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Performance and Character - Walks - Joyful Child

First day of school 


I've been enjoying the 2-D animation process even though I'm really in the beginner phase and still struggle to animate even in rough. I do enjoy a challenge or maybe i just hurt myself, but i decided to the child's walk in a front perspective. 

Character Bio


Name: Aadam

Age: 3 

Height: 3'1

Weight: 31 lbs

Background: Born and raised in Manchester, obsessed with Spider-man 

Personality: Extremely talkative and quite bold 

Hobby: Spider-man

Occupation: Spider-man

Pets: Spider-man 

Friends & Family: Mother, father, large extended family and Spider-man 

Where is it set? Alma Park primary school

What is happening? excitedly sees him mother and waddles over wanting a big hug

Who’s there? Aadam, his mum and school teacher

Why is it happening? Its the first day of primary school for Aadam and hes been waiting patiently for his mum. 

Animating







My nephew is really the only child i know and could get a personal video reference for. The original clip and him running back and forth but i thought that it wouldn't fit the brief ( thinking of you Joe ) and the stumbling nature would take a lot of time to perfect, especially in a odd perspective. I showed Joe my reference and he said that the walk wasn't joyful enough but my sister didn't get round to sending me another video so i had to work with what i had and interpret the footage myself.



As per usual i would start off mapping out the extremes, so the end of each step for a walk, but because of this perspective and my really crude grid it was slightly challenging, so had to create one with a clearer perspective.



As you can see i had been drawing the character in different poses as i wanted to familiarise myself with the construction of the character and i was struggling to find a pose with a strong silhouette that conveys joy clearly.




I really liked this animation, i felt like the arms swinging really conveyed the emotion as well as the little bounce in her she does. I'm not sure why but the walk feels feminine but it could be just the design overriding my brain, also because the animation is spinning its difficult to see the silhouette.







I watched Incredibles 2 and jack jack was the character that stood out the most with me, they produced a really great performance out him so looking through the scenes i could find i hope i would find a happy walk. In the middle of this battle scene, jack jack discovers he has laser beams and is very excited about this discovery, so i paused it a copied the poses which i thought showed his happiness the most.








To make sure that i had the mid points fairly accurate, i remembered watching this AMB video of him animating a jump in perspective. I find this guy really inspirational and aspire to be as good as him if not better. After this I put in the ups and downs which was more challenging than usual mainly because of the perspective and remembering that things closer get larger and if its further away it gets smaller.



I'm pleased with how this turned out even though that its still in the rough stage, but the potential is there for clean up and a strong animation. I do feel that the first step is too large, and i wanted to convey a hard stomp but couldn't really show that. Perhaps in the future when I've improved as an animator i will be able to do this 

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