These are rays of light cast in a certain direction. Parallel lights behave similarly to outdoor sunlight and can cast shadows. By default, parallel lights do not “fall off”, so it does not matter how close or far they are from the things they illuminate. Changing the Point of Interest on a parallel light will change the direction it casts light in.
Spot: This is a cone of light that is brightest in the center, then fades to darkness. You can adjust the angle and “feather” of the cone and spot lights can cast shadows. Spot lights have the most potential parameters to adjust – in addition to the light’s position, you can change its point of interest, orientation, and rotation on the X, Y, and Z axis.
Point: This is light emanating in all directions from a point in space. Like all light types, the point light itself is invisible – there is no glowing orb where the light is located, only its effects are visible. Point lights can cast shadows and are brightest close to the location of the light. Position is probably the most important property for point lights.
Ambient: This is light emanating from everywhere at equal intensity. Because light is coming from all directions, ambient lights cannot be used to cast shadows. Ambient lights are helpful when used in addition to other types of light, since they can change the illumination level and color of a composition uniformly.
Casting Shadows and Material Options
When you create a new parallel, spot, or point light, you will have the option to check a box that says “Casts Shadows.” However, you will also need to tell After Effects which layers in the composition are affected by the light’s ability to cast shadows. By default, every 3D layer can receive shadows (a shadow will show up on that layer when it is cast by another layer) but not cast shadows.
To change this and make your layers actually cast shadows, you’ll need to look at the “Material Options” for the layer. These are found below the “Transform” properties in the timeline window. The first option is “Casts Shadows.” In the same category are options for “Accepts Shadows” and “Accepts Lights,” both of which are “On” by default and both of which you can probably leave that way – unless you specifically want a layer to not be affected by the lights in your scene.
There are other areas you can adjust in the Material Options – shininess, diffusion, and more. While these parameters can be fun to play with, don’t be surprised if they don’t make a dramatic difference; many of these properties (like “Specular Intensity”) are most apparent on curved surfaces – and 3D layers in After Effects are flat. I generally don’t do much with the Material Options besides enable or disable shadows.
Illuminate Things!
Now that you know what the different kinds of lights can do, use them creatively to add an extra layer of interest to your compositions. Remember that almost every parameter – color, intensity, position, point of interest, etc. – can be keyframed. Also remember that lights, like cameras, only affect 3D layers in After Effects; nothing will show up until you click on that little 3D box icon for the layer in the timeline window. Have fun!
So far, we’ve used After Effects for 2D motion graphics and animation work. After Effects can also be used for 3D work – although there are some caveats. After Effects is not designed to do 3D graphics work in the same way that programs like Maya, Cinema4D, and Blender are. You can’t create detailed 3D models or complex environments in After Effects. However, you can move 2D assets into the third dimension – and create some unique and dynamic results.
This week, we’ll be creating a simple 3D scene. Download the images at this link if you’d like some media to play with.
From 2D to 3D
You may have noticed a series of symbols at the top of the timeline window, next to the Layer Name column. If you can’t see them, toggle the view options at the bottom-left of the timeline window. These symbols represent different properties that can be turned on or off for each layer. For example, the symbol that looks like a strip of film toggles frame interpolation, which is only applicable to video layers. The box we want to use looks like a little wireframe cube. This switches layers from 2D to 3D.
Clicking on this box will probably not make an immediate change to the way your composition looks. However, if you look at the Transform options for that layer in the timeline, you’ll see that the possibilities have expanded greatly.
Position, for example, was formerly defined by two numbers – a value on the X (horizontal) and Y (vertical) axis. In other words, that layer could formerly move up-and-down and side-to-side. With the 3D box checked, a third number has been added – we can now move forwards and backwards on the Z (depth) axis. The anchor point value has also gone from two variables to three. Rotation was previously described by a single number, but now objects can be rotated three ways. There is also a new “Orientation” value, which provides another set of rotation values. Scale has gained a third number as well, although the new Z-scale value won’t generally affect 2D layers.
3D Rotation
Let’s look at the rotation values first. X Rotation spins an object around a horizontal axis, Y Rotation spins around the vertical axis, and Z Rotation spins around the depth axis (2D layers can only spin around the Z axis, so X and Y are the new options). The best way to understand how these work is just to take some time playing with the values. Remember that layers rotate around their anchor points. So, if you want an object to swing open like a door, you’ll need to move the anchor point to the side of the object and keyframe the Y Rotation. If you don’t change the anchor point, the object will spin around its own midpoint.
X, Y, and Z Rotation each have their own section under the Transform properties. The Orientation section combines all three into a single keyframe-able value with three numbers. I tend to use the individual Rotation values more than Orientation, but they both do the same thing.
It is possible to work with both 2D and 3D layers in the same composition, but they don’t really “interact” with each other. If you rotate a 3D object so that it intersects with another 3D object, one will be “clipped” by the other. A 2D object will simply float in front of or behind a 3D object, depending on its layer position in the timeline.
3D Position
When you click on a 3D layer, you will probably notice a new icon appear in the composition window. This icon is comprised of a green, red, and blue arrow, centered on the anchor point of the layer. You can click and drag on the green, red, and blue arrows to move an object along the X, Y, and Z axis, respectively. You can also change these values using the three numbers that now appear next to “Position” in the layer’s transform properties in the timeline window.
Entering a positive value for the Z position (the third number) will push the layer further away; entering a negative value will pull the layer forward in 3D space. This may be somewhat counter-intuitive, so take some time to familiarize yourself with it. To create a very simple 3D scene, you might enter a positive Z position value for the background layer, a negative Z position value for the foreground layer, and 0.0 for the Z position value of the middle layer. As these layers get moved along the Z axis, their size will appear to change. You can compensate for this by adjusting the scale.
This can give us a nicely layered composition, but so far, we haven’t done anything we couldn’t do by adjusting the scale and position of 2D layers. For example, you can make an object appear to move closer by increasing its scale. So why use 3D position? One reason is that it can be difficult to estimate the way that scale and position should correspond. The other reason has to do with perspective and an effect that we can achieve only by using 3D layers – but for that technique, we’ll need a virtual camera.
A Virtual 3D Space
In our 2D work, we used the After Effects composition window sort of like a collage board; flat layers were placed on top of each other, rearranged, and adjusted. When we switch layers from 2D to 3D, that collage board becomes more like a shadow box; objects can move forward and backward in space. Our perspective on the shadow box hasn’t really changed, though – our view is fixed. By adding a camera to the scene, we can change our perspective and even move into the scene itself, going from a shadow box to a complete virtual environment.
To create a camera, go the the Layer dropdown menu at the top of the screen and choose New>Camera…. This will bring up a dialog box with lots of options. You can dig into these values and customize your virtual camera as much as you like, but I’d recommend leaving most settings at their defaults, at least to get started. The one thing you may want to adjust is the Preset, which has a handful of simulated lens options. These act just like lenses on real cameras: wider lenses (lower numbers) have a larger field of view and Z axis movement will be exaggerated. Longer lenses (higher numbers) have a narrower field of view and Z axis movement will be compressed. If you aren’t sure what to use, either the 35mm or 50mm presets are generally safe, middle-of-the-road options.
After you create your camera, you may notice an immediate difference in the scale of the objects in your composition. This is because of the aforementioned properties of the lens on your virtual camera. If you tip down the triangle next to the name of your camera layer in the timeline, you will see Transform properties and Camera Options. The Camera Options section contains a ton of variables to play with – you can define the virtual depth-of-field, the shape of the simulated iris, the size of the aperture, and much more.
Turning Depth of Field “on” is probably the setting that will give you the most interesting results. Depth of field describes how much of an image is in focus. If a scene has a deep depth of field, lots of things at various distances from the camera will be in focus. If a scene has a shallow depth of field, only a narrow sliver of the scene will be in focus.
If you have some experience with photography, those basic principles will help you as you define things like focal length and depth of field in the virtual cameras that After Effects uses. For example, you may be aware that a lens with a large aperture produces images with a shallower depth of field than a lens with a small aperture. Increasing the Aperture value in After Effects (which is measured in pixels) will therefore give you a more blurred out background when the Depth of Field toggle is enabled. For reference, the Aperture in the image above is around 400 pixels and the lens is 50mm. If this is unfamiliar to you, you may just have to experiment with the controls a bit to get the results you are looking for.
Moving the Camera
The Transform options control camera movement. You can keyframe the rotation along all three axis, either individually or using the Orientation. The position works the same as other 3D layers, but there is also a keyframe-able Point of Interest property. This is the point that the camera is aimed at; so, for example, if you keyframe the camera’s position along the X axis, but don’t adjust the Point of Interest, the camera will move from one side to the other while remaining aimed at the center of the screen. You can get some cool results this way, so take some time to play around.
In addition to the control options in the timeline window, you can adjust your camera using a section of tools in the toolbar at the top of the screen. The default option is the “Unified Camera Tool” (which looks vaguely like a movie camera), but there are several to try out if you prefer more “hands-on” control.
If you’re having a hard time visualizing how exactly your camera is moving, it can be helpful to change the view setting of your composition window. At the bottom of the window is a dropdown menu that, by default, reads “Active Camera.” Clicking this will give you different options for viewing your composition in 3D space. In particular, Custom Views 1, 2, and 3 are helpful for seeing how your camera is positioned and where it is pointed. Note that you may need to toggle the background visibility on or off (the checkerboard icon next to the view setting) and/or zoom out your view to see what’s going on clearly. Just switch back to “Active Camera” when you’re done.
There are many more things to explore when it comes to 3D work in After Effects. You can create different kinds of virtual lights, control the way simulated shadows are cast, affect how shiny or matte objects are, and so on. For now, though, just get used to moving objects in 3D space and operating a virtual camera – it will open up a whole new world of creative possibilities.
For the last several weeks, we’ve focused on the technical abilities of After Effects as an animation platform. Now, let’s take a step back and look at the animation process in general. Live-action films have a fairly straightforward workflow: a project is scripted and planned, then filmed, then edited. The editor has a large role in shaping the tone, pacing, and narrative qualities of a film – they choose the best takes and camera angles, define the length of shots, experiment with overall structure, and much more. However, animators don’t generally produce much, if any “extra” footage – there aren’t multiple takes or camera angles to choose from. So what is the role of an editor in animation?
As discussed in the following short documentary from The Royal Ocean Film Society, the editor on an animated project is actually a collaborator in the filmmaking process much earlier than a live-action editor is. Because animation is, by its very nature, tedious and time-consuming, you absolutely don’t want to waste time and money by creating shots that you aren’t going to use. On a live set, changing camera lenses, adjusting blocking, or trying something new with the lighting is relatively simple. When in doubt, you can film something multiple ways and then choose the best approach in post-production. Animators don’t usually have that luxury – they need to know the best approach before they start the animation process.
Even on short animated projects, planning is of the utmost importance. I generally start by writing a general outline, then some very crude sketches. From there, I draw more detailed storyboards, which I refine until I’m happy with the flow of the piece. Depending on the complexity of the sequence you’re working on, you may want to go a step further and create an animated version of your storyboards (known as an “animatic”). You should only begin animating once you have a clear plan and know that the shots will work together.
To illustrate the animation process, I decided to put together a 60-second short film. As you work on your own projects, think about what shots you need to animate, what puppets (and different versions of those puppets) will need to be created, and how to organize your workflow in general. There is room for improvisation and experimentation in animation – After Effects in particular makes it easy to move or alter keyframes, modify puppets, and much more. That being said, you need to be as organized and well-planned as possible. The more work you do at the beginning of the process, the easier the later stages will be.
Characters and Props
I had some characters already made up from an older project that I decided to reuse, which saved a lot of time. The characters were created in Adobe Illustrator. When I was creating these characters, my idea was to keep them simple and friendly-looking, with lots of rounded shapes and a limited color palette. In addition to the owl and bear, I knew I wanted my piece to include a firefly, but I planned on creating that directly within After Effects.
I also had a tree already created that I was able to use for this project. I modified it slightly, by adding a hollow, and made a side view by changing the shape of the trunk and deleting some branches.
I often find the process of creating characters, sets, and props to be the most time-consuming part of the an animated project — even more than the animation itself. For this reason, I’m always careful to keep anything I create so that I can potentially reuse it in the future. I actually have a folder in my Google Drive full of old Illustrator and Photoshop files, so that I can pull things up quickly wherever I am.
Storyboards
Before I sketched out my storyboards, I had the general idea of the piece figured out: a bear chases a firefly through the woods, the firefly goes into the hollow of a tree, and the bear is startled by an owl when he goes to investigate. The bear freaks out, but the owl is friendly and the fireflies follow him out. They all have a happy little moment together.
This is a very simple “story” – there is no dialog, the characters have very obvious motivations, and the actions are easy to understand. This is what I think of as a “one gag” film – a short film in which only one thing happens. In this case: a bear gets startled by a friendly owl. I like projects like these because they force you to focus on the basic essentials of animation and storytelling.
I did some very quick and sloppy storyboards for this project. This is such a helpful step, especially in terms of figuring out angles and perspectives. While the storyboards are a great tool, they do not necessarily dictate what everything will look like in the final version. The huge benefit of computer-based animation (like what we do in After Effects) is that it is still possible to make basic changes as you go. In hand-drawn animation and stop-motion, this is much more difficult.
