UNIT III

Computer Animation
1. Design of Animation Sequence

a. Storyboard layout ( rough sketch, basic idea, motion

sequence, etc)
b. Object definitions( basic shapes i.e. lines, curves,
polygon, etc)
c. Key-frame specifications
d. Generation of in-between frames
2. General computer animation function
object database, managing OD, updating,
manipulating, motion generation, , camera movements,
standard motions like zooming, panning, tilting, etc

3. Raster animation

4. Key-frame systems
•Morphing
•Simulating acceleration

5. Animation language
•Linear list notations
•General purpose languages
•Graphical languages
 Displaying animation sequences

• Movies work by fooling our eyes

• A sequence of static images presented in a

quick succession appears as continuous flow
 Why animation works
• The eye cannot record images faster than
approximately 50 frames per second
(30 is just about adequate)

• If a gap in the projection occurs, the eye

seems to perform spatial interpolation over
the gap
 Displaying animation sequences
• To achieve smooth animation, a sequence of
images (frames) have to be presented on a screen
with the speed of at least 30 frames per second

• Animations frames can be

– pre-computed in advance and pre-loaded in memory
– computed in real time (e.g. movement of the cursor)
 Raster animation
• This is the most common animation technique
• Frames are copied very fast from off-screen
memory to the frame buffer
• Copying can be applied to
– complete frames
– only parts of the frame which contain some
movement
CREATING ANIMATION SEQUENCES
 Object definition
• In simple manual systems, the objects can be
simply the artist drawings

• In computer-generated animations, models are

used

• Examples of models:
– a "flying logo" in a TV advert
– a walking stick-man
– a dinosaur attacking its prey in Jurassic Park
 Models can be
• Rigid (i.e. they have no moving parts)
• Articulated (subparts are rigid, but movement is
allowed between the sub-parts)
• Dynamic (using physical laws to simulate the motion)
• Particle based (animating individual particles using the
statistics of behaviour)
• Behaviour based (e.g. based on behaviour of real
animals)
• Simple rigid objects can be defined in terms of
– polygon tables (3D)
– basic shapes such as line segments, circles, splines
etc. (2D)

• Rigid body animation is an extension of the

three-dimensional viewing
 Path specification
• Impression of movement can be created for
two basic situations, or for their combination:
– static object, moving camera
– static camera, moving object

• The path defines the sequence of locations

(for either the camera or the object) for the
consecutive time frames
Static object, moving camera

Time

F1
F5

F2
F4

F3
Static camera, moving object

F1 F2 F3 F4
 Static object, moving camera

• The path specifies the spatial coordinates

along which the camera moves

• The path is usually specified for a single

point
 Static object, moving camera
• During movement, the target point in the
World coordinate system can

– remain the same (e.g. when walking or flying

around the object to see it from all directions);

– change (e.g. standing in one location and looking

round, or moving along a given path and showing
the view seen by the observer while moving).
 Static camera, moving object
• Path specifying the object movement has to
be defined

• The path is defined as the spatial coordinates

along which the object moves
 Static camera, moving object
• Objects and their parts are defined in a local
coordinate system
• Animation path is defined in the World
coordinate system
• The path is specified for a single point
• Coordinates of the actual points describing
the object are calculated afterwards
 It is important to remember that when the
object moves along the path, not only its
position changes, but also its orientation

Y Y

Z Z

X X
KEY FRAMES AND IN-BETWEENING
 Key frames
• Compute first a small number of key frames

• Interpolate the remaining frames in-between

these key frames (in-betweening)

• Key frames can be computed

– at equal time intervals
– according to some other rules
– for example when the direction of the path changes
rapidly
 In-betweening

• The simplest method of in-betweening is

linear interpolation

• Interpolation is normally applied to the

projected object points
 In-betweening

• Linear interpolation will not always produce

realistic results.

• Example: an animation of a bouncing ball

where the best in-betweening can be
achieved by dynamic animation
 In-betweening
• In-betweening should use interpolation based
on the nature of the path, for example:

