Final Animation The Surprise

The Surprise

Here is the final Animation with sound effects and music overall I feel that the principles of animation have been considered but it could be improved and refined. The timing and pacing mostly fits the emotion. During the animation he starts curious thinking about the present during his thoughts secondary action is used in the eyes ears and tail, an example of this would be at 0:04 when his pupils look to his upper left this represents the thought process. In his first thought when he first sees the present it starts slow and subtle. The animation also shows displays of squash and stretch in the poses first it starts with a squashed when he is thinking and then goes into a slightly exaggerated stretch when he turns round at 0:04

 The use of solid drawing followed with staging is strong and gives the character more personality at 0:05 his hand is on his chin which is a psychological gesture that represents thinking, next as he leans over to to look at the present slow in and slow out as well as arcs and follow through are are used to show the speed and weight of the character.

I feel at 0:07 the hold could last for longer this allows the audience to see what he is thinking, the secondary action of the ear shaking adds more animal instinct to display anthropomorphism. another example of anthropomorphism is in the solid drawing pose at 0:07 his arms are out in front of him while his hooves are out like paws.The way he leans over shows exaggeration in both the movement and his pose. The use of thought in each action represents the anticipation every time he displays thought there is an action afterwards the longer the anticipation the more exaggerated the action.

At  0:09 he crosses his arms and rubs his snout that combined with the secondary action of the eye position shows access to thought, this scene is also anticipation for him running to the present. The music I used Happy Go Lively by Laurie Johnson gives the animation more appeal and to some extent the music is timed to some of the movement this can be noticed most at 0:11-0:12. I feel that the Jazzy public domain 50's music I chose fits the overall theme of the feeling of curiosity and excitement. Also at 0:11 there is a great use of arcs and overlapping action and slow in and out. Next after running to the present he shows anticipation almost hugging the present, eyes becoming alert showing he is about to pounce then he quickly throws his arms up camera changes showing him from the back ripping the present open.

Opening the present is the main action in the animation (0:16) so it had a big build up of anticipation leading into an exaggerated fast paced action. To add more appeal sound effects of paper ripping were added, not just for exaggeration but also to communicate more to the audience of what he is doing. For every action there is a reaction so after he has finished opening the present I needed to use something that would be more universally classed as disappointment for a gift. So for the appeal and to add some extra comedy I made a pair of white under wear with red lining to make them more recognizable to the audience. The reaction of the gift is slow and contrasts with the fast rigorous action seen before he slowly raises his ears letting his eyebrows down followed by his ears in disappointment at 0:25 This would be a use of follow through since his brow leads his ears as he collapses down. The eyebrows are  a very expressive secondary action that make it easier to see what the deer is thinking and how he is feeling. Lastly to add more appeal to the ending corny fail music as used to hammer in the defeat of the character. This ends with a fade out created using adobe premiere.


The staging of the animation also helps convey the message of the emotions and what the character is thinking. The first camera angle focuses on the present zooming and panning out to reveal our character this is a clear introduction to the characters goal the present is positioned at the edge of the screen. The next camera shot is when we show the character close up on a front view, this allows to communicate his emotion to the audience more clearly. Next frame shows the character from the present's perspective this staging also allows to show he is moving closer to the gift. After that the character is shown from a profile view to anticipate the main action that comes next. The next two shots exaggerate the comedy, first a back view to show wrapping paper flying everywhere and the characters determination. The second shows a close up looking up at the character from the front, this compliments his feelings of disappointment.

The character himself has a nice use of appeal in his design, he was inspired off of British stop motion characters like Aardman and American animation from the 40's like Warner Bros Looney Tunes.

Overall I feel I am happy with the results more could have been done with more skill and understanding of 3D animation. The character displays emotions and personality and I am happy I managed to show this and feel it is the strongest part of my animation. The mechanics of the animation could do with work in some areas however they still convey the message of the animation and are not too distracting from the audiences perspective.