I'll try to make this short and quick. One idea versus another.
The (first) idea thus far of animation works by our retention of the frames we've just seen, connecting the drawings mentally to create the illusion of movement, right?
But, knowing the way our brains work, how much of it could also be our interpolation of the illustrations we've seen?
Try doing a head turn and don't inbetween at all. Just watch the keys. Obviously with (say 3) drawings it's not fluid or entirely convincing. You know it's not something real or even magical...but it works. I think largely in part because the frames we don't see - the drawings that are definitely not there, are created by our imaginations. Front, 45, side profiles...that's all I did.
But now apply that to conventional animation, say your favorite show on the Cartoon Network. This is one thing I haven't heard discussed much and I'm curious why. Even though we're supplied with the image data by our eyes/the TV/what have you, we're most likely creating a lot of (technically) unseen information on our own. Couldn't this be why we each get something different out of watching cartoons?
Supposedly, physiologists abandoned the persistence of vision theory (with regards to movies) long ago, although film professors (and probably many animation teachers) still erroneously teach it as fact.
Did you look into the phi phenomenon for an alternate explanation?
According to Wikipedia, you have it precisely.
"In actuality, psychologists and physiologists have long ago abandoned [P.O.V.]'s applicability to film viewership, though film textbooks, film professors, and film theorists have largely not."
It makes sense until they also say that one of the reasons that theory held was that it was believe the eye had a refresh rate of sorts (or the biological equivalent).
But the phi phenomenon you mentioned is exactly what I was talking about, it's so crazy. Never even heard about it before and came up with it on my own! But yeah, basically even the farthest-down inbetweens in the hierarchy, the most broken down drawings....their frames will have inbetweens that don't exist, but rather are created in your imagination to blend the motion smoothly.
Brilliant.
Thanks for being a smarty, Harvey.
Ask someone who remembers those old UPA cartoons that were all animated on threes if they remmeber them being choppy in their movement.
My mems have them actually moving somewhat more fluid they they really were.
But that might be just me.
--Ken
"We all grow older, we do not have to grow up"--Archie Goodwin ( 1937-1998)
I have your new avatar, Scat:
How about this one?
Are the lights moving in a clockwise or counterclockwise direction?
Use the power of your mind to reverse their movement!
gah! the human brain! I wasn't aware that POV was false. Thanks for the info. Now I feel a bit less ignorant.
Ender
Now that's just ridiculous...I sat here for 10 seconds going "Man, but it only goes clockwise...I'm broken!" then POOF....
My favorite examples of how animation can be great with only a few fps: "Broken Fairy Tales" and Bill Plympton's movies.
In Plympton's case for example, he uses very few frames, but his animation is so smart, the timing is so good and the drawings are so expressive and full of volume that no one really notices it.
And Broken Fairy Tales... well, it's just too damn funny!
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