PRINCIPLES OF ANIMATION

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SQUASH AND STRETCH
This is one of the most important principles of animation. Based on the rigidity of a animated body or character, the effect of movement is emphasized by a change in shape. The basis of squash and stretch is that the visual volume remains constant. While the height increases, width decreases and when width increases height decreases.

ANTICIPATION
Anticipation can be considered as advice for pre-informing the audience about the action that is about to happen. This is one of the prime considerations while preparing the storyboard and later on when an action is planned. In storyboards, anticipation is incorporated by the inclusion of a shot; anticipating the action that is about to happen. For example including a shot of the character looking up in horror, just before something heavy falls on him would make the incident much more clearer to the audience.

STAGING
This is rather general term, which has its origin from the theatre. In essence, it means how an action is presented so that it is completely and unmistakably clear. Staging includes a variety of factors such as the camera distance, camera angle, camera movements, lightning and atmosphere settings, type of background, etc.
Lightning: this is commonly employed in Disney animation films, where a well lit of action is defined by surrounding it with lessor lit areas, thus creating a spot lit effect.
Layout: The elements in the background are arranged so that attention is concentrated to the central character.
Perspective: this is mostly used in scenes which have an architectural background. The strong perspective lines funnels the concentration to the main character.
Line of sight: this is used when the stage character is very small. Though the eye first goes to the bigger character, it’s line of sight redirects attention to the staged action.
Posture: characters postures should be clear and defined. The best method would be to analyze the pose in silhouette to verify the clarity of representation.

FOLLOW THROUGH AND OVERLAPPING ACTION
When a character is animated, if all it parts start moving together and stop together, the action would look mechanical. This is because, in nature, different objects have different speeds of movement. For example, when a character turns, all its limbs do not start moving simultaneously. Probably the head moves first, followed by the limbs, then the trunk and then the legs. Similarly they stop moving at different frames. This  is overlapping action.

EASE IN AND EASE OUT
Force in movements is brought about by this factor. This Ensures uneven speed of motion. In animation, the sequence of frames is generated by first generating the key postures and then generating the in-between postures. The in-between postures are not equally spaced between the key positions. This would create a uniform speed of action and hence would result in a ‘mechanical’ movement. Variations in the spacing of postures. An object starting from rest would not start with its maximum speed. It slowly gains speed, comes to the maximum speed and then before the final position, starts reducing the speed and finally comes to rest. As a thumb rule, When the postures are close together, movement is slow and when they are spaced out, movement is fast.

ARCS
In nature most of the movements, follow an arc. A probable reason could be that most of the joints are through single point pivots. For example, the fingers are pivoted at its base to the palm. The palm in turn is pivoted at the wrist to the forearm, and the forearm at the elbow to the upper arm. The upper arm is connected to the trunk through a ball and socket joint. All these individual points move in arcs, and combined movement results in complicated arcs. There certainly are exceptions to this, yet on the whole, smooth movement requires movement along arcs.

SECONDARY ACTION
This is device for strengthening an action. For example, suppose the script specifies that the character turns away in disgust. The element of disgust may be amplified by the use of say an animated scowl on his face along with a disapproving nod of the head. In character animation, the turning action is the principle action, which is strengthened by the secondary actions i.e. the scowl and the nod.

TIMING
In animation terminology, timing implies controlling the speed and nature of an action by controlling the number frames used to create it. In addition to the number of frames, how they are spaced is also crucial in deciding the nature of a movement. For example, violent actions require lesser in-betweens and slower movements require more in-betweens. The point is to arrive at the correct combination of number of frames and spacing to convey the action. Other aspects of the character, such as the size , weight and the nature of action are all decided by the timing assigned to it.

EXAGGERATION
This can be considered as the basic of animation. In principle, this is enhancing the essence of an idea via the design and the action. But exaggeration is not just distorting a character beyond its physical limits. It should be acceptable to the totality of the scene and the type of action depicted. Exaggeration as a principle has various levels of consideration. At the most preliminary level, the basic concept of the film, the amount of realism, the overall design and treatment of the characters of the film itself would decide the amount of exaggeration adopted in the film. In normal circumstances, the exaggeration level of the film. An overtly exaggerated animation sequence would look out of place in a moderately exaggerated story and background treatment. A classic example of a positive use of this oddity is the central character of the film “The Mask’.

WEIGHT
All physical objects have weight. The simulation of weight is of prime importance while depicting any character action. This is achieved in animation mainly through timing or the speed of the animation. For example, a simple sphere can represent a shot put, a solid rubber ball, a balloon or a bubble through animation. In characters, huge and bulky characters are given a lumbering gait to enhance its weight.