When I first set out doing this project, I wanted to create a very smooth flowing animation that looked polished and perfect. But as I started to do it, and put in the keys, I realised that a really smooth animation wasn't picking up on the mood of the character. So I altered my angle slightly, and decided that I wanted to make it look a little more disjointed, as I felt that would reflect the mind of little Arnold. I went down a sort of "cut-out esque" sort of approach, using flash and photoshop to layer up the different parts of the animation, putting the eyes, arms and tears on separate layers, so it would look like I was layering paper on top of paper, while still being obvious that it was actually a Flash animation!
Sounds slightly complicated, but was actually a alot easier than animating each and every frame. And far less time consuming. Because I had opted to do a full colour detailed character, as opposed to just a sketch or mono chromatic character without too much detail, it was taking an eternity to draw and colour each frame individually, and I realised I was running out of time, so took a slightly easier shortcut. I think if I had possibly managed my time a little more efficiently, and spent less time doing tests and character design I could ahve probably done it frame by frame, in traditional animation stylee!
I have to admit that I am enjoying the character design parts of these projects more so than the actual animation, possibly because I prefer drawing than computers :P
But overall I have enjoyed this project. I think if I had had the entire year to work on it, I would have got the animation more refined, but overall I am pleased with the overall look of it.
Here is the (almost) final version!
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