The 12 Principles of Animation Explained - The Most Important Rules for Animating
12 Principles of Animation - In this episode of the Shot List, we look at the rules of animation that most animators continue to follow today.
What are the 12 Principles of Animation? ►► bit.ly/wi-pa
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Chapters:
00:00 - Introduction to the Principles of Animation
01:10 - History of the Principles of Animation
02:40 - Squash & Stretch
04:21 - Anticipation
05:55 - Staging
09:21 - Straight Ahead & Pose to Pose
10:50 - Follow Through & Overlapping Action
13:30 - Slow In & Slow Out
14:36 - Arcs
15:35 - Secondary Action
17:21 - Timing
19:45 - Exaggeration
21:40 - Solid Drawing
23:30 - Appeal
26:23 - Takeaways
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THE ILLUSION OF LIFE, EXPLAINED
In this episode of the Shot List, we break down the 12 principles of animation, how they work, and why animators continue to use them to this day.
APPLY THE 12 PRINCIPLES OF ANIMATION
Squash and Stretch: Deforming objects or characters to emphasize their weight, elasticity, or flexibility.
Anticipation: Preparing the audience for an upcoming action by showing a brief movement or change in expression.
Staging: Presenting ideas or actions in a clear and visually interesting way, directing the audience's attention to convey the intended message.
Straight Ahead and Pose to Pose: Two different approaches to animating movement. Straight ahead animates each frame in sequence, while pose to pose plans key poses first.
Follow Through and Overlapping Action: Continuing movement after the main action stops and parts of a character or object moving at different speeds or times.
Slow In and Slow Out: Gradually increasing or decreasing the speed of movement at the beginning and end of an action.
Arcs: Animating objects and characters along curved trajectories, mimicking real-world motion.
Secondary Action: Additional movements that complement the main action, adding depth and context to a character's performance.
Timing: The speed and rhythm of movements in animation, essential for conveying weight, energy, and emotion effectively.
Exaggeration: Pushing movements and expressions beyond reality to make them more dynamic and expressive.
Solid Drawing: Creating characters and objects with volume, weight, and dimensionality, making animation appear more believable and three-dimensional.
Appeal: Making characters and animation visually interesting and appealing, designing characters with unique personalities and maintaining consistency in design and performance.
#FilmTheory #VideoEssay #Filmmaking
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♬ SONGS USED:
"Look Up" - Watermark High
"Origin" - David A. Molina
"The Great Escape" - Ian Post
"Neon Sun" - Jacob Montague
"Wall of Fire" - Tony Anderson
"A Battle in the East" - Rhythm Scott
"No Regrets" - Makeup and Vanity Set
"Echo" - Twin Signals
"Assembly Line Dreams" - Ostin Drais
"I'll Make a Man Out of You" - Donny Osmond
"Dojo Tradition (Instrumental)" - In This World
"British News Team" - Lance Conrad
"Curiosity" - Kevin Graham
"Lithe or Death" - Michael Giacchino
"Andy's Birthday" - Randy Newman
"New World" - Ian Post
"Poor Bear" - George Bruns
"War Dance (Instrumental)" - Rhythm Scott
"Inquisitions" - Kevin Graham
"All Star" - ANBR
"In Love with Emi" - Fabien Fustinoni
"Principia" - Mike Steele
"Stuck Behind a Train (Instrumental)" - Makeup And Vanity Set
"Thumper Exotica" - Rhythm Scott
"Life's Journey Begins" - idokay
"Virtua Mima" - Masahiro Ikumi
"A Dream Is A Wish Your Heart Makes" - Mack David, Al Hoffman, Jerry Livingston
"From a Distance (Theme from Hit TV)" - Makeup And Vanity Set
"Silent Arithmetic (Instrumental)" - Hill
"Clockwork" - Borden Lulu
"William Tell Overture" - Rossini
"Discovery" - Kevin Graham
"Amber" - Makeup And Vanity Set
"Don't Lose Your Grip" - Diamonds And Ice
"O Come Let Us Adore Him (Instrumental)" - Salt of the Sound
"High Rollin'" - Stefano Mastronardi
"Anime" - Magiksolo
"This Is Me" - Michael Giacchino
"Wistful (Instrumental)" - Falls
"Unwind" - Mansij
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This is what makes animation appealing to audiences of ALL ages and not simply a child’s medium - the attention to detail and realism. I don’t understand the assumption of many that “cartoons” (animation) are just for kids. It does a great disservice to the artists and that thinking is a sign of a lack of imagination.
