Preproduction: Story
development
Animation begins with a story envisioned by
a writer. They begin as concepts (a couple short paragraphs
telling the gist of the story) and then are turned into a
story outline which describes all the major scenes in the
order that they will happen. Once approved by the story editor
and producer (if these are not one in the same or the writer/animator
himself) the story outline is turned into a script, describing
action, dialogue, camera angle, etc. The most prominent difference
in an animation script as compared to a normal script is the
great attention and detail put into describing every camera
angle, shot, and action sequence. The writer describes everything
the camera must record(Brigman 8-10).
Story Boarding
Next, the script goes to a story board artist
who draws a rough picture of how every scene will look. These
comic strip looking story boards allow the director to see
if the story is confusing, if there are too many or too few
of a type of camera angle, or if there is too much or too
little attention being given to various characters. They also
allow the director and scene planner to rearrange the sequence
of the scenes to improve the animation’s flow, if needed.
Storyboards save time and money (Brigman 11).
The director approves scripts, story boards,
and makes sure everyone in the animation process understands
what they are supposed to be doing including layout artists,
background artists, animators, animation checkers, painters,
and editors (Brigman 13).
Voice Recording
While the storyboards are being made the voice
actors are in the studio recording the sound track. In animation
the sound/voices are almost always recorded before the animation
process begins. The track is broken down so animators know
how many tenths of a second it takes for words to be spoken,
characters to skid, howl, etc. This long, tedious process
was preformed by track readers before new digital technology
came along. It would take a human track reader two days to
break down the sound track for a 30 minute animation (Brigman
16-17).
Layout
While the sound track is being recorded and
read, the storyboards are drawn up and eventually approved.
After the storyboards are approved, they are sent to the layout
artist who works with the director to design the locations
and costumes. Then, they stage the scenes, showing where the
various characters are going to move. There are approximately
300 scenes in a 30 minute animation and a layout artist can
complete around 3 scenes a day. The layout artist is also
responsible for model sheets. Model sheets are precisely drawn
groups of pictures that show all the possible attitudes, expressions,
and actions of a character. These sheets are necessary to
keep characters looking uniform when several different animators
are working on them. Model sheets are made for every character
and location (Brigman 19-20).
Sound Recording and Layout could be considered production or
preproduction.
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The Process of Making Animation:
Preproduction
Production
Postproduction |
