Animating to Music

Appealing character design. Appealing movement in cycles (because music is cyclic). Then hit those beats with some groovy poses. That is animating to music.



Undisputed best animation ever

22 minutes worth watching

I found this clip (and Vimeo channel) via an animation forum post at the 11 Second Club. It has information about getting into the animation industry.

Small Bird Flying Cycle - Don Bluth

I like this clip because Don talks about the animation principle of "Slow-In and Slow-Out", or as we may say in the studio, "Ease-In and Ease Out". He is talking about the spacing of the animation of the wings.

How about trying this 4 drawing cycle (on twos) and test it out with a line test or three?

Xray Vision - Annika Bergström

This is an interview with Annika Bergström, the Swedish animator who also wrote and performed the song*. Annika animated in Flash but had a mixed media approach that blended quite nicely (I thought) to create this narrative/music video.

Second years are working on their major project narratives and will have a music video assignment to work on in Jane's classes as well. I hope this clip may provide some inspiration.

Check out all the quiet moments that rely on 'camera movement' and 'idle' animation or FX cycles.

"It's just a little story describing one of life's lonely moments. There's a girl walking through an empty town, I think she's sort of isolated in her world. To her the real world just shines through in fast glimpses sometimes. There's not really a correct interpretation of it, it's a simple story."



* The second years are lucky they have music and audio students to work with.

Stop mOtion/ Time LApse Music Video

One of the first things students animate is 'the flight of a bumble bee'. The flight of the bumble bee is also a piece of orchestral music by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1899).

I have noted with curiosity some 2nd years attempting musical composition on the eukalali. Music is a close relative to animation, with beats, timing, spacing, narrative and arcs.

It might be blurring the borders a bit here but I found this time lapse / stop mo' music clip quite interesting to watch as it also gives an insight into the film/music maker's process.

Listen carefully for the performer's motivation in the final part of the clip.

11 Second Club meets Gobelins Graduate - Liane-Cho Han

The featured clip (above) won the 11 Second Club competition in September 2009. The animator's name caught my eye and I realised that it was Liane-Cho, one of the animators who was a tutor in the workshop time I had at the Gobelins summer school in 2009. He had just finished working on the 2D feature film The Illusionist. Will posted about that film on his student blog.

It was great to read a bit more about Liane-Cho in the interview by Eric Scheur.

His work is critiqued by Animation Mentor Dana Broadway.

The work below is from his blog. Warning: Strong language use.

After Michelle's comment (Thanks Michelle!), I have also embedded Liane-Cho's student showreel from Gobelins - pretty much all pencil tests (some 3D).