This week I’ll be talking about my process in the making of the main character’s animation.
First off, I did a very loose sketch of how the animation could look like, even before the base sprite was finished. This was to just feel if I could really pull off a swimming animation and to give myself some time to consider how to work with it. So, here is the first sketch which I worked from:
It only includes the basic, main frames. I knew I would have to add more frames to have it look smooth, and also put some more work into the dynamics of the flippers. I did not want it to be a super realistic swimming style, as long as it was obvious that the character was swimming. I am aware that the feet and legs are generally in a higher position compared to the head while diving, but I wanted the head to be the main focus and to really have the character looking forward.
I decided to take the animation in small steps, since I knew it would be difficult for me to animate. I have never done it before so I needed to figure out the quickest way for me to do it. Since there is a lot of details included in the finished base sprite (which can be seen below), it would take quite a lot of time to draw each frame. This is when I thought of skeleton animation; where there is a base skeleton underneath, which is used to move the character around. I decided to use that as inspiration and did an extremely simplified version of the techique. Since I did not have a ”base skeleton” I just used the simple method of copy and paste, and redrew the parts that needed fixing. All frames were basically created out of this one:
The first step, to me, was to get the legs moving. I focused solely on the legs, excluding the movement of the flippers. This version would only include the main frames, and consists of only 6 frames. Which makes the legs movement a lot quicker than planned and not very smooth. Here is that result:
After that, I thought it was important to get a good look for the flippers. The previous version makes them look very stiff and it’s just not working. If I’m going to be honest, the flippers were probably what took me the longest to do, mainly because I had a lot of problem getting them to look natural. Eventually I ended up with this;
It’s still not smooth or in the speed it’s planned to, but it does look more natural. After this I started focusing on the arm’s movement and adding the light which will hang from the belt. The arm holding the pistol will eventually be completely removed, since it will be separate object moving along the cursor. After struggles, several extra frames and a lot of redrawing, I ended up with this:
This is the current finished version, but will possibly be worked on again before the final version of the game.
Emma Fredriksson 
Hey!
So, starting off, lovely style. Anatomy, form, color, rendering, different materials, you seem to have it all down. I checked out the earlier drawings and it all comes together nicely. However, as I recall Ambient Pressure was supposed to be a horror game and I don’t see much of that in the style? Rather the art makes it seem more like a colorful, exploration-type of game for kids. The art is lovely to look at either way but I’m wondering if it is congruent with your aesthetic goals.
Some questions:
– Did you use references for the animation?
– How many frames did you end up with in the final animation?
– How long did the entire proccess approximately take?
Something is still looking off with the pace in the final animation. Just looking at the legs I think it should be slowed down even more, as it is now, it looks like there is barely any water resistance when the feet move forward and the flippers could perhaps bend back even more on the way back to show the water pressure. Movement in water is heavy and slow. Perhaps also angle the feet more downward, the movement now looks more like trampling water than swimming with flippers on.
Other than that, good job describing your process. Perhaps it could be worth adding if you used any of the animation principles from the 2D-II course or something else specifically you thought of while doing the key frames.
Keep up the good work!
GillaGilla
Hello, and thank you for your feedback.
Yes, in the original concept document they classed it as a horror game. We, however, still wanted the game to be kind of scary but we wanted the screen to have life and color. Which we actually received praise for, during our meeting with the teacher. So, according to our own aesthetic goal, we do meet them. However, I think ‘colorful, exploration-type game for kids’ is a bit pushing it considering our gameplay, but that’s just my opinion.
– I did not use any references for the animation, no. I based it solely on what I knew about swimming and diving, and advice from friends who have more knowledge in the area.
– At the moment I think it’s 10 frames, but I’m hoping to have time to add some before the final version of the game to get the exact speed of the swimming that I want.
– Counting in all the different animations I did, and I did a few, I think it took 10 hours. That includes test animation, sketches, program crashing etc.
As mentioned, I am hoping to go back and add some more frames to add to the water pressure but it is not one of my priorities at the moment. About the flippers, though, I think I have to disagree. I did draw them more bent on the way back, but after talking to a friend I was taught that flippers don’t actually bend that much forward considering the hard material. This could differ between flippers though, I can’t be sure.
Good luck with your own project, keep up the good work!
GillaGilla