Animation Fundamentals - Exercises 1: Bouncing Ball

22.4.2024 - 7.4.2024 (Week 1 - Week 3)
Vanessa Kei Kurniadi / 0360525
Bachelor of Design (Hons) in Creative Media
Animation Fundamentals - Exercises

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INSTRUCTION

Exercise 1 - Bouncing Ball

In this exercise we are to practice doing a basic animation of a bouncing ball. We will practice on how to make the animations frame by frame, as well as applying the "slow-in" and "slow-out" on the ball movement to make it natural.

Setting Up

Since this is out first time using Adobe animate, we were given direction on what to do. So first, when you click "New File" there are several presets we can choose from. This time, we are to use the HD preset. We just had to change the frame rate to 24 and leave the rest of the default settings, end then clicked "Create".

fig 1.1.1 Setting up Adobe Animate, week 2 (30.4.2024)

When the setting up is done, we are given a blank canvas. So we now need to make the assets for the bouncing ball animation. We had to make 3 main things: the ball, the floor, and the arch guide for the bouncing.

For the arch itself, we could adjust the opacity by going to the properties > frame > color effects > alpha, and then use the slider to adjust the opacity according to our needs.

fig 1.1.2 making the floor, week 2 (30.4.2024)

fig 1.1.3 Left: canvas with ball, floor, and arch ; Right: arch settings, week 2 (30.4.2024)

Animating

When everything is ready, we can start doing the animation. The first thing we can do is to add the key position first. So I started adding the ball position on the top and bottom position of every bounce.

fig 1.2.1 Adding the key positions of the ball, week 2 (30.4.2024)

Now that the key positions are in place, we could smoothen the animation by adding frames in between the key movements. One of the simple ways to do this is by adding a position right in between of the 2 existing positions.

fig 1.2.2 Adding the in between frames for the ball, week 2 (30.4.2024)

Now repeat the process a few more times (by a few, I mean more than 40 more times XD) and make sure the positions are aligned nicely with every new frames to make a nice flow of movements, and here's what I made:

fig 1.2.3 My bouncing ball frames, week 2 (30.4.2024)

Mr Kamal saw me doing this and asked me to play the animation. He saw the animation and told me that I made them a bit too advanced.

Usually animations are made with 1 frame distance between every position, making it 2 frames per position (although it also depends on the purpose and flow of the animation, you could need more or less frames) but I edited almost every frame, leaving only 2 position with 2 frames lol.

Mr Kamal also said that with a more complex object, such as human body, this type of animating won't be ideal since it'll take a lot more time to complete the whole animation. Of course, since this is just a simple ball he said it's fine, and it turned out okay.

I was just messing around and trying my hands on animating the ball, and ended up having too much fun with it. But I will take note of his advice and apply it on my further projects.

But anyways, here is how my animation turned out:

fig 1.2.4 Bouncing ball animation attempt #1, week 2 (30.4.2024)

When I checked the animation again, I think I there is some ways I could improve it:

• Add a pause before starting the animation
• Add a slower "slow-in" animation on the ball's first fall
• The bounce was a bit too rushed. I can maybe add some frames to make it slower.

So I made some more edits to the animation by adding 1 more frame and leaving it be, like a very short pause, to slow down the peak position of the balls, and here's what I made:

fig 1.2.5 Bouncing ball animation attempt #2, week 2 (30.4.2024)

After Mr Kamal reviewed it again, he said it is not recommended to have inconsistent frames. It is best to have all the frames with 1 gap each, or no gap at all for every frames, so the movement would be consistent and neat.

fig 1.2.6 Bouncing ball animation attempt #3, week 2 (30.4.2024)

I was about to submit this one as my exercise submission. but then I looked into the instruction details, and it says to do the animation in "2". So I had to redo all my animation and make a new one with 2 frames each position

fig 1.2.7 Bouncing ball animation attempt #4, week 2 (4.5.2024)

Apparently I realized that the hidden layer won't disappear even if we hide it. But deleting the layer would be a waste of proof of progress. So what I did is I decreased the opacity until it's barely visible, then I exported it as the submission video.

fig 1.2.8 Bouncing ball animation attempt #5, week 3 (4.5.2024)

During class time, Mr Kamal said I could add another frame on certain parts to make the animation look a bit smoother, cuz some parts are a bit faster than the others.

Final Result

fig 1.2.9 Bouncing ball final animation, week 3 (6.5.2024)

Exercise 2: Bouncing Ball with tails

In our second exercise we were instructed to give a more refine touch into our ball animation. We are to give our ball a stretch and squash effect.

Giving a stretch and squash into the ball gives off the impression that the ball is made of an elastic material. The more the shape changes in the animation determine how soft and elastic the ball material is.

We can apply the stretch and squash into the ball by using the free transform tool. Keep in mind that when you squeeze a ball, you make them look longer. Otherwise the volume doesn't add up and the animation will seem like the ball shrinks in size.

