"Little Monk" series of production of the whole process analysis

Process

In recent years, the Shenzhen ERA Digital Co., Ltd. launched Flash series animation short film-"Little Monk", in the flash of the Empire Crawl list has become a popular play, this series of humorous animated cartoon is praised as the tide, cast personnel for the Flash and Alexander. This tutorial is written by the Flash-Tao in person, with the "Little Monk 3 Christmas Eve" as an example, detailed analysis of an animation production process. Maybe you'll see what your problem is after reading it.

I. Character Design Chapter

Flash animation characters like the actor in the film, any story in the film must be achieved through the role of the performance, their character, appearance, stature, clothing will directly affect the quality of the film. Watching a film, you see a rich plot story, but these stories will not be long before you forget, and ultimately stay in your mind is not these stories, but the expression of the main body-role. This shows that the role of design in the production of film is an extremely important link.

First of all, we need to determine the background of the people and the circumstances of their origins. To put it simply, is he a Chinese or a foreigner, an ancient or a modern man, a nobleman or a commoner?

"The Little Monk" series we set its background as "also ancient also today", the main scene of the story-"Gan" is an antique Chinese monastery, the monastery next to a small mountain village "Bead Wo Village", typical of China's remote rural areas. But beyond the great Mountains is the modern metropolis. The main characters in the film are ancient costumes, which can be said to be living in the modern age of the "people" bar.

Then, we must define the character, the character's shape must conform to the character, and to serve the character.

Let's analyze the character traits of the main characters in the Little monk:

The Little Monk is a silly, stupid image. Never seen anything, so everything is easy to believe. No skills, but do things adhere to, very perseverance, one want to practice good Kung Fu. On the other hand, he sometimes has a bit of bad, especially for the green bug, always want to kill it. Colleagues said that the role is particularly like Tao Tao himself, hehe, maybe it really is. (Figure-Little Monk)

Little girl is a naïve, cute little sister image, never know what is dangerous, always think of things very simple. But the luck is very good, can always be saved. So every time the little monk wants to protect the little girl, the final outcome is always to be beaten badly, the little girl is not a thing. (Picture-Little girl)

The old Monk is a martial arts master. But very 龌 鹾 of kind, have nothing to spit, martial arts are also more disgusting, such as ... You'll find out later. He always likes to use his master's identity to bully the Little monk, is a funny image. (pictured-old monk)

The female monk is a more flower-mad character, beautiful but without mind. Very like the little Monk, always regard the little girl as illusion of rival. (Figure-Female Taoist)

Green worm, a supporting role? In fact, it is the real hidden protagonist, the little girl's pet, is a defying difficulties and hardships, each episode, and then rushed to the role of death. (Fig-worm)

With the character, the next step, we began to design the shape of the characters. Below, we take the little girl and the green insect as the example, detailed explanation.

In the design of the little girl, we first drew some sketches to the image of the character in our mind, from a rough outline gradually clear, gradually concrete. Finally, from a few sets of plans to determine the image-wear Chinese-style red-padded jacket, tie two pigtail, petite stature, a little bit of feeling, looks very well-behaved. (Picture-young girl's first draft)

Colleagues are feeling good, in the final finalization of the time, I suddenly came to the idea, a heartless pair of watery big eyes to wipe off, two pens, to the little girl with a pair of grinning narrowed eyes, and, after the young girl always grinning, eyes will never open. In this way, the character is very consistent with her personality, and very distinctive, I like it. (Picture-The little girl completes the manuscript)

The next step is to scan into the computer and stroke the line. A lot of friends have asked me, is directly in the flash inside painting role, or first on paper to draw a good sketch, and then scan, production. My personal habit is the latter, why? Because to create a character is not so simple and random, you have to make the impression of the character in your mind step by step. And the use of computer production, often lose that kind of painting feeling, will become stiff, mechanical.