Couldn't agree more!
It IS primarily a visual medium that’s meant to entertain and impart good lessons on children. It’s asinine to claim otherwise. With the exception of animation strictly aimed at adults like those from Japan, every creative working on animation is PRIMARILY concerned with serving a younger audience. It’s bullshit to pretend otherwise. Of course that doesn’t mean they wouldn’t like for adults to enjoy the content and they even cater to them, but only to an extent. Because again, if children can’t consume a creative choice (say too risqué and adult) then that choice doesn’t end up on the final product. It just doesn’t take away from your enjoyment to admit those truths.
@@frankie4855 This ignores the fact that many of the classic “cartoons” of the 30’s-50’s were not originally directed at kids of the time but adults. These were shown prior to many major motion pictures of the day alongside Movietone news reels and the subjects and jokes were targeted at the adult audiences much of which completely went over the heads of children that might be in attendance.
@@glennac What’s the most successful, most iconic and beloved animation? It’s that of Disney (the classics more so). Along with other animation content from other places that’s also for children. You have a medium, that is ALWAYS at its most SUCCESSFUL when it’s aimed PRIMARILY at children. So, you could say that inherently, the DNA of the animation art form lends itself at its best when the audience is kids, not adults.
@@frankie4855 I think you confuse correlation for causation. If Studio execs think the same as you do, they will not risk with animated movies for adult only audience so there will never be a SUCCESSFUL Hollywood adult animation movie, because it would never be made. The very fact that you had to exclude anime from Japan is proof of that. However it's something that creators have been pushing against for a very long time. Most of the SUCCESSFUL animation movies are made so both young and mature audience could enjoy them. Just because something is made accessible to children, doesn't mean they are the PRIMARILY audience. There are also more animations targeted at young adults. "Arcane", "Spider-man - Into/Across the spider-verse", "Castlevania", "Invincible". If the young audience keeps watching animation, the market for adult animation would keep growing. I would even argue that the recent photo-realistic remakes of Disney classics are PRIMARILY targeted at audience of adults who are too embarrassed to watch the animations they grew up with. "The Lion King"(2019) grossed $1.6 Billion, it's entirely 3D animation.
"Animation is not a genre for kids. It's a medium for art, it's a medium for film, and I think animation should stay in the conversation." Guillermo Del Toro
Excellent quote!
"They must be prepared for the next movement..." while showing a shot from the "Be Prepared" sequence from The Lion King (4:43). This is the top-shelf content that I come here to see!
Thanks for noticing! 😉
Yayy I thought nobody would've noticed or it'd be buried under lame comment❤s
Animation Movies are Masterpieces! This video is a complete audiovisual encyclopedia about how Animation works. Thousand Thanks StudioBinder for this Inspiring video. All the Best to come.💯💯💯
Thanks for watching!
It's always nice to watch about the base principles, no matter how long you have worked in animation. Thanks a lot. Very well crafted video
Thanks! Yeah, these principles have been around for decades and still very much apply.
Glad StudioBinder is giving the Animation medium the respect it deserves. This is a fantastic video. Would love to see more like this!
Thanks! We love animation so that won't be a problem for us.
Would definitely to see more videos about each steps of the animation production in the future🙏🏾
Thanks for the suggestion! We just might have to do that.
