Process and Production - A Brief History of Animation… The 12 principles of animation

The 12 principles are the solid code and rule that all animators should follow, they give a character life and bring you into nthe world of the animation and the animators mind. But they weren't created on the spot or on a whim due to a need, they came into being as a way of explaining and describing the way an animator had created so, Walter Disney would go up to an animator and say that theres a really nice squash to that movement. It was a new jargon that would get an animators intentions across more clearly. Animators would try a variety of ways and techniques with the full intentions of not getting it right the first time, but the inclusion of these principles offered security and ease for animators and as each one was made it was then analysed and scrutinised to a state of perfection so that when new artists and animators joined the team they would be taught these techniques. Before the principles were put into place animations would move in a very rigid and lifeless sense, failing to give off any of the principles, even timing which was something missing from animations before, such as fantasmagoria.