Strokes of the time, I usually use the "pencil" tool, with a uniform thickness of the line outline outline, lines to be as concise as possible smooth, do not appear too many nodes, do not have broken lines, disorderly line, to ensure that each color block is a complete single smooth lines around. At this point, it is very useful to select "adsorption". (Picture-Little girl single draft)

OK, after the line we want to make the line as a component, in order to facilitate the future to do "motion tween", my habit is to direct the characters in accordance with the joint, so the various parts of the body are separate components. The torso, upper arm, lower arm, hand, thigh, calf, foot are all made into independent components. In this way, in the future when doing animation, in many cases, just move some parts of the position can be achieved, very convenient. (Figure-Split of components)

Next, you can fill in the color, but if you look at the "Little Monk" series, you will find that we have an important link before the color-sideline processing, rest. My usual practice is to convert the lines into blocks, using the "Modify-shape-convert line to fill" instruction. Then the line of the edge of the details of the adjustment, sometimes to use the "Node selection tool", adjust the sideline, to consider the direction of the line, rhyme, line at both ends is particularly important, a little similar to the line feeling in Chinese painting. The line of the Little Monk series is not black, but a darker color than the filling of the color. (Figure-Trimming of lines-1)

Figure-Rest of line-2)

(Figure-Rest of line-3)

(Figure-Rest of line-4)

Note that the rest of the line can make the screen more exquisite, more rich details, more engaging, but will greatly increase the workload, especially to the production of a lattice animation add a lot of trouble. So do not recommend all enthusiasts to learn.

Fill the color. Pull up the appropriate color and use the paint bucket tool to pour into the area. A lot of friends asked me, "What color collocation is beautiful", or "how to match a beautiful color." In fact, whether the color collocation is beautiful without an absolute standard, a matter of opinion, you think beautiful is beautiful. Want to do well in this respect need solid art accomplishment. How to improve it? On the one hand, can buy some books on color theory, understand the color principle is very important. On the other hand, can be more optimistic about the work, (not only flash, but also including graphic design, painting, photographic works, etc.), experience, imitate the collocation of others. Draw nourishment from classic works. (Picture-The girl fills the color)

Here, a character can be done, but if you feel more refined, you can add light and shade to the character. Use the line tool to outline the dark side, fill in a slightly darker color, and then erase the line. But a friend would ask, "How do I know where the dark side is?" "This requires a solid sketch foundation, there is a lot of observation in life, understand the principle of light and light you can draw a down-to-earth thing to." (Picture-The little girl completes the manuscript)

To give a more unique example, let's look at the setting of the bug image.

First of all we have a preliminary idea, we have to set a pet for the girl, it is a whole series of funny supporting actors. The original idea was to design a cat or a dog, but it felt too common to impress the audience. Then after a discussion, we thought about designing a unicorn. This is a good idea in itself, with Chinese characteristics, and a certain sense of mystery, suitable for the spread of the story around it. But the idea has a fatal problem-Kirin's modelling is too complex for flash production. Finally, I think of a more alternative idea, the design of a worm as a little girl's pet, the original idea is a gram worm, or cockroaches and so on. But after thinking about it, I decided to make a green caterpillar, which is simple and suitable for performance, and the body of meat daze can have a variety of "dead" laws. Later, each episode of the worm will come out, and each episode will have a different "dead" method. This is a very cool idea in itself. Everyone feels good, so the worm was born. The specific method of production described in the previous paragraph does not waste ink. (Fig-The various states of the worm)

Two. Script Creation article

A good screenplay is definitely the soul of animation, especially for short, lean flash clips. A classic flash animation, which must contain a wonderful "creative".

Friends often ask me where these ideas come from.

In fact, the creation is a kind of catharsis of personal emotion, some of these ideas come from the little thoughts in life, some from a dream, some from the chat between friends. Creativity is often a moment of feeling, can be a little moved, can be a let oneself want to laugh the strange idea, can also be an accident. Such things are always there, but most of the time it is in your mind, fleeting. Only those who are sensitive and good at discovering can catch it.

I have always had a habit, I have a small book, carry, a good idea I will write down, or draw a sketch. In fact, is a little bit, very humble, but when you need, this is a wealth.

