Computer animation

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An example of computer animation which is produced in the "motion capture" technique

Computer animation is the process used for digitally generating animated images. The more
general term computer-generated imagery (CGI) encompasses both static scenes and dynamic
images, while computer animation only refers to the moving images. Modern computer
animation usually uses 3D computer graphics, although 2D computer graphics are still used for
stylistic, low bandwidth, and faster real-time renderings. Sometimes, the target of the animation is
the computer itself, but sometimes film as well.
Computer animation is essentially a digital successor to the stop motion techniques using 3D
models, and traditional animationtechniques using frame-by-frame animation of 2D illustrations.
Computer-generated animations are more controllable than other more physically based processes,
constructing miniatures for effects shots or hiring extras for crowd scenes, and because it allows the
creation of images that would not be feasible using any other technology. It can also allow a single
graphic artist to produce such content without the use of actors, expensive set pieces, or props. To
create the illusion of movement, an image is displayed on the computer monitor and repeatedly
replaced by a new image that is similar to it, but advanced slightly in time (usually at a rate of 24, 25
or 30 frames/second). This technique is identical to how the illusion of movement is achieved
with television and motion pictures.
For 3D animations, objects (models) are built on the computer monitor (modeled) and 3D figures are
rigged with a virtual skeleton. For 2D figure animations, separate objects (illustrations) and separate
transparent layers are used with or without that virtual skeleton. Then the limbs, eyes, mouth,
clothes, etc. of the figure are moved by the animator on key frames. The differences in appearance
between key frames are automatically calculated by the computer in a process known
as tweening or morphing. Finally, the animation is rendered.[1]
 For 3D animations, all frames must be rendered after the modeling is complete. For 2D vector
animations, the rendering process is the key frame illustration process, while tweened frames are
rendered as needed. For pre-recorded presentations, the rendered frames are transferred to a
different format or medium, like digital video. The frames may also be rendered in real time as they
are presented to the end-user audience. Low bandwidth animations transmitted via the internet
(e.g. Adobe Flash, X3D) often use software on the end-users computer to render in real time as an
alternative to streaming or pre-loaded high bandwidth animations.

Contents

 1Explanation
 2History
 3Animation methods
 4Modeling
 5Equipment
 6Facial animation
 7Realism
 8Films
 9Animation studios
 10Web animations
 11Detailed examples and pseudocode
 12Computer-assisted vs. computer-generated
 13See also
 14References
o 14.1Citations
o 14.2Works cited
 15External links

Explanation[edit]
To trick the eye and the brain into thinking they are seeing a smoothly moving object, the pictures
should be drawn at around 12 frames per second or faster.[2] (A frame is one complete image.) With
rates above 75-120 frames per second, no improvement in realism or smoothness is perceivable
due to the way the eye and the brain both process images. At rates below 12 frames per second,
most people can detect jerkiness associated with the drawing of new images that detracts from the
illusion of realistic movement.[3]Conventional hand-drawn cartoon animation often uses 15 frames
per second in order to save on the number of drawings needed, but this is usually accepted because
of the stylized nature of cartoons. To produce more realistic imagery, computer animation demands
higher frame rates.
Films seen in theaters in the United States run at 24 frames per second, which is sufficient to create
the illusion of continuous movement. For high resolution, adapters are used.

