Animating for Fun

I had never made a zoetrope before, let alone one on a vinyl record, so it was fun figuring out the math. This 12” vinyl plays at 33.3 rpm on the turntable so I knew the rate of spin, and for the zoetrope “shutter”, I chose a 30fps “shutter” to make it easier if viewed through a phone since most smart phone cameras record video at 30fps by default.

With that information, I knew I would be animating at 30fps, and I found that playing with the number of sub-divisions on the disc could give the illusion that the cycled animation appears stationary (54 subd) or travels clockwise (55 or greater) or counter-clockwise (53 or less). The factors of that subdivision number inform the frames of the cycled animation. For example, at 52 subdivisions, the animation cycle could be either 4, 13, or 26 frames long, and it’ll appear to travel counter-clockwise.

Using After Effects, I created a series of nested comps for different subdivisions so all I had to do was drop the animation file in the desired premade comp and it would output the subdivided disc layout.

I started this 6 weeks ago, just before Nintendo shut down its 3DS and WiiU servers. The server shutdown meant no more multi-player online play for 3DS games, like Mario Kart 7, but also no more uploading to the Butterfly Animation online gallery directly from the app.

As an homage to the Inchworm and Butterfly Animation apps for the DSi and 3DS that I’ve been animating on since 2011, I originally was just going to animate just a single shot featuring something butterfly related.

But the story evolved as I began asking myself a series of "what if" questions that I had fun answering, like, “what if it was a little girl playing dress up as a butterfly?” And then “what if she was first cosplaying as a caterpillar then the butterfly?” “If this is a story of growth, what if she stumbles? What is her attitude when she stumbles?” “What if the design of the girl was something like Isao Takahata or Yoichi Kotabe would draw?”

Making this was the embodiment of everything I hope to achieve with my personal animation: to let creativity flow and just have fun animating and creating.

Since this mini-short was animated on my Nintendo 3DS, there was a memory limit of only 100 drawings, which was a bit of a challenge for longer or complex actions, but was a fun puzzle to solve. Sometimes limitations force you to come up with even more creative solutions. (I was able the squeeze in more drawings than the memory allowed, and filled it to the max!) :)

The song I used is from Rebecca Sugar’s album, "Spiral Bound", and perfectly fit the theme of the short. Initially, while I was drawing the character, I found myself humming a tune from Steven Universe that dealt with beginnings, endings, and not being ready. It’s amazing how the brain can subconsciously pick the playlist!

In the end, that song, sung by Steven’s father in the show, didn’t quite fit, but then I remembered another song by Rebecca Sugar which was more on theme with my story, called “My Own Way to the End”. The whole album is wonderful! You can check it out here:

Painting the backgrounds for this was the most challenging thing for me, but also the most eye opening! After painting, I would look around at the trees in the neighborhood differently. So many colors when you really look closely.

There’s so many talented people at my work and it was great that I could ask them for advice. One person I asked was the talented Tia Kratter, who happened to teach a mini-painting class for the animators while I was working on this short. I asked her for advice on one of the background paintings and she asked great questions which challenged me to try different things, but I still felt like I was having fun and playing without fear of failure. I mean, it was still hard though! Hahaha!

Having owned Sara Bareilles’s previous albums, I blindly purchased her then latest album the day it came out. As I listened, I noticed a strong baking and pie theme connecting the songs, which seemed a little strange until I discovered it was an album of songs Sara wrote for a new musical, “Waitress.”

At the time, I didn’t know the story of the musical or of the movie on which the musical is based, but the emotion in the lyrics of the song, “She Used to Be Mine” was so clear, you really felt for the character, and could see who she’s transforming into. It was something I really wanted to draw and animate, just for fun and practice.

I never showed anyone, out of embarrassment, because by that time, my coworkers and I were all geeking out over Jessie Mueller’s rehearsal performance that hit YouTube a few months later in 2016. Her acting was so good and inspiring, and what I had done just didn’t compare.