The 12 Principles of Animation: 1.

Squash and Stretch:

The squash and stretch is mainly used to create the motions become larger than life instead of swift or realistic. This principle is normally used when the object is in fact being affected by either gravity or weight; the Stretch comes into play when something is effect by momentum or other such forces, in ways that are actually impossible in reality.

2. Anticipation:
Anticipation is the pre-movement, which prepares the audience of a major action from the character. For example; if a dancer is made to jump, they must first bend their knees. The act of anticipation helps make the action seem more realistic. If a comic effect is required anticipation is not used.

3. Staging:
Staging is a key point to animation because it directs the audience to the idea/ story that is being told to them. The main importance of staging is to highlight an important factor of a scene whether that is an action, expression or a mood. The placement of a given character, the change in lighting or even the angles of the camera, these are all different aspects of staging. Using to many actions within in a scene can in fact confuse the audience using one clear idea to get the main point across. If the camera is angled from the base of the screen it can make the character appear larger.

4. Straight ahead and post to pose animation:

Straight ahead animation is creating a scene frame by frame, beginning to end. This creates a more fluid scene therefore it is more used for realistic scenes, though it is hard to maintain the proportions when using this technique. Pose-to-Pose animation is creating a scene to a time scale. Starting with a few key frames and the filling in the blanks at a later date. Pose-to-

Pose is best used for dramatic/ emotional scenes where relating to the background are of greater importance. This technique brings a high advantage when it comes to using computers because it means that the sound can be added at later date but will still sound in the right place. For example; if a bomb goes off, the sound will be filmed and added after the animation is created but the explosions sound will still sound when the explosion takes place.

5. Follow through and Overlapping Action

Follow through is when certain parts of the body carry on moving even if the character has stopped. Although it doesnt have to be the character stopping it can in fact be an object. For example; if a car suddenly slams on the breaks the character in the driving seat will continue to move forward, therefore the motion is followed through. Over lapping is when a character changes their direction and objects such as clothing or hair do not follow the direction change straight away. The direction change will be followed a few frames later when the clothes/ hair return to the same direction as the character. Drag is also connected to over lapping; this is when a character such as goofy, starts to run but his head, ears, upper body and clothing cannot keep up the leg movements. In features this type of action is done subtly. Timing is critical when trying to use drag and overlapping effectively.

6. Slow-Out and Slow-In

The movement of nearly all objects needs time to accelerate and slow down. This is the reason for animations looking more realistic and the beginning and the end of an action, because the extreme poses are emphasized and the middle posses are not so much. When the action first starts there will be more drawings, the middle will have 2 or 3 and there will be more images near the end of the action. Fewer drawings make the action faster and more images make the action slower.

7. Arcs
Most natural movements follow an arched trajectory, therefore animation has to comply with this principle, and this gives the animation the realism. This applies to a limb movement by rotating a joint or a thrown object following a arched trajectory. The only expectation to this principle is when animation mechanical movements because they typically move in straight lines. As the speed/ momentum of an object increases the arc tends to flatten out and broaden in a turn. For example; a fastball is more likely to move in a straighter line than any other kind of pitch. If an object in motion suddenly moves out of their natural arc for no reason it appears to the audience as being erratic rather than fluid.

8. Secondary Action
By adding secondary actions to a main action the scene will appear more realistic. For example; a man-walking can either swings his arms or place his hands in his pocket, he may even whistle. For realism if it was windy his hair would have to blow in the wind. The most important thing about the secondary action is that it in fact emphasises the main action rather than take any attention away from it. If the secondary actions happen to remove the attention from the main action they are most probably better off left out. Both the secondary and the main action should clearly link into each other fluidly without looking out of place. Using the example above again; the main action is the character walking but the secondary action would be the hair or arms (or both) moving as the main action takes place.

9. Timing
Timing is a technique that is vastly improved over time. The basics are; more drawings between poses slow and smooth the action. Fewer drawings between the poses create a faster more crisp action. By adding a mixture of fast and slow creates more texture within the action. The more accurate the timings in action the more the objects within the action appear to conform to the laws of physics. Another thing that timing is critical for is deciding on a given characters mood, for example the emotion will all depend on the reaction.

10. Exaggeration: Exaggeration is a principle commonly used in cartoons; perfect imitations can make the animation look statics and dull. The level of the exaggeration totally depends on whether the animation is after realism or another particular style. The classical definition of exaggeration, employed by Disney, was to remain true to reality, just presenting it in a wilder, more extreme form. When using exaggeration you have to be careful not to overdo it otherwise the scene will become too theatrical and overly animated. 11. Solid Drawing (Poses): The bases behind this principle is giving the image the correct look, whether thats from the depth, width and balance. The pose has to have this in order to create a believable and interesting to watch. The main base for any cartoon is classical drawings, done using pencil sketches and various drawings of life. These are then transformed by using colour and movement to bring the characters to life using the illusion of three and four dimensional life. Three dimensional is movement in space and four dimensional is movement in time. 12. Appeal: An animated character has appeal just like a performer has a certain charisma. Appealing animation does not have to have a cute and cuddly because the appeal can be whether they are heroic, villain, comic or yes cute. The appeal is actually in the personality, clear drawing and an easy to read design, all of these things will capture the given audiences eye. Over the years the appeal has change along with the technology of creating the animation, years ago the appeal used to be short gags strung together creating an animation, were as now they are more based on an on-going story with a character as the lead. Animation is no different to other types of storytelling; the feature has to appeal to the mind as well as the eye.