History[edit]
Main article: History of computer animation
See also: Timeline of computer animation in film and television
Early digital computer animation was developed at Bell Telephone Laboratories in the 1960s by
Edward E. Zajac, Frank W. Sinden, Kenneth C. Knowlton, and A. Michael Noll.[4]Other digital
animation was also practiced at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.[5]
In 1967, a computer animation named "Hummingbird" was created by Charles Csuri and James
Shaffer.[6]
In 1968, a computer animation called "Kitty" was created with BESM-4 by Nikolai Konstantinov,
depicting a cat moving around.[7]
In 1971, a computer animation called "Metadata" was created, showing various shapes.[8]
An early step in the history of computer animation was the sequel to the 1973 film Westworld, a
science-fiction film about a society in which robots live and work among humans.[9]The
sequel, Futureworld (1976), used the 3D wire-frame imagery, which featured a computer-animated
hand and face both created by University of Utah graduates Edwin Catmulland Fred Parke.[10] This
imagery originally appeared in their student film A Computer Animated Hand, which they completed
in 1972.[11][12]
Developments in CGI technologies are reported each year at SIGGRAPH,[13] an annual conference
on computer graphics and interactive techniques that is attended by thousands of computer
professionals each year.[14] Developers of computer games and 3D video cards strive to achieve the
same visual quality on personal computers in real-time as is possible for CGI films and animation.
With the rapid advancement of real-time rendering quality, artists began to use game engines to
render non-interactive movies, which led to the art form Machinima.
The very first full length computer animated television series was ReBoot,[15] which debuted in
September 1994; the series followed the adventures of characters who lived inside a
computer.[16] The first feature-length computer animated film was Toy Story (1995), which was made
by Pixar.[17][18][19] It followed an adventure centered around toys and their owners. This groundbreaking
film was also the first of many fully computer-animated movies.[18]

Animation methods[edit]

In this .gif of a 2D Flashanimation, each 'stick' of the figure is keyframed over time to create motion.

In most 3D computer animation systems, an animator creates a simplified representation of a

character's anatomy, which is analogous to a skeleton or stick figure.[20] They are by default arranged
into a default position known as a bind pose. The position of each segment of the skeletal model is
defined by animation variables, or Avars for short. In human and animal characters, many parts of
the skeletal model correspond to the actual bones, but skeletal animation is also used to animate
other things, with facial features (though other methods for facial animation exist).[21] The character
"Woody" in Toy Story, for example, uses 700 Avars (100 in the face alone). The computer doesn't
usually render the skeletal model directly (it is invisible), but it does use the skeletal model to
compute the exact position and orientation of that certain character, which is eventually rendered
into an image. Thus by changing the values of Avars over time, the animator creates motion by
making the character move from frame to frame.
There are several methods for generating the Avar values to obtain realistic motion. Traditionally,
animators manipulate the Avars directly.[22] Rather than set Avars for every frame, they usually set
Avars at strategic points (frames) in time and let the computer interpolate or tween between them in
a process called keyframing. Keyframing puts control in the hands of the animator and has roots in
hand-drawn traditional animation.[23]
In contrast, a newer method called motion capture makes use of live action footage.[24] When
computer animation is driven by motion capture, a real performer acts out the scene as if they were
the character to be animated.[25] His/her motion is recorded to a computer using video cameras and
markers and that performance is then applied to the animated character.[26]
Each method has its advantages and as of 2007, games and films are using either or both of these
methods in productions. Keyframe animation can produce motions that would be difficult or
impossible to act out, while motion capture can reproduce the subtleties of a particular actor.[27] For
example, in the 2006 film Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, Bill Nighy provided the
performance for the character Davy Jones. Even though Nighy doesn't appear in the movie himself,
the movie benefited from his performance by recording the nuances of his body language, posture,
facial expressions, etc. Thus motion capture is appropriate in situations where believable, realistic
behavior and action is required, but the types of characters required exceed what can be done
throughout the conventional costuming.

Modeling[edit]
3D computer animation combines 3D models of objects and programmed or hand "keyframed"
movement. These models are constructed out of geometrical vertices, faces, and edges in a 3D
coordinate system. Objects are sculpted much like real clay or plaster, working from general forms to
specific details with various sculpting tools. Unless a 3D model is intended to be a solid color, it must
be painted with "textures" for realism. A bone/joint animation system is set up to deform the CGI
model (e.g., to make a humanoid model walk). In a process known as rigging, the virtual marionette
is given various controllers and handles for controlling movement.[28] Animation data can be created
using motion capture, or keyframing by a human animator, or a combination of the two.[29]
3D models rigged for animation may contain thousands of control points — for example, "Woody"
from Toy Story uses 700 specialized animation controllers. Rhythm and Hues Studios labored for
two years to create Aslan in the movie The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the
Wardrobe, which had about 1,851 controllers (742 in the face alone). In the 2004 film The Day After
Tomorrow, designers had to design forces of extreme weather with the help of video references and
accurate meteorological facts. For the 2005 remake of King Kong, actor Andy Serkis was used to
help designers pinpoint the gorilla's prime location in the shots and used his expressions to model
"human" characteristics onto the creature. Serkis had earlier provided the voice and performance
for Gollum in J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

