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Unit 8: Fundamental of Animations

Staging multiple characters is also an important issue. Generally, you want to always make sure notes
that where the audience is looking within the shot. Background characters must be animated such
that they are still “alive”, but not so much that they steal the viewer’s attention from the main
action. Staging like this is also related to a lot of directing and editing principles.

11. appeal
Appeal means anything that a person likes to see. This can be quality of charm, design, simplicity,
communication or magnetism. Appeal can be gained by correctly utilizing other principles such
as exaggeration in design, avoiding symmetry, using overlapping action and others. One should
strive to avoid weak or awkward design, shapes and motion.
It is important to note that appeal does not necessarily mean good versus evil. For example,
in Disney’s animated classic “Peter Pan”, Captain Hook is an evil character, but most people
would agree that his character and design has appeal. The same goes for Hopper in “A Bug’s
Life”. Even though he’s mean and nasty, his design and characterization/personality still has a
lot of appeal.
12. personality
This word is not actually a true principle of animation, but refers to the correct application of the
other principles. Personality determines the success of an animation. The idea is that the animated
creature really becomes alive and enters the true character of the role. One character would not
perform an action the same way in two different emotional states. No two characters would act
the same. It is also important to make the personality of a character distinct, but at the same time
be familiar to the audience.
Personality has a lot to do with what is going on in the mind of the character, as well as the traits
and mannerisms of the character. It is helpful to have some background in acting, and certainly
taking acting or improve class as an animator is a good idea.
The Twelve Basic Principles of Animation is a set of principles of animation
introduced by the Disney animators Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas in their
1981 book: The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation.
8.2 animation fundamentals

Many of us grew up watching cartoon characters every Saturday and Sunday mornings, but we
never really appreciated the work that went into making them. In this section, you will be looking
at animation fundamentals and techniques that have been around for many years. These gave
birth to talking rabbits, wacky ducks, and a mouse named Mickey.

Animation is the art of creating the illusion of movement from inanimate objects. Before we had
full-motion moving pictures, there was animation. Flipbooks were small books with pages where
small caricatures were drawn. As you flipped the books from front to back, the drawings looked as
though they were animated. Some flipbooks came empty, and you could add your own drawings.
Flipbooks gave the illusion that the cartoon character in the pages was actually moving before
our eyes. This illusion is the cornerstone of animation.
8.2.1 Model sheet

If you are going to create a character to animate, it usually helps to have a model sheet, which is a
series of poses of the character to refer to when you are animating. The sheet could include poses
of the character standing still, bouncing a ball, smiling, jumping and running.
The idea is to draw the emotions and actions that would be expected from the character. If your
animations are going to be much simpler than an animated person or animal, however, a model
sheet might not be necessary.

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