Penguin Animation from Katie Hughes on Vimeo.

Subjected around the theme of land and sea, this task involved creating an illustration of a character, before animating it, displaying the final video result as part of an extended piece.

This was my character, constructed on Adobe Illustrator. I vectorised form through simplistic deconstruction, presenting my penguin character in a cartoon method. I then imported this Illustrator file into Adobe After Effects, retaining layers. This entailed for the ability to manipulate movement of specific assets, as opposed to the image existing as one solid image.

I then named each layer before assigning a “parent”, meaning that it will move with the motion of its neighbouring assets, while still having freedom of individual movement.

Then, I adjusted the anchor point of each object, so that when using the rotation feature, the object will move from this specific point, as opposed to a centre point. This was specifically important for the head, fins and feet so hat they could move in a life-like motion without becoming detached from the body of the penguin.

The above screen-shot demonstrates my use of such manipulative strategies, showcasing how I worked with the timeline using the stop-watch toggles to make elements move fluidly, as intended.

I really enjoyed this workshop, being my favourite one so far. I enjoyed experimenting with editorial strategies, bringing my character to life. The ability to animate elements specifically to make up a larger image, in this case being the character, is a skillset I have learned and developed through participation of this Animatic workshop. Altering anchor-points has also refined ability, bringing more realism to my character.