Equipment[edit]
A ray-traced 3-D model of a jack inside a cube, and the jack alone below.

Computer animation can be created with a computer and an animation software. Some impressive
animation can be achieved even with basic programs; however, the rendering can take a lot of time
on an ordinary home computer.[30] Professional animators of movies, television and video games
could make photorealistic animation with high detail. This level of quality for movie animation would
take hundreds of years to create on a home computer. Instead, many
powerful workstation computers are used.[31] Graphics workstation computers use two to four
processors, and they are a lot more powerful than an actual home computer and are specialized for
rendering. A large number of workstations (known as a "render farm") are networked together to
effectively act as a giant computer.[32] The result is a computer-animated movie that can be
completed in about one to five years (however, this process is not composed solely of rendering). A
workstation typically costs $2,000-16,000 with the more expensive stations being able to render
much faster due to the more technologically-advanced hardware that they contain. Professionals
also use digital movie cameras, motion/performance capture, bluescreens, film editing software,
props, and other tools used for movie animation. Programs like Blendr allow for people who cant
afford expensive animation and rendering software to be able to work in a similar manner to those
who use the commercial grade equipment.[33]

Facial animation[edit]
Main article: Computer facial animation
The realistic modeling of human facial features is both one of the most challenging and sought after
elements in computer-generated imagery. Computer facial animation is a highly complex field where
models typically include a very large number of animation variables.[34] Historically speaking, the
first SIGGRAPH tutorials on State of the art in Facial Animation in 1989 and 1990 proved to be a
turning point in the field by bringing together and consolidating multiple research elements and
sparked interest among a number of researchers.[35]
The Facial Action Coding System (with 46 "action units", "lip bite" or "squint"), which had been
developed in 1976, became a popular basis for many systems.[36] As early as 2001, MPEG-
4 included 68 Face Animation Parameters (FAPs) for lips, jaws, etc., and the field has made
significant progress since then and the use of facial microexpression has increased.[36][37]
In some cases, an affective space, the PAD emotional state model, can be used to assign specific
emotions to the faces of avatars.[38] In this approach, the PAD model is used as a high level
emotional space and the lower level space is the MPEG-4 Facial Animation Parameters (FAP). A
mid-level Partial Expression Parameters (PEP) space is then used to in a two-level structure – the
PAD-PEP mapping and the PEP-FAP translation model.[39]

Realism[edit]
Realism in computer animation can mean making each frame look photorealistic, in the sense that
the scene is rendered to resemble a photograph or make the characters' animation believable and
lifelike.[40] Computer animation can also be realistic with or without the photorealistic rendering.[41]
One of the greatest challenges in computer animation has been creating human characters that look
and move with the highest degree of realism. Part of the difficulty in making pleasing, realistic human
characters is the uncanny valley, the concept where the human audience (up to a point) tends to
have an increasingly negative, emotional response as a human replica looks and acts more and
more human. Films that have attempted photorealistic human characters, such as The Polar
Express,[42][43][44] Beowulf,[45] and A Christmas Carol[46][47] have been criticized as "creepy" and
"disconcerting".
The goal of computer animation is not always to emulate live action as closely as possible, so many
animated films instead feature characters who are anthropomorphic animals, fantasy creatures and
characters, superheroes, or otherwise have non-realistic, cartoon-like proportions.[48] Computer
animation can also be tailored to mimic or substitute for other kinds of animation, like traditional stop-
motion animation (as shown in Flushed Away or The Lego Movie). Some of the long-standing basic
principles of animation, like squash & stretch, call for movement that is not strictly realistic, and such
principles still see widespread application in computer animation.[49]

