Animation Basics in 14 Minutes (6 Big ideas for beginners)

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hi welcome to animation for anyone my

name's Alex today's lesson is a bit of a

crash course in animation we'll start

with how animation works and then I'll

share with you the six ideas that I

think are the most important to

understand when you first start

animating and after that I want to show

you my thought process how we can use

multiple animation ideas at the same

time let's jump in I think the easiest

way to understand how animation is

working is by looking at a flip book if

you're anything like me you might have

made little animation flip books out of

your exercise books at school you draw a

picture and then a slightly different

picture and you keep going until you

flip through your pages and see your

pictures move this is how pretty much

all animation Works recreate still

images and play them back quickly to

create the illusion of motion if you've

never tried it maybe spend a few minutes

now it's pretty fun flip books are a

good way to visualize animation but

they're a little bit hard to demonstrate

the ideas I want to explore today so

instead I'm going to use a coin and

capture the visuals digitally that lets

me play back the animation at a constant

predictable speed of 24 frames per

second in future videos I'll show you

how to do this but for now we're really

just looking at the ideas behind the

animation and how to plan out the

movement so if I want to animate this

coin moving from one side of the piece

of paper to the other I take a picture

of it move it a little and then take

another picture and then keep going

until I get to the other side

now when I play the images back it feels

as though the coin is moving across the

screen looking at it though I think it

feels a bit weird I think the most

important question you can ask yourself

while you're animating is how does this

motion feel this is my guiding principle

while I animate all of the fundamentals

we talk about today and in future

lessons really come back to this one

question so if I ask myself how does

this motion

feel I'd probably describe it as bupy or

jittery let's look at why that might be

happening below the coin I've

Illustrated the exact spacing of each of

the

frames you can see that it's not very

even there are frames that are really

close together and there are frames that

are really far apart from each other and

that's because I've not been very

deliberate about how far I move the coin

each

time so if this motion feels jumpy or

jittery now I think we could make the

motion feel a bit smoother by making the

spacing between the coins a little bit

more

even now that I've evened up the spacing

you can see that the coin moves a little

bit more consistently across the screen

there's no more jumpiness at the moment

the coin moves across the screen in 1

second or 24 pictures let's see what

happens if I move it across the screen

in less time I think we can see two

really clear things here the coin moves

much faster and the spacing between the

coin is much larger than before let's

see what happens if if we make the coin

take longer to cross the

screen okay I think that the results

here are pretty clear as well the coin

feels like it's moving more slowly and

the spacing between the coin is much

closer than before so this is the first

big idea in animation I wanted to show

you things feel fast when they're far

apart and slow when they're closer

together so if I ask myself now how does

this motion feel I'd say smooth or

consistent but maybe a little unnatural

the coin starts moving suddenly and then

stops moving suddenly so if we wanted to

make a more natural feeling the coin

could start moving slowly speed up in

the middle and then slow down at the end

we start slow by having the coins closer

together and then gradually get further

and further apart and then we slow the

coin down by making the spacing closer

and closer until we come to a

stop I think that's starting to feel a

bit more natural for this next step I'm

going to Loop the animation so that the

coin travels from the left of the screen

to the right and then back again using

the exact same spacing for this next

step I'm going to exaggerate the

speeding up and slowing down a little

you can see that the spacing changed so

the parts that were close together

before are even closer together now and

the parts that were far apart are even

further

apart let's see what happens if we

exaggerate it even

more you can see now it feels a bit more

lively or zippy

we don't always have to start slow and

finish slow either here's an example of

how changing the acceleration can

entirely change the way the motion feels

in this example I have a coin that

slowly speeds up gets really fast and

then changes Direction suddenly this

gives us a kind of bouncy feeling one

thing that I think is quite important to

mention at this point is that these

motions all feel quite different but

they have the exact same timing they all

take 24 frames to get from one side of

the screen to the other all of the

difference in the way that they feel

comes from the amount of space we put

between the

frames so this is the second big idea I

wanted to show you if we want to make

things slow down or speed up we

gradually get closer and closer together

or further and further apart from each

other this is called acceleration and

deceleration some people call it easing

or you can just call it speeding up and

slowing down so far all of our animation

has been done using a coin which doesn't

change shape I'm going to start using a

cutout piece of paper so that we can

change the shape as we animate in this

first example I'm going to take the

fastest frame of animation and stretch

the frame out a little this changes the

feeling of the animation I think it

feels a little less rigid maybe more

Zippy more

lively let's try changing the shape

again but this time we'll squash it I

think the best example to demonstrate

squash would be our bouncy animation

I'll start by stretching out the frame

where we're moving the fastest and then

squash it where we change direction this

is going to make it feel a little bit

more like a bouncing

ball squash and stretch is the third big

idea I wanted to share with you it's

great for adding a little bit of life to

your animation and making it feel less

rigid it also really helps the audience

understand what the object is made of

this coin doesn't squash or stretch as

it bounces so it feels quite hard

