How to Make Animation Tip# 1: Thumbnail Story Reel

 Click on the link below to get to YouTube.

https://youtu.be/iWW6uYy_0Ys

I’m developing my second Snuffy & Zoey cartoon and documenting my progress with a series of videos showing the stage of production I’m currently at. Titled “Animation Tip #1: Thumbnail Story Reel” shows how I start the entire production process by scanning thumbnail storyboard panels and creating a basic story reel with sound and music.

How To Draw Like An Animator

My latest YouTube video is now published! Hope you like it, and if you do, please leave a comment on YouTube!

Old School Pencil + New School Tools

I've been working on simple action cycles that are entertaining to watch and play with...as in a mobile video game. I created this clip of simulated game play, using a combination of old school and digital methods...animating with pencil on paper, then scanning the drawings into ToonBoom Studio for color and assembly.

Click on the video below to watch it. 

Nelvana Seminar Notes (circa 1981): Part Three

These are the third and final set of notes from my Nelvana seminar. Please remember that I was asked to explain my personal method of animating (and the Frank and Ollie tomb "Illusion of Life" had not yet been published). We were all youngsters, experimenting on our own and trying to learn from each other.

The third seminar session consisted of answering questions that were handed in by animators a week after the first two sessions. I believe that the material covered in this series is as relevant today as it was 30+ years ago.
 

The following is how I rough out my full-size poses after working out my thumbnails.

Above is my first rough pass at a Quadhole key pose.

Above is my second rough pass at a Quadhole key pose...I mold the character's form over the forces I laid out on the first pass, making subtle changes as I feel the body reacts to those forces. This pose would be cleaned up on a third sheet of paper.

The next three sheets show how I filled out the basic posing and interpreted the timing of the previous examples shown in sessions one and two. Please refer to the exposure sheets in session one to see how I described the action with particularity. I find that writing it out in this manner forces me to analyze the movement in terms of "anticipation, action, and reaction".

If you have a mind to, you can cut out the poses (registering them by their leg placement and shifting of weight), then film them in sequence as a rough pose test, using the exposure sheet for timing.

Nelvana Seminar Notes (circa 1981): Part Two

This post contains the notes from the second of three seminars I gave at the Nelvana Studio back in 1981. The Quadhole artwork included here is a portion of what I handed out during those lectures, helping to illustrate my personal creative process in molding my animation. In a future post, I'll include the rest of the artwork with those third session notes.

 

 

To see how the phrasing of Quadhole's acting works with his dialog, please refer back to my exposure sheets in my previous post.

Nelvana Seminar Notes (circa 1981): Part One

It's been a very long time since I last posted. I always promised myself that I wouldn't write just anything just for the sake of posting something on my blog. Now I have a topic that I believe will be of interest to those visiting here.

Recently in a communication with Ken Duncan (Owner/Executive Producer of Duncan Studio), Ken said "John, when I was in Paris in the 80's I thought I saw some 'how to' notes that you'd done during Rock 'n Rule.....
1- Am I delusional?
2- If not, are they available to see?"

Well, Ken is not delusional...and after searching through my files I found the original typed notes that were xeroxed and handed out at Nelvana during the production of Rock & Rule. Basically, it was an explanation of my approach and work-flow method, going from initial thumbnails through to tie-down drawings.

Originally, there were 20+ pages in my handout for the three session seminar, which took place over three afternoons, using poses of my character Quadhole the Policeman to illustrate my approach. Because of the amount of material covered, I've decided to post them all here as a series. I have also supplemented the examples with Cindy Schlepper development material I created months after this seminar was given.

(Note: At that time, Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston's bible "The Illusion of Life" had not yet been published. Young animators such as ourselves were basically learning from our own experiments...studying the silent results on the studio's Lyon Lamb Video Animation System...not seeing if it worked with the dialog until it was shot on 35mm film and synced up on the flatbed.)

