Animator here. I love this little animation! Your sister has a lot of natural talent! If you are looking to encourage and inspire her, THIS BOOK is the Bible for animators, and can help put her on a creative path that could include a future in animation! Tell her to keep at it; art as a career can be tough, but creativity is a lifelong companion that is always worth embracing.
"every day we stray away from god" - The Unofficial Holy Bible for Minecrafters: A Children's Guide to the Old and New Testament
Gonna share an older comment I wrote about this. This is just a guide; everyone learns differently so don't feel like you need to follow this exactly!
>Here's a rough outline of the basic steps to getting into animation:
>1. Research the animation basics. Specifically, study the 12 principles of animation. Buy/borrow a copy of the Animator's survival kit. This book was pretty much my only textbook at uni and is something industry professionals still reference today. (Don't worry, there are lots of pictures).
>2. Pick a type of animation you want to do. 2D (drawing on computer or paper), 3D (CG, like Pixar), or stop motion (real life objects/puppets). Look up what materials, software, and skills you need to start doing that type of animation.
>3. Obtain your materials/software and learn the basics of how to use them. (for example, flipping frames and onion skin for 2D, or manipulating a rig and the graph editor for 3D).
>4. Try your hand at simple, basic animation exercises. Otherwise you'll be trying to run before you can crawl. I recommend starting with the pendulum, then the bouncing ball, waving flag then the flour sack. Look up tutorials and ask for help/critique if you need it!
>5. Once you've got the hang of that, move onto stuff like head turns, walk cycles, object interaction, and weight shift. Keep looking for ways to improve your skills and get critique, if possible. Don't forget to have fun! Hope this helps!
For anyone trying to find work, I've found the best way is real life networking. Find your local relevant network (ie digital, web, creative - keep it broad), go to events. The other way is mass emailing, as described in The Freelance Manifesto (it's targeted at motion designers but lots of it is relevant to others). Introduce yourself, tell them what you do, show your portfolio and suggest meeting/chatting. This is how I get all my work and it's great.
In terms of managing work, that's just down to organisation. I have all the folders organised on my computer so I know what work is in progress and what's done. I contact my clients via email/phone, or Slack if they use it too. I only tend to have a couple of jobs on the go at a time so it's never too much to manage, but I guess some sort of spreadsheet would help, or something like Mindly or the millions of other project management platforms out there. The difficulty of having all clients in one place with an IM, file manager etc is that clients don't all use the same thing. Especially actual clients that pay; they're not looking on Upwork.
Hi! here's a rough outline of the basic steps to getting into animation:
Research the animation basics. Specifically, study the 12 principles of animation. Buy/borrow a copy of the Animator's survival kit. This book was pretty much my only textbook at uni and is something industry professionals still reference today. (Don't worry, there are lots of pictures).
Pick a type of animation you want to do. 2D (drawing on computer or paper), 3D (CG, like Pixar), or stop motion (real life objects/puppets). Look up what materials, software, and skills you need to start doing that type of animation.
Obtain your materials/software and learn the basics of how to use them. (for example, flipping frames and onion skin for 2D, or manipulating a rig and the graph editor for 3D).
Try your hand at simple, basic animation exercises. Otherwise you'll be trying to run before you can crawl. I recommend starting with the pendulum, then the bouncing ball, waving flag then the flour sack. Look up tutorials and ask for help/critique if you need it!
Once you've got the hang of that, move onto stuff like head turns, walk cycles, object interaction, and weight shift. Keep looking for ways to improve your skills and get critique, if possible.
Don't forget to have fun! Hope this helps!
Are you more interested in making a game, or the tech behind games?
Game Programming Patterns is a great reference when you have problems to solve or a system to design. It's a relatively light and easy read and definitely very helpful.
Game Engine Architecture gives a broad view of technologies behind a game but it doesn't actually go into the nuts and bolts on how to develop one. I recommend it as a way to see how things work, and a gateway to learning about the different technical specializations in a game engine. The reference list is very useful for further study.
Neither of them are of much help when it comes to using Unreal or Unity though. I've actually found that "learn to make game with engine X" books serve as a guided walkthrough of engine features and workflows and give you a solid base on which to continue exploring the engine. I've also found that working through a book has a much lower mental barrier than searching for tutorials on the Internet, since all the info is available on hand and (hopefully) presented in an easy-to-follow manner.
