A doodle

Software: Alias Sketchbook Pro

Flip your drawings!

There are many workflows and methods of animation that have been in existence for well over 70+ years now. Many cool traditional tips and tricks are just limited to 2d animation but some of them are really helpful in CG as well. And one of the methods is "flipping". Flipping is a method to go through the drawings very quickly and see whats happening with your character and whether your drawings are working well all together. It gives you a clear picture of your drawings on the whole, and really helps to spot a problem very easily.
When I animate in Maya or FlipBook, I always keep on flipping to my previous drawings while making my poses/drawings. It really helps to figure out the arcs, spacing, overlaps and the overall performance of the action.

TIP for Maya users: Use "<" and ">" to flip through the (CG) drawings. It especially helps when you've timed out your shot and want to flip through your breakdowns and keys to maybe fix some spacing and arcs issues, without worrying about the computer inbetweens.

Here's a video where I've animated a simple floursack jump in FlipBook. You'll see how frequently I flip through the drawings while animating. And it really helps a tonne while inbetweening my shot in 2d, where the spacing might get really, really tight almost like a moving hold, and it becomes almost impossible to put a drawing without flipping back to my previous drawings for reference.

Here is the video, enjoy.... :)


Flour Sack in FlipBook from Amrit Derhgawen on Vimeo.

Boss Walk... doodle

Hey everyone!

I've been reading The Illusion of Life and studying/observing some walking styles. It's a character walk and I like to call it "Boss Walk". This guy is the boss around here! heh... I remember, I've seen this kind of walk in the movie "Flushed Away", where in one of the shots the frog guy (the gangster king) starts walking this way.... and I really loved the style.
This kinda shows over confidence (maybe!), arrogance, leadership, anger, experience, and a very narrow and fixed view. And for this kind of walk you always tend to favor the "up" position, stay there for a while and throw a leg up. The guy really feels at the top of the world and thus, spends more time near the "up" pose. Its really fun to watch and especially to animate! I showed it to Jason. I'm glad he liked it and gave me some great suggestions to improve this walk. As Jason said, its just little stuff but I think I'll do it all over again and I'm trying to find some time for it. I'll post it here as soon as I'm done with my new walk. This time it will look more organic with some opposite actions and better balance. I will also be doing some acting stuff in CG and will post the blocking as well.

Anyway, here is the boss walk...