Creating emotion is possible with just the brow or eyebrows. With nothing else on a face, we can tell our audience how a character feels is the brow is there and animatable!

Jan 15, 2017

Jan 13, 2017

Recipe 2 - The Brow with Wind-up

Jan 13, 2017

Adding Wind-up to a Brow animation provides the snap or pop of intensity to the change in emotion. This is putting an exclamation point on emotional change.

Jan 13, 2017

Jan 11, 2017

Recipe 3 - The Brow With Eyes

Jan 11, 2017

First the Brow. Then add Wind-up for punching up each emotion. Now add eyes, and the Brow pops even more. Thinking like an animator now!

Jan 11, 2017

Jan 9, 2017

Lesson 4 - Crying Calm

Jan 9, 2017

Let those tears role down the cheeks. Slow motion and looping come together to create a weeping effect.

Jan 9, 2017

Jan 1, 2017

Recipe 5 - Crying Hysterically

Jan 1, 2017

When The Tears Fly

Jan 1, 2017

Dec 18, 2016

Recipe 6 - Steam Out of Ears

Dec 18, 2016

Toggling toots of steam for animating a classic cartoon madness effect.

Dec 18, 2016

Dec 11, 2016

Recipe 7 - Eye Pop 1

Dec 11, 2016

A simple way to pop the peepers out of their sockets for an astonishing reaction.

Dec 11, 2016

Dec 4, 2016

Recipe 8 - Eye Pop 2

Dec 4, 2016

Eye pop reprise with a more complex animation with eyes shaking and quivering out of the sockets.

Dec 4, 2016

Nov 27, 2016

Recipe 9 - Eye Pop 3

Nov 27, 2016

The Accordion variation on the Eye Pop theme. A complex count of corneas come shaking and quivering! Now you are thinking like an animator. Having fun with all the options.

Nov 27, 2016

Nov 20, 2016

Recipe 10 - Light Bulb Over Head

Nov 20, 2016

Squash and stretch bump the light bulb cartoon classic. Quivering and shaking ideas!

Nov 20, 2016

Nov 13, 2016

Recipe 11 - Head Turn (Single Take)

Nov 13, 2016

A subtle effect when animating a character noticing something off screen, and a basic acting move to build upon.

Nov 13, 2016

Nov 6, 2016

Recipe 12 - Double Take

Nov 6, 2016

Using two “takes” to notice something off screen will give a character the illusion of thinking through the first impression, and then paying closer attention with a second, closer look. An acting basic.

Nov 6, 2016

Oct 30, 2016

Recipe 13 - Triple Take

Oct 30, 2016

A triple take gives a character real emotion as first, second, and third impressions are processed. This is a great acting move, suggesting a slow reaction to important information off screen, such as impending danger, or a vey interesting or beautiful something just out of frame.

Oct 30, 2016

Oct 23, 2016

Recipe 14 - SloMo No

Oct 23, 2016

Ultra slow motion is used for dramatic effect often in animation. This recipe shows how many pictures an animator is going to have to take to create that moment of danger or denial when the world slows to a crawl when a character is flummoxed by something off screen.

Oct 23, 2016

Oct 16, 2016

Recipe 15 - Sloppy Chewing

Oct 16, 2016

This exercise in free form animation is open ended. sometimes tight timing and spacing needs to be thrown out the window in favor of improvisational animation.

Oct 16, 2016

Oct 13, 2016

Recipe 16 - Biting w Wind-up & Follow Through

Oct 13, 2016

A simple act of chomping down on something requires Wind-Up and Follow Through. It adds snap to an otherwise simple animation. Clay Glob eats the flying bat from the White Hat recipes!

Oct 13, 2016

Oct 10, 2016

Recipe 17 - Snoring

Oct 10, 2016

Snoring involves Quiver, Shake, Speeding Up & Slowing Down with a proper Snoring pose. More and more posing will be emphasized to help your audience “read” a characters state of being.

Oct 10, 2016

Oct 7, 2016

Recipe 18 - Close Ups

Oct 7, 2016

Close Ups require options with eye-brows, eyes, and mouths. Emotional expression is infinite with just 12-15 pieces of paper. This simple recipe is an experiment with a variety of in-between face poses when going from one emotion to the next.

Oct 7, 2016

Oct 4, 2016

Recipe 19 - Posing for Emotion

Oct 4, 2016

The body expresses emotion through poses. We explore how to create poses that show joy, sadness and sneakiness. An animator is always thinking about posing and gestures that communicate the appropriate emotion for acting.

Oct 4, 2016

Oct 2, 2016

Recipe 20 - Running: Basic

Oct 2, 2016

For a basic running pose, a waddle will do. If you waddle a stiff character and make sure it is posed correctly, the audience will buy a basic run animation.

Oct 2, 2016

Sep 30, 2016

Recipe 21 - Running: Intermediate

Sep 30, 2016

Running and walking are the most difficult things to get right in animation. Break a character into two poses or parts: upper body and lower body. A two piece rig for a running character adds sophistication, while reducing the overwhelm of a dozen joints in motion..

Sep 30, 2016

Sep 27, 2016

Recipe 22 - Confident Pose

Sep 27, 2016

The confident pose is subtle. In this recipe we Wind-up from a sad pose into a confident pose. Holding that pose creates the illusion of strength and fearlessness.

Sep 27, 2016

Sep 24, 2016

Recipe 23 - Throwing Fast

Sep 24, 2016

Using this example from “The Abdominal Snowman” animation in Black Hat cases studies, we apply posing with Inbetween Blur and Wind-Up & Follow Through. This gives us a more advanced throw animation than the simple toss in the White Hat recipes

Sep 24, 2016

Sep 20, 2016

Recipe 24 - Frog Hop

Sep 20, 2016

This variation on the Bouncing Ball recipe requires a Squash pose from our frog. The flatten and crouch poses are essential.

Sep 20, 2016

Sep 17, 2016

Recipe 25 - Frog Tongue Snap

Sep 17, 2016

Frog’s eat flies, right? This recipe shows you how. To create a snapping tongue relies on posing and timing. We bring it all together to eat a fly flying on a path with SloMo spacing.

Sep 17, 2016

Sep 12, 2016

Recipe 26 - Bee Buzz

Sep 12, 2016

This Bee has two wing poses. Toggle them while it flies on a path and watch them come alive.

Sep 12, 2016

Sep 7, 2016

Recipe 27 - Pig Fly

Sep 7, 2016

Make a pig fly by posing two independent wing props. Keeping track of the proper “flapping” poses is not as easy as it looks, as the happy-pig-body-pose glides along a path with the Spacing is Speed recipe in mind.

Sep 7, 2016