Greetings from Rokugan! Today we're sitting down for a talk with Atle, who's an animator on Shadowveil: Legend of the Five Rings.
Would you like to introduce yourself?
My name is Atle Fägersten and I am the animator at Palindrome Interactive. I was one of the founders of Palindrome Interactive back in 2015 and has since then had a bunch of different roles from generalist to producer but for Shadowveil: Legend of The Five Rings I am fully focused on animation!
Can you share your initial inspiration for these specific animations?
Our style was inspired by different “limited animation” styles. Limited animation is often used in anime to reduce the cost of animation but in our case it is more used to create impactful movements and add the jarring feeling of the Shadowlands to our animations.
What references or real-life movements influenced the style and feel of the animations?
Lots of references from traditional martial arts were used as inspirations for many of the animations. But with our style and camera angle, those traditional movements often needed to be exaggerated in order to be interesting.
On the more technical side of things, which animation software or tools did you use to create these sequences? How do you decide on keyframes, timing, transitions and such, to achieve this type of movement?
The two biggest parts in achieving this look is:
Stepped interpolation: Normally when animating in 3D your software will interpolate between keyframes to create smooth motions. For this style we go instantly from one pose to the next.
No in-between poses: Traditionally when doing big movements you will add poses between the two extremes to create a movement that flows well and is readable. For this style we go directly from one extreme to the other (sometimes making an exception and having one in-between pose for 1 frame).
What was the most challenging aspect of creating these animations (and how did you overcome it)?
It is quite a different style to work with as you need to find the right balance between the time between poses and change from pose to pose. Too short of time between not enough movement and you start to lose that stepped feel. Too much time between too large of a movement and it becomes impossible to follow. Through trial and error I was able to figure out some base guidelines for what would work.
Were there any particular character traits or design constraints that made the animation process more complex?
I don’t want to spoil too much but working on characters of different scales, especially bigger characters, added an extra level of complexity as they move at different speeds.
Thank you, Atle, for sharing!
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