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[Ajezard]

Ok, so I've designed and started programming a cinematic platformer game.
If you don't know what they are take a look at games like the original Prince of perisa, Flashback or Abes odysee.
Now the problem I'm having is the game graphics. I can paint, draw really well and I have a graphics tablet but im having truoble animating. I just cant get the movement right, and with a cinematic platformer animationn is REALLY important.
I'm kinda stumped at what I should do, i searched all weekend for a decent sprite base to work off of and found nothing. What could help me draw realistic animations?

[Dugan]

Well one option is to recruit a skilled animator! Like anything, to do animation well takes time and practice.

But - if you really want to animate yourself I`d suggest doing some basics first, like the first exercise I did at Uni was to draw about 4secs each of:
1. a bouncing ball
2. a balloon
3. a heavy ball dropping

If you can animate those 3 convincingly then those techniques can be used in various combinations to create all sorts of other animations (not always using balls obviously - rather it shows you can express a sense of weight/timing etc).

Also - the guy who did the original prince of persia rotoscoped home video footage he made which helped a lot rather than drawing all from scratch, but you still benefit from being able to draw basic animation when it comes to cleaning up the converted frames.

see `POP` video examples here -


Another World was rotoscoped too - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Another_World_%28video_game%29

[Nouveau303]

Yeah, I was going to mention rotoscoping, check this out:
http://jordanmechner.com/blog/2009/11/the-making-of-prince-of-persia/

[Ajezard]

Yeah I did have a look at rotoscoping it would help, but im on to trying the ball techniques like you said. I think once I get the hang of animating simple objects I can go onto my character. I have animated before but it just looks very unrealistic, i guess I'll just have to practice, thanks for the video links by the way.

[Ego_Shiner]

get a program that can onion skin

[Bree]

Onion skinning or some other way of seeing multiple frames at once will help you out a ton. If you're wanting to learn more about technique, the best place to start would be the Animator's Survival Kit. It's a huge dense book written by Richard Williams, whose most notable project was Who Framed Roger Rabbit. It's mostly geared towards cartoony Western animation, but the principles and examples will help you out with whatever style you choose. Practice is also gonna be key, like anything else.

[Ajezard]

Thanks again for the help, that survival kit looks good. I currently have Fireworks, Flash and illustrator. I know flash can onoin skin but not too sure about the others, can anybody reccomend some programs? price is not a problem for me if theyre decent and not too complicated, thanks.

[Ego_Shiner]

for pixelart (or not if you know what you're doing) graphicsgale is terrific.

[Jad]

Dude, get some animations posted and I'll show you what principles you're not getting and make you get them <3 When you start getting timing and spacing right it suddenly becomes hard to do bad animation. ' u ' So put some animations up for feedback and feedback you'll get.

[Derakon]

Definitely second the Animator's Survival Kit. It's a superb book, and the techniques in it apply regardless of style -- I'm using it to help me with 3D animations, for example. It does cover some more stylistic things, like bending joints backwards to create more dynamism, which not everyone's going to want to do, but that's just a bonus. The important thing is the fundamentals, which it does a great job of covering.

[antymattar]

Nothing can help you anymore. You are doomed. 

[Ajezard]

lol, I've been practising with rotoscoping and its makes thing a whole lot easier and better, so thats what I'll be doing for my game. Although I will get that book as it looks really helpfull :D Thanks guys!

[Nate Kling]

I think rotoscoping is the best way to go for these kinds of games.  They always have really smooth motion and an easy way of getting that is rotoscoping to get a lot of frames.  Good luck with the animations!