If you ever gazed with wonder at a flipbook when you were a child, or sat and watched your favourite Disney movie, then you’ll have some experience of animation and the magic you can create. Being an animator often involves cartoon movies or TV shows, but you may also see it in video games, television adverts, or multimedia presentations. Lately there is also the culture of creating and sending Gifs on social media. If you’re interested in the science behind what you see on screen, and how still images are brought to life, then this is the course for you. Why not sign-up and learn what it takes to be an animator.

What Will I Learn?

This course is divided into two sections; what is animation and the basics, and intermediate animation techniques. Video content in the first section will introduce you to what animation is, and some basic techniques, and includes a few demonstrations, such as how to make a ball bounce or flag appear to wave. Once you’ve learned some of the principles of animation you’ll be able to move on to section two, which focuses on head turns, walk cycles, and breaking a character down into basic shapes. With over 12 hours of content and demonstrations, you’ll receive a good grounding in the basics of animation with this course.

Who Is This Course Aimed At?

Anyone with an interest in animation, whether you are hoping to pursue it as a hobby, pick up some skills you can use at work, in marketing positions, or maybe you have ambitions to make videos or short movies yourself and progress into an animation career.

KEY LEARNING POINTS

Gain an understanding of beginner and intermediate principles of animation and how to apply them.

Topics Include:

• Insight into the job of an animator, from involvement in storyboards, character creation and scripts, to production elements like setting up the characters and environment, animating them and editing.
• Looking at the production processes which can be applied to objects and people.
• A focus on motion rather than the final render (colours and inks).
• Study the 12 principles of animation.
• Learn how to make actions interesting, adhere to physics, bring out emotion and deal with the suspension of disbelief.
• Begin to create simple shapes and move on to character walks and dialogue.
• Using Adobe Animate program, including looking at aspect ratios.

What Is Animation & The Basics:

• 3 part demonstration on making a ball bounce.
• Pendulum and platform pendulum demonstrations.
• Look at the bouncy ball in perspective.
• A flag waving demo.

Intermediate Animation Techniques:

• Weight, and how to show weight with your characters.
• How characters react to the weight, where the weight is, and the anticipation of the weight.
• Use of gesture drawings to plan out what a character will do.
• Different actions to show characters picking up light and heavy objects.
• Benefits of breaking characters down into basic shapes.
• Adding or taking away from basic shapes.
• Things to practise drawing in Adobe Animate.
• Making a character jump up and down.
• Learn about boils – or line shakiness – such as characters shivering or shaking.
• A take or double take – characters quick reactions to something, such as surprise or being startled.
• Using staggered frames for shaking or vibrating and laughing, while characters are performing another action.
• How to perform a natural head turn on your characters.
• Learn more about walking cycles with characters, the challenges in this animation, and how to achieve a natural full body motion during the walk cycle.
• Move on to achieving running cycles with a basic character.
• Watch and learn from fascinating dialogue demonstrations.
• Acting aspects of speaking, and making mouth shapes and body actions matching the dialogue.
• End with a recap and conclusion of all you’ve learned.

ADVANTAGES OF THIS COURSE

• Instructor demonstrates tools and techniques in an animation program, so you can see how it’s really done.
• Demonstrations include explanations of each part of the process, and how to transition between them.
• Handy tips to help you get started with animating, and what to look out for.
• Learn at your own pace, and re-visit videos as often as you wish while you study.
• Easy access platform via the internet and compatible devices.
• A great starter course for someone who wants to animate for the first time, or progress their existing skills.