Animation
I imported the tree and the owl and bear puppets, then got the puppets rigged for animation. For the firefly, I just created a little green circle and applied the Glow effect to it. I then began animating them against a plain black background.
For this project, I skipped around a little, but mostly animated in order – shot one first, then shot two, and so on. This is completely a personal preference, but working like this allows me to make sure that each shot flows nicely with the next one. As I did the rough animation for each shot, I placed that shot’s composition into a larger composition so that I could see how the piece was coming together as a whole. My general process is to start with basic movement, then add finer details, then refine the timing, and then to polish things up with final touches such as simulated camera movement or adding filters and effects. For a few shots, I added a blur to either the background or a pre-composed puppet, to give the illusion of depth-of-field.
As I roughed out the animation, I made some alterations to places in the storyboard that I felt could be improved. One of the first changes I made was to add more fireflies. My storyboards only showed one, but adding a few more made the scenes they were in much more visually interesting. The fireflies were animated using the “wiggle” expression to make them move randomly.
By combining the wiggle with keyframed position animation, I was able to easily move the fireflies around the screen in a way that was organic and unpredictable. Also, because the wiggle expression generates random movement, I could copy and paste the same firefly layer over and over again and get a unique result every time.
Another simple change I made was to adjust the shot of the bear peering into the tree from the side (as seen in the screen shot above). In my original sketch, this was quite a close shot. Looking at everything together, though, I decided that a wide shot would be more interesting. Every shot prior to this one is fairly close, so going to a wider shot provided a some variety and allowed me to show the bear and the tree more fully.
There are a few shots in the piece in which either the bear or owl are seen from behind. I didn’t create specific “rear view” puppets; instead, I simply masked out areas of my existing puppets in After Effects. For example, to create the rear view of the bear, I just covered his face and “tummy patch” with a solid the same color as his fur. If I were working on a longer project with several shots of a character from behind, it would probably be worth it to create a specific puppet. I knew that these shots would be quick and simple to adjust for, however, so making the alterations inside After Effects was the easiest option.
Unexpected Challenges
Random problems arise all the time in animation – with luck, you are able to figure them out as you go. On this project, I had occasional issues using the Puppet Pins tool to deform my bear character. I wanted to bear to have a slightly “squishy” quality, but adding pins sometimes caused the puppet to deform in unexpected ways. I did some experimentation and determined that this was likely caused by either the upscaling of the vector art, the parenting, or the order in which I was applying the pins. In some cases, I reworked the animation to avoid these issues. For others, I decided that the pins were simply causing more trouble than they were worth and decided not to use them. After Effects is a complex program and it doesn’t always behave in the exact way we expect it to. Being flexible enough to work through this is an important skill.
I mentioned previously that I was able to modify the owl and bear puppets directly within After Effects for shots in which they were seen from behind. In the last two shots, I wanted the bear to be cowering down on the ground. I had first planned to use my front view puppet of the bear for these shots, but I just couldn’t get a result that I was happy with. I ultimately decided that it was worth creating an additional puppet of the bear on the ground. This took some extra time, but gave me a result I liked much better.
Backgrounds
Since I was putting this project together quickly, I knew I didn’t have a lot of time to spend creating background images. My initial plan was to create a sort of “greenish blur” that would suggest a woodsy backdrop. It looked too abstract to me, though, so I decided I needed something with more detail.
Next, I found a nice photo online using a Google search. In the search tools are options for finding images that can be reused without violating copyright restrictions. When I tried this image, I had the opposite problem – the background was too detailed for the simple character design. I tried some blurs and filters to soften it a bit, but still wasn’t happy with the result.
To make the image fit in better with the cartoon aesthetic I wanted, I imported it into Illustrator and created a vector image from it. To do this, import the image and go to Object>Image Trace>Make. There are several presets you can choose from, as well as more detailed options in the Image Trace panel. Using Image Trace can time consuming (it may take a few minutes per image), but the result is a vector image with a sort of “posterized” look. Once the image has been converted, it can be scaled up infinitely like other vector art. This scaling gave me the flexibility to get all the background coverage I needed from this single image; I simply zoomed in to different parts of it for different shots.
I think that the vector background fits in much better with the rest of the artwork. If I had more time, however, I would probably create my background from scratch using simpler shapes. This would give me the most flexibility and allow me to layer things in interesting ways.
Audio
The audio tools in After Effects are pretty basic, but they are enough to do a fairly simple audio mix with. You can add keyframes to the levels on any layer with audio, which lets you fade sounds in and out or adjust the overall volume. There are also a handful of audio effects that can be applied. These can be used to do things like add reverb or tweak the bass and treble of a track. Adding the “Stereo Mixer” effect to a layer will allow you to pan audio to the left or right channels. Remember that you can mute tracks by unchecking the box with a speaker icon in the timeline.
For the projects we are working on in this class, these tools should be more than sufficient. If you want to do more advanced audio work, however, I would recommend using a different program. Audacity is free to download and can be used to create sophisticated multi-track mixes. If you subscribe to Adobe’s Creative Cloud service, you have access to Audition, which has powerful tools for filtering, modifying, and repairing audio. Many video editing tools also have solid audio capabilities, so if you are familiar with Premiere Pro or Final Cut Pro, those are good options as well. On the really advanced end of the spectrum are dedicated and complex programs such as Avid’s Pro Tools.
Whatever software you end up using, the most important aspect of sound design is to be conscious of the ways that it alters your film. If you want to create a sense of unease or dread in your short film, try using some dark, droning ambient noise. If you want to make a scene bright and happy, reflect that with your music choices. To make your film seem more exaggerated and “cartoony,” you can add obvious sound effects to your character’s movements – such as a “whoosh” when they turn their head. For a more realistic approach, be more subtle. The options are endless.
Remember that there is a section called RESOURCES linked in the top menu of this website. It contains links to pages where you can download royalty-free music, ambience, and sound effects. I found ambient sounds, effects, and music on the YouTube Audio Library, findsounds.com, and Audio Blocks. I had to do a little hunting around to get sound effects that I liked – for example, the first owl sound I downloaded was a pretty scratchy recording and it sounded out of place with the rest of the piece.
I tried several different sounds for the startled bear. I actually found a few different recordings of bears, but the emotion wasn’t quite right. The sound I eventually ended up using is actually a deer. I went through a few different ambient noises as well – one was too windy, one had too many birds in the background, one had a stream in the background that sounded odd because we never see water in the short.
For music, I initially tried a few classical tracks, since that was my first idea of what might fit well. Classical music felt too “serious,” though, so I kept trying new things. Many music sites organize their tracks by genre and feel, so you can search for something like “humorous rock music” or “eerie classical.” This makes wading through hundreds of pieces of music much easier. In the end, I clicked on the track I used almost by chance. I thought the title – “Root Bear” – sounded funny, like it might be a typo. I gave it a listen and thought it would give the piece some silly charm, so I tried it out.
I actually added audio using Premiere Pro instead of After Effects, since I like that interface better for sound mixing. Everything I did could have been done easily in After Effects, though. In the image below, you can see that I edited the music track (A1) just a bit to make it fit the length of the piece. The ambient sound (A5) goes underneath everything. Tracks A2, A3, and A4 are all for different sound effects.
Putting It All Together
Here’s the finished piece! All together, I spent about a week putting it together, from storyboard to finished animation. If I were going to spend more time on it, I would probably do more work on the backgrounds and further refine the character animation – but every project has aspects that you won’t be completely satisfied with and eventually you need to just move on to something new.
Here are some tips for working on your final projects. Remember, these are due December 7! We’ll do a brief check-in on everyone’s progress next week.
Make a storyboard, even if it’s just stick figures and scribbles. It will help you visualize your project and figure out what puppets, props, and backgrounds you need.
Use lots of compositions in After Effects, rather than trying to create everything in the same composition. I recommend making each shot its own composition, but you may have several pre-composed elements within each larger composition.
Rig your puppet with parenting, anchor points, and/or puppet pins once and save that composition as a reference. You can copy and paste the layers into other compositions – rigging is a tedious process and you don’t want to have to do it more than you need to.
Animate your characters before you worry about the backgrounds too much – if you run out of time, you can always go for a minimalist look with the environment, but you need to have the character animation in place.
Think about ways to animate efficiently. Use cuts, reaction shots, and framing wisely. If something is difficult or problematic to animate, you may be able to work around it.
Add audio last. You may need to make some tweaks to the animation to fit the music or sound effects you choose, but those are generally minor adjustments. It can be fun to experiment with different soundtracks to see how it changes the overall feel of the piece.
Fake It
As I mentioned above, it’s smart to consider how you use framing and editing to streamline the animation process. For example, if animating a full walk or run cycle is feeling overwhelming, you might want to consider some creative ways of “cutting around” those kinds of movements. The fact that your character is moving from one location to another doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to show a full-body walk cycle in all its complexity. Instead, feel free to use editing to hide movements that are too complicated, time-consuming, or confusing to animate.
Here are two shots of a character walking. In the first, the entire body is animated doing a full walk cycle. Note the number of layers that have keyframed animation in the timeline – this character has seventeen body parts all moving in tandem with either their position or rotation (or both) keyframed.
To simplify this walk, we can zoom in on the character so that the legs are no longer visible and animate their position from one side of the screen to the other. This achieves the same basic effect – we see the character walking – but it can be done by animating only three layers. The changing position along with the swinging arms are enough to suggest that the character is walking.
Let’s look at another example. Here is a short film created by Sawyer Owens during the Spring 2017 semester.
You’ll notice that the “fight scene” in this piece is actually just a series of slashes on the screen accompanied by sound effects. Combined with the shots immediately before and after it, it’s clear to the audience what has taken place. Using this kind of stylized approach accomplishes a few things: first, it allowed Sawyer to avoid animating a very complex sequence, which would have been time-consuming and possibly difficult to pull off. However, the greater accomplishment is that this approach really works for the style and tone of animation here. It adds an element of humor (and pays homage to the pieces that inspired it) by having the action take place off-screen.
I want to make it clear that I am not suggesting that you should always take the easy way out when it comes to animation. Animation is always a time-consuming process, though, and the finished piece is more important that its components. If you can achieve the same effect using a quick and simple method or a slow and complex method, why not give yourself a break? Stay true to your vision, but don’t make the process harder than it needs to be.
You can download some files at this link to follow along with the lesson today. For a “classic” walk cycle, I’ve provided a realistically-proportioned puppet in a side view. Depending on your character’s design, you may need to modify the poses used – or your character may not walk at all. A robot character might roll on wheels or a ghost character might float. Regardless, walk cycles are a fundamental skill for character animators, so it’s important to learn the basics.
Walk cycles are also notoriously challenging, so try not to feel discouraged if things don’t look right at first.
Import and Rig Your Character
Now that you (hopefully) have your main character designed and created, you should be ready to import it into After Effects and get it rigged and ready for animation. Remember that you can continue to tweak your character as you go by opening the Illustrator or Photoshop file and making adjustments. However, making major changes that alter the overall shape of your character or modify the layer structure will cause problems for the imported file. In other words, don’t import your puppet until you are generally happy with their design and layout.
If you’ve created your character in Photoshop or Illustrator, remember that you need to change the import settings when you bring in your file. Under “Import As:” select “Composition – Retain Layer Sizes.” Also make sure that the “Sequence” setting (below “Import As:”) is not checked. If you have everything set up correctly, your file will be imported as a new composition with the different layers separated.
We’ve already covered the basics of setting anchor points and parenting for puppets, but let’s quickly review the process. First, use the Pan Behind tool (Y) to move the anchor points to their appropriate locations. If you have a simple puppet, you might just have layers for the arms, legs, body, and head. If you have a more complex puppet, you might have layers for the individual fingers, hands, forearms, upper arms, upper and lower legs, feet, toes, torso, hips, neck, head, facial features, articles of clothing, and more. In either case, remember that the anchor points should be placed at the point around which you want the layer to rotate. The hands rotate at the wrist, the forearms rotate around the elbow, the upper arms rotate at the shoulder, and so on. If you have separate layers for the torso and hips, set their anchor points near the waist of your character.
Once everything has its anchor point placed appropriately, it’s time to parent the layers. Fingers are parented to the hand, hands are parented to forearms, forearms are parented to upper arms, upper arms are parented to the torso, etc. If you have separate torso and hips layers, you can parent the torso to the hips to allow your character to bend at the waist. This will most likely make your hips layer the top parent layer – the “root” layer that everything is ultimately connected to. You could also parent either the hips or both the hips and torso to a null object (Layer>New>Null Object). This will act as a sort of “master control” layer. Null objects can be useful for other layers as well – they can be used to control parts of your puppet that are difficult to select because they are small or are covered by other layers. I often find it helpful to create a null object to control the eyes of a puppet.
As you parent the layers to each other, test them out by rotating them with the rotate tool (W). If something looks wrong, check the location of the anchor point, the overall position of the layer, and the parenting order.
If you planning on animating your character using the puppet pins tool, use it to place deformation pins on the layers of your puppet. The more pins you add, the less each one does, so for very exaggerated elastic movement, only use a few pins – three is a good bet for the “rubber hose” effect on arms and legs. If this is the style of animation you want, place a pin at the shoulder, elbow, and wrist. Adding more pins will create subtler deformation and if you want to limit the influence of a certain pin, you can place additional pins in the areas you want to hold down.
