Improbably Possible

Well it's been another long gap between posts and in looking at the dates there seems to be something about summer that makes me want to start writing haha. I think it might be that I start a lot of "Summer" projects. The days are longer, it's warm in the Pacific Northwest, it's beautiful outside and I get motivated to do something. This got me thinking about the importance of personal work and personal projects. I believe they are important because as artists these are opportunities to more easily process and develop. There are many types of projects that could fall into this realm. I like to break up projects into these three categories: DEVELOPMENT - A project designed around an area I'm wanting to improve in artistically (i.e. sketching faster, cartoony animation, drawing hands, etc.) THERAPEUTIC - A project that allows me to process my thoughts and emotions through my artwork EXPLORATION - An open project often focused  on having fun or trying out a ne...

After finishing the little series on the 12 Principles I realized that it's been quite a while since I've shared what I've been up to. So as I develop more post ideas I thought I would take a minute to do that. I graduated from Animation Mentor back in 2018 (I said it was a while haha), and after about a year of applying and trying to make new shots for my animation reel I signed on to my first contract as a 3D Animator. I actually just wrapped up work on this project, it has been an absolute joy to work on and I'm still shocked and grateful I had the opportunity to be involved. That project was in the Film/TV sector of the industry and a little over a year ago I was able to start working in the Game sector. I have really enjoyed both sides, but personally, I was able to learn more about mechanics and animation faster working in games because of the types of animations that games require. In addition to working as an Animator, I was humbled to be asked to teach at my al...

There are 5 principles left to cover all 12 Principles of Animation. These last 5 are a little more straightforward in terms of definition, but some of them may take extra effort when trying to communicate with others because they have to do with personal aesthetics and/or workflow. Looking WAY back at my introduction , I used 3 groups to organize the principles. We already covered all of the Motion principles and the last 2 groups are Technique and Aesthetic . These groups help to frame the principles in a way that I find helpful in terms of understanding their purpose. As usual, we will start by introducing the principles and defining them, and then move on to see how they are typically applied. The Technique group has 2 of the last 5 principles and seems like a good place to start since they are the most straightforward. They are: Solid Drawing - Drawings(2D) or poses (3D/Stop Motion) that show believable weight, balance, and relationship to the character's form as a whole w...

After discussing timing and spacing, I think it's a little easier to see how all of these animation principles really feed off of each other and overlap in many ways. So instead of focusing on them as separate principles, I decided to discuss the remaining motion  principles as a group. They really are artistic definitions of scientific principles, a way for us to discuss and push reality while still basing our animation on realistic physics to ground our work and make it more believable. Starting with reality, we can look at science, then we will define and apply the animation principles. Obviously, I'm not a scientist so I will not try to get too technical, but I think it's helpful to look at the reality of motion. Specifically Newton's 3 Laws of Motion: (1) Every object in a state of uniform motion will remain in that state of motion unless an external force acts on it (objects at rest will stay at rest until another force acts upon it, objects in motion will...

 Alright, I'm really excited to get into this second part of Timing and Spacing. Hopefully, I will be able to apply the principles we defined in Part 1 in such a way that helps make these concepts start to click for you. After reading this post I encourage you to keep studying this principle and read what others have to say about it because once you start to grasp it your animations move to another level. ***EXPLANATORY CAMMA*** One last note before starting, since I'm going to try and move into application vs. definition I'll define these terms as I mean them here so that I don't have to pause to define them later. Key Drawing or Key = A drawing(2D) or frame (3D) that establishes when something will happen as well as extreme poses that help communicate the story. Breakdown(BD) = A drawing or frame that establishes how something transitions from one key to the next Inbetweens = The drawings or frames that guide the viewers' eye to and from Keys and BD's. Tim...

For my posts discussing the 12 Principles of Animation, I want to begin with Timing and Spacing because I feel that this principle is a major building block of the art form. This principle has a lot of power in establishing the style of a shot as well as what will be exaggerated and highlighted. It is also a principle that can be a bit confusing at times. For example, I'm calling the principle "timing AND spacing" while it has also been called simply "timing", and I sometimes hear students talking about the "timing feeling off" when it seems like they are trying to call out the spacing. All this to say I feel there's a lot to unpack so I decided to devote two posts to this principle. In this post, I'll define the principle as I think about it and share some basic examples so that in the following post we can dive in a bit deeper but all be on the same page. So, let's define this principle. The first thing to note is that while it is conside...

