P1: Assignment 1 - Section A; Types of Animation

Rotoscoping

Rotoscoping is applying an effect to a person, their face or their whole body, this effect will make their face/body look like a cartoon and this usually has a bold outline.

To achieve this effect I first opened my starting image in Photoshop, then I started selecting the face, there are many ways to do this but I used the brush tool on a mask to block out the face. Once I blocked out the face completely I “Ctrl” selected the layers mask, this selected the outline of the face, then I selected the original photo and pressed “Ctrl” + “J”, this created a new layer with only the face on it. With the layer selected I went to the filter tab and selected the Artistic option, I tested the effects and found the Sponge option to look good, after I customised the options I applied the effect. The last thing I did was apply a stroke fx before saving the image as a JPEG format.

Rotoscoping was used in the popular movie 300, the actor’s faces in this movie were slightly Rotoscoped.

6/10 – Simple, slightly pointless

Zoetrope

A Zoetrope is a drum like object with slices cut out the side, these are used to view the photos within which spin round creating the illusion that they are moving.

The biggest Zoetrope was used by Sony for an advert since paying the football player Kaka would have been more expensive than building this massive Zoetrope.

4/10 – Painstaking, outdated

Cell

Images are drawn on layers of plastic sheets (cells) and layered over each other, this is useful because you can keep the background static and no not need to redraw the whole thing again.

This technique is used mostly in cartoon shows (such as the Simpsons) to animation characters or parts of them without having to redraw the background.

7/10 – ingenuity

CGI (Computer Generated Images)

This is a type of animation that is overlaid a video (taken with a camera), you create points though a software package (such as Cinema 4D) to map the scene then superimpose 3d objects or characters into that scene.

Some examples are the Citroen C4 Transformer advert, and the new Robocop movie (2014), but it is used in many movies to make them more futuristic, or add machines or odd creatures.
 
9/10 – brilliant, difficult

Stop Motion

This is when you take images of a scene, and move objects around slightly (clay being a popular example) and their structure, then take another image until you have done enough to make it a video.
A usual stop motion video would have 24 images in a second (24 FPS), so at the end of a normal minute video there would be 1440 images. Which would take around a minute to frame a take (can vary), that would equate to 24 hours. Due to this, and the amount of work needed to do it, they are very rare and usually low quality compared to other computer based alternatives which can automate things, and offer easy modification to previous frames.

A popular example is Morph and “Wallace and Gromit”, which both use clay, and are made by the same people, I have created my own stop motion by making simple shapes in PowerPoint and hen importing them into a program called UnFREEz.

7/10 – painstaking, worth it

Flick-Book

This is using pages to draw something on, the on the next page a similar drawing with a slight difference, then continuing this process until you have an animation.

When you have finished you would grab the notepad or book, grab it by an edge, then flick them to quickly reveal the next drawing, if done correctly your mind should perceive it as an animation.
This is rarely used anywhere, but it does show commitment and before computer animation

techniques became more common it was more popular, since you need very minimum (a notebook and a pen).

4/10 – outdated

Tweening
 
This is where a shape/graphic is changed then a tween is applied to automatically animate it into the transition. There are 3 main types of tween, Shape, Motion and Classic (in Adobe Flash).

Shape

This only works on shapes (not types of graphics), and requires them to be transformed for you to be able to apply a shape tween, this will warp the shape from the first key frame to the last.

Motion

If you are moving any object the best way to do this is with a motion tween, it will automatically calculate how it has to move from point A to B.

Classic

This works very similar to the Motion tween, where it is normally used to move objects, but with a classic tween you would have to manually create key frames then apply a Classic tween when with a Motion tween they are created if you move the shape between point A and B. Also if you apply a classic tween to a graphic you have more options, such as Alpha (transparency), and you can also transform a graphic in a Classic tween (1% to 150% then 100%).

Tweening can be seen in many animations, since it avoids creators from manually having to create key frames.

10/10 – very practical

Onion Skin

This is similar to the technique used in flip book animation, it is when you have drawn a scene (possibly on paper, or in an animation package such as Adobe Flash), but with onion skins you see the previous scenes at half opacity.

This can also be seen in quite a few animations, it is very useful technique to use whiles using key framing to be able to know the exact changes you are making.

7/10 – better than just flip book

Lip Sync

When creating a cartoon you would use lip syncing to create the perception that the cartoon character is talking, this is the same as cell animation, but focuses on the lips of a character.

You would see this being used the same place cell animation would take place (cartoon, such as the Simpsons) since it comes under the same category of animation.

6/10 – can be painstaking, realism

Pixilation

 This is very similar to stop motion, but instead of using objects, an actor is used, it works the exact same way as stop motion, where image after image is took with subtle differences.

This technique is often used to create short amusing videos for YouTube, there are not any popular films that use this animation technique.

4/10 – pointless (in my opinion), less reliable (human movement in play)