When you have everything anchored, parented, and pinned, take a moment to ensure that your layers are named appropriately. You may also want to color code the various layers by clicking on the small colored square next to the layer name in the timeline panel. Use whatever system makes sense to you – you could make the left leg and left arm layers the same color, for example, or you could give everything a unique color. I like to make whatever the “top” or “master” layer happens to be a nice bright color so that I can find and select it quickly.
Once your puppet is rigged and organized, do not start animating directly within the composition you have imported. Instead, name the layer something like “Character Rig Master” and keep it as a reference. You can duplicate the composition or copy and paste the layers within it into other compositions to actually do your animation. Getting your puppet correctly rigged takes time and you don’t want to have to do it more than once. Since you will probably be using several copies of your puppet throughout your project, it makes sense to keep one composition as a reference that you can copy from.
Creating A Walk Cycle
Now it’s time to tackle one of the most challenging things in character animation – walking. Walking is one of those actions that’s both ubiquitous and surprisingly complicated. When a walk looks wrong, it sticks out noticeably – good walk cycles appear effortless. The way a character walks also tells the audience a lot about their personality, mood, age, and more. It’s an important skill for any character animator to work on. Mastering it takes a lot of practice.
We’ll be creating a walk cycle that can be looped in After Effects. Because it loops, we only need to animate a short section – probably a second or two – but a lot needs to happen in that time and the cycle needs to end exactly where it begins. This is what allows the animation to be played over and over seamlessly.
Animator Alan Becker, whom you may remember from his animated explanations of the twelve basic principles of animation, breaks walk cycles down into four key poses. The two most important poses are “contact” and “passing.” During the contact post, one foot is extended forward and just touching the ground. During passing, that leg goes back and the opposite leg passes it, moving forward. The cycle then repeats with the opposite legs contacting and passing. The other two poses are “down” and “up”, which correspond with the body raising and lowering slightly during the walk. The head is at its lowest point after contact and its highest point after passing. The arms generally swing opposite the legs, so the left arm is forward when the right leg is making contact. However, there is a fair amount of flexibility in how the arms can be animated – for example, they can hang forward listlessly to make the character seem downtrodden.
Using Becker’s technique, you end up with a total of nine poses in a loop: the four poses for the first step (leg A moving in one direction, leg B moving the opposite direction), the four poses for the second step (with the directions of legs A and B reversed), and the final pose which is the same as the first. This will result in a very realistic walk.
This technique can be simplified, however. If we remove the “up” and “down” poses, you end up with a five pose loop: contact and passing for the first step, contact and passing for the second step, and back to the original contact pose. When you animate a walk cycle this way, you may find that you need to raise the puppet a bit on the passing pose – the up and down poses help the feet raise and lower appropriately and removing them can cause the legs to arc downwards. The result is a walk cycle that is less realistic than the nine pose loop, but simpler to animate.
Contact: Right leg forward, heel just hitting the ground. Left leg back, toe about to lift.
Passing: Right leg center, planted. Left leg bent and lifting forward, passing the right.
Contact: Right leg back, toe about to lift. Left leg forward, heel just hitting ground.
Here’s another take on walk cycle animation, by the talented and snarky Ross Plaskow. Plaskow animates using puppet pins, but you should be able to adapt his technique to characters that are animated only using rotation and position keyframes. Plaskow’s walk cycle takes only 16 frames to complete and loops seamlessly. If you would like to download the bear puppet that he uses in the tutorial, you can find a slightly simplified version of it here.
Here are a few tips, if you find yourself feeling frustrated:
Follow Plaskow’s example and rearrange your panels. It’s very helpful to be able to see all the layers in the timeline at once. You can easily switch back to a standard view when you finish the walk cycle.
The arms are easy to animate, so save them for last and start with the legs. Either animate one leg at a time or one pose at a time. Take it slowly.
Don’t neglect the “passing” pose – it’s important. If you skip the passing pose, the legs will sort of “sweep” instead of lifting naturally from one step to another.
Subtle movements carry a lot of weight. It’s easy to overdo things like rotation and the up and down movement of the head.
Try working on a very slow walk cycle – several seconds – and then shrink all your keyframes closer together to speed it up. It’s sometimes easier to work with more space on the timeline, but fast walk cycles generally look better.
Make sure that your puppet is in exactly the same position at the beginning and end of the walk cycle.
Use the work area handles in the timeline to define the length of your walk cycle. You can preview only the work area (on a loop) using the controls in the Preview panel. The 0 (zero) key on the number pad is the keyboard shortcut for this.
Try creating a “floor” using a solid as a point of reference – it can help you visualize where the feet should be hitting. When you are finished, you can delete or hide the layer.
Walk cycles look more believable with lots of overlapping movement. Adding small amounts of animation to the rotation of the torso, the position of the head, the sway of the hands, etc. help sell the overall effect.
Walk cycles usually look terrible until you are about 80% done with the process of animating them. Keep plugging away.
This kind of animation is notoriously challenging – don’t feel frustrated if you don’t get it correct right away.
Making a Loop
A walk cycle is just that – a cycle. That means that it can be looped over and over as much as needed. As long as the first frame of the cycle and the last frame of the cycle are identical, the loop should be seamless. You can loop animation in a few different ways. You could, for example, copy and paste the keyframes over and over again. You could also bring the entire walk cycle composition into another comp and duplicate it. However, there is a much more efficient way of looping animations in After Effects – using expressions.
The first step in creating a looping walk is to isolate the walk cycle itself. In your walk cycle comp, position your work area handles around the walk cycle, if they aren’t already. Right-click on the lighter grey area between the handles and choose “Trim Comp to Work Area.” The composition will shrink down to only the area in the work area, which will probably be less than a second for a walk cycle.
To create a loop of the walk cycle, you’ll need to be working in a different composition. So create a new one (longer than the walk cycle composition) and drag the walk cycle comp into it. Right-click on the walk cycle comp in the timeline and go to Time>Enable Time Remapping. Click it.
A new property called “Time Remap” should appear under the layer name. You should also see a keyframe appear at the beginning and end of the composition. Time Remapping is actually a very powerful property in After Effects – it allows us to speed up or slow down footage, or freeze it completely. It also allows us to create an animation loop using an expression.
The expression we’ll be using loops all of the keyframes for a given property. We’ll be looping the Time Remap property to create an endless walk cycle. However, because of the way that After Effects creates compositions, the last keyframe in a time-remapped composition is actually blank – if you go to the last frame of your walk cycle comp in the timeline, you’ll probably see a blank screen. So, go to the last frame, then go back a frame and press the “create keyframe” button in the timeline (it looks like a blank keyframe and can be found to the left of the layer name in the timeline). Then delete the keyframe at the very end of the comp.
With keyframes at the beginning and end of the walk cycle animation, it’s time to add the expression. We’re going to be adding this expression to the Time Remap property, so alt-click on the stopwatch icon next to “Time Remap.” The expression text window should appear in the timeline, along with the expression controls.
On the left of the timeline, you should see a series of icons next to the words “Expression: Time Remap.” One looks like an equals sign, one looks like a graph, one is the pick whip, and the last one looks like a little “play” symbol – an arrow in a circle. Clicking on this last one brings up a menu with different expressions that can be inserted. Go to Property and select loopOut(type = “cycle”, numKeyframes = 0). It’s about halfway down the list. Click on it and it should be added to the expression in the timeline. Click out of the text window or hit “enter” on the keyboard to exit the text editing mode.
Any keyframes for that property – and there should only be two, one at the beginning and one at the end – should now loop for the length of the layer. Click and drag the end of the layer to make it longer. If you preview the composition, you should see the walk cycle animation looping and the character walking continuously.
Here’s a quick recap of the steps:
Trim the walk cycle comp to the exact length of the cycle.
Drag the trimmed walk cycle comp into a different composition.
Right-click on the walk cycle comp in the new comp and select Time>Enable Time Remapping.
If the last keyframe in the layer is blank, create a keyframe at the last frame of actual walk cycle animation and delete the blank one.
Alt-click on the Time Remap keyframe icon to create an expression.
From the expressions menu, select Property>loopOut(type = “cycle”, numKeyframes = 0). Hit “enter” or click out of the text area.
Extend the walk cycle comp as long as you like.
That may seem like a lot of steps, but it goes quite quickly once you are used to the process. Once you have the expression set up correctly, you can copy the looping walk cycle from one layer to another easily – and make the walk cycle as long as you want. The loop out expression works with other properties as well, so feel free to experiment; if things start to look strange, you can always remove the expression by alt-clicking on the stopwatch icon.
Project 11: Walk This Way
You may not need to use a walk cycle in your final project, but it’s still something you should practice making. For this week’s assignment, finish the walk cycle we worked on together in class and send me a video clip of it looping for five to ten seconds. If you’d like to modify the puppet or add a background, feel free!
Adding keyframes is one way of animating properties in After Effects, but there is another method as well – using expressions. An expression is essentially a line of simple code that is applied to an animatable property. It’s not the same as writing computer code – you don’t need to know any specific programming language, or anything like that – but the idea is similar. To add an expression to a property, alt-click on the stopwatch icon that you usually use to turn keyframes on and off. The value associated with that property will turn red and a box of text will open in the timeline window. That window is where you add the expression.
Probably the simplest kind of expression – and one of the most useful – adopts the value of a property on another layer. For example, you could take the rotation value of one shape and apply it to the rotation of another shape. When you create an expression, four small icons will appear, one of which is the swirly “pick-whip” icon that we previously used to parent layers. If you use the pick-whip to select the rotation property on a different layer and then hit “enter” (or click outside the text box), whatever value is entered for that layer will be used for the layer with the expression.
I realize that may sound confusing, but it’s fairly simple in practice. It means that you can animate a single layer and use it to affect other layers. Simply animate the first layer, then use an expression on the others. Try it out – once you get used to the process, you might find yourself using this particular expression a lot.
One small thing to keep in mind as you are entering expressions: the “enter” and “return” keys do different things. One (enter) closes the text box, the other (return) adds a line to the current expression. You can also close the text box by clicking outside of it in the timeline. If you want to remove an expression, alt-click on the stopwatch icon again and it will return to normal. Expressions can also be used in conjunction with keyframes.
Math
One thing that’s neat about expressions is that they can be easily combined or modified. If, for example, you wanted to use the rotation expression above, but make the layer with the expression rotate the opposite way of the layer it gets linked to, that’s very simple. Just use the pick-whip to select the layer with animation, then type *-1 (multiply by negative one) after the expression in the text box and hit “enter.”
This technique can be very helpful for things like animating a bird flap its wings, since you can animate both wings with one set of keyframes. Furthermore, any changes you make to that set of keyframes will automatically affect both layers.
There are a lot more expressions that you can use to automate all sorts of properties in many different ways. One that you might come across uses the timecode of the composition, often multiplied by a number. If you add an expression to the rotation property of a layer and type time, the layer will rotate to one degree at the one second mark, two degrees at the two second mark, etc.. If you type time*100, it will rotate to 100 degrees at the one second mark, 200 degrees at the two second mark, etc.. This is a simple way to add continuous animation to a property, regardless of the length of the composition.
I animated the gears in the example below without using any keyframes at all. The rotation of the first gear was set using the expression time*20. Every other gear’s rotation was pick-whipped to that first gear, with a multiplier, if necessary. By using some very simple math, I was able to animate the entire scene in such a way that changing the rotation of the first gear accurately changes every other gear.
Get Random
I’ve been using rotation in my examples so far, because it’s an easy property to visualize. Anything that can be keyframed can be affected by an expression, though – opacity, position, scale, and even the individual parameters of effects. One of my favorite expressions, wiggle, applies random values within certain limits. It can be used, among other things, to create unpredictable, organic-seeming movement when applied to the position of a layer.
To add wiggle to the position of a layer, alt-click on the Position keyframe icon in the Transform properties. A text box will open in the timeline – in it, type wiggle, then two numbers in parentheses, separated by a comma. For example: wiggle(2,150). The first number in this expression is the frequency: 2 equates to two times per second. Entering a 3 would be three times per second, and entering .5 would be half a time per second (or once every two seconds). The second number is the amount to move. So, our position expression “wiggle(2,150)” will move an object up to 150 pixels along the X and Y axis, twice per second. If our layer were 3D, it would move on the Z axis as well.
Of course, you don’t always want random movement, but it’s occasionally extremely helpful. I’ve used the wiggle expression to animate everything from fireflies to dials on a car dashboard. You can even apply a wiggle to a virtual camera to simulate the look of handheld footage. Randomness is more powerful than you might initially realize.
Wiggle can also be applied using an animation preset. These are found in the Effects & Presets panel (the same place we found the text animation presets earlier in the semester). If you type “wiggle” into the search bar, you’ll see a few different options there. The wiggle animation presets still use expressions, but they sort of do the coding for you. The presets work in conjunction with the Transform effect (in the Distort category), as opposed to the transform properties in the timeline panel.
Expressions open up a vast new world of possibilities in After Effects. The icon to the right of the pick-whip opens a window that contains dozens of “building blocks” – presets and pieces of expressions that can be combined to make very complex automated effects. Don’t feel like you need to understand what each of these does – instead, just get comfortable applying expressions. Often, online tutorials and trainings will provide expressions for you to copy and past into your own compositions. Like so much of After Effects, once you are familiar with the process, you can figure out the specifics as you go.