Thanks for this in-depth look at animation! Much of this I already knew but there is so much more that goes into animation. Heck, a single frame animation is a mini-production. My hat is off to all those old school animators (independent and pro) who gave us hours of animated features!!! I think I will stick to live humans to make my features, but there is much to take away from this lesson of animation for filmmaking.
Well said!
This is awesome one thing i love about studio binder is how the breakdown is done have learnt so much from the videos that even when i do my first full animation story will be amazing
Always nice to have a refresher on these basics!
Indeed! Thanks for watching.
Keep up the great work StudioBinder! Very well done!
*What are Media Text, Niche Culture, High Art, Low Art, Pop Culture, Representation, Iconography and Semiotics in film studies could you please make a video on these?❤*
Those are all great suggestions. We'll add 'em to our list.
All these subtle details are fascinating!
We couldn't agree more!
So informative as always. Love it
Thanks so much!
I have to say, yall knock it out the park, Im working on my animation short and decided to get a little lesson in of filmmaking that I could apply to animation, whatever but this is the video I really wanted. Good job
Thanks and good luck on the project!
Great presentation. Well done.
Thanks for watching!
Amazing! A true animation class!
Awesome video like always. I wonder when are we getting a video about music editing in movies, or anything related to sounds.
I'm EXTREMELY grateful for dis video
please do more about animation, studiobinder!!! i love your videos about it
Thanks! We feel the same so we definitely will.
Once again you guys have neiled down. Thanks for such awesome content
Great lesson, great video SB ✌️💯💥
Thanks!
Well done StudioBinder. My love of animation from cartoons to comic books has always been from a heavy fascination and appreciation with the art of the use of perspective and scale. As well as not only does it give you the freedom to express cool ideas, but it's provided the best uses of comedy and drama in cinema. And it's provided some of the best scenes cinematography wise. I have forgotten most of Pinocchio. It was never my one of favored Disney classic. Not that it is a good movie. But it just takes a backseat to all the other to me. But seeing the scene where the kid turns into a donkey and having him call out to his mother while you see the silhouette of it just caught me off guard as "they really had that scene in a kids movie?" On the other side, I've become a growing fan of anime that was kicked off because of your videos about Hayao Miyazaki. And there's a scene from a movie I haven't seen yet, Ponyo, of a girl running on top of waves and the waves are cresting like whales. Everything about that short clip is so cool to me. Just the idea of her running on top of waves for one. And the way the girl has the fast motion of her legs the way kids look when they're running. Then she goes into that quick hurdle jump. The secondary motion in her hair and clothes. And then the pan and change of perspective to be behind her. That one scene not only makes me want to watch the movie, but it's good enough to play on a loop as an art piece. The art of animation (not just the graphics or drawing, but the art of telling a story with animation) is probably going to go through a period of taking a back seat, or my bigger fear is almost disappearing, because I'm expecting AI to like many forms of tech lead to an influx of people without skill making things where before they needed skill to make. (auto focus for cameras for example) And it's going to show in the quality.
this is so good!
Thanks, we put a lot into this one.
This is incredibly interesting! I never knew any of this about animation and i've been watching disney and cartoons for years.
Yeah ! Studiobinder in tha house with their amazing content again 😎🚀
Every week! Thanks for watching.
So many great films in this episode.
And yet we had to leave so many more out! There's so much good animation out there.
Thank you so much for this video! Big fan of your work, and one day I'll be a Writer and possibly a Director for films and an animator!
You're very welcome and hopefully we can help you get there!
As a newbie, I appreciate these basics. They don't feel "basic" yet.
They're a great starting point for all animators, that's for sure.
amazing vid!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Even through many of the different animation genres, these rules still stay follow, for example, I am more well versed in Japanese anime style kind of animation, but I still follow the 13 rules of animation in order to create the necessary effects
Fantastic!
As an animator, this was an amazing description of the principles.