The following are my original typed notes from the first session. I'm including the exposure sheets and samples of my thumbnail analysis of a couple of Cindy Schlepper scenes.

 

These above poses were my very first exploratory sketches of Cindy Schlepper.

 

 

 

Above are my thumbnail analysis of the first time we see Cindy.

Cindy has arrived at Club 666 and is excited. "Oh, Boy! Mutants in the foyer!"

The following exposure sheets are for a Quadhole scene---the poses of which were originally handed out as a packet including the typed notes. I'll be posting those drawings in the next installment...and you can then cross-reference them with these sheets.

For those who are not familiar with the process, there's a lot to digest on these pages.
Hope you find it informative and useful.

The Animator's Team

Historically, the best way of producing animation in terms of both creativity and hitting production quotas was to set up animation units, whereby the various members of a unit could concentrate on certain aspects of bringing a scene to life. This was how the Disney studio set up its animation teams. At its most successful, it made for a great sense of pride and security amongst the team members that they could count on one another to get the job done.

It was also a great way of having an apprenticeship program by which everyone had the opportunity of being trained to go up to the next level; or it became apparent that a person could not handle the next stage and he/she'd gone as far as ability would let them. (The fact there was studio politics that stood in the way of deserving talent does not diminish the validity of this team concept.)

Before there were animation schools, on-the-job training was the only way to learn more than just the basics (which you can teach yourself). Even today, an apprenticeship program would be the best way of developing animation talent. But that would mean a commitment by the studio to keeping its artists employed from production to production.


The following is a basic Old School Unit the way I remember it on the feature Raggedy Ann & Andy:
1) Animator
2) Rough Inbetweener
3) Assistant Animator
4) Breakdown Assistant
5) Clean Inbetweener

Work flow:
The Animator draws the rough keys and eccentric partials. These are shot for a pose test. When the pose test is okayed by the director, the scene goes to the Rough Inbetweener who rough inbetweens the entire scene for the first action pencil test.

Once the director okays the rough pencil test, the Animator may go back in and add the important lip sync (if he hasn't already included it in his rough pass). The Assistant Animator then cleans up the keys, making adjustments so that the character is on model, and checks the exposure sheets to make sure that any leveling of the figures, overlays, etc. are correct.


The Breakdown Assistant then cleans up and completes any eccentric partials and crucial inbetweens, leaving the Clean Inbetweener to finish off the rest of the drawings.

But let's not come away with the mistaken idea that working this way was a bed of roses. The pressure on the artist to produce has always been enormous. The following is a 1976 cartoon by Eric Goldberg showing a bit of foxhole humor during my last few days on Raggedy Ann and Andy. I was leaving to start my first gig as an animator at Nelvana...and there was the assumption that I would be introducing Hollywood animation production methods to that studio in the Great White North.

Motion Capture Is NOT Animation

Calling the process of Motion Capture "animation" is like calling tracing a photograph onto a sheet of paper "freehand drawing."

Using Motion Capture (or Performance Capture) is basically 21st Century rotoscoping. I don't call this animating...it's special effects. The process of taking the movement of a live actor's performance and transferring it to a design created in computer, is basically no different than encasing something that already has been recorded with a layer of effects to enhance its appearance.

Animation is feeling the movement within one's self and imparting it to a design through your pencil, stylus, or fingers.

Motion Capture is just a new form of tracing...on film instead of on paper. Yes, the technician layering a graphic design over the frames of Motion Capture has to manipulate the design at times...but that is the same as adding an effect, not creating the performance from scratch.

Animating is creating from scratch the physical performance one sees on the screen. Just as a live actor does, an animator feels the emotion within him/herself, then projects those feelings as a performance on paper or the computer screen.

Okay, I open the floor to you for your comments.

How Long Does It Take To Finish A Clean Up? #2

I ended my previous post on this subject with the statement: "As long as animation is treated purely as a manufactured product, the art of animation will never develop past what it has been in the past."