Project 10: Expressions of Terror
It’s almost Halloween, so let’s have some spooky fun! I’d like you to use expressions to create a spooky animated scene. You can create the media you use yourself, find some online, or use materials from previous lessons. Whatever you choose, you must use expressions at least three times in your animation. It doesn’t need to be long – maybe ten seconds or so – but make it scary and experiment with expressions!
There isn’t really a right or wrong way to design a character; the kinds of characters you choose to make is ultimately a matter of artistic preference. We can, however, learn a lot by listening to the advice of other artists and animators. In his book Making Comics, Scott McCloud suggests that there are three qualities that a successful character must possess: an inner life, visual distinction, and expressive traits. Without these qualities, a character might be confusing, flat, or – worst of all – forgettable.
A character’s inner life relates to their “unique history, worldview and desires.” This includes a character’s backstory, personality, archetype, and more. Visual distinction means that a character has” a distinct and memorable body, face, and wardrobe.” This has to do with a character’s physical characteristics. Expressive traits are “traits of speech and behavior associated with that character.” A character’s expressive traits are what make them move and speak in a unique and interesting way – this could include posture, body language, facial expressions, and more.
Backstory
In order to be successful, even a very simple character should have a backstory. While you certainly don’t need to know every detail of a character’s life history – McCloud writes that “obsessing too much over such details is a classic beginner’s mistake” – you should certainly have a sense of a character’s personal identity.
Some characters are defined by specific moments in their history. Superhero stories often utilize moments like this – think about the origin stories of Spiderman and Batman. Other characters are defined by their desires – something that motivates them and causes narrative conflict. Every character in The Wizard of Oz has a clear desire that motivates their actions. Still other characters fit into certain archetypes. Star Wars makes great use of archetypal characters: the naive hero beginning a quest, the lovable rogue, the princess, the wise old man, etc. Your characters can be defined by their history, their desires, their archetype, or some combination thereof – the important thing is that you know and understand them.
Shape and Silhouette
Matt Groening, the creator of The Simpsons and Futurama has a theory of good character design that has helped him create some of the most iconic characters in the history of animation. “The secret of designing cartoon characters — and I’m giving away this secret now to all of you out there — is: you make a character that you can tell who it is in silhouette. I learned this from watching Mickey Mouse as a kid. You can tell Mickey Mouse from a mile away…those two big ears. Same thing with Popeye, same thing with Batman. And so, if you look at the Simpsons, they’re all identifiable in silhouette. Bart with the picket fence hair, Marge with the beehive, and Homer with the two little hairs, and all the rest. So…I think about hair quite a lot.”
One way to give a character a distinctive silhouette is by using basic shapes as a starting point. By using a square, circle, or triangle as a starting point, you can give your character a unique look that is easily recognizable. Of course, you can – and should – elaborate on these basic shapes, but they can be a great starting point.
Shapes can also tell the audience a great deal about a character’s personality. Think about Ellie and Carl in the Pixar film Up – everything about Carl is square and blocky, which makes him seem gruff and serious. Ellie is made up of curved lines and circles, so she seems free-spirited and whimsical by comparison.
I’d also suggest using lots of reference images when you’re designing your characters. Don’t feel like you can only draw from your own imagination –there is absolutely nothing wrong with using other images, or even other artists’ characters, as a point of inspiration. Just be sure that you make the finished character your own.
Body Language and Speech
Does your character slouch or stand up straight? Do they fidget? Walk with a limp? Speak with an accent or use particular idioms? These are some of what McCloud calls “expressive traits.” Whereas visual distinction has to do with physical appearance, expressive traits are related to what your character does.
Japanese animation legend Hayao Miyazaki does a masterful job of using physicality to reveal aspects of a character to the audience. In My Neighbor Totoro, older sister Satsuki is graceful and precise while younger sister Mei is comparatively clumsy. The way each character moves tells the audience about their age, personality, and relationship to each other. Satsuki flits across the screen while Mei crashes after her.
McCloud suggests defining key poses or facial expressions for your characters. These are physical cues unique to each character. It could be the way someone cocks their head to the side, or leans against a doorframe, or looks over the tops of their glasses. As the audience gets to know your character, these key actions will become associated with their respective characters and help make them seem more rounded and alive.
You can also use expressive traits to play against a character’s physical appearance. A hulking, brutish looking character could tiptoe fearfully or a meek-looking character could pose heroically. There are endless options.
Designing for Animation
We’re not going to dive too deeply into how to use programs like Photoshop and Illustrator, but there are some things to keep in mind. First, remember the abilities and limitations of After Effects when you are creating your character. We’ll be animating using keyframed transform properties like rotation and position as well as puppet pin deformation. This gives us a lot of flexibility, but it also means that some things are more difficult to animate than others. Wild, elaborate hair, for example and flowing fabric will be challenging to animate in After Effects. That said, you can often find creative solutions to such problems, so don’t sacrifice your vision.
Second, remember to think in layers. When a Photoshop or Illustrator file is imported, we can retain the layer structure. If you want something to move independently, put it on its own layer. As a very general guideline, a good layer breakdown might include the head, facial features, torso, hips, upper and lower arms, hands, upper and lower legs, and feet. The more elaborate and detailed your character is, the more layers you’ll have to create (and eventually animate).
Finally, think about how your character is going to appear in the animation you will eventually be creating. If your character is only ever going to appear from the front, you might only need a frontal view – but if your character is going to be seen from the side, behind, or above, you’ll need to create those views as well. Also think about how closely you’ll be seeing your character on screen. While Illustrator files can be scaled up without distorting, Photoshop files will pixelate if you zoom in too far. If you’re creating your character in Photoshop, make them big enough to be usable, or create multiple versions at different resolutions.
Drawing Inside After Effects
After Effects does not have the same breadth of drawing tools that dedicated programs like Photoshop, Sketchbook, Gimp, or Illustrator do. However, its tools are robust enough to be used in certain situations and animation styles. After Effects’ shape tools allow you to control the path, fill, and stroke of shapes, so it’s fairly easy to create relatively simple characters directly within the program.
There are some distinct benefits to building your puppet within After Effects. For one, since shapes in After Effects are vector-based, they can be scaled up infinitely with no loss in quality. Creating your puppet within After Effects also means that you have one less file to keep track of and you don’t need to “round-trip” between After Effects and another program to make changes. Finally, creating a puppet within After Effects lets you keyframe and control aspects of the character in unique ways; for example, you could keyframe the path of a shape or the thickness of its stroke. That kind of direct control is only possible when creating characters directly within After Effects.
The biggest downside to drawing your puppet within After Effects is that you just don’t have as many options at your disposal. After Effects is not really a drawing program, so its interface and toolset aren’t designed around that purpose. That being said, there is still a lot of latitude within the program and you shouldn’t discount it as a possibility.
If you want to use this method, I’d suggest starting with a sketch and then importing it into After Effects. You can then use the pen and shape tools to trace the sketch in After Effects. Note that you can actually have multiple shapes – with different fills, strokes, and paths – on the same shape layer, which can help keep your composition a bit more manageable. However, every part of your puppet that needs to move independently should be on its own layer.
Talented (and profane) animator Ross Plaskow utilizes this method in some of his animation tutorials.
https://youtu.be/fXL9bVnX8fU
Using Photoshop
Photoshop’s biggest asset is probably its ability to modify and utilize other images. Images can be distorted, manipulated, and combined in very interesting ways. Photoshop also has very advanced drawing tools – if you are an artist with a traditional drawing background, using Photoshop and a pen tablet may be an easy transition for you.
Photoshop is very well suited for creating characters with texture, shading, and rough edges. If you want your character to have a hand-drawn look, Photoshop is probably your best choice. It’s also a great tool for collaging or importing your own artwork. If you aren’t comfortable drawing digitally, one option is to draw your character by hand, scan it, then separate the layers in Photoshop.
Layers are one thing you’ll need to be mindful of regardless of the method you choose to make your character. Think about how you want your character to move and let that dictate the structure of your character. If your character has a long flowing scarf, for instance, that scarf should probably be on its own layer. Other objects that don’t need to move independently (such as the buttons on a character’s jacket) can be combined with other layers.
Another thing you’ll need to consider regardless of your method is the way that layers overlap and interact with each other. In Plaskow’s tutorial above, he mentions that overlapping body parts should have curved ends. This allows two layers – for example, the upper and lower arm, which meet at the elbow – to rotate around each other without creating strange blocky shapes. Of course, if you plan on animating parts of your character using puppet pins, they will be set up differently. Keep the way your character is supposed to move in mind as you draw them out.
One thing you’ll want to be sure of when drawing in Photoshop is that the background behind your character is transparent. By default, Photoshop makes a white base layer, so you may need to delete this.
One nice feature about Photoshop and Illustrator files is that you can turn off the visibility for layers. The layer will still be there when you import the file into After Effects and you can re-enable its visibility. So, if you want to draw multiple mouths or eyes for your character, you can make them in the same Photoshop file and simply hide the layers.
Another nice feature of working in Adobe software is that you can continue to update your file even after it’s imported into After Effects. You need to be careful not to change the overall file structure, but you can continue to make alterations right up until you render your finished video.
Overall, Photoshop is a great tool for puppet creation. The major downside is that the files you create will eventually become pixelated and distorted as you zoom in on them. If you keep this limitation in mind, you can use it to make almost anything.
Using Illustrator
While Illustrator and Photoshop have similar toolsets and interfaces, they “feel” different in practice. You can import still images into Illustrator, just like in Photoshop, but the program is really designed around drawing with curves. You can create gradients and patterns, but you won’t get the same textural results that you do in Photoshop. Characters created in Illustrator tend to have clean lines, uniform colors, and be composed of relatively simple shapes.
When working in Illustrator, you can actually have multiple groups of shapes within each layer. When you import the file in After Effects, only the top-level layers will be recognized, so group your shapes accordingly.
Remember to name your layers as you go. If your puppet has its right eye and left eye on separate layers, name them accordingly. It’s going to be a frustrating process if you import your character into After Effects and see “Layer 1, Layer 2, Layer 2 copy,” etc.
The benefit of using Illustrator is that you have access to a very full-featured tool for creating layered vector artwork – artwork that can be scaled up as much as you want without becoming pixelated. The downside is that most Illustrator art tends to be fairly simplistic in terms of color and shape. If you like a simple aesthetic, however, it’s probably a good choice.
Designing a memorable, well-realized character is challenging, but it can also be a lot of fun. If you find yourself getting stuck, pick a theme or point of inspiration and start elaborating on it. If you give your character a personal history, a unique look with a recognizable silhouette, and a style of movement and speech that fits their personality, your character will come to life in exciting ways.
Project 9: Make A Friend
Your assignment this week is to create the character you’re going to use for your final project. If you haven’t already done so, review the details of the final. Your character may change a bit by the time the final is actually due and that’s fine – but this should serve as your first pass at designing your lead character.
Your character may be human, animal, an inanimate object, or whatever you like. You can create it using Photoshop, Illustrator, directly within After Effects, or by hand. If you choose to draw or paint your character, you should scan it and separate the different layers in Photoshop.
If you aren’t comfortable drawing, you can also create a character by “collaging” in Photoshop – find images of the different parts of your character and assemble them together in the software. If you take this approach, you will probably have to do a lot of erasing and clone-stamping to get everything to fit together. I’d ask that you either heavily modify any source images that you use or use images that are “labeled for reuse” in the search tools of Google Images. You could also take photos yourself.
For some examples, you can either review the files from last week or check out these two skeletons: one created in Illustrator and one created in Photoshop. Your characters do not need to have as many layers and parts as these; again, think about what your character needs to do and how complex it should be.
However you choose to create it, make sure that it is ready to animate next week! Send me an image of your character before class.
Now that we know how to parent objects, pre-compose layers, and adjust anchor points, we can move on to actual character animation. Let’s start with some simple pre-made figures – you can download a few at this link.
A simple puppet might have the figure’s arms, legs, head, and body on different layers. Complex puppets will break down the figure more and more – you might have separate layers for parts of the face, finger segments, clothing, and more. Basically, any part of the figure that you want to animate should be on its own layer.
You can import these layers individually, but After Effects is also very good at playing with files created in other Adobe programs. If you create your puppet in Photoshop or Illustrator, you can import those files with their layer structure intact. When you import an Illustrator or Photoshop file, simply change the Import As drop-down from “Footage” to “Composition – Retain Layer Sizes.” (The “Composition” option will work also, but I find “Retain Layer Sizes” easier to work with.) If you’re using a Photoshop file, another screen may appear with the option to keep or merge your layer styles – I tend to choose “merge.” Once you’ve imported the file, it will appear as its own composition with each layer separated out. If the file appears as a single piece of media instead of a composition, double-check your import settings.
With the puppet imported, you’ll want to begin parenting the different parts together – but first, you should think about each layer’s anchor point. As we discussed previously, a layer’s anchor point is the point around which the layer scales and rotates. Since we’ll be doing most of our animation using the rotation property, the anchor point is important. For example, a hand rotates around the wrist, the forearm rotates around the elbow, and the upper arm rotates around the shoulder. You can use the “pan behind” tool (its icon has four directional arrows in a dashed box – the shortcut is Y) to grab and move anchor points to their appropriate locations.
