Bouncing Ball Animation 2- Electric Boogaloo

Ahoy there!

I'M BACK WITH ANOTHER ANIMATION! ...Of a bouncing ball... But hey! It's good, I promise!

THE PATH OF THE ANIMATOR
(The Big Steps, I mean)

This project was made extremely similarly to the previous animation, except for the movement of the ball. It moves in arcs instead of straight up and down, and bounces lower as it goes on. Squashing and stretching is still there, of course. And to add a little more flair to the animation, we had to give the ball a face that changed when it hit the ground (I made mine a little blue duck) and have a little ending to the animation. While most made their ending something silly (such as the ball inflating and flying away), I decided to make my little bird ball yawn and go to sleep. The timeline was a little weirder to work with this time around due to the massive amount of frames.

What Did I Learn That I Didn't Previously Know?

I learned about arcs, and how adding them can make movement feel more natural. I also learned about tweening, which is the process of fading in and out (which is what I did with the title card). Another thing I learned is exaggeration, which really helps when trying to show dynamic movement. Exaggeration is present when the bird yawns, as its body stretches out before it flattens out and falls asleep. Finally, I learned something very important- to have patience when working with the deadly combo of 100-something frames and the Photoshop timeline!

How'd I Do, In My Opinion?

I think I did pretty well, given the amount of things to do in order to finish the animation. The frames and timeline kept messing things up and throwing the integrity of the animation out of the window! But, I had patience, worked through it, and finished it so I could share it. I think the final product is really cute, and fairly well animated. If I did it again, I'd most certainly pay more attention to the timeline and order of the frames (which kept tripping me up). I want to learn more about exaggeration as well- it's really fun to make exaggerated things!

Anyways, that's all, folks! See you in the next animation!

Thanks for reading,
Tate

Bouncing Ball Animation

Ahoy there!

The time has finally come... The grand transition from Graphic Design to the almighty Animation! And with a new class comes a new first project (specifically an animation of a bouncing ball that I made) that I have to write a blog post about for a grade. So here we go!

A (Not-so) Brief Summary of the Given Project

The main goal of this assignment was most likely to ease us into animation and introduce us to the basics of animating. To start, we had to make both a sky and the ground, each in separate layers, along with a ball suspended in the sky. (I added clouds because I'm just that cool.) Next, we added a fancy little gradient to each object. And after we had set it all up, it was time for the challenging part- creating a bunch of layers to show the ball moving. All we had to do was make a new layer with the ball in it and NOTHING ELSE, and very slightly move it downward and squash/stretch if necessary. Following that, we set up a timeline and created all the needed frames in order to bring the animation all together. The final step was to export the animation, and then blog about it.

What did I learn during this project?

This may sound a little weird, but... Before this class, I didn't even know that Photoshop was capable of animation! I thought it was just a photo editing/drawing program. In terms of what I learned about actual animation, though, I mainly learned two basic processes- Squash and Stretch, plus Ease in/out. Both can breathe more life into an animation and make the whole thing feel more real. By use of squash and stretch, you can tell that the ball clearly has a bounce to it, and that it doesn't just hit the floor and roll away like a bowling ball. Easing in and out allows the animation to show speeding up and slowing down as it falls and bounces back.

How'd it go? Would you change anything if you did it again?

I think that the whole process went very smoothly- I was quick to understand what I was taught and managed to finish this animation with great results. If I did this again, I would try to brush up the stretching a bit more- in some places it looks like it either shrinks or gets too long/narrow. It may look a bit unnatural to me, but nothing too strange or noticeable.

So, there you go! An in-depth review of my first project in my new animation class. I had a lot of fun making it, and I can't wait to see what we'll do next.

Thanks for reading,

Tate