Animation is a truly majestic way of telling a story 🔥🔥🔥🔥
Definitely!
Love you guys ❤
The feeling is mutual!
This is Gold.
Thanks! We had a blast making it.
Great video!! 15:23 small technicality: we usually need to adjust all 3 axes (x,y,z) to make a proper arc in 3D animation.
Thanks for the clarification!
Great explanations.
Glad it was helpful!
Animation is a masterpiece and does not just appeal to children, I didn't know about the 12 principals of animation but now I do thanks Studiobinder
You're welcome!
Best narrator ever
Oooh wow ❤❤❤am so glad❤the class is in session
We're glad you're here!
Awesome animation is one my favorite subject matter
Ours too!
Very helpful🌟
Thanks for saying so!
Great stuff. Would it be possible for you guys to make an entire bundle of videos showing many movies' and TV shows' filming gear?
We do have a series called "How They Shot It" that covers a lot of that: kzhead.info/channel/PLEzQZpmbzckUBXvCXDDyCzBraZ-WLWwY8.html&si=aEh0yVcKwfyyVY4n
@@StudioBinder Thank you
Amazing how much of this is transferable to live action films--whether in the writing, acting, staging or direction.
thank you for this
You're very welcome!
It feels so obvious when you explain these principles, even though none of this was ever explain in art class.
That's true. We take these things for granted but there's a whole art/science behind them.
Awesome thanks!
Our pleasure!
4:43 they must “be prepared” Shows clip from the be prepared number
Hey, guys, could you make a video on the Psychological Drama genre? You know, films like The Whale, Melancholia, First Reformed, Brothers, The Hunt, Spencer, Requiem for a Dream, etc. Is it possible for you to do that?
Thanks, GOD bless you.
Oh so y’all had this ready!? 😂 drop the other videos too!
I like live action movies but I love animation even more. There is just so much more freedom of expression imo. The moment I learned about impact frames in Anime I saw them everywhere, even in non-anime animations
So much to love about animation!
Ouuuffff just in time 🎉🎉🎉🎉
Phew!
Out of curiosity can you do one on character design? Like the process in making a character and model sheet for animation.
Great idea!
@@StudioBinder awesome can't wait to see it.
Could you maybe make a video about what constitutes a good book to film adaptation? I’m very curious to see what you would have to say.
Interesting topic! That would be a fun one.
Thank you🙏
You’re welcome 😊
My favorite quotes from the book "The Illusion of Life Disney Animation": " Our tools of communication are the symbols that all men understand because they go back before man developed speech. As he said of himself: I can never stand still. I must explore and experiment.(...)"
That's an excellent quote.
@StudioBinder Well, all we have to do then, is keep claiming (like your point here) that animation is for all ages and sign it until the top heads (or the Oscar's animation people --as that might seem like the cream of the crop now) make this clear by not allowing anyone make a joke out of it as they have in the past! If people always state that animation is use to "keep their children at bay" only, then, you've gotta keep your voice heard and burn it in their ears that is NOT a kids medium only!
can you guys do a video analyzing techniques used by Akira Kurosawa, like the one made by every frame a painting?
We actually having something coming soon!
I want to be an Animator and i want my creations to impact the world positively... I hope i will be able too
Road to 10M views ❤
Please take more example of these rules please please please 😢😢 another video
I think new Disney should watch your video so they would remember where they came from.
Thanks for the encouragement!
@@StudioBinder A long time fan here. Im not a film maker but I enjoy watching movies. Also, there is something soothing about the voice.. Keep it up. 👍
Finally, Animation Lore.
Thanks for watching!
7:20 Let's face it that goes for all that action movies. Fury Road really worked hard to keep the action easy to follow using this. Also, all spider verse movies uses frame rates very creatively across the board. No wonder they are seen one of the best spiderman movies.
Agreed!
Using Studio Ghibli films is just 🤩... like showing someone a Caravaggio to teach them how to paint 😂
If you're not inspired there, you might not ever be.