You can then parent the layers accordingly – in this example, the hand is parented to the forearm, the forearm is parented to the upper arm, and the upper arm is parented to the torso. If you do this correctly, rotating the forearm will also move the hand and rotating the upper arm will move all three. I realize that this is probably difficult to visualize, so take some time to play with parenting and anchor points. Imagine your puppet is a marionette and think about where the hinges should be – that’s where your anchor points go. Once the anchor points have been set and the layers have been parented, you can begin animating the puppet by rotating and moving the layers. Don’t forget to turn keyframes on for any properties you want to animate!
One benefit to creating your puppets in Illustrator (or using shape layers within After Effects) is that the puppet can be scaled up infinitely without losing quality. That’s because Illustrator is a vector-based program, as opposed to something like Photoshop, which uses pixels. To enable this ability (it is turned off by default), you need to check a box in the timeline that looks like a little sun – if you hover your mouse over it, it will say “For vector layer: Continuously Rasterize.” For pixel-based artwork, you will start to lose image quality as you scale up, but you can control how After Effects processes the image using the column next to the sun that looks like a pixelated diagonal line.
Puppet Pins
While animating using the transform properties can achieve very sophisticated results, the animated characters can sometimes look a little stiff. When we watch a cartoon, we are accustomed to seeing things move in “elastic” way: stretching as they build up speed and squashing when they land. We can achieve this effect in After Effects using Puppet Pins.
Set up your character in the same way we went over last time: position the anchor points on the joints, move the layers into position, and parent everything appropriately. Once everything is in place, it’s time to add some pins.
Puppet Pins are a tool for deforming layers. When you add pins to something in After Effects, the program generates a “mesh” over the object. When you move a pin, that mesh shifts and the layer is deformed. If you move a pin too much, you’ll get some funky results; the image will stretch too much and begin to tear. Moving a pin just a bit can give some really interesting results, though.
To start adding pins, select the Puppet Pins tool from the menu bar at the top of the screen – it’s the one that looks like a pushpin. In the timeline, select the layer you want to add pins to, then click on the layer in the composition panel to add a pin. You should see a yellow dot appear where you clicked.
Every pin you add will “pin down” a part of the object. That means that the more pins you add, the smaller the area that each pin will affect. My general rule is to add three pins to each part of the puppet I want to animate in this way. On an arm layer, I might add a pin near the shoulder, one near the elbow, and one near the wrist. On a leg layer, I might add one near the hip, one near the knee, and one near the ankle.
Pins have keyframes turned on by default, so you will add a keyframe every time you move a pin. However, you can still move or rotate the layer itself without adding pin keyframes. I like to add pin keyframes to accentuate movements; for example, I might add pins to a swinging arm to give the movement some elasticity. Note that pins are not affected by parenting layers to each other – they move independently. If you can’t see the pins, you can highlight the layer and click on the Puppet Pins tool again, or find the Puppet section of the layer in the timeline.
Occasionally, your pin may pull the layer apart in an unexpected way. This is usually because the mesh that the tool generates is not covering the entire object. When you have the Puppet Pins tool active, you should see some options next to the tool icon at the top of the screen. Clicking “Show” box next to “Mesh” will reveal the mesh that is being generated to deform the layer. If your mesh is cutting off part of the object, either add triangles or increase the “Expansion” property.
Puppet Pins open up lots of new creative possibilities. Use them to make your animations seem even more alive!
Project 8: Bring a Character to Life
This week, I’d like you to start experimenting with character animation. Download the sample files and create a five to ten second scene with the character (or characters) of your choosing. Try either traditional keyframes, puppet pins, or both. If you want to create your own character, don’t worry – we’ll be covering that next week. As usual, render it as a QuickTime movie using the H.264 codec, upload it to your Google Drive, and send me a download link. Have fun!
There are a lot of effects built into After Effects and countless more can be added using third-party plugins and scripts. While there are far too many to discuss them all individually, I thought it might be useful to take a look at a few of them more closely. Here are a few “must know” effects – and a couple that are just fun to play with.
Curves (Color Correction)
Curves is a simple, but powerful tool that you may already be familiar with if you have experience with photo editing. Curves gives you control over the color information in an image or video by letting you adjust the red, green, blue, and alpha channels, as well as the overall saturation and brightness. You simply choose the channel you want to adjust, then click and drag points on the appropriate line. A small adjustment goes a long way with this effect – dragging a line all the way to the top or bottom of the graph will probably give you pretty bizarre results. If you want a simpler method of color correcting something, there are also effects for Brightness & Contrast and Hue/Saturation in the Color Correction section – but I think Curves gives the most control.
Glow (Stylize)
This is an effect that’s easy to overuse, because it often just makes things look cooler. Adding Glow produces a soft aura around the bright areas of an image. The “Glow Threshold” determines how bright something needs to be for the glow to appear – so to make more of the image glow, you actually set the threshold to a lower percentage. You can also adjust the radius, intensity, and color of the glow to dial in the exact look you are going for.
Gradient Ramp and Fill (Generate)
Both Fill and Gradient Ramp are simple effects that get used a lot. Adding Fill to any layer will cover that layer with the solid color of your choice. So, if you wanted to create a silhouette version of a character you were animating, you could pre-compose the character’s layers and apply a dark grey Fill to the resulting composition. Gradient Ramp does the same thing, but uses either a linear or radial two-color gradient instead of a solid color. You can use Gradient Ramp to quickly add a bit of visual interest to an otherwise plain background. Changing the start and end points of the Gradient Ramp affects where one color stops and another begins.
Fractal Noise (Noise & Grain)
Much like the Gradient Ramp and Fill effects discussed above, adding Fractal Noise to a layer covers that layer completely. However, instead of a simple color or gradient, Fractal Noise creates a complex black and white noise pattern on the layer. Changing the “Fractal Type” will allow you to generate a variety of patterns – some are blocky, some look like smoke, some look like television static. You can adjust the contrast, scale, and more, but the real magic of Fractal Noise comes from animating the “Evolution” property of the effect. This causes the noise to change dynamically, which gives really interesting results. Fractal Noise is a great effect to use when you want to give a project some texture. Create a solid on top of your composition, add the effect, then change the transfer mode and/or opacity of the layer so that it is barely visible – the result can be really striking. Fractal Noise has tons of other potential uses as well; you could use it to simulate smoke or water, create a unique background, or combine it with other effects.
Gaussian Blur, Fast Blur, and Camera Lens Blur (Blur & Sharpen)
There are several blurring effects in After Effects, but I use these three the most. Gaussian Blur and Fast Blur are basically interchangeable – they are simple blur filters that don’t take too long to render. For a long time, Fast Blur was my go-to because it rendered (imagine this) faster, but recent versions of After Effects have improved the speed of Gaussian Blur and moved Fast Blur to the Obsolete category of effects. It still works well, though. For the absolute best results, however, I would recommend Camera Lens Blur. This effect does a much better job of recreating the kind of blur you get from an out-of-focus camera lens; points of light, for example, are rendered more realistically using Camera Lens Blur than Gaussian Blur. The downside of Camera Lens Blur is that it is much more processor-intensive and will slow your computer down more than the other options. One thing to note with all of the blurs is that the edges of the layer you are blurring will soften along with the rest of the image unless you check the “Repeat Edge Pixels” option.
Offset (Distort)
Offset is a very cool effect that can be used for things like endlessly looping backgrounds. When you apply it to a layer, you can keyframe to “Shift Center To” property to scroll through endless copies of that layer. If you do this to a layer that is seamless on either the left and right or top and bottom, you’ll have a nice infinite loop. This is a great way to do something like clouds floating by continuously in the background of your shot.
Audio Waveform (Generate)
This is a neat effect for quickly and easily creating an audio waveform. It should be applied to a solid or other visual layer – not the audio layer itself. Once the effect is applied, you can choose the appropriate audio layer from the first dropdown menu. There are a few different styles to choose from and define the color, size, and position of the waveform. If the waveform is too small or too large, change the “Maximum Height” property.
Shatter (Simulation)
There are several interesting “simulation” effects, but Shatter is one of the most potentially useful. While it doesn’t give you all the control that 3D programs do, the Shatter effect allows you to simulate the process of an object breaking apart. There are presets for glass, bricks, puzzle pieces, and more. When you first apply the effect, the layer you apply it to will be replaced with a wireframe version – change the “View” mode to “Rendered” to see what the effect actually looks like. You can make adjustments to factors like force and simulated gravity to alter the effect. Shatter begins breaking apart a layer from the beginning of that layer, so you’ll have to be thoughtful with how you use it.
Fractal (Generate)
Not to be confused with Fractal Noise, the Fractal effect generates a fractal image using a mathematical formula. Fractals are patterns that can be zoomed into endlessly — the formula will continue to generate new details as you go. Why would you want to generate a fractal in After Effects? I’m honestly not sure, but they look pretty cool. You can change the type of fractal you generate using the “Set Choice” and “Equation” controls, then explore the fractal using the corresponding menus. Try using it when you need a weird abstract background or in conjunction with other effects.
CC Snowfall and CC Rainfall (Simulation)
CC Snowfall and CC Rainfall can be used to quickly add “weather” to a scene. You can dial in settings like the size, opacity, color, and density of the effects as well as playing with forces like wind and random variation. Both effects look pretty good at their default settings, though. Note that by default the effects are composited on top of a layer, so you should either pre-compose your scene and then add the effect to the resulting composition or apply the effect to a solid and uncheck the “Composite With Original” box.
Advanced Lightning (Generate)
Rounding out the weather effects is Advanced Lightning, which is just like regular lightning, but with a way cooler name. In all seriousness, After Effects does a pretty solid job of simulating lighting. There are several different types to choose from and you can define the size, color, and how many “forks” the bolt has. If you want the lightning to crackle, keyframe the “Conductivity State.”
Project 7: Stock Footage Remix
Download this clip; it’s fairly generic stock footage of a woman running through a field in slow motion. For this week’s assignment, I’d like you to take that clip and transform it into something unique. Use effects, transfer modes, track mattes, transform properties, or any of the other tools we’ve covered in class so far to alter the clip. You can duplicate the layer and/or add text solids, shapes, and other media.
The purpose of this assignment is to get you to really dig into the library of effects that After Effects has to offer. You must utilize at least four different effects, but you are encouraged to use more. You can use the ones discussed in this week’s lesson – or find new ones to experiment with. Try a bunch out to see what they do. If an effect doesn’t seem to do anything after you play with its settings, move on to another one – there are a ton to try out. Get creative and have fun with this – make it funny, weird, scary, or some combination thereof! Render the finished clip as an H.264 QuickTime movie and send it my way before next week’s class.
Last week, we went over some of the ways that layers can interact with each other in After Effects, using track mattes and transfer modes. This week’s lesson has a similar theme, as we’ll be combining, affecting, and linking layers in new ways. These techniques will be essential as we begin to work on actual character animation, but they are also extremely helpful when creating motion graphics and text animation.
Adjustment Layers
Adjustment layers are a very cool feature found in After Effects and some video and photo editing programs. Basically, an adjustment layer is a blank layer in the timeline. Any effects that you add to an adjustment layer will be applied to the layers beneath it. Any layers above the adjustment layer will be unaffected. This allows you to quickly apply effects to an entire scene. If, for example, you decide you want your composition to be in black and white, you can add an adjustment layer and apply the “tint” effect to it. Without the adjustment layer, you would have to go to each layer individually and apply the effect.
To create one, go the the Layer drop-down menu at the top of the page and go to New>Adjustment Layer. An adjustment layer the size of your current composition will be created and placed in the timeline. After Effects also lets you modify adjustment layers in interesting ways by using masks. For example, you can use a circular subtract mask on an adjustment layer to create a simple vignette. Note that while adjustment layers have transform properties, modifying those properties does not affect the layers below – only effects are applied.
If you do want to apply things like scale and rotation using an adjustment layer, it is possible, however. In the “Distort” section of the effects, there is one called “Transform.” This is a set of the usual transform properties – anchor point, position, scale, rotation, and opacity – that can be applied as an effect. If you add the transform effect to an adjustment layer, that effect will be applied to the layers below.
Pre-composing
When you create a new composition in After Effects, it appears in the project panel along with the rest of your media – that’s because compositions essentially are pieces of media, just like stills and video files. This means that you can drag one composition into another and then add effects, mask it, or manipulate its transform properties. In fact, it’s quite common to have compositions within compositions within compositions for a complex project.
In addition to dragging one composition into another, you can choose certain layers within an open composition and make a new composition out of them – without ever leaving the timeline you are working in. After Effects calls this “pre-composing.”
To pre-compose media in the timeline, select the desired layers (command-click to choose more than one layer), right-click and select Pre-Compose…. A menu will appear with options for re-naming the new composition (probably a good idea), leaving or moving the “attributes” of the layers (choose to move them), adjusting the length of the new composition (choose to do this), and opening the new composition (not necessary).
Once the layers have been pre-composed, the new composition will appear in the old composition as a single layer. It will also show up as a new composition in the list of project media. If you double-click on the pre-composition, it will open up in the timeline and preview windows. Pre-composing media is a great way to clean up a chaotic composition (sometimes you just have way too many layers in there), as well as a simple method of applying effects and transformations to multiple layers at once.
Parenting
Parenting is a unique feature in After Effects and it’s incredibly powerful. When you parent one layer to another, the “child” layer will be affected by the scale, position, and rotation of the “parent” layer. Parenting does not affect opacity, effects, or masks.
