Student’s Animation Portfolio
I had a student, Tom, who had recently completed his animation portfolio. I am very proud of him and I would like to acknowledge his effort in this post. Over the past 2 years, with consistent 2 hours weekly of contribution to his animation skill, Tom started out learning animation from zero to newbie animator. Tom began learning animation as a hobby as he likes watching anime. Even if it is a passion for him, it was not an easy journey because he tends to get confused very often. Every week, he stretches and challenges his capability of doing things that he is not comfortable or familiar with. He starts to realize that short cuts without much prior planning do not really produce good results. Thorough understanding of a subject is very crucial in learning. Without a clear fundamental understanding of the learning subject, we might not build a solid and stable foundation for our building. Over time, Tom got used to such stimulating exercises that makes him search and try different solutions to overcome his technical problems. When an approach does not work, doing it repeatedly will never produce a new result. Be open and learn to find new solutions to any problem. Eventually Tom becomes proficient in his animation skills and he is able to handle most of the basic animation exercises on his own. Most importantly, he did not give up whenever he meets a new challenges. It takes time for one to be good at anything and giving up is never a solution. Giving yourself time to reflect and time to learn is more important than...
5 basic tips to creating realistic animations
Realistic animations are what fascinates the viewer. The audience is able to fully enjoy the content and the story behind the animation because the motion is believable. One way to make our animations realistic is by adding force in the movement. Applying appropriate timing gives a realistic indication of the object's speed. When an object is going to travel 1 meter, the time it requires to reach from point A to point B indicates how fast the object moving. If the object takes 1 minute to travel from A to B, that object might be a snail. If the object moves from point A to B within 1 second, it feels like a fast rolling ball. When we animate, we think about what exactly do we want this object to be. If someone animates a bullet flying across the room using 30 seconds, that might look like we are watching The Matrix. If an object starts to move from stationary, it takes time for the object to travel fast. A car that moves on green light will move from slow speed to a fast speed because the car needs to accelerate. A heavy truck will take more time to speed up while a racing car takes a split second to be traveling fast. Take a moment today to observe when you are on the road today. Observe the difference between the picking up speed for different cars. When an objects is coming to a stop, it takes time to slow down too. For example, when someone switches off the fan, it does not stop immediately. The fan's blade...Animator’s Starter Kit – Ebook progress
It’s been sometime since I last posted and yes, I was busy. I’m busy writing out a e-book, titled Animators Starter Kit Learn to Animate with Observation. The name is not confirmed yet but feel free to give suggestion if you have a better name! I’ve given a lot of thoughts for this book as I really want to share my ten years experience in becoming an animator from scratch. This ebook is going out to help friends or animators wannabes who wish to learn and create their own animation from the fundamentals. This is the juice of the book but that is easily available on the net! Thus, I’ve also included topics that even animators themselves sometimes do not learn in school. Ten years back in school, I wish I had learn all these topics in school on top of learning digital animation in softwares. Topics such as observation skills, self assessment, motivation, etc. From what I can recall from memory, my teachers basically teach us how to draw in Photoshop or Flash without basic understanding of drawing. Worst, we were not taught how to generate concepts for our topics and our assignment grades us on our creativity. Is this still happening to you? I certainly hope not but for some unfortunate students who has this experience, I really hope to give you more insights and depth to your animation and the creativity within. For a start, here are the contents I’ve included in my e-book and it is still under construction. Much of the contents has been written and is still undergoing polishing. What...
Learn to create bouncing ball flash animation for beginners!
If you are new to learning animation, this is the best tutorial to get you started! Every animator starts to learn animation by creating a bouncing ball animation. In this video tutorial, I'll guide you to use an animation software called Adobe Flash (version CS4 and above) from creating the file all the way to finishing your bouncing ball Flash animation. So what are you waiting for? Start up your Adobe Flash and lets get started! Learn Flash Animation Basics The videos are created in high definition (HD) format so you can view exactly how I created the animation. I have split this tutorial into 4 videos. At any point of time, if you have already learn how to do certain steps, feel free to skip to the next video. Nevertheless, I still encourage you to watch it because sometimes I'll include some very "tiny mini" tips for animation production which are common industry practices that schools don't teach! #1/4 Draw circle in Flash for bouncing ball tutorial (4:50min) #2/4 Learn to convert shapes into symbols and usage of symbols in Flash (4:55min) #3/4 Learn to create motion tween and key frames for Flash Animation (4:04min) #4/4 Learn to create Bouncing effect using Motion Editor in Flash (7:36min) The tutorial videos include short cut keys mainly for Mac O/S users. I'm not bias but based on my current class, 7 out of 8 students are using Macbook Pro. This is why I put more emphasis on Mac shortcuts. If you are a Windows O/S user, fear not! When you see Cmd (command) keys, it is equivalent to...Useful Resources
About Nash Lin
Nash is a self taught animator, a fanatic gamer and a digital media coach. He has created many types of 2D and 3D animation. You will get to learn effective animation skills and tips with Nash. Continue reading...
