Practice what you preach.

I attempted to act out a shot within my scene in front of a camera, recording the movement and then analysing it later. Video referencing has proven beneficial in past projects and when creating animated sequences; however, during this part of the process, it hindered my ability to animate rather than assist. In addition, I noticed I was overanalysing both the poses and movement within the footage, feeling compelled to copy every detail within its duration. Feeling frustrated with my lack of progress, I decided to reflect on what alternative methods I could use to get past this creative obstacle. Then, I remembered how early Disney animators used mirrors to analyse their facial gestures to apply them to characters and gesture-draw life models acting out a sequence to get a sense of poses, rhythm and timing.

I attempted to act out the movement in front of the mirror, making mental observational notes on timing, pose and how the body acts accordingly. I then completed rough thumbnails of what I considered the key and breakdown poses of the movement and animated them. Compared to video referencing, acting out the action in front of a mirror improved my animation process. In retrospect, video referencing meant I was being too reliant on the privileges which come with video footage, i.e., the ability to pause a movement on a particular frame and unintentionally becoming obsessed with its detail and accuracy. Simplifying the process using a mirror allowed me to concentrate on the broad gestures, rhythm, and timing without overthinking the process. In addition, I could focus on believability rather than realism.

It took me considerable time to get into the creative frame of mind and allow myself to make countless mistakes until I achieved the desired outcome. I put a lot of pressure on myself to get the best work done, naively, on the first attempt. By embracing my mistakes, I could divert my focus from what I was doing wrong towards getting the best possible drawings to communicate emotion and action. Concerning the thumbnailing process, it proved to be extremely useful. It allowed me to think about the character's movement and pose rather than focus too much on style and detail. This meticulous planning has allowed me to perceive how the action will look.

Another reason the video footage was less effective than I would have hoped to have achieved was because I was the subject being filmed, being too cautious about getting the best performance possible. Inevitably that stress became apparent in the movement.