Start with the extensive tutorials Unreal and Unity offer on their official websites. If you find those hard to follow, or when you're done and think you need more guidance, just hit Amazon and look for books like this which are relatively well-reviewed.
Fellow enterprise developer turned manager here. Me and my cohort are about to release our first title. It was developed using .NET/C#.
AMA. :)
I'll start with the questions you have above.
Assuming you already have a solid foundation in OOP, Design Patterns, some basic RDBMS, etc, you actually already have 60% of what you need. Code is code.
The other 40% depends on the type of game you are making. 2D? Basic algebra. 3D? Now it gets tougher on the math (though thankfully today's engines do most of the heavy lifting for you, but you still need to understand what is used for what).
Doing multi-player? Now networking is the tricky part because you are likely to use some sort of UDP communication layer and all the REST/SOAP you learned at work, while still useful for managing latency-agnostic stuff like player lists, matchmaking requests and such, won't cut it for real-time multi-player games. Writing solid "netcode" that delivers a great experience at 60+ FPS requires some creativity in managing perception (extrapolation and interpolation when latency is present) and fault-tolerant algorithms. It is no fun when you get a headshot in an FPS, see it happen, but your opponent runs away, apparently unscathed.
As far as graphics, I solved that one easily... I had a friend join my project who was the graphics guy. I provided the framework for doing the graphics and turned that area over to him. He went above and beyond though and learned shaders and added all sorts of special effects.
Meanwhile, I focused my energy on the game engine, networking layers, AWS cloud stuff, matchmaking and lots of behind the scenes stuff.
The other thing I did was read as much as possible about Game Design. I ordered a dozen books from Amazon, including my absolute favorite Designing Games by Tynan Sylvester, the developer of RimWorld (link: https://www.amazon.com/Designing-Games-Guide-Engineering-Experiences/dp/1449337937).
Hope that helps!
So I don't know of any Anime particular effects resources to be honest, but there are some amazing books I definitely recommend that show some incredible effects.
A great start would be finding Joseph Gilland's Elemental Magic effects book. The book contains literal stepped processes on many different effects animation composed by fantastic american animators, a lot coming from classic 2d Disney backgrounds. It's a great start, and it isn't very hard to find a free pdf of it online, or buying the book physically which for some reason I like more.
Amazon Link: https://www.amazon.com/Elemental-Magic-Special-Effects-Animation/dp/0240811631
Other then that, studying, and practicing what you find from great effects animators on Sakugaboru is what I'd recommend. Some of my personal favorite guys that immediadly come to mind are:
Yoh Yoshinari (Classic Gainax/Trigger Effects)
Yutaka Nakamure (Impact Frames, fire, lightning, in bombastic style, the guy is a legend for a reason)
Masanobu Hiraoka (Surreal, and mind melting work, incredible what he pulls off)
Hope all this helps out. Have fun.
https://www.amazon.com.au/Animators-Survival-Kit-Richard-Williams/dp/0571202284 this is the book that every course suggests to read. It's pretty much got all the principles you'll need . Other than that, there's some good tutorials on using blender 2D at the moment. Opentoonz tutorials are pretty good as well. Just set yourself a project . Like a storyboard, drawings and plans for a 2 minute music video . And then do it like a school project. No pressure to show it then do another one. It's all they did at my uni, and it was cheaper to stay home and learn online
For 2D animation, I think the first exercises are;
I'd really really recommend getting your hands on a copy of The Animator's Survival Kit . It's pretty much considered the animators bible, and I'm pretty sure there are PDFs out there if you can't afford it right now.
It goes into a lot of detail on keys and how they relate to timings specifically. In fact, pretty much everything in there shows the keys used and key poses, and how to achieve weight.
Alternatively, if it's mainly the 'illustrating' side of things you enjoy rather than the 'figuring out how to make things move gud' aspect then something else you might want to look into is motion graphics, and starting out with making some of your existing character illustrations move around a bit with After Effects.
Toon Boom Harmony is another software looking into if you get a chance - especially as you already have a grounding in 3D. From my understanding, it's the same workflow as 3D animation only with 2D rigs instead. I'm pretty sure shows such as The Amazing World of Gumball, Rick and Morty, Family Guy and The Simpsons use it - but it's far more common in industry these days than traditional (hand-drawn) animation.
Hi! I always think graphic designers make great animators!
