Week 2 - Posing & Principles

This Thursday's Q&A was all about the 12 principles of animation, the original 'rules' the old Disney animators swore by and that every animator still swears by today. Some examples for the plebes: Squash and Stretch (the change of volume in reaction to force, e.g the squash of a ball as it makes full contact with the ground before it bounces back up and returns to form); Anticipation (the action before the action, e.g the pulling back before the punch); and Arcs (almost everything moves in an arc, arcs are visually pleasing!). Not all rules necessarily apply to every scene, nor do the principles have to be followed to the T. But you have to know the rules in order to break the rules (effectively).

The assignment this week was to go out and observe people in interesting poses and draw them. Then we pick our favourite sketch and use our trusty 'Stu' rig to pose it in 3D. However a 43 degree heatwave doesn't make this an easy task, so I sketched poses off of references instead. Here are the results:

I realise my sketches are far more detailed than they have to be. I actually find it hard to simplify and hold back the detail. Preferably I'd like to be sketching out twice or three times as many poses in less time with very simplistic, but effective gesture drawings. It is the gesture of the figure that is most important, so I will try to experiment with quicker drawing styles in the coming weeks.

The final rendered pose: (I went a little overboard while messing with mental ray renderer.)

I'm hoping it effectively communicates Stu's emotion. It's slightly different to the sketch to give him a more 'bored' look. I referenced myself for this pose and could really feel the strain on the pushed out hip so I pushed it out as far as possible while still trying to maintain the character's balance and line of action.