My Ideal Future Direction – Animatior
If I graduated from the CSM, I could have gone on to choose a job in the animation industry. There are many options for jobs in the animation industry, I could choose to be a modeler, I could choose to be an animator, I could even choose to be an editor and various other careers. All in all, I have gained a lot of knowledge about animation through my two years of studying Character Animation at LENY Central Saint Martins and I have also learnt various animation techniques. On my own terms, I was exposed to animation from undergraduate to postgraduate level for 6 years and worked on many animation projects, which makes me more suitable to be an animator after graduation.
An animator does not require a high level of drawing ability, but the artistic aesthetic will be enhanced if you want to produce more vivid and fluid animation. Personally, I have more experience in 3D animation than 2D animation as I learn to bind skeleton, brush weights and key frames together, using 3dsmax and Maya, even in 2D there are TVPAINT and Animate available, and I like to make exaggerated movements for my favourite characters to make them lively. With a few vivid keyframes and intermediate frames, the movements are more coherent. After studying the Twelve-Laws of Animation at the postgraduate level, I have a better understanding of character movement, such as how to do following movements, how each of the character’s joints moving, and what kind of pose to do at keyframes.
In addition to this, a good animator also needs to have a good grasp of the camera shots and the character’s personality, by observing the character’s expressions and mannerisms, when key animation, walking when you are happy is completely different from walking when you are disappointed. The different characters, such as the calm old man and the happy child, also walk quite differently, with the steady pace of the old man contrasting with the brisk pace of the child. The camera shows the artistic effect of the animation, the close-ups of the movements, and the movement of the characters in the big scenes, every movement in the camera is very meaningful to the animator and can be shown in different forms.
Some animation companies will put a mirror in a special place and the animator stands in front of it to act out the character’s movements, so you can see the movements yourself and it’s easier for you to understand the main points of the animation, so when the animator is finding key-frames, a lot of the time they are doing all sorts of strange stylistic movements that look very odd but this is necessary. The animators in foreign animation films must preview the animation before they key animate, and they usually have a lot of funny videos that we animators must key animate, and these processes are inevitable in the process of making animation.
I practiced many times during my animation studies, and practice makes perfect is a constant in all fields. I can extrude and stretch the character’s movements in the software. When I first started, I found it very difficult to learn and found that my key movements were very flat and weightless, but after I became more familiar with the software and then practiced in class, I didn’t find it so difficult. But then I would keep my character moving all the time, whether it was moving my eyes, lifting my chest, or even small movements such as tail wags. Apart from the special stiffness effect, every part of my character needs to move slightly so that your character comes to life, and certain small movements will make my character more in tune with his personality. I think that key animation is both a technical and an artistic job, but also an experience and an ability to understand.