Amazingly enough, being in a Digital Media class helped a lot in deciding what shots to use. I'm in the middle of a project where we have to apply cinematographic techniques, which helps in pacing and making an animation better.
What is Staging?
Oh the humanity! The great and unholy divinity that is staging! The line that divides the good from mediocre, the okay to terrible! The reason why animation is so frustrating to do and why I will probably contract osteoarthritis! Tremble before its might!
Staging, at first, may seem to be an easy, or even time-saving task for animation. Staging can be summed up as using angles and scenery in animation to emphasize actions , mood, or even the focus of the scene, not unlike cinematography or photography. Concepts such as the
Rule of Thirds,
Tilt & Pan, and
Lead Room all translate nicely into making a more coherent animation. there are also some forms of staging that don't have an official name, but serve to make a film more understandable through simple camera framing.
In serious animated films, expect to see cinematographic shots and techniques as standard in every scene; this is because they have the budget and time to make the magic happen. In reality, using staging in animation can be time-consuming and require a good idea of space, as many types of shots normally seen in real life can be frustrating to replicate in animation.
There are a plethora of other types of named cinematography like Long Shots, Medium Shots, and Bust Shots, which I incidentally used in my animation, but I won't be going over them.
What in the Name of Yog-Sothoth are those Cinema Terms?
Rule of Thirds
As the name implies, the Rule of Thirds is the framing of subjects in thirds, where the main focus is always in one of the thirds, and environment details are usually in the other two thirds. In some cases, the Rule of Thirds can be adapted to create ninths, and where the lines intersect, points of interest are created, which is generally where you would want to put the subject of the scene.
The Rules of Thirds can be used to create thirds, but in cinematography and photography, it is more often used in ninths. The use of this principle is to frame the main focus of the scene at one of four
Interest Points. Humans tend to be pleased more when a subject is at one of these four interest points, and it helps attract attention to the character being framed, as people are naturally inclined to focus on one of those points. The image below illustrates this principle.
Do you see where the lines intersect? Those are the four primary interest points, and because the subject of the scene is framed to be at one of those locations, our eyes are dragged to the man.
Tilt
Tilt is used frequently in animation because it is the most simple way to convey information and scale. Tilting is, easily enough, the movement of the camera up or down, which can be applied to identify the scale of a setting or something that a character sees. The brother technique to Tilt, Pan is very similar, the only difference being that pan moves horizontally.
You can see that I use a very minor tilt in the middle of my animation, while framing the end of the course between the stickman and his board.
Lead Room
Perhaps one of the most important rules to use in animation, Lead Room is a shot framed to give the subjects room to move in. It is an incredibly simple thing to do, but can do wonders if you capture the animation properly. Keeping the main focus in frame while hinting at where the animation will move next will help make sure the audience's eyes is focused on what is happening and what will happen next, since they always know what direction the next action is coming from.
I tried to give as much lead room as possible to the stick man to give a sense of scale to the mountain he was on, but still shifted the subject to the back of the frame to give the audience an idea of what direction the stickman was moving in.
This is a good lead room shot because it gives space for the subject to move.
That was boring. Is this really necessary in animation?
Unfortunately yes; in my pursuit of this skill, one must sacrifice their personal pleasures in hopes of achieving the impossible task of good animated flicks.
Some might find that this post is unsatisfactory, and I have to agree. Staging is too broad a subject to cover in a single post, and the lack of part-by-part consistency was especially off-putting for me while I wrote this out. However, I hope that I can go back on this principle later, to better understand and apply these specific shots to better my animation. Staging is unique in that it isn't just a principle, but a title that encompasses all of cinematography, which makes it particularly frustrating to learn.
I hope that the next few principles aren't as complicated as this; I don't think I'll be able to reach the end of all twelve if they are as complicated as staging. Cutting corners is something that I hate think of, much less do, but it might be needed if I want to finish my project on time.
Will it be like this for the rest of the Principles?
Dear god no, I'd rather flop the project than try and write this much for every following post. Don't worry; this post is the single exception to my adamant attempts of not writing walls of text. I'm going to cut down on reading and up the watching next time. Trust me!
Sources:
Oseman, Neil. “Lead Room, Nose Room or Looking Space.”
Neil Oseman, 2 June 2017, neiloseman.com/lead-room-nose-room-or-looking-space/.
Thomas, Frank, and Ollie Johnston.
The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation. Disney Editions, 1995.
Williams, Richard.
The Animator's Survival Kit: a Manual of Methods, Principles and Formulas for Classical, Computer, Games, Stop Motion and Internet Animators. Farrar Straus & Giroux, 2012.