As a 2D animator myself, I can tell you animation leans heavily into design—when I’m animating I like to think about my linework as “notes” for a logo design. Great animation, like Ollie or Milt, is about a logical flow of lines, very much a design (so-so animation is about making things move).
You can check out the idea (more eloquently) here (Amazon).
Welcome to animation!
I’m sure you’ll be great at it (don’t worry too much about software, TV Paint is the industry standard—expensive—but there’s also toonboom, and what I work in procreate). And be wary of grumps (they’re everywhere).
I graduated from California college of the arts with a bachelors of fine arts in graphic design. I had a job lined up for myself when I graduated. It was at an agency I interned at. Unfortunately I graduated in 2008, at the height of the housing crisis. The agency went out of business, and for the life of me I could not find a job. There were massive layoffs going on, people were moving out of San Francisco in droves, and senior designers were taking any jobs they could get. I went into a serious depression, and questioned my value as designer and the amount of money I had spent on school. Plus my wife was 6 months pregnant. It was a very low point in my life. So I can relate to how you are feeling. I started reaching out to my friends, family, and school mates, and I eventually found a job as a flash designer (I’m so old… flash). But the struggle was tough.
I know it’s feeling really hard right now, but it will get better. You just have to be persistent and knock on every door. Reach out to everyone you know, and people you don’t, you’ll eventually find something. I recommend this book:
The Freelance Manifesto: A Field Guide for the Modern Motion Designer https://www.amazon.com/dp/1619616718/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_DBZE201X0RBTGZWS72BX
It’s for motion designers, but the principals are sound. It’s has a step by step guide on how to find work.
Try Craig Perko's Concrete Play series for an intro to game design.
Also in my totally objective opinion, <em>Designing Games</em> by Tynan Sylvester is a way better book than all the others mentioned here combined. The Art of Game Design by Jesse Schell is too vague and esoteric to be useful in practice, and Game Design Workshop is too industry-focused.
Since you're learning about Unity, you should checkout my book Unity in Action. It's very highly rated on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/161729232X/
Note that it's designed for people who already know how to program and doesn't teach programming basics, but it sounds like you have that covered.
My book Unity in Action is designed for people who already know how to program but are new to Unity: https://www.amazon.com/Unity-Action-Multiplatform-Game-Development/dp/161729232X/
(objectively, it's got a high rating on Amazon)
These books are your friend!
Elemental Magic, Volume I: The Art of Special Effects Animation https://www.amazon.com/dp/0240811631/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_csJlFbTEJ0C0V
Elemental Magic, Volume II: The Technique of Special Effects Animation (Animation Masters Title) https://www.amazon.com/dp/0240814797/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_xpJlFb7YJG8Z0
The short answer is you don't have to be good at drawing. Of course this means you would be focusing on 3d animation. But, you'll still have a lot to learn from 2d animation.
No matter what you're animating, you're going to want to learn the 12 principals of animation. You can probably find some youtube videos or something, but I really recommend this book:
https://www.amazon.com/Animators-Survival-Kit-Richard-Williams/dp/0571202284
It's been a standard in animation schools for ages. It's what I learned on ages ago, and still holds up. If you can afford this, I would start here.
You don't need a degree. Going to school is great, but you can maybe split the difference and find a few decent paid (maybe on sale, not too expensive) courses online. There's free stuff on youtube but you may have more confidence in a properly structured course. Stuff like this goes on sale a lot, google around a bit and see if anything stands out to you.
I studied 3d animation in school and I'm not good at drawing. When school started, we only did 2d animation in order to learn the basics. This is fine, you can do basic animation with bad drawings. You can probably skip it and go right to 3d, but just keep in mind it'll be a good idea to study a lot of classic 2d animation.
Regardless of what you do, it'll be a lot of work. Whatever you produce early on probably won't look good and you'll get discouraged. Just keep practicing, keep learning. Take affordable courses when you can. Spend a lot of time watching tutorials for your chosen software, because 3d animation can be pretty complex.
I started from reading this book: https://www.amazon.com/Color-Correction-Handbook-Professional-Techniques/dp/0321713117 Then I watched a few good channels like goats eye view mostly about hot to use resolve, not color grading per se.