Here is how I made the ball's squash and stretch:

2.1.1 Ball animation squash and stretch

Now that it is done, I need to add a tail into the ball, that will flail according to the movement of the ball.

fig 2.1.2 Tail animation on the ball

Making the tail is a bit difficult. One of the tips is to follow the flow of the previous tail position. But I also need to imagine how the tail would move against the air flow and movement of the ball. I'm trying hard to make it look natural, without the rotation of the ball.

The tail line art is obviously only just the beginning. I will then need to fill them in. Mr Kamal showed us how to make the tails with the pen tool. That is probably for those who don't have the drawing tablet, because the process takes much longer time. I personally just use the paint bucket tool to fill the inside of the tails.

fig 2.1.3 filling the tails line art with paint bucket tool

fig 2.1.4 my whole frame timeline

fig 2.1.5 Bouncing ball with tail animation attempt #1

After seeing my peer’s work, I noticed that my tail is a bit small, plus the direction of the tail isn’t too good either. Mr Kamal also gave me some feedback on the work, which is quite a lot of revisions. But I’m getting the hang of it, and will attempt to fix it.

I didn't get the chance to do a revision for quite a long time because I am too piled up with other assignments, but I finally managed to do a revision when we're getting really close to the end of the semester's submission T.T .

(I also moved from Adobe Animate into Procreate to do this project. It is not because Procreate is better for animation. In fact, it is quite a bit more challenging especially in the area of layers. But for this particular project it's still quite sufficient to do the job.)

Even though the app is different, I still did the same process as the one I did in Adobe Animate. To stretch the ball, I just used the free transform tool in Procreate.

This time, I made sure that the flow of the tail will go nicely and not too stiff. The tail itself is made to be much longer to give me a bit more freedom in creating the flow of the tail's movement.

fig 2.1.6 Making sure the new tail movement flows nicely, week 15 (3.8.2024)

It might not be perfect and I didn't have any time to ask for any feedback, but I am pretty sure that this one is much better than the previous one.

fig 2.1.7 Bouncing ball animation with tails final result, week 15 (3.8.2024)

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Feedback

Week 2

• Your animation is a bit too advanced. You made the animation on "1". It is more ideal to make the animations on "2", because it will be beneficial for us when we need to make more complicated form's animation. But for now I think this is okay
• Be consistent with the frames. If you are doing "1", keep it as "1" until the end. If it is "2", make sure it stays that way until the end too. Changing the frame gaps would make the overall animation inconsistent.

Week 3

• Some parts look a bit faster than the others. I think could add another frame before the first collision with the floor, and another one before and after the peak of the second arch.

Week 4

• Can skip the 1 stretch frame after contact with ground.
• Make sure the tail is consistent, and to follow the flow of the lines.

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Reflection

Experience

This is my first ever time trying to make an animation. I had to think hard and try my best to make it as natural as I can, and it turns out very nicely, which makes me very proud of my first animation. I am really looking forward to see how much my capabilities could go with this course. I'm happy to say that I am enjoying this course so far. The process is a bit long and tiring, but it's very satisfying to see how each frames come to life.

I also changed platform at some point to do the exercises. Both platforms have their plus and minus sides for me personally. The Adobe Animate is far more efficient when it comes to doing animation with lots of layers involved. It also has a lot of features that helps me in a lot of my problems and challenges. But it has 1 major issue for me personally: Sitting in a laptop for too long and draw on my drawing tablet strains and hurt my neck and back after quite some time.

Yes, ideally I suppose I'm not supposed to do all the animation in one sitting, thus the quite fair deadline. But due to personal reasons combined with my other assignments in this semester, I found myself having to rush things again and again in one sitting. So at one point, I decided that I am more comfortable using procreate in my iPad for now.

Observation

I noticed that there are a lot of techniques and methods to make our animation look more natural and more alive. I might need to use those techniques in future projects. I have also seen some of my peers work. Some needs some more tuning, and some are really good at it. I wanna practice more to be able to produce animations of better quality.

This task has also allowed me to learn some new things for both Adobe Animate and Procreate's animation feature. Adobe animate focuses on keeping the quality of the drawing sharp with vector lines (I think). So shrinking or zooming the drawing do little to no damage to the drawing quality. But it also gives another challenge when I need to color or draw in gradient. The brush pressure is also a bit too sensitive for me to use the feature comfortably, though it might just be me not finding the brush adjustment feature. The other thing I wish it has is the iPad version. I would help me a lot to be able to use it in my iPad because bringing my laptop, charger, drawing tablet, and all the cables are one of the nuisance in the situation where I need to work mobile.

Procreate seems to be much lighter to do the animation. It doesn't seem to lag, and the export process is also very swift. It is also perfect for mobile work. But the HUGE disadvantage of using procreate is how you can't use multiple layer for a single animation frame. Yes, you can use the grouping feature, but note that in even in default procreate (not using the animation assist), you still have the layer limitations for each project, especially if you really need to work on a lot of layers.

Findings

I found out from our tutorial video that apparently smoother animation isn't always the best option. Some animation are better left in low frame rate to make them more expressive. I also know that there most living creature actually moves in arc, giving an art movement flow into the characters give them a more natural movement. They also have some arc after certain actions, which is a nice touch at the end of an action.