Films[edit]

"Spring", a 3D animated short film made using Blender

CGI short films have been produced as independent animation since 1976.[50] An early example of an
animated feature film to incorporate CGI animation was the 1983 Japanese anime film Golgo 13:
The Professional.[51] The popularity of computer animation (especially in the field of special effects)
skyrocketed during the modern era of U.S. animation.[52] The first completely computer-animated
movie was Toy Story (1995), but VeggieTales is the first American fully 3D computer animated
series sold directly (made in 1993); its success inspired other animation series, such as ReBoot in
1994. While other films like Avatar used CGI for a majority of the movie while still incorporating
human actors into the mix.[53]

Animation studios[edit]
Main article: List of animation studios

The examples and perspective in this section deal primarily with the
United States and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject. You
may improve this section, discuss the issue on the talk page, or create a new
article, as appropriate. (May 2018)(Learn how and when to remove this template
message)

Some notable producers of computer-animated feature films include:

 Animal Logic – Films include Happy Feet (2006), Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of
Ga'Hoole (2010), Walking with Dinosaurs (2013) and The Lego Movie (2014)
 Blue Sky Studios – Films include Ice Age (2002), Robots (2005), Horton Hears a
Who! (2008), Rio (2011), The Peanuts Movie (2015)
 DreamWorks Animation – Films include Shrek (2001), Madagascar (2005), Kung Fu
Panda (2008), How to Train Your Dragon (2010), The Croods (2013), Trolls (2016), The Boss
Baby (2017)
 Ilion Animation Studios — Films include Planet 51 (2009), Mortadelo and Filemon: Mission
Implausible (2014) Wonder Park (2019)
 Illumination — Films include Despicable Me (2010), The Lorax (2012), Minions (2015), The
Secret Life of Pets (2016), Sing (2016), The Grinch (2018)
 Industrial Light & Magic – Films include Rango (2011) and Strange Magic (2015)
 Pacific Data Images – Films
include Antz (1998), Shrek (2001), Madagascar (2005), Megamind (2010), Mr. Peabody and
Sherman (2014)
 Pixar Animation Studios – Films include Toy Story (1995), Monsters, Inc. (2001), Finding
Nemo (2003), The Incredibles (2004), Ratatouille (2007), WALL-E (2008), Up (2009), Inside
Out (2015), The Good Dinosaur (2015), Coco (2017)
 Reel FX Animation Studios – Films include Free Birds (2013) and The Book of Life (2014)
 Sony Pictures Animation – Films include Open Season (2006), Surf's Up (2007), Cloudy with a
Chance of Meatballs (2009), The Smurfs (2011), Hotel Transylvania (2012), Cloudy with a
Chance of Meatballs 2 (2013), Hotel Transylvania 2 (2015), The Emoji Movie (2017), Spider-
Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
 Sony Pictures Imageworks – Films include The Angry Birds Movie (2016)
 Triggerfish Animation Studios – Films include Zambezia (2013), Khumba (2014)
 Walt Disney Animation Studios – Films include Bolt (2008), Tangled (2010), Wreck-It
Ralph (2012), Frozen (2013), Big Hero 6 (2014), Zootopia (2016), Moana (2016)
 Warner Animation Group – Films include The Lego Movie (2014), Storks (2016), The Lego
Batman Movie (2017), Smallfoot (2018)