The critical word in that statement is "purely". Of course animated films in essence are manufactured in that thousands of images have to be created and linked together to form the final piece, product, or however you want to describe it. To me, what kills the art is treating each drawing as "piece work".

I know that a certain amount of work needs to be done each week in order to make a deadline. What I object to is the attitude of "Let's set the budget of this project as cheaply as we can and beat the drawings out of everyone."

An example of a manufacturing attitude: Stories are boarded as though everything can be animated fully, and then toss the burden onto the contracting studios to "make it work." 

I learned very early on: Don't treat each scene as though it was equal to another...there are "money" scenes and there are scenes that can be done cheaply. Put the effort (money) where necessary and balance it out with easy scenes. I learned this from animators like Johnny Gentilella and Marty Taras (who were veteran Fleischer/Paramount/Terrytoons animators).


When I first started in the animation industry, I quickly became an assistant animator doing clean-up on "Tubby the Tuba". There I was assigned a mix of hard and easy scenes so that I could hit my weekly footage quotas. Even though I was on a salary, we still needed to keep one eye on completing a minimum amount of work each week. I have used that basic formula in everything I've done in my animation career (which hasn't ended).

How Long Does It Take To Finish A Clean Up? #1

An anonymous comment was posted to my blog entry: "1st Pass Roughs, Semi-Roughs & Clean-ups: Hank the Spider Monkey & Batman." The person asked the question: "How long does it take to finish the clean up? For example that Batman. How long did the clean up artist (take) to finish the inking, painting and shading for every 1 frame?"

The answer to that question is not a simple one. It's not just a combination of how talented and fast the clean up artist is, how much pencil mileage (complication) there is to the design, and how much work the animator left for the clean up artist to correct/adjust. This question also suggests that the clean up, inking, painting and shading, etc of that drawing is going to be handled by the same person. Given what computer animation programs can do today, I know that painting a cleaned up drawing is very fast, but I am not on the production line and don't know how long a complicated color scheme (several different colored lines, multiple colors for costume, hair, etc.) takes to paint. The fastest I can paint one of our studio's Avenging Apes characters (using a bucket dump tool) in about five minutes. But I wouldn't want to be painting at that rate all day long.

Regarding cleaning up a rough drawing, again it depends on how much work the animator left for the clean up artist to correct/adjust. I spend 30 minutes to draw a semi-clean pose like the Batman drawings in question. It would take me another 30 minutes to clean it up on a new sheet of paper. This includes some rest time for my hand as these drawings need very tight pencil control. At other times, like drawing a fast action, I don't have to be as precise and can finish a clean-up in ten minutes.

Then comes the shading, which I consider to be a special effect, which needs to be done by an artist who understands how to handle that. It may be done by the same animator who animated the action, but that stage needs time to think out and accomplish.

This brings up (what is to me) an injustice. I consider the dumping of several stages of production onto the shoulders of one artist, but not scheduling the time to do it properly, to be unfair. Animation programs that can combine layout, key posing, and even create animatics into the storyboard stage, may seem to be wonderful to The Suits and Bean Counters, but it's a prime cause of burnout for the artist.

It's not just about the physical time it takes to do a particular stage of production, it is also about the reasonable amount of thinking/analysis time these stages need before a line is drawn. Someone who has the talent to visualize a script onto a storyboard doesn't necessarily have the makings of a layout person, who can block out the on-model poses for the animators, create solid backgrounds, etc. Nor should that storyboard artist also be expected to time the scenes as they are to appear in the story reel.

What infuriates me about today's animation industry is the race to the bottom regarding cost of production. I, myself, am a Suit and I know it has always been "Faster! Faster! Cheaper! Cheaper!" But at what cost? If the final product (however economically produced) does not interest its potential audience, than The Suits are to blame...not the medium itself for the lack of viewership.

