“No valid plans for the future can be made by those who have no capacity for living now.” — Alan Watts, Philosopher
What does it mean to learn? To understand? Is it as simple as accumulating more and more information? Or perhaps maybe it has more to do with actually understanding the material that is at hand?
Today, artists — and especially animators — are always searching for more and more tips, tricks or technical scripts to improve their work. It’s normal to be looking for techniques and tools that might make the job easier or allow us to be more creative, and it’s also understandable to feel insecure and lacking, especially since we’re all essentially living in a very competitive globalized market economy. Unfortunately, this kind of mindset only leads one to constantly chase the craft, rather than pay attention to it.
The purpose behind our art — which parallels the purpose in living to a degree — is to enjoy the process while also making some kind of meaningful contribution. This is often forgotten in the rather repetitive nature of common work and our conditioning to be ambitious, not to mention the basic need for survival. As noted here before, there are only a few fundamental ways to learn anything: analysis, explanation, demonstration, imitation, and repetition. The accumulation of knowledge itself is not enough — and can even be hindrance — if the necessary commitment that follows the acquisition of knowledge is not made. Anything new needs to be studied, understood, and practiced to become useful. This explains why students who jump from course to course, teacher to teacher, or school to school, don’t realize that most of the information is mostly the same stuff regurgitated — only the approach might differ. Anyone who tells us that he alone has the secret to success is clearly trying to pull a fast one on us.
“The type of thing I’ve had the most luck with is working on it, wrestling with it, scratching on the drawings, flipping them until the character’s doing what I conceive of it doing.” — Frank Thomas, Animator
Seeing is the start.
When young artists come to me for assistance, I primarily work to alter the way they look at the information, first by showing and then explaining to them why they’ve not yet understood such seemingly simple concepts as weight, depth, or overlapping action on their animations. What they soon realize upon our sessions is that it’s their inability to see and their lack of effort and time put into understanding the actual fundamentals that hinders them. Oftentimes, having been told or having done one applicable yet rudimentary exercise on the subject, students think they’ve actually learned the concept. Sometimes it’s even worse, having “passed” a course on the subject, he is deluded; the false impression of competence a passing grade or a piece of paper gives can easily decieve. So, like an athlete who wonders why his game seems to be lacking, what he needs to do is take the moment to look and see — and acknowledge to himself honestly — that he’s badly out of shape, can’t move well and lacks real strength or endurance. For the animator, the parallel often lies in the very poor knowledge and understanding of basics like anatomical structure and body mechanics. I also believe that many animators really don’t understand basic design or acting as well as they think they do. After all, almost everybody thinks they have “good taste.” Humility frees the mind and gives us strength. Knowing that you don’t know is the first step to building capacity.
“It’s a very difficult medium… You have to understand movement, which in itself is quite a study.” — Milt Kahl, Animator
The necessity of patience.
The other big hindrance to learning is a lack of patience. Skills don’t jump overnight. Just as muscles take time to grow despite our pounding away at the gym, the brain requires time to breakthrough our previous lack of seeing or clarity. Rushing gets us no where faster. One cannot create anything good or exciting without first a clear vision nor can he fix or repair what is wrong when he cannot identify the problem. This is purely psychological, of course; once the artist relaxes his desire to learn or improve quickly, his mind also relaxes and opens up thus expanding his capacity to understand new concepts or see old ones in a new way.
Building one’s capacity — which is both the understanding and the ability to apply — is always more important than the mere accumulation of more knowledge. Besides, most information and knowledge is already out there. If we’re talking about character animation, the great books written by legendary artists such as Preston Blair, Eric Goldberg, Richard Williams, Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston are more than sufficient to derive most of the important principles and techniques on how to animate well. Add to them the hoard of excellent books on anatomy and near-instant access to online demos, video references and countless animated movies to study, there really isn’t anything new under the sun that would constitute giving anyone an “edge” over his peers.
I think it’s better always to keep things simple; see what fundamental issue you struggle with and go address it. Look at the core of the problem. Find the valid and applicable information, then actually try to understand it by studying it and practicing it. Seek a reputable teacher/mentor if that is desired. Copy if it helps. Trace if we must. Doing so is not cheating if it’s done to learn. (Copying and using for final production, and then not giving acknowledgement however, is stealing, and horrible shame and bad karma should visit those who do so!)
In summary, remember what’s most important is the depth of one’s understanding. Real ability lies there. Learn to see, then learn to do. Afterall, it’s only our genuine ability that’s ever gonna give any of us any sense of security in a world so full of uncertainty.