To parent a layer, you use the Parent section of the composition panel. You can either choose the parent layer from the drop-down menu or use the “pick whip” selector next to it (it looks like a little swirl). A parent layer can have multiple child layers connected to it – and a child layer can have its own child layers – but a child layer cannot have multiple parent layers. That probably sounds confusing, but it should quickly make sense once you start playing with it.
Parenting has some very basic and commonplace applications for things like lower thirds and title design. For example, you could parent a text layer to a solid layer, then animate the solid layer sliding into the frame. The text will keep its position relative to the solid and slide in with it. This keeps your animation consistent and means that you only need to keyframe properties on one layer instead of two.
Under the Layer drop-down menu, you can also create a “Null” object (Layer>New>Null Object). Null objects don’t appear to do anything at first, but they are very useful as parent layers. You can parent several child layers to a null and then affect them all simultaneously.
Project 6: Lower Thirds
One thing that After Effects is often used for is the creation of “lower third” graphics. A lower third is a graphic (usually located in the bottom third of the frame) that contains text information about the subject of the video. Lower thirds are most often used in interview and documentary footage where the viewer needs to know the name and/or other information of whoever is on screen.
This week, you’ll be creating a lower third graphic. Download one of the videos above and create a lower third for that person. Here are the parameters:
The lower third should be on screen for between five and ten seconds.
The graphic should animate on to and off of the screen. This can be done using opacity, movement, or anything else you like.
There should be two lines of text: one of your subject’s name and one of their job or title. Make something up!
This is a good opportunity to practice and combine the various skills and techniques we’ve been going over – track mattes, effects, easing keyframes, etc.. If you would like some additional generic footage to use, here are some slow motion clips. You are also free to find footage or still images on your own. Render the video at 1920 x 1080 resolution using the H.264 codec and send me a download link!
Most of the media you add to your composition can have three kinds of properties: masks, effects, and transform properties. You should be familiar with transform properties by now; they are the most basic keyframe-able properties of a piece of media, such as scale, position, and rotation. Masks allow you to cut unwanted areas out of a piece of media. Effects are used to modify the media in countless different ways. These three properties – masks, effects, and transform properties – are always applied in the same order: masks first, then effects, then transform properties.
You’ll find the mask tools up at the top of the screen in the tool bar. There are preset mask shapes (hold-click to see the various options) and a pen tool for custom shapes. Be sure to select the layer you want to mask in the timeline panel before clicking on a mask tool.
After you add a mask to an object (with either a shape tool or the pen tool), it will appear as a property of that layer in the timeline panel. Next to the name of the mask, you’ll find a dropdown menu – the default value should be “Add.” This means that the mask is “adding” that area and discarding everything else. If you change this to “Subtract,” the area of the mask will be taken away and everything else will remain. Choosing “None” will make the mask have no effect. There are several other options as well, but add and subtract masks are what you will use most of the time.
There are a number of options for further modifying the mask, which are available by clicking the triangle to the left of the mask’s name. Feather fades the edges; Opacity changes the transparency; and Expansion allows you to grow or shrink the mask.
Mask Path is the shape of the mask and by turning keyframes on for that property, you can animate that shape. When the mask path keyframes are activated, you can move the points that define the mask or adjust their bezier curves. If you click on the word “Shape…”, you can automatically change the mask to an ellipse or rectangle.
Shapes can be animated in a very similar way. If look at the properties of a shape in the timeline, you’ll see a new category called “Contents.” Under the shape’s name, you’ll find keyframe-able properties related to path, stroke, fill, and transform. “Path” allows you to animate the shape of the shape, just like the shape of the mask can be animated. Stroke and fill control the color of the shape and the color and thickness of its border. Transform is a second set of transform controls, applied before the regular transform properties. There are a few extra properties in these new transform controls; they are related to the skew, or distortion, of the shape.
Effects
There are many effects built in to After Effects and countless more that can be added using plugins. The effects are organized into categories under the Effects dropdown and in the Effects panel, which has a useful search bar. Clicking on a piece of media in a composition and then choosing an effect in either location will add that effect and should bring up the Effect Controls panel. The effect will also appear in the layer information of the composition in the timeline.
The list of effects can be found in two places. The top dropdown menu has an Effects section with all the effects grouped into categories. Simply go to the effect you want and click on it – it will be added to the selected layer. There is also an “Effects & Presets” panel (you may need to find it using the Window menu). This panel contains the same categories as the dropdown menu, but it also contains a search bar. So if you know the name of the effect you want, just start typing it into the search bar and all the possible matches will appear.
When you add an effect, that effect will appear in the “Effects” section of the layer’s properties in the timeline (under “Masks” and before “Transform”) and in the Effect Controls panel. The Effect Controls panel is best for getting your effect dialed in exactly like you want it – many effects have specialized controls and elaborate options. The timeline window is best for refining and manipulating any keyframes that you add to your effects. Remember that you can show all the keyframes that have been added to a layer by pressing the U key.
Text
In addition to media that you import, you can create layers to add to your composition from within After Effects. The most common are solids and text layers. To create one, go to the Layers dropdown menu at the top of the screen, select New, and choose Solid or Text. When you create a new solid, you’ll see a menu with options for name, size, and color.
You can create text in a composition either by selecting the text tool (Cmd+T on Mac, Ctrl+T on PC) or choosing Layer>New>Text from the top dropdown menu. You can either draw a box for the text in the composition window or just click somewhere and start typing. You can also double-click on the layer in the timeline window to begin editing the text.
The “Character” panel in After Effects contains all the usual options for modifying text, as well as some unique controls. You can change the typeface, size, fill color, stroke, and style; but you can also adjust the kerning and line spacing, add a faux bold or italics, switch to all-caps or small-caps, put text in sub- or super-script, and more. You can highlight just part of your text and modify its properties separately. There is a different “Paragraph” panel for adjusting the justification.
There are two text-related tools in the toolbar: one for horizontal text (this is what you’ll use most of the time) and one for vertical text. What if you want your text to run along a specific path, however? This can be achieved using the masking tools. With your text layer highlighted, choose either the pen tool or a mask tool and draw a mask or path. If you are using the pen tool (which is what I’d recommend), you do not need to close the path – you can simply create a line for the text to run across.
With your path drawn, click down to the “Text” section of the text layer in the timeline and find the “Path Options” section. Next to “Path,” you should see a small dropdown menu – it will say “None” by default. Open that menu and choose the path you’ve drawn – your text will snap to the path. Some options for adjusting the position of the text on the path will also appear.
Transfer Modes and Track Mattes
Those of you with Photoshop experience may be familiar with transfer modes. A layer’s transfer mode affects the way it interacts with the layers below it. There is a “Mode” section of the timeline where this can be adjusted. You may need to hit the “Toggle Switches/Modes” button at the bottom of the panel for it to become visible.
By default, the transfer mode should be set to “Normal.” There are too many options to go through individually, but they are grouped together into sections. The section with “Darken” at the top uses the dark areas of the layer to affect what is visible; the section with “Add” at the top uses the light areas. You should experiment with the transfer modes to see how layers affect each other – you can get some really interesting results with them.
Next to the transfer modes are options for “Track Mattes.” A track matte tells a layer to look at the layer above it for certain properties. The “Alpha Matte” and “Alpha Inverted Matte” are particularly useful. For example, if you put a text layer above a video layer and then set the track matte of the video to Alpha Matte, the video layer will have the shape of the text layer. Alpha Inverted Matte will cut out the shape of the text.
Animate Text
As you can see, there are many ways of manipulating text in After Effects. However, there is a whole other category that we haven’t yet discussed: animation presets. There are actually animation presets for all sorts of things, but the text presets are particularly fun. To use them, you’ll need to go to the Effects & Presets panel; *Animation Presets is the first option.
Within the Animation Presets category, you’ll see several subcategories. Go down to Text and open it up. There, you’ll see many more subcategories such as Animate In and Animate Out, Graphical, Mechanical, Organic, and lots more. Animate In and Animate Out do just that – they automatically animate the text moving on or off of the screen.
The other categories of animation presets add things like movement, graphical elements, or light effects to text. For example, the Flicker Exposure effect in the Lights and Optical category makes each character in a text layer randomly flicker. This is a fairly simple effect, but it would be very tedious to create it manually; the animation presets make it simple.
Many animation presets can be manually customized after they are applied. To do this, go back to the “Text” section of the text layer in the timeline – there should be a new section called “Animator” followed by a brief description. You can dig through the animator options to alter the animation preset, or highlight and delete it to remove it.
Project 5: Word Mark
By now, you should be able to add media to a composition, keyframe various properties with precision, use masks and transfer modes, and manipulate text. I’d like you to combine these skills to create an animated “word mark” – essentially, an animated text-based logo. Think about creating something that you’d like to use to identify your work, like the logos that play at the beginning of movies.
It can be your name, a brand name of your own creation, or any name you’d like to use as a personal identifier – but it must contain text. If you’d like some media to use, here is some generic slow motion stock footage – although you are welcome to use any footage or other media you like.
Your finished graphic should be under 10 seconds long, feature some sort of text element, and be rendered as a QuickTime movie using the H.264 codec. If the resulting file is small enough, email it to me directly – otherwise, upload it to your Google Drive and send me a download link.
This week, we’re going to dig deeper into After Effects – specifically, keyframes. In the previous lesson, we discussed how to add objects to a composition and keyframe their basic properties, such as position, scale, and rotation. That lets us do a lot, but to make animation really seem alive, we need to move beyond the basics. Before we get started, let’s review some of the principles of animation, as explained by Alan Becker.
Slow In, Slow Out
The ability to keyframe and animate properties is probably After Effects’ most powerful feature; however, that animation may look a little stiff and unnatural at first. For example, if you use two “normal” keyframes to move a shape across a composition, the shape will begin moving abruptly, travel at a constant speed, and then stop abruptly. Sometimes, this is the desired effect, but it’s not how things usually move in the real world. Fortunately, After Effects makes it simple to make animation more natural and dynamic.
By default, keyframes in the timeline are diamond-shaped. This is a standard “linear” keyframe. If you right-click on a keyframe and move down to the “Keyframe Assistant,” you’ll see three “Easy Ease” options: Easy Ease, Easy Ease In, and Easy Ease Out. Easy Ease Out “eases out” a property, meaning it will start slowly and then build up speed. Easy Ease In “eases in” a property, meaning it starts fast and then slows down. Easy Ease is used for keyframes where you want a property to start fast, slow down, then pick up speed again. When you choose one of these options, the shape of the keyframe will change: Easy Ease Out is an arrow pointing left, Easy Ease In is an arrow pointing right, and Easy Ease is basically the other two icons combined.
Easy Ease sounds complicated, but it should quickly make sense once you start playing with it. It’s really an essential tool in After Effects; it makes animated properties – especially movement – seem much more natural. If you’re having a hard time with it, my general rule is this: use Easy Ease Out on the first keyframe in an animation, Easy Ease In on the last keyframe, and Easy Ease on the keyframes in between. If you aren’t sure what to use, the regular Easy Ease is probably your best bet.
If you want to switch back to a standard linear keyframe, you can command click on it and its shape will change. If it turns into a circular shape, command click on it again, until it is back to a diamond.
Here is the same piece of animation, first with regular keyframes, then with eased keyframes:
Changing the Position Path
As we discussed last week, many transform properties can be manipulated either in the timeline or within the composition window. For example, if you animate an object’s position in the timeline, you should see those keyframes appear as a path in the composition window. The keyframes themselves are little squares and the dots along the path represent individual frames. You can get a sense of how fast or slow movement is happening based on how close together the dots on the path are.
From within the composition window, position keyframes can be moved just by clicking and dragging. If you click on a keyframe, you will also see curve controls. These can also be clicked and dragged to change the position path of a moving object. If you alt/option click, you can move the curve controls individually. If you select the pen tool (G) and click on a keyframe, it will remove all curves from that part of the path.
Manipulating keyframes using Easy Ease and curves can help make your animations feel more natural and fluid. Be sure to experiment with these techniques – and remember to consider the basic principles of animation.
Layer Trimming
One very basic action that we haven’t covered yet is the editing of a layer’s in and out-points. By default, the entire length of a piece of media is dragged down into a composition and you may have noticed that there is no razor blade tool in the After Effects toolbar. Instead, to trim the beginning of a layer, move the playhead to the desired in-point and hit option [. Option ] will set the end point. (Use alt on a PC.) You can also click and drag on the ends of layers in a composition.
If you don’t hold down option, the [ and ] keys will move the layer without trimming it. [ will move a layer so that its in-point is at the playhead location. ] will move a layer so that it’s out-point is at the playhead. These shortcuts allow you to adjust the length and position of layers in the timeline very quickly, once you’re accustomed to using them.
When you’re moving or trimming layers, it’s obviously important to have your playhead exactly where you want it in the timeline. You can use the spacebar to play or move the playhead by clicking and dragging it with the mouse. For precision, you can use page up and page down to move frame-by-frame forwards and backwards. This is different from Premiere, which utilizes the arrow keys to move the playhead; in After Effects, the arrow keys adjust the position of the highlighted layer. If you hold shift and press page up or page down, you will move the playhead ten frames instead of one.
You will also probably need to duplicate layers fairly often in After Effects. This can be done by copy/pasting, but you can also use the Cmd+D keyboard shortcut. You can actually use Cmd+D to duplicate all sorts of things in After Effects: shapes, text, entire compositions, and even effects.
