Bouncin' Ball #5: Animation Goggles

There's one place that I know we've all been to: The Zone. Everyone's been in "The Zone" and not even necessarily when animating, it could be while doing other things. It's that point of focus where you can't see anything else, can't hear anything else, and can't do anything else. It's sometimes the preferred mode that you want to work in because you feel like (and this quite possibly may be true more often than not) you get a lot of good, quality work done. But, where is that point in "The Zone" that isn't so beneficial anymore? That point where you've been in "The Zone" too long and can't see the big picture anymore? Being in "The Zone" may sometimes become a determent to our animation. It's something that I like to call "Animation Goggles" (quite similar to beer goggles). Whether you've been trying to re-work timing, finesse an arc, get just the right amount of drag and follow-through, just enough overshoot and settle, we all get to a certain point where we're looking at our shot with Animation Goggles and can't really tell whether there are better animation decisions that you can be making. What's so funny is that when you're looking through those goggles, you can't really tell what else to do or what else to fix after a while, but then when you look back on it at a later date you say to yourself "What the heck was I thinking???". But, have no fear (well, maybe a little), the best remedy I've been told and found to Animation Goggles is to SHOW PEOPLE YOUR WORK. Which I'll cover in another post. Keep that ball bouncin'!

Stephen