Here is an analysis of the "Little Monk 3 Christmas Eve Fright" script.

First of all, we have a preliminary idea. To make a little story about Santa Claus on Christmas Eve. But the protagonist of the series is "Monk", "Monk" and "Christmas" is two unrelated nouns. How do you get a monk to celebrate Christmas? We have wanted to do some warm theme, such as the Little Monk tired and hungry back to the monastery, the old monk and the little girl prepared a table full of delicious waiting for him. But the idea was immediately denied. This is inconsistent with our pursuit of the funny, avantgarde style. So we thought of letting the old monk pretend to be Santa Claus to give the children gifts. (pictured-old monk's fantasy)

Preliminary ideas have, but how to be wonderful? Several friends in the discussion of the idea gradually mature, some people put forward to let the old Monk suffered. Yes, since the little monk they never saw Santa Claus, they treated a strange thief who crawled in through a chimney to be "beaten up". So the main line of the story is there, and then you should think of some details of the joke. The old monk has not seen the "Santa Claus", but only from the "Doll pictorial" on the scanty, so we can make his appearance is not fish and fowl, a red-padded jacket plus a Peking opera inside "Guan Gong" type of fake beard, this is not the shape of the earth. (pictured-old monk dressed as Santa Claus)

The old monk from the pictorial understanding of Santa Claus, began to disguise, posing as Santa Claus to the children to send gifts, climbed from the chimney into the small monk's room, but was treated as a thief beat. (Figure-Beat)

In this way, the story is basically shaped. And then the worm, how to arrange for the worm to come out and "die" at the right time? After discussion, we decided to let the bug at the beginning of the scene to debut, as a foreshadowing. Then, let the worm eat the cake secretly, and finally die. By the way, don't overeat during the holiday season. (Fig--hang on to death)

Three. Animation Production Chapter

With the characters and the script, let's start making animations.

First, draw a shooting sketch from the script. is to make the script specific to every shot, and draw a sketch on the paper for each shot. (Photo-shooting sketch)

Many friends often ignore this step and think about where to go. In fact, this is a very bad habit.

The process of making a shooting sketch is the process of Hongri the whole film. In this way, you have already played the movie in your mind before the animation is formally made. Many problems are exposed at this stage and are immediately resolved. Otherwise, think of where to do, and then think behind, will make your film very messy, no clue. Moreover, the production of a film often takes quite a long time, and in the process, many of the original ideas will be forgotten. So be sure to make a sketch of the shooting carefully.

began to make the animation. Before I can formally synthesize a cartoon, I will first make the action elements to be used in the film. (Figure-A small monk's action Element)

Make the action for the character. My usual habit is to put the standard character into the scene first, and then according to the need for the role of the corresponding posture, if it can be transferred from the position of the components, it is very convenient. If not, you should draw it. (Figure-Posture)

And then it can be mobilized.

There are usually two ways that I do character action. "Symbol animation" and "grid-by-step animation."

The so-called "component animation" is to make the need to move the part of a separate component, on a separate layer to do the motion gradient. If you need multiple components to move at the same time, place each component on a separate layer and make a motion gradient. If the part of the movement is much, the movement will appear rich. In fact, how complex action is also composed of the most basic elements, as long as you more experience, you can make very complex, very in place of the action. The advantage of "symbol animation" is relatively simple, as long as you set the starting and ending state positions for each moving component, all of the processes in the middle are automatically generated by the computer. The disadvantage is that it is only suitable to do some simple position to move, zoom out and so on. (Figure-Walking component)

If you need more than just a position to move, but each screen will have a larger change, then, "component animation" can not be achieved. This will only do the "grid animation". The "grid-by-step" principle is simple: you need a lattice of the character action, and eventually connected to a coherent action (the same as the traditional animation principle). The advantage is exquisite, rich, but the production is quite troublesome, often a small action need to draw dozens of consecutive picture. It takes a lot of labor, and requires a very deep understanding of the action, otherwise it will be difficult to achieve results. (Figure-Dash to the screen)