Technology for creating animation in simple language

 

How classic animation works

Essentially, animation technology is an optical illusion. In classical animation, it is also frame-by-frame or animation, the author first draws by hand a series of pictures with minimal differences from each other. 

After that, this sequence of pictures is shown to the viewer at a sufficiently high speed to create the illusion of movement. 

Due to the peculiarities of the human eye and brain, the viewer feels that the picture comes to life already at a playback speed of 16 frames per second. The generally accepted standard for cinema and animation has become the speed of 24 frames per second. The famous legend about magic and "hypnotic influence" of the 25th frame also appeared from this. 

In modern high-budget blockbusters, they use the HFR format (from the English "High Frame Rate" - high frame rate), a speed of 48 frames, and even 60 frames per second (FPS - frame per second). This gives the picture incredible clarity. 

In reality, this means that the viewer sees the same static picture twice.

Modern 2D animation technology

In the age of information technology, to create stop-motion animation, an artist no longer needs to redraw the same character many times with minimal changes. An object or character is created by the artist once, and then animators "animate" it using special programs. You can try it on your own without even having the technical knowledge and talent of a motion designer. 

And although frame-by-frame animation remains an ageless classic even in 2020...today, other less labor-intensive technologies for creating 2D animation have become on a par with it. This is vector animation, where there is no need to draw each picture by hand - an illustration (for example, a character) is split into layers, points are placed at certain places in its body, which is then set to motion.

3D computer animation technology 

If 2D animation can be created by hand or with the help of simple technical manipulations, then to create 3D animation you cannot do without powerful expensive computers and no less powerful and expensive software such as Maya or Cinema4D. 

How it looks technically: 

Let's look at the example of the simplest image in 3D Max. 

• Point A (frame # 1) - we have a static image of the ball in three-dimensional space (coordinates X1, Y1, Z1).
• Point B (frame # 25) - the position of the ball in space a second later (coordinates X2, Y2, Z2).

 

• The next control point, a second later (frame # 25), the position of the ball in space changes (coordinates X2, Y2, Z2).
• In addition, the animator sets the point of view of the camera (coordinates X3, Y3, Z3), explaining the technique from which perspective to look at the object. And finally, it indicates the direction from which the light falls. The next control point, a second later (frame # 25), the position of the ball in space changes (coordinates X2, Y2, Z2).

• After all the parameters are set, the machine calculates the entire scene (this process is called "rendering").

Two parameters are calculated:

1. The path that our ball makes in space from point # 1 to frame # 25. In what coordinates will it be in each of the 25 frames. 
2. How each frame will look from the position of the camera.

As a result, we get a sequence of 25 images of the ball in three dimensions. When played back in a video player, all these frames will flash before your eyes in a second, and in your mind there will be a complete feeling that the ball is moving. 

Before calculating the final scene, they also make a so-called "animatic" - this is a rough sketch of the animation, which allows you to evaluate how the composition will look, the movement of objects in the frame, how the camera behaves, while looking at the timing of each scene in seconds and, if necessary , at the next stage of the finishing animation(original Motion Graphics services in USA), make edits:

What about 3D character animation

The first step is to draw the character's concept art. Then, according to the drawings, its three-dimensional volumetric model is recreated. The skeleton (bones) of the character is assembled, for which you can then move it. Add textures in layers and here we have a hero revived on the screen:

Separately, it should be said about the popular Motion Capture technology (motion capture), when sensors / points are hung on the body of an actor and / or his face, which later on on the computer to the smallest detail repeat his natural plasticity of movements and thereby improve the quality of animation of a 3D character. very high, practically realistic level.

One of the main problems with all animation technologies is the lack of object weight. It is very difficult to manually recreate real physics given this weight. Therefore, they came up with motion capture, which helps to automatically arrange all points in space in a natural way and not waste time and resources on bringing the movements to 100% realism.