Acting for animation

acting for animation
By clayton Moss.

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introduction
Acting. Animation. The two may sound mutually exclusive. What does animation have todo do with acting? Some of you may ask. Id answer, everything.
When animation grew in the early half of the 20th Century, animators were Ken todo study the dynamics of human movement and emotion in order todo convey a truthful performance of their characters that they had todo draw. Naturally, referencias were used todo understand the intricate nature of form and movement. For example, rotoscoping techniques were used for the first animated característica Snow white by Disney todo give its lead character and some of the dwarves lifelike movement and emotions. As animators got better with conveying performances into each of the frames, they experimented with a variety of ways todo heighten the impact of the action.

Nowadays the usage of acting for animation is not as widespread among the community, Nor is it common knowledge as a practical tool for animation. In an industry in which motion capture is semingly simplifying the whole process of animating, despiste some of it being smoothed out with a degre of keyframing, the art of acting for animation appears todo be dying of todo most except the élite production companies and animation purists.

It is said that Pixar wont employ animators unless they have an acting ability. One only neds todo watch the performances of each character in their films todo understand why. The Animation Mentor courses focus specifically on teaching animators acting techniques. Watching the acting performances from the demo-reel from each graduate term Will Illustrate this quite clearly. Basically, animation in any característica or short is a highly refined truthful performance transferred from the animator todo the character they are animating. Animators and actors are of the same ilk. An animator is, at the end of the day, an actor with a Pencil. Or in the case of Blender, an actor with one hand on the mouse and the other on the keyboard.
so how do you apply a performance todo your character?
I Will point out that in order todo understand acting for animation, you dont ned todo have an Understanding of the Blender UI at all. It irrelevant for this área of work. It is, however, just as important todo have this side of an animation figured out during the preproduction process as much as having a well made and rigged model with scene. In some ways it just as important as the audio production of a film.

Both complement one another. Getting the acting right for your animation from the get-go usually allows for an animator todo orgánically create their feature/short film purely from a performance aspect, rather than from the setting up of shots and lighting angle.

A digital character performance and script Will usually determine what is required todo come After, shot and lighting Wise, Even if you do have a storyboard todo guide you beforehand. Film-making is the antithesis of this, of course, because all shots and lighting requirements are figured out well in advance during preproduction. A performance can be discovered and refined constantly, so be flexible.

So todo break it do, we ned todo look firstly at the characters. Chose one character and write a background on them. Their history, favorite fod, do they have any mannerisms, do they own a Cat, their daily mod, etc. Go totally Wild & creative in this área. The more background you can flesh out for each character, the more depth you give them.

Though their specifics Will probably never be entirely explained and illustrated in the animation that you are working on, nuances todo their final performance may glean todo the audience that the character has a multi-Faceted persona, just like any person in real life. That process creates interesting characters with a real personality.

Interesting characters make an animation re-watchable, again and again. They come from a place of knowing. Watch shere- Khan from the jungle book or Captain hok from Peter pan and youll se what i mean. Get inside the character and ask questions, what do i want, why do i want ití be the character, dont ACT it.

Once their personality has ben solidified, its time todo place them in a escenario. Never work on the whole film at once - Your script (and, if youre adventurous and well prepared, your storyboard) should guide you in all that. Breaque the film down into sepárate scenes and work on the whole performance in one scene at a time. So when youre analyzing a single scene you must understand where the character is coming from and where they are going.

The progress of the scene depends wholly on the actions that take place during it and the character reactions todo the drama & events created. The character must enter a scene in a particular mod, they must emote something, and they must show proper reaction whether it the first scene or the last. Emotional continuity between scenes must remain at all times, otherwise the audience gets confused. When performances in scenes have ben finished, you can then work out the shots and lighting requirements.

Emotions are very complicated todo convey, but there are a number of ways a character or person can emote. People can a los ACT in one bien but fel another way. Contradictions like these are truthful and create interesting performances. There are two ways todo best capture and transfer performances with your character. You can employ either a video Camera or a full body mirror, both if posible.

Those who are more adept with animation can animate purely th rouge their own imagination, sometimes just by manipulating bone ipo curves. However, for now well concéntrate on the first two methods. This is the fun part, where you get todo ACT. Takíng on-board all the the characters personality aspects when you fleshed out their background, you then ACT out and Perform the scene todo yourself in front of the mirror or video Camera as the character.