The closest thing would be Walt Stanchfield’s “Drawn to Life” notes (that’s how I learned to draw at least)
If 2D is okay, then check out Elemental Magic by Joseph Gilland. There are two volumes but I like the first one better.
https://www.amazon.com/Elemental-Magic-Special-Effects-Animation/dp/0240811631/
Hope this helps!
The only animation book you really need is Drawn to Life Volume 1&2. These have single handedly taught me everyothing I know about drawing and animation.
https://www.amazon.com/Drawn-Life-Classes-Stanchfield-Lectures/dp/0240810961
As Glen Vilppu says, "No rules, just tools." So draw whatever you want, with whatever you want. Mechanical pencils are great for lots of things, but for me they're not super awesome for lots of variations in line weight. I don't really love charcoal myself, so I generally try a Conte Pencil sharpened up so I can work with the point or use the side to lay in stronger lines. Brush pens also work, as do markers, etc etc etc. Even just a good soft 3b pencil can work at the size you're drawing. One of the best artists in one of my recent life drawing sessions worked in a small A4 sketchbook and drew with a ballpoint pen, so you can make just about anything work.
Walt Stanchfield is great. After he died, a lot of his lectures and drawings (and his student's drawings) were published in two volumes called Drawn to Life. If you haven't heard of Mike Matessi's Force, that's also a great resource for pushing your drawings.
I cannot recommend Drawn to Life enough. I’m a self taught animator/storyboard artist. These books (two volumes) are 50% of my knowledge alone, w/ just practice and sporadic tips for the rest.
https://www.amazon.com/Drawn-Life-Classes-Stanchfield-Lectures/dp/0240810961
I would try to work on nailing proportions, start life drawing exercises online (prob going to have to do clothed as models are typically drawn in the nude), and work towards speed. Sometimes when you draw figures it’s a matter of nailing down what you can first, then take some breaks to reflect on how you can fix it/grow.
Take some time analyzing structures of animals or human anatomy, if you want, try getting this “Animation Bible” and read into some chapters, principles, and exercises.
There’s some good resources out there that explain character model sheets (friendly characters are usually more oval/circular; evil are usually drawn in triangles, sharper edges, etc).
Best of luck.
Source: just graduated from uni majoring in Animation and some other stuff.
Easiest way is ipad + apple pencil + procreate. Cheapest way (a lot more hard) is a camera and some paper (well, and pegs). Don't get bogged down in (27 ^(1/2) principles of timing and animation, or whatever)--just dive in. Motivation and experimentation go a looong way. You can tighten it all up later on.
This is very best book on the subject https://www.amazon.com/Drawn-Life-Classes-Stanchfield-Lectures/dp/0240810961
On the first part (Synergy), and in general, I do recommend Tynan Sylvester (Rimworld) book on game design. From Chapter 2:
> In a way, every game exists already. They’re out there, hidden in the logic of the universe. We don’t create them. We find them like a sculptor finds the statue in a block of marble—not by adding anything, but by taking away the excess material that obscures the form within.
>
> (...)
> Elegance from Emergence
> EMERGENCE is when simple mechanics interact to create complex situations.
> Leveraging emergence means crafting mechanics that don’t just add together, but multiply into a rich universe of possibility.
> Elegance happens when mechanics interact in complex, nonobvious ways. But this same complexity and nonobviousness makes elegant design very difficult to achieve.
> Mechanics that interact with many other mechanics smell like elegance.
> ...
The XCOM2 comparison part reminds me of Avengers/superhero movie suit-up scene, btw.
I'd suggest Designing Games: A Guide to Engineering Experiences. It is as good as Art of Game Design, if not better tbh and I learned many things especially about design thinking and process from this book.
Get him a physical copy of this book :) It's pretty iconic in the animation scene.
Otherwise a graphics tablet perhaps?
I'd recommend "Designing Games: A Guide to Engineering Experiences" by Tynan Sylvester. Very practical and you can get through it in a week on first read. "The Art of Game Design" is comparatively very textbook-y and more useful as reference material (although it's a fantastic book, don't get me wrong).
Yes, I still recommended something full length book-y, but it's concise. Gives a really strong primer in game design in about 200 pages (the rest of the book being more about the dev process vs. core design principles).
Tynan Sylvester (creator of RimWorld) wrote a book about game design which a lot of people seem to like. I haven't had a chance to read it yet.
https://www.amazon.com/Designing-Games-Guide-Engineering-Experiences/dp/1449337937