Web animations[edit]
The popularity of websites that allow members to upload their own movies for others to view has
created a growing community of amateur computer animators.[54] With utilities and programs often
included free with modern operating systems, many users can make their own animated movies and
shorts. Several free and open-source animation software applications exist as well. The ease at
which these animations can be distributed has attracted professional animation talent also.
Companies such as PowToon and GoAnimateattempt to bridged the gap by giving amateurs access
to professional animations as clip art.
The oldest (most backward compatible) web-based animations are in the animated GIF format,
which can be uploaded and seen on the web easily.[55] However, the raster graphicsformat of GIF
animations slows the download and frame rate, especially with larger screen sizes. The growing
demand for higher quality web-based animations was met by a vector graphics alternative that relied
on the use of a plugin. For decades, Flash animations were the most popular format, until the web
development community abandoned support for the Flash player plugin. Web browsers on mobile
devices and mobile operating systems never fully supported the Flash plugin.
By this time, internet bandwidth and download speeds increased, making raster graphic animations
more convenient. Some of the more complex vector graphic animations had a slower frame rate due
to complex rendering than some of the raster graphic alternatives. Many of the GIF and Flash
animations were already converted to digital video formats, which were compatible with mobile
devices and reduced file sizes via video compression technology. However, compatibility was still
problematic as some of the popular video formats such as Apple's QuickTime and Microsoft
Silverlight required plugins. YouTube, the most popular video viewing website, was also relying on
the Flash plugin to deliver digital video in the Flash Video format.
The latest alternatives are HTML5 compatible animations. Technologies such
as JavaScript and CSS animations made sequencing the movement of images in HTML5 web pages
more convenient. SVG animations offered a vector graphic alternative to the original Flash graphic
format, SmartSketch. YouTube offers an HTML5 alternative for digital video. APNG(Animated PNG)
offered a raster graphic alternative to animated GIF files that enables multi-level transparency not
available in GIFs
See also: Comparison of HTML5 and Flash

Detailed examples and pseudocode[edit]

In 2D computer animation, moving objects are often referred to as "sprites." A sprite is an image that
has a location associated with it. The location of the sprite is changed slightly, between each
displayed frame, to make the sprite appear to move.[56] The following pseudocode makes a sprite
move from left to right:

var int x := 0, y := screenHeight / 2;

while x < screenWidth
drawBackground()
drawSpriteAtXY (x, y) // draw on top of the background
x := x + 5 // move to the right

Computer animation uses different techniques to produce animations. Most frequently,

sophisticated mathematics is used to manipulate complex three-dimensional polygons, apply
"textures", lighting and other effects to the polygons and finally rendering the complete image. A
sophisticated graphical user interface may be used to create the animation and arrange its
choreography. Another technique called constructive solid geometry defines objects by conducting
boolean operations on regular shapes, and has the advantage that animations may be accurately
produced at any resolution.

Computer-assisted vs. computer-generated[edit]

To animate means, figuratively, to "give life to". There are two basic methods that animators
commonly use to accomplish this.
Computer-assisted animation is usually classed as two-dimensional (2D) animation. Drawings are
either hand drawn (pencil to paper) or interactively drawn (on the computer) using different assisting
appliances and are positioned into specific software packages. Within the software package, the
creator places drawings into different key frames which fundamentally create an outline of the most
important movements.[57] The computer then fills in the "in-between frames", a process commonly
known as Tweening.[58] Computer-assisted animation employs new technologies to produce content
faster than is possible with traditional animation, while still retaining the stylistic elements of
traditionally drawn characters or objects.[59]
Examples of films produced using computer-assisted animation are The Little Mermaid, The
Rescuers Down Under, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King, Pocahontas, The Hunchback
of Notre Dame, Hercules, Mulan, The Road to El Dorado and Tarzan.
Computer-generated animation is known as three-dimensional (3D) animation. Creators design an
object or character with an X, a Y and a Z axis. No pencil-to-paper drawings create the way
computer generated animation works. The object or character created will then be taken into a
software, key framing and tweening are also carried out in computer generated animation but are
also a lot of techniques used that do not relate to traditional animation. Animators can break physical
laws by using mathematical algorithms to cheat mass, force and gravity rulings. Fundamentally, time
scale and quality could be said to be a preferred way to produce animation as they are two major
things that are enhanced by using computer generated animation. Another positive aspect of CGA is
the fact one can create a flock of creatures to act independently when created as a group. An
animal's fur can be programmed to wave in the wind and lie flat when it rains instead of
programming each strand of hair separately.[59]