The 12 Principles of Animation
1. Squash and stretch: gives a sense of weight and flexibility to drawn objects
2. Anticipation: prepares the audience for an action, makes the action appear more realistic
3. Staging: direct audience's attention and make clear of what is of importance by placing a character in a frame, using light and shadow, and angle and position of the camera
4. Straight ahead action and pose to pose: straight ahead action means drawing the scene frame by frame, while pose to pose is drawing key frames and filling them in
5. Follow through and overlapping action: follows laws of physics; loosely tied parts of a body should continue moving after the character has stopped moving
6. Slow in and slow out: movements need time to accelerate and decelerate so the animation looks more realistic
7. Arc: natural action follows a trajectory, which follows the laws of physics
8. Secondary action: gives main action more life; emphasizes main action
9. Timing: Number of drawings or frames for a given action, or speed of the action on film
10. Exaggeration: reality taken to a more wilder, more extreme form; involves supernatural alterations in the physical feature of a character
11. Solid drawing: three-dimensional, gives volume and weight; need to know three-dimensional shapes, anatomy, weight, balance, light, shadow, etc.
12. Appeal: gives a character charisma; viewer feels the character is real and interesting; baby-like face
- Sophie Huang #7