As I said in one of my first posts on this blog: "As long as animation is treated purely as a manufactured product, the art of animation will never develop past what it has been in the past."

Wearing Two Hats #2: The Artist and Businessman Existing Under One Roof

A comment was made regarding my previous post on this topic. The comment was:

"Some where I read that an artist can not be a good business(man) and a business(man) can not be (a) good artist at (the same) time. Artists are passionate people for art and business man balanced sheet for profit."

The opposite extremes of anything (whether it be animation or politics) are constantly at each others' throats, trying to dominate a common territory. It's the constant straining against each other that keeps progress at a minimum, if not a standstill.


A businessman/woman who doesn't understand the need to be creative in order to bring something new to the marketplace is doomed to see their customers grow tired of what is being offered for sale. This will eventually result in a drop of sales and profit... and eventually enough so that the business may fail. This is why it is necessary to budget for creatives/artists searching for and developing new products/programming/etc, without an eye totally on the balance sheet.


The artist who wants to make a living with his/her artistic abilities, must understand that there must be buyers for these abilities/creations. Passion is wonderful when it helps you do your very best, but not when it keeps you from completing a job and getting paid. Artists must know where to draw the line between personal and professional works. Passion alone doesn't pay the bills...give your best for what you're being paid to do...and save your passion for your bedroom.

An example of a person with equal amounts of passion/creativity and sense of business: Steve Jobs

Your additional comments are welcomed.

Wearing Two Hats: Artist and Businessman

Animation has always been a business, but that's not the reason most people get into it. Usually, it is because a young person wants to tell a story or because of the need/enjoyment of creating a world full of characters.

As an artist, I always wish for unlimited budgets and unlimited time to craft my work. But as a businessman I have to squeeze every dollar I get. You only have so much money in your budget. The funds have to be spread out. Where do you put your money?

For me the important elements are: story, design, and the planning of key animation scenes. So, I look at everything I do with an eye on getting the most out of every drawing I make.

This affects my decision regarding animation choices such as:
1) Putting an action on one frame exposure or two frames.
2) Do I level the body as a held cel or trace it continually for several drawings? Or do I run a cycle of three traced back bodies to maintain a flicker of "life"?
3) Can I reuse a strong action several times in different scenes by changing the fielding and/or flopping the drawings to move in the opposite direction? And so on.

It doesn't hurt the artist in me to be creative in searching for solutions that will help the businessman in me to pay the bills. In fact, I believe it forces the artist to focus on what is important in the scene.

The following is a short "Rant"

For me, creating an animated film is like baking a cake and icing it. There are so many elements that go into the process that, if the baker doesn't use the right ingredients and proportions, the cake can easily be ruined. For me, the most important part is the body of the cake, not the icing. A simple layer of icing on a tasty cake is a wonderful touch, but it isn't the most important element.


However, now that film producers have the computer technology to put up on the screen almost anything one can imagine, they spend fortunes on making beautiful icing, but insist on using it to cover very substandard cake.

In fact, for me the vast majority of today's animated features (and live action films) are all icing and no cake.

How 2D Cartoons Were Made: The Old School Way

I have always considered this film by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation to be the most comprehensive documentary explaining the production of an animated cartoon. This was filmed in early 1978 and broadcast later that same year.

Click here for Part 1

Click here for Part 2

 

Here are some thumbnails I did on that production (when I was a very young pup). The important thing to remember is that the purpose for thumbnailing your poses is that you are working out your analysis of the scene -- not trying to create art for the ages. Some people can draw beautiful thumbnails, and that is wonderful! ...but not the point of the process. Don't pour so much effort into the thumbnails to the point that you have nothing left to put into your actual key drawings.

The thumbnails above were my working out portions of the final song.

The thumbnails above were done after working out the scene with my director,
as shown in part one of the documentary.

DAN MOUSE MODEL SHEET COBBLED TOGETHER FROM PRODUCTION DRAWINGS