Flip Review no.1

So I finally got around to doing the first video review. It was very interesting for me to do this, and it served as a good test to prove that I can easily do more of these in the future and hope to make it a regular part of the blog.

Remember that this is funded 100% by love and rainbows, and these reviews will be free if you're interested in sending something in to me. Click here to find out more, and to see the guidelines for submitting an animation for review.

My thinking about all this is that watching a video review of an artists work is a very efficient way to learn about animation. As usual, I would appreciate any comments, particularly those that suggest ways I could improve upon this idea.

The animation discussed in the video is in the "stepped" blocking stage, and was kindly provided by Asemta Bhattad who can be reached at asemtab@gmail.com

2D.. whats that ?

Well.. that was a joke. I know that personally I have to force myself to try and think in a 2D way when I work - I'm talking about thinking poses, thinking thumbnailing, trying to 'plan' my animation in a more traditional way. I never had any formal animation training, and so I learnt to animate in a more straight ahead, and layered fashion. Personally the change of technique to a more 'blocked' approach is my biggest creative challenge right now... its hard.

Anyway.. the point of this post is that I wanted to point you towards a great little program I found recently on the net. Its called "Plastic Animation Paper" and is simply a small, easy to use, and compact little 2D animation program. Its free too.

I was working on the blocking for my project at home ( and yes I will post info on this soon ), and I was getting stuck with a particular broad action. I was posing through it when I thought "I think I need to add a pose inbetween here to get the effect I want", but I wasn't 100% sure if it really would work. This is the problem with 3D - I then have to spend about 20 minutes posing up that frame ( for a rough pose at that ) ... this to me seems fruitless as I just wanted to see if a shape would make for a more expressive transition.
So I thought it best to draw up a few poses in very loosely in Plastic Animation Paper, and asses it there. It was remarkably successful, and in fact I ended up animating the action in a way I`m certain I wouldn't have thought of If I hadn't done this.


There are simple options for frame management and playback, and a cool 'lightbox' feature to see your frames underneath. This drawing is embarassing, but a good example of the basic kind of image needed to explore an idea.

To me, moments of realisation like that really mean something. I do plan and draw my ideas, but only very loosely, and I dont spend too long thinking about the actual mechanics of how A gets to B because I like to concentrate on the performance. Using a small 2D animation prog however, can really help you concentrate on that part when the times comes to nail down exactly how A does get to B.

You can grab the program here: Plastic Animation Paper