How Psychophysical Perception of Motion and Image relates to Animation Practice

Abstract

This paper investigates the difference between seeing and perceiving in animation. It analyses character design in the light of experiments in face recognition, in particular how iconic a character can be in design. It discusses whether a universal theory can be applied and if caricatures are really 'super-portraits' that echo how brains recall faces. The psychophysical perception of motion in animation is analysed in the light of animation principles such as 'squash and stretch' and 'isolation'. Using made and found examples, the paper looks at how signature movement and animation principles are now being supplemented or even supplanted by motion capture and posits what this means for animation in the future. The paper maps popular animation characters within two specially designed triangular charts for image and for motion. It analyses the resulting images in terms of perceived and received information, looking particularly at the region of empathic connection coined by Dr Masahiro Mori as the 'Uncanny Valley'. [1] By examining the different empathic demands motion capture makes on an audience it reaches the conclusion that both image and motion must be treated symbiotically for full analysis to be achieved.