Drawn to Life: 20 Golden Years of Disney Master Classes Volume 1

41 Pose and Mood Plus Timing and Phrasing and Texture

Poses in a scene accomplish more than just the mood or dramatics: they also create extremes. Animating a scene by extremes (as opposed to animating straight ahead) makes it easier to time the action by use of timing charts. These charts are put on each extreme, making it possible for the follow-up crew to complete the breakdowns and inbetweens according to the animator’s concept. The timing charts are also a record of how the scene was animated, so if any timing changes are necessary they can be made by merely adjusting the charts and then new drawings are made accordingly.

Don Graham in his chapter on reality (from the unpublished Art of Animation) called the extreme “a story-telling drawing,” ...