The Anatomy of an Animation

Hello my fellow Steemians!Have you ever thought about wanting to make an animation but weren't sure where to Start.Hopefully this quick guide will give you a general sense on how to begin.Let's get started!

STORYBOARD
The storyboard is like the skeleton of your animation.It's where all the ideas come together and are translated as drawings on paper or whatever medium you're using for the storyboard. Storyboards are important because it gives not only you but also your team(if you're working with one) a general direction on how the animation is going to play out and its story. Storyboards can be as simple as a rough sketch on a post it note to a full blown drawing on paper.The more detailed the storyboard generally the more approachable it will be but don't put in too much detail or you'll spend to much time on the storyboard itself and halt production.

ROUGH ANIMATION
The next step of the process is the rough animation.This is like the muscles of your animation what makes your animation come alive and goes from a set of pictures to life-like moving drawings.For me there are many steps to this process as you can see below.On this animation I started with a simple sketch of a dragon on a mountain and from there built over it with a simple rough line sketch to give me a general idea of what the dragon would look like.You can see that process below. I also animated on a mixture of straight ahead and key frames,this is crucial to getting a nice flowy and life-like animation.Straight ahead is when you do frame after frame after frame while key framing is where you put a frame at an extreme,then put another frame at the other extreme and then add inbetween frames between the key frames.Its generally advised to use a mixture of both.

At this point I've figured out where I want to go and I start adding camera movements to track the dragon and really show the weight of this enormous dragon.I also start fleshing the dragon out a bit more and adding details like the wings,neck,body,and head.

At this point all the rough animation is pretty much complete. Ive added debris clouds,a frost breath,wind and added details to the dragon like spikes and horns.

LINE ART,COLOR,and BACKGROUNDS
Finally we have the skin of the animation.This is what viewers will see when you release the animation and this generally makes the animation more appealing to look at rather than seeing the rough animation.Here I start my background first and I want it to look cold and frosty.I use a combination of dark blues,cyan blue,grays,and even black to give a nice wintery sky and have a block of ice for my dragon to sit on.
Next I go into the line art.Now that I have my background I have reference for what color I should use for the Dragon.I pick a dark blue for the outline,light blue for the body,and a darker blue for the shadows. I use a darker blue for the gums,and white for the teeth.I also use white on frost breath and add a glow.
Finally I add cracks to where the dragon lands to again emphasize force and weight.I add a gradient of black to transparent over the entire animation and now were finished.
The animation is ready to be released!

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.Have a great day!