These are the 7 most common mistakes that I have found in beginning animators, including myself, and how to avoid them.
Animation is a challenging art form, but if you take note of these common mistakes, you will be much further on the road to success.
1. Keying Controls Sporadically
I have found that the biggest problem for beginners is not keying every control on each of the main keys. This poses many problems. Personally, I used to think that they goal was to have as few keys as possible, but this is quite the opposite. I learned the hard way that you should NEVER let maya make the decisions for you of where a control should be placed because it always creates even and boring inbetweens. This is why each main key and breakdown should have every control keyed. This way, your pose is locked in, and maya can't change it. As you move on from blocking and into the polishing phase, you will also want to add extra refinement keys for this same purpose: to prevent maya from deciding how it should look. Adding a little rotation and translation to every control in each of your poses also makes your animation feel more natural. When doing CG animation this is especially important because a lack of movement is much more noticeable. Instead, like a real human, nothing should ever be perfectly still. This leads into the topic of moving holds. If you want to learn more about moving holds, see this post: https://rbossert27.wixsite.com/mysite-2/blog/the-moving-hold
2. Difficulty with Feedback
As animators and artists, taking feedback can be difficult because we get attached to what we've done, but it's essential to take feedback well because you will learn a lot from it and really be able to improve your work. I'm also often pleasantly surprised to find that I like the changes much better than what I had before. When it comes to taking feedback, it's best to separate yourself from the work, and know that the person giving you notes is only trying to help you, not to criticize you. The more you become accustomed to getting feedback, the more comfortable you will become. I also recommend seeking out feedback when you can because other people often see things that we can't, since we've been looking at our shot for so long. Don't forget to give feedback too! It's helpful for training your eye and will allow you to critique your own shots better as well.
3. Skipping the Basics
It's extremely tempting to skip ahead to fun and complicated shots, but this actually makes it very difficult to learn. Animation, like many subjects, builds one topic on top of another, and if you don't have a strong understanding of the basics, it's hard to be successful at more difficult subjects. I've learned this the hard way, and speaking from experience, I recommend starting with simple shots, such as bouncing balls and pendulums, in order to learn more about the 12 principles. Doing this is definitely worth the wait to get to the fun acting shots!
4. Time Management
Animation takes a surprising amount of time to learn, and each shot that we do takes weeks, with many hours a week dedicated to it. This is why spending as many hours as you can animating is extremely helpful for improvement. However, it's also important to relax, so I recommend getting to know your habits and planning the best times to animate, so you still have time to relax as well. Animation Mentor actually has a great post with tips on how to schedule your time, which you can find here: http://blog.animationmentor.com/getting-everything-done-time-management-for-animators/
5. Forgetting the Breakdowns
A common beginner mistake is making even movements, with every part of the body moving at the same time. This comes down to how the breakdowns are used. When I first started animating, I didn't know about the concept of breakdowns, and this made my shots less interesting and the body mechanics unbelievable. Adding breakdowns allow you to tell maya which parts of the body are moving first and to incorporate overlap into the body, and this simple information really breaks up each motion, giving you a lot more fluidity and believably. If you want to learn more about breakdowns, see this post: https://rbossert27.wixsite.com/mysite-2/blog/breakdowns-how-to-get-from-here-to-there.
6. Ignoring Problems
I'm sometimes tempted when blocking in a shot to skip over adding little details or fixing small problems because I can add them later and move on to fun stuff right away, but this always makes me suffer when I get to splining and polishing. It's much harder and slower to add details like finger movements later on, and especially if there's a body mechanics problem in your blocking, it's very difficult to refine and recover from later. Biting the bullet and making all of these changes in blocking is the most efficient and painless way to do this, and your shot will turn out better in the end too.
7. Giving Up
We've all heard the phrase that "we're our own worst critic", and this is especially true for artists. In many cases with animation, we're tempted to give up because we feel like we can't be as good as other animators or we're just not getting it, but in reality if you keep going, you will eventually start getting it. It's natural for people to move at their own pace and understand animation concepts sooner or later than others. I've also found that giving up is typically related to comparing your work to other people's, which is always a bad trap to fall into. The people who do amazing animation have often been doing it for many years and have made many mistakes and taken many hours to get where they are. You can never really know everything they've done to create such amazing work, so it's useless to compare yourself to them. Instead, you should compare your work to what you've done before and take pride in the improvements that you've made. This positive attitude will help animation to be more fun as well!
Keep Going!
Animation is challenging, but these tips have helped me to drastically improve my work, and I hope they're helpful to you too. Good luck on your animation journey, and don't give up!
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