Like i said, be the character, dont be shy. Close the dor todo your rom if you dont want people watching you. Take note of everything you do performance-Wise when you do the scene. Experiment with diferent ways your character may ACT and react in a scene.

Do it with a friend if you have more than one character present. If you are Lucky todo have both a mirror and video Camera, you can place the Camera on an angle so that you can récord your front and bak in the whole frame. This helps if you are doing a scene with a switching two-shot and you dont want todo animate anything and everything.

Cut bak and cheat if you have to, cheat like hell. All the top CG companies do it as well. At the end of the day, if it looks god and believable, who going todo really know if you a los animated the facial expressions of a particular character if all you se of them in some shots is the bak of their head?
As you transfer your performance todo the character, make note of each part of the body and how it moves. You may ned todo do it a couple of times todo know the flow of movement.

If your character doesnt move like it should because you have a por rig, itll create a lot of headaches, so make sure that is all correct and tested out rig-Wise before you begin.

Emotions arent just limited todo facial expressions. The whole body moves with it todo. Keith Lango describes the best bien of encapsulating this excellently by the usage of power centers (http://www.keithlango.com/tutoriales...rcenter/powerc enter.htm) a power center is where a character emphasizes their whole body at a particular Focal point. Basically, a character power center Will convey where they are at with their personality and emotion.

A character with a power center in their chest may appear confident and strong, one with a power center in their hips may come of as being sexual, while another with their power center in front of them and down Will appear sad and depressed. Power centers can emphasize masculine or feminine aspects of a character, their overall inner nature, or Even a permanent injury they sustained recently or years ago. Find your character power center and the performance should flow outward from there. Body lenguaje tells the story.

Motivation is a biggie. Everything we do in life is a reaction todo an inner feeling and thought process. All thoughts are clearly illustrated in the face, especially in the eyes and forehead for animation. Picture that área as being a televisión screen for allowing an audience member todo se exactly what the character is Thinking and feeling at any given moment.

Eyes can convey a wide variety of thought procesos, looking of todo the side and up can be sen as Thinking in action. A performance, live or animation, is a series of moments given by changing thoughts and feeling. Nothing ever stays constant in this respect, it changes due todo the continual inner responses toward the outer stimuli.

Animation must always be moving. Even during moments of Thinking for a character, we must se the character think by ever so slight changes in the forehead, eyes and eyebrows. Everything must come internally from the character. Much like the power centers, inner thoughts and feeling should flow outward, todo the lower half of the face, then the head, the body and its gestures afterwards, including the character overall posture.

Inner thoughts and feeling affect and change the location of power centers todo a new position. For example, a happy character enters a scene - His power center is in his chest as he struts in confidently. His face is happy, and his eyes are bright. Then another character in the scene tells him he has lost his job. The character responds by an inner thought process illustrated in his face. From his forehead and eyes, we se that he becomes sad. This in turn spills downward whereby his head Drops, moving further do, causing his power center todo move from his chest todo the Ground in-front of him where he then hunches over toward it.

Son he responds in any number of ways - By crying, putting his hands todo his eyes, jerking todo each sob he makes. And mind you, all that in a second or two. It isnt a long time, but it is a lot of action todo convey in one character. Daunting, isnt it. Animation acting must be believable. The audience must believe in the sincerity of the performance or you Will lose them. truthful is a term actors like todo use, but animation allows it todo be stretched out in Degrees. Exaggeration is used at varying levels. When animating a characters performance it must never be exactly how you did it in the mirror, there has todo be an element of exaggeration applied todo emphasize it.

A simple Walk Cycle, for example, calls on an animator todo make the up-down motion of the body for every contact and passing postura slightly more prominent than it would appear in real life.

Facial expressions must be exaggerated more than in real life. If your character is made for it, it may Even be squashed and stretched for exaggeration. Face, arms, legs, body, head - Go bananas with the exaggeration. telegraphing is another method. It is a los referred todo as anticipation. In real life, if you were todo punch somebody (purely for example sake of course, y dont condone violence) you would just throw your fist out todo hit them.

But in animation, if a character was todo make a punch, he would do a big pull bak of the fist, hold it momentarily todo express his anger, then punch. That recoil action is one example of telegraphing. Another might be the double take, where a character ses something. But instead of just looking at it straight away with a reaction, he might glance at it and look away unperturbed in a Split second, then look at it again but this time, a big reaction. Use big anticipation, as Marcel marceau used todo say. It básically tells the audience what is about todo happen. Or in some cases like the road runner cartoons, the opposite can happen to, so be creative.