One last note about layers: if you double click on a layer in the timeline, it will open that layer in a panel over the composition preview window. This is actually not where you usually want to work, so if you accidentally double click on something, close the layer panel or click back to the composition preview window.
Timeline Length
When you create a new composition, you are asked to define its length. If you need to change the length of the composition, you can do so by going to Composition>Composition Settings… or using the Cmd+K keyboard shortcut. Changing the duration in the composition settings window that appears will either add or subtract time from the end of the composition. However, you can also trim the composition down from within the timeline panel.
At the beginning and end of the timeline, you’ll find blue handles – these define the “work area.” (There are actually two sets of blue handles – the smaller ones can be used to zoom the view of the timeline in and out.) You can think of the work area handles as After Effects’ equivalent of an in and out point. If you drag the work area handles to the section of the timeline you want to keep, then right-click on the lighter area directly between them, you’ll see a few options appear. Select “Trim Comp to Work Area” to remove everything outside the handles and shorten the length of the composition.
Project 4: The Bouncing Ball
You may have noticed that a bouncing ball is used a lot in lessons about animation. That’s because it’s a simple action that clearly and concisely illustrates the basic principles of motion – and animation.
For your next project, download two or more of the graphics below. Your goal is to create a short animation that shows the properties of the kinds of balls you choose. A golf ball should bounce higher than a bowling ball; a football will ricochet differently than a tennis ball will; air resistance will affect a beach ball more than a soccer ball – you get the idea. You can use solids or shape layers to create surfaces for the balls to interact with.
Here are the specific parameters:
Create a composition using the HDTV 1080 24 preset. It should be between three and five seconds long, although you may go longer if you want to get elaborate.
Animate at least two different kinds of balls. They should interact with their environment in some way, such as bouncing off the floor.
Export your finished video as a Quicktime movie, using the H.264 codec.
If you finished video is small enough to email, send it to me directly. Otherwise, you may need to upload it to your Google Drive and send me a download link.
It’s time to dive into After Effects. As we explore the program, consider the things we’ve discussed so far – like cartoon representation and the twelve basic principles of animation – and try to incorporate them into your projects.
After Effects is designed around creating media, often using assets created in programs like Illustrator and Photoshop. After Effects is the perfect application for building animated titles and lower thirds, is a powerful tool for character animation, and can be used for compositing and special effects work. It is often used in concert with other programs to create sophisticated video content.
After Effects is also deeply customizable. There are countless plugins and presets available for After Effects that can completely alter the capabilities of the program. These run the gamut from manipulating 3D models to automated text animation to particle effects and everything in between. Websites like aescripts and Video Copilot are fantastic resources for adding functionality to the application. Larger companies like Red Giant and GenArts make more sophisticated — and often expensive — add-ons for even more advanced professional-grade work. However, even without external plugins, After Effects is an incredibly powerful platform for media creation.
Setting Up A Project
When you open up After Effects, you’ll likely see a splash graphic with the usual options for starting a new project or opening an existing one. After Effects does not require you to set a project location or save before you start working. I’d recommend keeping everything organized in a central folder, sorting your media by type, and saving frequently.
A quick word on the layout of the After Effects workspace: like all current Adobe software, After Effects has a flexible, adaptable layout that you can – and should – modify depending on your current needs. There are a number of preset layouts, which are accessible under the Window>Workspace dropdown menu. If you are moving panels around and lose something important, you can always reset the workspace by going to Window>Workspace>Reset to saved layout. The Window dropdown also contains a list of every available panel, so if you can’t see or can’t find a specific area, you can choose it from that list. The panels you will probably use the most include the Project, Composition, Timeline, Effect Controls, and Preview panes. If you are editing text, you may want the Character, Paragraph, and Align panels open. If you are working with lots of effects, having the searchable Effects & Presets panel up will be helpful. If you find a layout you like, you can save it under the Window dropdown. Don’t be afraid to move, resize, open, and close panels – you can always reset them later.
In After Effects, you’ll be working in compositions. You can create a new composition by hitting Cmd+N, selecting “New Composition” from the Composition dropdown menu, or by clicking the icon that looks like a scene inside a filmstrip at the bottom of the Project panel. You’ll be greeted with a menu that gives you options for resolution, frame rate, and the duration of the composition. There are several presets to choose from and they are actually pretty helpful. For this class, use the HDTV 1080 24 preset.
Hitting “OK” will open up a new blank composition. You’ll be dragging media into the Timeline and your work will be visible in the Composition panel. There are no pre-determined audio or video “tracks” in the Timeline window; pieces of media simply stack on top of each other. Every video or audio clip, still, adjustment layer, text, and shape appears as its own layer in the Timeline. You can also drag one composition into another or put footage into a “pre-composition”. You can rename media in either the Timeline or the Project panel by highlighting something and hitting return.
To get media into After Effects, you’ll need to import it. You can import all kinds of things – stills, video, music, 3D files, even other After Effects projects – by going to File>Import>File… in the top dropdown menu, hitting Cmd+I, or just dragging things from the Finder into the project window.
You can also create pieces of media such as solids and shapes to use within After Effects. A solid is a simple block of color. Go to Layer>New>Solid… or hit Cmd+Y to define the color and size of the solid, then hit “OK” to create it. It will automatically appear in the timeline of whatever composition you are working on. To create shapes, use the masking tools (discussed below) without selecting a layer in the timeline. In other words, simply select a mask or pen tool and begin to draw in the composition window. If do you have a layer selected, that layer will be masked instead of drawing a shape – we’ll go into this in greater detail later.
Tools
If you’re using the “standard” layout, you should see a bar of tools across the top left section of the screen. These are what we’ll be using to interface with After Effects, so it’s essential to know what they do.
From the left, the first tool is the arrow selection tool. This is what you’ll be using most of the time. Its keyboard shortcut is V.
Next is the hand tool, which moves your view around in the composition window. You can press H to select the hand tool or you can hold the space bar down to switch from your current tool to the hand tool. This is the quickest way to move around your composition.
Next is the zoom tool, which looks like a magnifying glass. The zoom tool is pretty self-explanatory: it zooms your view of the composition window in; hold alt/option to zoom out. This is useful, but a faster way of zooming is by using the scroll wheel on your mouse: scrolling up zooms in and scrolling down zooms out. There are also zoom controls in the bottom left corner of the composition window.
The circular arrow is the rotation tool, which can be selected using the W key. This rotates media in the composition window. Next to the rotation tool is a dropdown menu with several tools related to virtual cameras – we’ll discuss those later in the semester when we go over 3D compositions.
Next to the camera tools is an incredibly useful tool that looks like four arrows in a dashed-line box. This is the pan behind tool and you can select it using Y. The pan behind tool is used to change the anchor point of a piece of media without moving the object itself. This will prove very helpful when we begin to do character animation.
Next to the pan behind tool is a dropdown menu with tools for either creating different kinds of masks or different shapes (Q). Then there are the pen tools (G) which can also be used to create masks or shapes. The horizontal and vertical text tools are next (Cmd+T).
We won’t be using the next few tools very often, but they are: the brush tool, the clone stamp tool, and the roto brush tool. The last tool, which looks like a push pin, is the puppet pin tool (Cmd+P on a Mac, Ctrl+P on a PC), which we’ll use for character animation.
Transform Properties
Let’s manipulate some media in After Effects. The timeline is where you to modify properties like scale, opacity, and position. On the left side of each piece of media (or layer) is an arrow that can be tipped down. Clicking it will reveal three categories of properties that can be adjusted: masks (if any have been added), effects (if any have been added), and a section called “Transform.” These categories always appear – and are applied – in this specific order: first, masks are applied, then effects, then transform properties. If your media includes audio, that section will appear last.
Clicking “Transform” will reveal the following properties: anchor point, position, scale, rotation, and opacity. Most of these are self-explanatory, although “anchor point” can be a little confusing. The anchor point is basically the central point in an image or video and changing the anchor point changes the way an object rotates and scales.
You will be adjusting the transform properties a lot when using After Effects, so it’s helpful to know their keyboard shortcuts:
A – anchor point
P – position
S – scale
R – rotation
T – opacity
You’ll notice that next to every transform property – in fact, next to almost everything – is a stopwatch icon. This icon turns keyframes on and off. Setting keyframes allows you to animate a property over time. By default, keyframes are switched off – you can tell because the stopwatch icon is greyed-out. Clicking the icon will turn keyframes on and a new keyframe will be set every time an adjustment is made to that property.
Whenever you add a keyframe to an effect or transform property, that keyframe will appear as a diamond shape on the timeline. Keyframes can be moved, copied and pasted, or deleted right on the timeline. A group of keyframes can be scaled up or down by selecting them with the mouse, then holding alt while clicking and dragging a keyframe at the end of the group. You may need to experiment to see just how this works, but After Effects is designed to make adding and modifying keyframes very easy. As a result, you can animate properties with very precise control.
To see all the keyframes on a layer, highlight that layer in the timeline and press the U key. I use this particular shortcut constantly.
Exporting Using the Render Queue
The best way to export in After Effects is using the Render Queue. The Render Queue exists as a panel in After Effects – it may show up as a tab next to the compositions in the timeline (otherwise, you can always find it under the Window dropdown at the top of the screen).
To add a composition to the Render Queue, open the composition in the timeline, then go to Composition>Add to Render Queue. The name of the composition should then appear in the Render Queue panel. Before you hit the “Render” button, you’ll need to set a few parameters. Unless something has been changed, everything in the Render Settings section should be fine at the default values. The Output Module is where you actually make changes to the file type and codec, so click on that to bring up a window with lots of options. For our purposes, just click on “Format Options…” and change the video codec to H.264. Click OK to close each window. Finally, set the file’s name and destination by clicking on the text next to “Output To:”.
What’s great about the Render Queue is that, if you are working on multiple compositions, you can add them all, then render them together. Just repeat the process of adding them to the queue and adjusting their settings, then hit Render.
Project 3: Transform Properties
For this week’s project, I’d like you to go through the process of creating a composition in After Effects, adding keyframes to the transform properties, and rendering the finished video. Make a new composition using the HDTV 1080 24 preset; it should be between five and ten seconds in length. Add at least three different pieces of media to the composition and keyframe at least one transform property on each piece of media. The media you use can include solids, text, or photos and videos that you import into After Effects – if you want to find some images to use with Google, that’s completely fine.
Once you’ve created your short animation, export it using the instructions above. Export using the QuickTime format and H.264 codec. For the name of the exported file, use your name and “project 3.” Email the finished project to me at dan014@bucknell.edu before class next week.
This project is all about getting used to working in After Effects, so don’t worry too much about creating an animated masterpiece. However, it is important that you pay close attention to your composition and export settings – you’ll lose points if something is in the wrong format. As always, be creative and have fun!
We know that animation is made up of deliberately composed frames, but how do those frames end up on the screen? There are currently three basic techniques used for “capturing” animation, with a few outliers and overlaps.
The first technique is frame-by-frame animation. In frame-by-frame animation, an animator creates each frame individually. This is the oldest technique and, potentially, the most time-consuming. Hand-drawn or cel-based animation is a done frame-by-frame, as is stop-motion. Since each frame is being created, frame-rate is a major consideration for frame-by-frame work. Animation being done at 24 frames-per-second requires twice as many frames to be created as animation done at 12 frames-per-second.
By its very nature, frame-by-frame animation is the most exacting and precise technique used. Every aspect of frame-by-frame animation is controlled by the animator. Hand-drawn animation (such as “classic” Disney films) and stop-motion are the most obvious examples of frame-by-frame animation. In frame-by-frame animation, the animator has to have a good sense of timing, physics, and movement – and how those factors translate into individual static frames. In a way, frame-by-frame animators have to operate in two different states of time simultaneously. The work of animation is done between the frames.
https://youtu.be/EgvfVusJS2k
The second technique is keyframe animation, which evolved from the frame-by-frame technique. In keyframe animation, an animator defines the “key” moments in a sequence and software fills in the blanks. If, for example, we were animating a spaceship moving from one side of the frame to another over two seconds, frame-by-frame animation would require us to create up to 48 individual frames (depending on the frame rate being used). Keyframe animation might only require us to create two frames – the start point and the end point – and animation software would fill in the rest.
That sounds like a huge time savings – and it can be! – but keyframe animation can also be incredibly involved. Keyframing works well for setting start points and end points, but often animation involved multiple things moving at different rhythms simultaneously. For example, a person walking is moving almost every part of their body – upper and lower arms, upper and lower legs, hands, head, hips, torso – and all of those parts need to be keyframed separately in a way that appears seamless and natural.
The third technique is motion capture. This is the newest animation technique and the one that requires the most specialized knowledge and software. In motion capture, an actor wears a special suit (or make up, for facial motion capture) covered with reflective dots that can be tracked by software. As the actor moves, a camera interprets the movement of the dots and applies them to the movement of an animated character. Sometimes this is done after the fact and sometimes it is done instantaneously.
Because motion capture is created using “real world” movement, it can be used to create animation that is realistic and subtle. Motion capture is often used in the special effects industry, where believability is of the utmost importance. It is also commonly used to create animation for video games.