whereas a rubber ball might squash and

stretch Heap

which is what makes it feel rubbery and

stretchy so that's three big Ideas

covered and I've got three more I want

to show you the first is

anticipation anticipation is a really

important part of animation but it's

something that's easy to forget about

when you're first starting out

anticipation does two key things it

builds up energy and it also gives the

audience an indication that something's

about to happen which really helps with

Clarity when I think of anticipation I

think of a spring it builds up energy in

One Direction and then releases it all

at once in the opposite

direction you might like to think of

someone jumping before they jump up in

the air they often move down to build

tension in their body this downwards

motion is the anticipation in this

example I have a ball that moves quite

suddenly and then slows down to make it

feel more natural I could add a little

bit of squash to anticipate the movement

this makes it feel like we're building

up energy and releasing it all at once

once the fifth idea I'd like to talk

about is overshoot overshoot is like a

mirror image to anticipation imagine you

have a really big movement go too far

and then bounce back overshoot helps add

weight or springiness to your animation

in this example I've added a double

overshoot to the ball as it Springs back

into

place you might have noticed that all of

our motion so far has been along a

straight line the last idea I'd like to

talk about today is

arcs things in nature don't usually

follow a perfectly straight line more

often than not natural movements follow

some sort of Arc arcs tend to add flow

to your

Motion in this example I've taken our

coin and rather than moving it directly

across the page I've swung it down like

a pendulum this gives it an entirely

different

feeling okay so those are the six big

Ideas I wanted to talk about today let's

have a bit of a recap our first idea was

about speed if we make things closer

together they move more slowly and if we

make them further apart they move more

quickly our second idea is about spacing

and acceleration if we gradually get

closer and closer together or further

and further apart things feel like

they're slowing down or getting

faster the third idea is about squash

and stretch and how using it can add a

bit of life to your motion and also give

the audience a sense of what your your

objects are made of the fourth idea is

about adding anticipation to your motion

this will help build up energy and

sometimes add Clarity our fifth idea is

overshoot this is where we let objects

bounce back after a big movement and our

sixth idea is about arcs this is where

we decide if we want our motion to

follow a straight line or a more natural

flowing Arc through space so the

question is how do we use all of these

ideas at the same time if you're working

on an animation you can ask yourself how

does this motion feel the answer could

be anywhere from it's great I love it to

could be better or it could just be this

feels wrong if your answer is anything

other than great I love it you can use

these ideas to start asking questions

that will help improve your animation

does the speed feel right should we

change the spacing to adjust the

acceleration should we be using some

squash or stretch or maybe we need some

anticipation are the arcs working well

or do we need some overshoot to help

sell the weight I'm going to walk

through a simple animation now and use

these questions to help push our

animation to the great I love it part of

the graph

here so for this animation I'm trying to

make a ball jump in the air and land on

the other side of the

screen let's just move the ball upwards

upwards upwards and then come back down

again it takes 1 second or 24 frames to

get to that point and let's play back at

full speed

now if I ask myself how does this motion

feel I'd say not that great it feels

unnatural it feels stiff it doesn't have

any weight to it so this is where we can

start asking those questions and apply

those animation ideas that we've been

talking about I'll start with the most

obvious thing to me at least I think

this motion could use an arc if I

imagine a cannibal flying through the

air I don't imagine a straight line up

and a straight line down I picture more

of an arc this is because it's being

affected by gravity so let's add an arc

to this

motion okay so I think that's starting

to feel better straight

away let's see what other ideas we can

start working into this animation I

think we could use some squash to create

an anticipation so it feels like the

ball is building up energy before the

jump I think that we could exaggerate

the acceleration by using a couple of

frames of stretch in the fastest part of

the motion and we could also use a bit

of squash to create an overshoot when

the ball lands this will give it a bit

more weight and make it feel a bit more

springy okay I think that's looking even

better it's a totally usable piece of

Animation but if I ask myself one more

time how does this motion feel I'd say

it falls into this area

here so if I look at these ideas again I

can think about which ideas I could

exaggerate even more I think that we

could push the anticipation even further

so it feels like it's shaking and

building up energy just before it jumps

I think that I could fine-tune the

spacing a little bit more so that the

acceleration is clearer as it leaves the

ground and I think that I could

exaggerate the overshoot even more by

adding a stretch frame this means that

it'll have a kind of double overshoot

making it feel really

springy and this is the final

result I think that it's got a lot more

energy and personality now and that's it

six of the biggest ideas in animation

and how to start applying them to any

animation you want to make thanks for

sticking with me now for some homework

choose an animation medium it could be

anything from a flipbook to a program

that you're learning and take one of the

six ideas we've talked about here today

like anticipation or arcs and create a

short animation based on that maybe 1 to

2 seconds long then take a different

idea maybe squash or stretch and create

a second animation once again 1 to 2

seconds long and lastly create a short

animation that uses both of these ideas

at the same time hopefully you've

enjoyed this crash course we'll be

looking at these individual ideas and

many more in future episodes see you

next time

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