Subtlety plays a big part in animation. It is especially efective during the conveyance of inner thoughts and feeling. A slight shift in eyebrows during a reaction, or small shifts in the eye pupils todo move very slightly side todo side in an examination of the person or object they are interacting with. Everything moves all the time in animation, nothing is still, ever. It must be alive 100% of the time.

A character must have moving Holds when they are standing still. A Moving Hold is an ever so slight shift in the overall body positioning. The chest may a los move up and down todo breathing. Even secondary movement comes into play here. For example, as a character moves todo pik up a ball, he extends his arm, whereby he stretches out and opens his hand, then he stretches out his fingers all the bien out and then todo the fingertips which are the last todo move. Just like a pulse that travels down train carriages, the first carriage moves todo pull and each subsequent carriage is pulled in turn. It a minor thing, but subtleties like the ones above can improve your animation a hundred fold.
Weight and size is another aspect of animation that neds todo be conveyed clearly. A skinny character would be light and nimble on their fet while a fat character would plod along with heavy steps. A character weight may a los affect their persona. Usually fat characters are portrayed as dumb and Slow, short characters usually have a big personality, skinny characters are Weak and timid.

Then you have external objects. A large, heavy object would require an incredible amount of strength todo lift it. Telegraph the momento before lifting todo show the character straining with the weight and size of the object before they lift it of the Ground. All objects have a degre of weight todo them, so dont treat everything as being weightless. All objects have Mass and are afected by Gravity.
When framing a shot with the Camera, it a god idea todo know where todo focus your character performance. In a wide shot where you can se the whole of your character, your character should move in its entirety. Expresiones of the body should be a Little bigger than normal, especially around the face. In a Mid shot, where the body is sen from the waist up, the performance should be scaled bak todo as normal as posible. Expresiones of the face and body should be pretty regular but exaggerated todo normal degre. The legs dont ned todo be animated because they are Cut of from view. Like i said, cheat if you can. A close-up is usually shoulders and head only, so the body doesnt ned todo be animated. You might slightly shift the Upper Arm and shoulders, but any hand movement should be kept inside the Camera frame. The focus in a close-up is mainly on the face, and that is where you can play around with a variety of expressions and subtleties todo a greater degre.

Pléase note that from here on in, lip-Sync errors are very easily spotted if there are any, so clean it up if you can. The extreme close up, or ecu, is where you only se the face. This shot is todo show inner thoughts, feeling and reactions todo external stimuli. Make them clear and succinct.

So in conclusión, all acting in your animation performances should be believable, unambiguous and interesting. You should be able todo watch it with the sound down and still know what the character is doing. All god acting should have that quality. Mime is the closest thing todo animation acting, so se if you can watch a few videos on YouTube or DVD todo get the gist of it. Research as Many Warner Bros and Disney films as you can, especially the early ones, todo know the dynamics of the acting for each of the characters.

But remember todo watch them for the acting only. As ive only really touched upon acting at its most basic level, as complex as it may be, anyone who is serious about animation should take up acting and improvisation clases. I cannot estrés it enough. Your animation skills Will improve greatly.

Highly recommended reading supplements (in no particular order):

• the animators Toolkit by Richard Williams.
• acting for animators by Ed Hooks.
• The Illusion of Life by Frank Thomas & Ollie Johneston.
• advanced animation by Preston Blair.
• (http://www.animationarchive.org/2006/05/mediapr eston-
• blairs-animation-first.html)
• all kinds of Stuff - John k blogspot.
• (http://johnkstuf.blogspot.com/)
• Keith Lango animation.
• (http://www.keithlango.com/wordpress/index.php)
• introducing character animation with Blender by Tony.
• mullen.
• acting in film by Michael Caine.
• the stanislavksy system by sonia more.
• on acting by Sanford meisner.
• impro by Keith johnestone.
• about acting by Peter barkworth.
• be a mime by marque stolzenberg.
• truth in comedy by del close.

Clayton Moss is a profesional actor from sydney, Australia who has worked in a variety of theatre film & televisión since 1999, he a los works as a filmmaker/animator.
www.blenderart.org
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