The biggest benefits of motion capture are speed, realism, and the ability to improvise. A motion capture actor can collaborate in the animation process – keyframe and frame-by-frame techniques rely solely on the animator. The downside of motion capture is that it can introduce too much realism – or, perhaps, the wrong kind of realism – into the animation process. When we watch something that we know is animated, we accept (and even anticipate) a certain level of exaggeration and a certain level of simplification. This relates back to our discussion of “iconic” imagery. Animation that looks nearly real, but seems just slightly “off” can be incredibly distracting. The industry term for this phenomenon is the “uncanny valley.” Animated films like The Polar Express have been criticized for looking too real to be cartoons and too cartoony to be real. The uncanny valley refers to this disconnect with regard to both visual representation and movement.
While these three categories of animation might initially seem distinct and clearly defined, they often overlap with each other. For example, keyframe or frame-by-frame techniques are often used to tweak and refine motion captured animation. Frame-by-frame animation is often started by a “key” animator, who only draws the keyframes. This work is then passed off to “in-between” animators, who fill in the gaps, essentially acting like human animation software. There are also some techniques that defy easy categorization. Marionette or puppet-based films are not truly animated, but they fit the definition of iconic cartoon representation. Rotoscoping, a technique wherein live-action photography is covered with cartoon art, falls somewhere motion capture and the other techniques. There are also still-image-based films (also called “diaporamas”) that are composed of frames in sequence, but do not give the illusion of movement.
The 12 Principles
As mentioned earlier, one reason that the so-called “uncanny valley” is a problem is that we don’t expect animated things to move in a completely realistic way. Of course, the effectiveness of animation is determined by more than realism. The best guide for how movement should be animated probably comes from two former Disney animators named Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas in their book Illusion of Life. Johnston and Thomas defined twelve “basic principles” that animators should master. They are as follows:
Squash and Stretch – The idea that the shape of objects and characters is flexible and determined by their movement. The classic example is of a rubber ball elongating as it falls and squishing down as it hits the ground.
Anticipation – This is a small action that precedes a larger one, such as when you duck down slightly before jumping.
Staging – This deals with the way a scene is arranged. Ideally, it should direct the viewer’s attention in a clear way.
Straight Ahead Action andPose To Pose – Essentially, this is the difference between frame-by-frame (straight ahead) and keyframe (pose to pose) animation.
Follow Through and Overlapping Action – These two techniques help animation seem more natural. In follow through, moving objects tend to keep moving past their destination because of inertia; for example, your arm keeps swinging after you throw a baseball. Overlapping action is the movement of multiple objects or body parts simultaneously, but at different rhythms or speeds.
Slow In and Slow Out: generally, objects in motion don’t move at a steady rate. Instead, they accelerate or decelerate depending on a number of factors. Slow in and slow out can tell the viewer a lot about an object’s weight, mass, and speed.
Arc – Things very rarely move in perfectly straight lines – most action follows an arc trajectory. A thrown ball will move in a rounder or flatter arc depending on its speed. Walking is composed of small arcs from step to step.
Secondary Action – This is a smaller action added by the animator to emphasize a bigger one. Things like facial expressions and hand gestures are often used as secondary actions.
Timing – In its simplest terms, timing describes how long animated actions take to occur. Johnston and Thomas are specifically referring to the number of frames an action takes and how manipulating that number can change the meaning of that action.
Exaggeration – The amount of exaggeration in animation is largely determined by the level of realism in the work. Often, exaggeration is used for comedic effect in animation.
Solid Drawing – In two-dimensional animation, the animator should consider how the character or object would exist in three-dimensional space. This helps give things mass, weight, and balance. Without solid drawing, things tend to appear flat and floaty.
Appeal – This relates to character design. Animated characters should be pleasing to look at. This doesn’t necessarily mean that they must by physically attractive, but they should be interesting to the eye. Exaggerating proportions and playing with shape is a good way to do this.
Keep in mind that Johnston and Thomas’s principles are just that – principles, not hard-and-fast rules. Squash and stretch or exaggeration can be used to varying degrees to make a piece more realistic or more cartoony. The principle of solid drawing could be ignored to make a piece deliberately surreal. Whether you follow the principles closely or purposely break them, the most important thing is that you understand and consider them as you move forward with your own animated projects.
Project 2: Frame By Frame
For your first animation assignment, I’d like you to create something without the use of a computer. It can be done using stop-motion puppetry, paper cut-outs, collage, drawing on paper, drawing with chalk or a white board, or another “hands-on” technique. Create at least five seconds of animation at a minimum average of 12 frames-per-second (in other words, you must create at least 60 frames). Plan it out in advance and, as you work, keep the basic principles of animation in mind.
The easiest way to capture your animation is probably using your phone. There are a number of free apps for creating animation; I’d suggest Stop Motion Studio, which is available for both Android and iPhone. Stop Motion Studio allows you to take photos within the app and choose the frame rate at which they play back. If you’d rather hand draw your animation, that’s fine too. There is a cool app called Animation Desk that allows you to draw frames within the program. Both apps are fairly intuitive and there are lots of resources online if you get stuck.
If you decide to do stop motion, one challenge is going to be keeping your phone steady as you work. You may want to consider securing your phone to a stable surface using rubber bands, tape, or clay. Even just leaning your phone up against something can help a lot. You will probably have to do some problem-solving and improvising to make things work – have fun and get creative! There are also a limited number of phone mounts and small tripods in the equipment collection. The library Equipment Services may have options as well.
Animating frame-by-frame like this is time-consuming and difficult to master. Don’t get discouraged! Seeing animation that you’ve created with your own hands come to life is incredibly rewarding. The goal here is to get a better understanding of things like motion, speed, and timing.
When your animation is finished, export the video and email it to me at dan014@bucknell.edu. If your file happens to be too big to email, drop it in your Google Drive storage and send me a link. Happy animating!
To study animation, I believe that it’s important to understand two central aspects of the form: one is technical and the other is aesthetic. The technical aspect of animation deals with the mechanics of its creation – how animation, in it various forms, is made. The aesthetic aspect of animation examines the unique qualities of animation as a medium, as opposed to other forms (such as live-action cinema, photography, and literature). Put simply, these two aspects comprise how animation works and what animation can do as a medium.
To get started, let’s get some very basic definitions out of the way. At its most basic, animation is the illusion of movement created by viewing a series of images in rapid succession. The base element of animation – the frame – is not meant to be viewed individually, but as part of a larger whole. This means that a flip book is animated, since the images therein are viewed sequentially, but a comic book is not, since the panels that make it up are considered individually.
The root of the word “animate” translates roughly to “instill with life” – processes within the brain breathe movement into static images when they are viewed one-after-another at high speed. This illusion is commonly referred to as “persistence of vision,” which is technically incorrect, but has a nice poetic ring to it. By definition, all film and video – live action or otherwise – is animated, since all film is made up of individual frames that have the illusion of movement when played together. To avoid confusion and adhere to the common usage of the word, we’ll limit our definition of the term to works that use representative art instead of photography.
However, it’s vital to appreciate how intertwined “cartoon” animation and live action cinema really are. While animation is often dismissed as a childish offshoot of “real” film, on a technical level, live-action cinema is actually a subcategory of animation.
The Evolution of Animation
Animation is old. It can be traced back to the very inception of cinema and beyond – potentially, much further beyond. With an open mind and a bit of imagination, you can connect animation to the dawn of art and civilization itself. In the beautifully preserved cave paintings in Chauvet Cave (located in southern France) you can find horses and bison drawn with extra limbs and lions that seem to rush forward. Some scholars have theorized that prehistoric people would have seen the illusion of movement in these images, watching them through the flickering light of a cave fire. They are estimated to date between 32,000 and 30,000 B.C.E.
There are several other examples of pre-cinema animation from through human history. An Iranian bowl dating from around 3,000 B.C.E. shows a goat leaping into a tree in multiple “frames.” Some Egyptian hieroglyphics show sequential movement and the multiple limbs in DaVinci’s Vitruvian Man imply movement in the same way that the paintings in Chauvet Cave do.
In the roughly 300 years before the birth of cinema, the precursors of animation took the form of toys and curiousities, such as the magic lantern, thaumatrope, zoetrope, flip book, and praxinoscope. Eadweard Muybridge’s famous photographic studies of galloping horses were another milestone – more explicitly than ever before, they divided fluid movement into static frames.
In 1892, (a year before Edison invented the kinetoscope and two years before the Lumiere brothers invented the cinematograph) Charles-Émile Reynaud debuted the Théâtre Optique in Paris. Reynaud showed a series of short films, each comprised of 300 to 700 painted frames of animation. These frames were strung together into what was essentially a filmstrip and projected using a magic lantern.
The development of motion picture cameras brought animation to a state that more closely resembles its current form. The Humorous Phases of Funny Faces (1906) by J. Stuart Blackton is often cited as one of the earliest examples, although Emile Cohl’s Fantasmagorie (1908) captures animated movement in a much more sophisticated manner. The brilliant illustrator Winsor McCay debuted his Gertie the Dinosaur cartoons in 1914. McCay even incorporated himself into the action, interacting with the animated Gertie in a well-timed theatrical performance.
It’s believed that the first feature-length animated film was the 1917 Argentinian political satire El Apóstol, which was tragically lost when fire destroyed the only known print. The oldest surviving animated feature is the 1922 film The Adventures of Prince Achmed by Lotte Reiniger. Reiniger painstakingly created the film using intricate paper cutouts. The resulting film was then hand-tinted, creating a striking aesthetic.
The evolution of animation throughout the twentieth century includes too many milestones to list here. A few highlights include:
The rise of Disney in the late 1920s, with Steamboat Willie
The “golden age” of American animation (including the work of Warner Brothers, MGM, Fleischer Studios, and Disney) from the 1930s through the 1950
The explosion of animated television programs beginning in the 1960s
Pioneers like Ralph Bakshi in the 1970s and 1980s, who pushed animation into more adult territory
Pixar’s groundbreaking work in the 1980s and 1990s in the world of computer animation, most significantly with the release of Toy Story in 1995.
Of course this is only a brief – and admittedly U.S.-centric – overview. Animation has branched out into styles and techniques too varied to cover and you can find fascinating examples from every corner of the globe. Notably, in Japan, animation has a position of cultural importance that is difficult to overstate – but that goes far beyond the scope of what we can cover here. There are simply too many rabbit holes to follow.
With that caveat in place, here are a few video essays exploring the work of a few very different animators: Chuck Jones, Brad Bird, John Kricfalusi, and Satoshi Kon.
The Language of Symbols
What do you see below?
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A face? A human face tied to a specific emotion? Why would something so simple call to mind something as complex as a human being experiencing the concept of happiness? This is the sort of question that pertains to all visual art, of course, but something about the illusion of life in animation makes it seem especially relevant.
I’m going to borrow pretty heavily from Scott McCloud and his excellent Understanding Comicsfor this discussion. McCloud is obviously focused on comics, but a lot of what he writes about is applicable to animation as well. In his chapter “The Vocabulary of Comics,” McCloud spends a lot of time talking about what he calls icons and how the level of visual realism they carry imbues them with different qualities.
McCloud argues that cartoon icons – simplified visual representations of real-world things – contain a unique power. For one, the generalization present in cartoon representation allows the viewer to project themselves into the character. McCloud ties this to the fascination that children have with animated characters.
Another power of cartoon representation lies in its ability to magnify certain qualities of the character or thing being shown. Because cartoons use fewer elements (details, shading, realistic proportions, etc.), the elements that are present become incredibly potent.
In the following images, the idea of nervousness or fear is shown with decreasing realism. While the photograph is potent, it’s also complex and specific. The stick figure (which is from Don Hertzfeldt’s Billy’s Balloon) conveys a similar emotion with far greater economy – and, potentially, more power. Just as an exercise, consider this: the last time a movie made you really emotional, was it live-action or animated?
To close, here are a few clips from short films by Don Hertzfeldt, one of my favorite animators. His work appears simple at a glance, but the animation is meticulously drawn and his work manages to be simultaneously absurd, tragic, and hilarious. I think the Hertzfeldt’s work exemplifies the kind of iconic power that animation possesses.
Project 1: Watch This
I think that it’s really important to watch lots of animation if you’re going to create animation. For your first assignment, I’d like you to watch an animated short film. There are lots of channels dedicated to animation on YouTube and Vimeo; you could also try a site like Cartoon Hangover, Cartoon Brew, or Short of the Week. There are endless options, just find something interesting. It can be any length, just keep it under 20 minutes. It must be available to watch (legally) online.
Once you’ve found your short film, write a few sentences about why you think it’s interesting. How does the animator use imagery and sound? Are any clever editing techniques being used? Are the characters iconic or more realistic? Just write up a brief analysis of the film and email it to me (dan014@bucknell.edu) with a link to the film itself. Send them to me by next Thursday morning at the latest, so that I can review the films and post them online before class.
Parallel: These are rays of light cast in a certain direction. Parallel lights behave similarly to outdoor sunlight and can cast shadows. By default, parallel lights do not “fall off”, so it does not matter how close or far they are from the things they illuminate. Changing the Point of Interest on a parallel light will change the direction it casts light in.
I animated the gears in the example below without using any keyframes at all. The rotation of the first gear was set using the expression time*20. Every other gear’s rotation was pick-whipped to that first gear, with a multiplier, if necessary. By using some very simple math, I was able to animate the entire scene in such a way that changing the rotation of the first gear accurately changes every other gear.