During the current COVID lockdown, I'm finding some time to blog again and thought I should make a little check-in post to let you know what I'm working on and planning for the next couple of posts. I've decided to start getting into some of the animation principles. I mentioned a classification for the principles in a previous post  and decided to tackle the MOVEMENT principles first starting with "Timing and Spacing". This is a big one. I know. This term gets dropped a lot in critiques and feedback, and sometimes they are used as if they can be interchanged. In addition to giving a description of the principle, I hope to also explain what some of these terms are trying to describe and how to better understand them so that you can make the needed adjustments to achieve the type of look you want in your work. Hopefully, this next post will be out soon. Until then keep creating and thanks for reading! -Justin

Now that so much work can be created digitally there seems to be a little resistance to the idea of developing an ability to sketch on paper. What I hear most often is that people aren't good at it, it's a waste of time, and/or I like to figure it out on the computer. As someone that grew up thinking I was terrible at drawing but liked to do it, and now finalize most of my work on the computer I thought I would share my thoughts about these statements to help explain why I continue to sketch. "I'm Not Good At It" I completely understand this one because I said this to myself when I thought of being an artist in grade school. First I would ask what are you not good at. Are you not good at quickly roughing out some of your ideas, or are you unhappy with the quality of the sketch when it is finished? If it is the latter I would encourage you to learn to let it go. It is very difficult to do so, especially with Twitter, Instagram, etc. and everyone posting there ...

So it's been a while... The last few terms of my program where very time intensive for me and I poured all of my time into my school assignments. A lot has happened since posting last. I graduated from the AnimationMentor character animation program in June 2018, I attended CTNX and I am currently looking for work as an animator. I'm hoping to get into a normal schedule of blogging again and pick up where I left off. Explore some of the animation principles more in depth and see where to go from there. Well just wanted to make a quick post saying that I'm still here and that I'll start blogging again shortly. 

As I'm going through my character animation course, I wanted to use this blog to share some of the things I'm learning. To establish a foundation for those future posts I think it's important to start with the 12 animation principles established by the early animators at the Disney studio. These principles are both technical philosophies and terminology that help animators speak to specific aspects of a piece of animation that are working and/or needing work. When used together the principles can help any animation be perceived as more harmonious and believable. While they are listed as separate pieces many overlap and inform the others. Recently, I heard Mark Oftedal put these principles into categories that I found very helpful. Group #1: MOTION - Squash & Stretch, Anticipation, Follow Through, Slow-In & Slow-Out, Arcs, Secondary Action, Timing & Spacing; Group #2: TECHNIQUE - Solid Drawing, Pose-To-Pose & Straight Ahead; Group #3: AESTHETIC -...

Here are some visuals to show where I am. These are some notes and thumbnail sketches for the 3 shots I have been working on this term. I plan to post the final animations here, but until then I hope that you enjoy this little sneak peek.

After talking about life as a journey and the process of becoming an artist in my last post I thought I'd share a little bit more about where I am in my journey right now. Currently, I am wrapping up my 3rd term at Animation Mentor. I am enrolled in the character animation program there and have been blown away by the teaching and community that they have developed there. Animation has always been a dream of mine, but because I was not an excellent draftsman in grade school I convinced myself that I would never be able to do that. However, I found animation so interesting that I learned as much as I could about the techniques and production pipeline hoping that I might find an opportunity to work somewhere in the industry. This round about approach helped me gain a lot of understanding that I'm finding very helpful at the moment, as well as cultivate an appreciation for many forms of art. I hope to write a more detailed post about my how I got here soon. Also, as a...

Hello and welcome! I've been meaning to start blogging for some time now and finally have the motivation to start. So without really knowing  how  to do that I'll start in the middle. About halfway through my first year of community college, I decided to pursue a degree in Fine Art. Art had always been an interest of mine but because I could not draw/paint like Michelangelo when I was twelve I thought I couldn't be an artist. I still cannot draw/paint like Michelangelo but I have come to discover two things that have helped me embrace the title of "artist". The first is that a lot of artists, if not most, cannot draw like the masters of the renaissance (which is why they are called masters and still studied today). The second is a more personal thought about what it means to be an artist and that is to place the importance on what is learned about yourself, the medium, and the craft while creating a piece of art rather than what it looks like at the end. Whet...