You should do the cinematography of Dean Cundey.
Great suggestion, we have to!
Gold
Upon reflection, HB and Filmation, and even WB at times, seem to have skipped most of those lessons. I suppose there could be a separate video on animating within time and budgetary constraints.😞 Some KZhead channels, such as Terrible Writing Advice, use very scaled down animation still, but to good effect, as their messages are in the dialogue.🤔
That's true. If there are budget concerns, the animation might not be able to have all of these principles in effect.
Does any of theses rules apply to 13 plus animation?
I mean like pg 13
Yeah, they apply for all ratings.
@@StudioBinder and is it ok to not follow the exaggeration rule so I can have a more realistic animation?
How to use korrellation in films?
you need to do a directing style video on michael bay or a vid on him.
why posted late? that's my lectured in 1 semester 😂❤
Sorry we're late!
More Videos On Animation ❤
We just might have to do more!
5:49 animated James Bond cheating at Golf
Indeed!
me here!! sir amirull :)
Welcome!
There's a 13th Principle that no one seems to talk about, not even The Illusion of Life references it. Here's a video explaining what it is, and a video about its origins. kzhead.info/sun/raerZqaDf3x8en0/bejne.html - What Is The Plausible Impossible kzhead.info/sun/YMyvqt6CiZOIno0/bejne.html - Walt Disney's The Art of Animation Fauxview (came from the never released book, Walt Disney's The Art of Animation from Walt Disney's Disneyland)
Thanks for sharing!
@@StudioBinder This principle is so important, that it explains why some things are the way they are in cartoons. Heck, it’s even responsible for why certain inventions and foods are being attempted in the real world. Why Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston left it out of The Illusion of Life, probably the same reason why they caused Eric Goldberg not to get the job at Disney the first time he tried out.
Anime uses way more than 12 principles, animation in the West is far behind, in fact it always has been. It's no wonder that anime is influencing the return of hand-drawn animation and style, as in Puss in Boots, Arcane, Spiderverse, etc. who used the advanced techniques created by anime
A certain horse needs to watch this
🤔
👌👌
Thanks!
Man, I need the list of all the animations shown here so bad. Want to watch each of them after such a great video. Yeah, they are all titled in the corner, but the list would make it so much easier 🥲
Good thing you made this. Hopefully, the new Tumblr hires at Disney animation can use this as a reference, and they don't end up blundering their way through another "Wish".
Thanks for watching!
Chapters are broken
The lack of EXAGGERATION is why so many live action adaptations are dull. One Piece on Netflix recently made some big strides in the right direction due to the abilities of the characters. Studios need to look more into fan-made live action adaptations which happen to stay truer to the source material while not ruining it by being too real.
Good point!
noodle would be proud
Im going to start the next Disney animation company on tik tok after i watched this video, my only problem is i Don't have enough bank accounts to hold all the money that i will make
That's a good problem to have!
wow, now i will see animation differently
Fascinating, right?
@@StudioBinder It is, I"m more knowledgeable now
KZhead Film school
Thanks for watching!
How to pitch a script👀
Fantastic suggestion!
I do alot of pose to pose, I'm my animation.
Annie May
Good ol' Annie May!
Waiting for a while…..
Finally arrived!
And now im canceling my animaiton course and save 500USD
Yep hentai never disappointing
Animators who watched this and felt understood 👇
That was our goal!
why movies are to dark and near total black ?
They have gotten literally darker, haven't they?
@@StudioBinder wish you can in light this subject as you doing beautifully in other matters , have a free day from film school series :)
i dunno, all kinda sounds like a lie to me
Thanks for the feedback.
Nice, Im gonna do my own animation with AI, don't get mad, I have no studios, it's basically one man project, not for profit really, just to make something cool
All animators use tools to help them. Good luck!
AI Generated Content.
I think you mean SB Generated Content 😉