Finding Ideas: Animation Inspiration

The concept of finding and using inspiration is one that is common to every facet of creative practice. From fashion to interior design, architecture to web design; the ability to look around at the world around us or the work of others who we admire and receive impetus for our own work is critical. But i have been pondering about what it means to find inspiration as an animator. One might watch an animated feature or a short but how does that translate to inspiration for me on my next piece. I'm going to try and share some of the things I have learned over the past few weeks.

Always Start Here 
If ever I need to look for a place to start looking for what would be called acceptable 3d animation here is where I start.

PIXAR ANIMATION STUDIO . Their blockbuster movies are the Incredibles, WALL-E,Ratatouille,Toy Story 1 & 2,Cars,Finding Nemo,Monsters Inc.,The Incredibles,A Bug's Life etc.

DREAMWORKS ANIMATION owned by Steven Spielberg and his other two partners
Their blockbuster movies are Shrek 1,2&3, Kung fu Panda, Over the hedge, Bee Movie


Ask Why Not How!
Because the field of animation is mostly technical and requires a skilled use of techniques, the error is usually to look at someone else's work and wonder "how did they do that?". I have learned to not just ask how they did something but also why they did it. In understanding why they have used a particular lightening scheme, i have found out about how lighting can affect the mood of a scene and how audiences respond to the characters or the narrative presented. A bluish scheme suggests a horror or sci-fi theme to the scene and bright yellow or orange scheme suggests a happy and fun theme to the scene. Asking why can also give more insight to how and when I should use certain elements in  my animation. From adding more anticipation, to exaggerating weight etc. finding out why, can go a long way to answering how this actions help communicate greater believability in a character and the overall animation.


Observe The Details
I also have learned to look at what additional actions, movements in the shorts or animated features I see help to make the characters more believable. I look at the timing of eye winks, the follow through on limbs and cloth, facial expressions, amount of depth of field in a scene. Applying all these things in my own animation help to improve it. I simply look at something I've seen and liked, comparing whether it would make my own animation look even better and then add it.

This is just a few of the many things that I watch for as i look at other people's work. The aim isn't to copy them or use the same narrative or style they used in hope of achieving the same level of success on a piece. In the end, originality of content while keeping those elements of animation that communicate believability will always produce the best results. In my current piece, I have found inspiration for the character I am working with, in the "Scrat" character from the Ice-Age animated feature movies (Chris Wedge and Carlos Saldanha, 2002). 

References

Ice Age, 2002. [Film]. Directed by Chris Wedge, Carlos Saldanha. USA: Blue Sky Studios