LECTURE 9
THE USES OF ANIMATION IN
MULTIMEDIA
1
Objective
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What is an animation?
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Animation categories
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Animation Special Effects
2
Animation
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Such animation is made from a series of stills and
relies on something called persistence of vision.
Persistence of vision is the phenomenon were an
object on the eye’s retina remains for a brief time
after viewing.
This means that a series of still images which vary
slightly, if shown rapidly will give the illusion of
movement.
3
Animation
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If each of the eight pictures below were shown at the
same point in rapid succession, the result would be a
rotating arrow.
The pictures shown below are stills of the rotating
Ford logo from the Ford Motor Company site.
4
Animation
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TV gives the illusion of continuous movement by
showing the stills at the rate of 30 frames per second.
Feature films are filmed at a rate of 24 frames per
second but shown at a rate of 48 frames per second.
Today, most animation is performed by computer.
Examples are Bugs, Toy Story, Jurassic Park and the
BBCs Walking with Dinosaurs.
The computer will produce a wire frame of the scene,
then apply textures and light effects before moving onto
the production of the next frame, each of which may take
hours or even days to produce.
5
Animation Categories

Two categories :

Traditional Animation
All frame in an animation had to be drawn by hand
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Computer Graphics Animation
The use of computers to create animations.
6
Traditional Animation
Different techniques for creating animation by hand:
 Key frames
 Cell Animation
 Rotascoping
7
Computer Graphics Animation
Two types of Computer Graphics:
 Linear animation or 2D animation
 Page flipping
 Cell Animation
 Object Animation or Path Animation
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3D animation
 Modelling
 Animating
 Rendering
8
Animation Special Effects : Morphing
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Morphing is the effect in which one image transforms
into another through a series of intermediate frames.
This is done by first creating or scanning the first and
last images.
Then key points are specified, i.e. points on the
original image which should become points on the
final image.
The computer then produces the frames in between,
with each successive frame becoming progressively
more morphed into the last image.
9
Morphing
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The creator can usually specify the number of
intermediate frames to be produced as well the the
number of key points.
Both the number of the key points and number of
frames will impact on the time taken to produce the
sequence of frames.
The diagrams on the next page show start and end
frames and the intermediate frames produced by
morphing software.
10
Morphing
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Morphing software:
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Photo Morph,
Hijact Morph
Elastic Reality
11
Animation Special Effects : Warping
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Special effect that allows you to manipulate a single
image.
Example:
 You could stretch a facial feature to change a
frown into a smile.
 Warping software : Kai Super Goo
12
Advantages and Disadvantages
of using Animation
Animation captures the imagination like no other tool,
portraying actions and spatial relationships that are not
readily visible in reality or that may not exist at all.
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Advantages
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Attracts and holds attention
Show otherwise invisible actions or physical processes
Increases retention
Allows visualization of imagined concepts, objects and
relationships
13
Advantages and Disadvantages
of using Animation
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Disadvantages
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Requires extensive memory and storage space
Requires special equipment for a quality presentation
Cannot depict actuality like video or photography
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