In Week 8, George talked about body mechanics and how to plan a short animation shot in Maya. He said body mechanics is about how the body moves with weight, balance, foot placement, and posture. It is the first and most important layer of animation. For this assignment, we did not focus on acting. We mainly focused on making the movement clear from point A to point B.
George strongly asked us to use video reference. He said we should shoot reference and watch it frame by frame. This helps us find key poses and basic timing. We can also understand why the body moves in a certain way, like how the hips shift and how the feet follow arcs. He also showed a planning method using simple proxy shapes (like a ball) to test timing before doing detailed animation. This week’s task was planning only: reference, sketches/poses, or a 2D test, before starting the final animation next week.