– straight path linear interpolation

– circular path angular interpolation

– irregular pathlinear interpolation

spline
 Keyframing

• Traditional animation technique

• Dependent on artist to generate ‘key’ frames
• Additional, ‘inbetween’ frames are drawn
automatically by computer
6. Methods of Controlling Animation

a. Full explicit control (description of everything is

given)
b. Procedural control( position of one object may
influence motion of other)
c. Constraint based systems(motion of one object
may be determined by other which in
constraint)
d. Tracking live action
e. Actors ( a control mechanism which will
operate object from the frame)
f. Kinematics & dynamics
 Keyframing
• Keyframe systems take their name from the
traditional hierarchical production system first
developed by Walt Disney
• Skilled animators would design or choreograph a
particular sequence by drawing frames that
established the animation - the so-called keyframes
• The production of the complete sequence was then
passed on to less skilled artists who used the
keyframes to produce ‘in-between’ frames
 Keyframing
• The emulation of this system by the computer,
whereby interpolation replaces the inbetween artist,
was one of the first computer animation tools to be
developed.
• This technique was quickly generalized to allow for
the interpolation of any parameter affecting the
motion
• Care must be taken when parameterizing the system,
since interpolating naive, semantically inappropriate
parameters can yield inferior motion
Keyframing

Interpolation of rotation angle

Interpolation of end points

 Keyframing
• The keyframing approach carries certain
disadvantages
– First, it is only really suitable for simple motion of
rigid bodies
– Second, care must be taken to ensure that no
unwanted motion excursions are introduced by
the interpolant
– None the less, interpolation of key frames remains
fundamental to most animation systems
More squash and stretch
• resolution of action
• Discontinuities are unsettling
 Examples
• Sports video games
– Madden Football
• Many movie characters
– Phantom Menace
• Cartoons
 Motion Capture Strengths
• Exactly captures the motions of the actor
– Michael Jordan’s video game character will
capture his style
• Easy to capture data
 Motion Capture Weaknesses
• Noise
• Magnetic system interference
• Visual system occlusions
• Mechanical system mass
• Tethered (wireless is available now)
 Motion Capture Weaknesses

• Aligning motion data with CG character

– Limb lengths
– Idealized perfect joints
• Reusing motion data
– Difficult to scale in size (must also scale in time)
– Changing one part of motion
 Motion Capture Weaknesses

• Blending segments
– Motion clips are short (due to range and tethers)
– Dynamic motion generation requires blending at
run time
– Difficult to manage smooth transition
 Examples
• Inanimate video game objects
– GT Racer cars
– Soapbox about why this is so cool
• Special effects
– Explosions, water, secondary motion
– Phantom Menace CG droids after they were cut in
half
 Procedural Animation
• Very general term for a technique that puts
more complex algorithms behind the scenes
• Technique attempts to consolidate artistic
efforts in algorithms and heuristics
• Allows for optimization and physical
simulation
 Procedural Animation Strengths
• Animation can be generated ‘on the fly’
• Dynamic response to user
• Write-once, use-often
• Algorithms provide accuracy and exhaustive
search that animators cannot
Procedural Animation Weaknesses
• Difficult to generate
• Expensive to compute
• Difficult to force system to generate a
particular solution
Segments
 Introduction
• To humans, an image is not just a random collection of pixels; it is a meaningful
arrangement of regions and objects.
• There also exits a variety of images: natural scenes, paintings, etc. Despite the large
variations of these images, humans have no problem to interpret them.
• The image information is stored in Display file.
• Existing structure of display file does not satisfy the requirements of viewing image.
Display image is modified to reflect the sub picture structure. To achieve this display
file is divided into segments.
The Segment table indicates the portion of the display file used to construct the picture

Segment Table
Display File

Display
Segment table
Segment Number
Segment Start Segment Size Scale X Scale Y Color Link
3
1 4
2
2
3
5
Null/

For ordering the segm

 Display file Linked List
OP X Y Link
1
2 2 .1 .5 5
3 1 .1 .1 2
4
5 2 .5 .5 9
6
7 2 .1 .5 0
8
9 2 .7 .5 7
10

Start=3
 Segment Functions
• Create Segment
• Close Segment
• Delete Segment
• Rename Segment
CREATING AND DELETING SEGMENTS

CREATE SEGMENT(ID)
CLOSE SEGMENT

For example:
CREATE SEGMENT(1)
DUCK
CLOSE SEGMENT

DELETE SEGMENT(ID)
 RENAMING SEGMENTS

• Segments can also be renamed, by invoking

the function:
RENAME SEGMENT(OLD, NEW)
 Deleting A Segment
➢ When we want to delete a particular segment from the display file then we
must recover the storage space occupied by its instructions and make this
space free for some other segment. To do this we must not destroy and re-
form the entire display file, but we must delete just one segment, while
preserving the rest of the display file.
➢ Here we have used arrays to store the display file information.

Segment 1 Segment 1
Segment 2 Segment 3
Segment 3 Segment 4
Segment 4 Unused Space
Unused Space
 Segment Attributes
• Segment Transformations
• Segment Transformation and Clipping
• Segment Visibility
• Segment Highlighting
• Segment Priority

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