Miki

Permanently tired. Always late to the party. Once in a blue moon I post some art here.

[twistedmiki]

Hmm, yes. Wait, no!

[saszor]

"Tutorial" on how to "draw" a blind OC.

My kofi

Boring tired disclaimer: Keep in mind that this is an introductory "drawing" "tutorial" and has some generalizations in it, so not every “X is Z” statement will be true for Actual People. Which happens to be true for everything in general. Links below so that you can research and do a nuance. Ones that were directly mentioned are bolded.

Writing a blind character 101 What to avoid etc Video on types of white canes Video on types of cane tips Some more explanation on white canes + tips + other stuff Guide animals Video on working with a guide dog But why are Magical White Eyes a problem Same as above Going blind from an accident Video on conformers World's most basic "what do you call someone with albinism" The blindfold thing. No people don't wear these. This mostly stupid trope of covering a blind character's eyes because lord forbid someone sees a disabled body part This just stupid trope of giving a blind character some bs superpower to "see" The echolocation thing that every other blind oc does for some reason Just give them a cane good lord if you want a character that can see perfectly then maybe don't make them blind Bonus: if your character has a bunch of scars or whatever else then congrats! You made a character with a facial difference. Which is also something you should research.

[twistedmiki]

Cat studies.

[capsyst]

In the 80’s as computer animation was on the rise one of the thorniest problems was “how do we get this thing we made on the computer… OFF the computer?” There were a lot of unique solutions, but the one I’m fascinated by most is Disney’s solution of using a plotter.

A plotter acted as sort of a 3D printer but for 2D images. There was a ball point pen that could move up and down, and the paper underneath could be moved in and out. Using CAD based programs you could plot points in 2D space and the plotter would draw the lines between them and even do geometric shapes!

When it came time to do The Great Mouse Detective, the animators at Disney wanted to do more dynamic shots for the climatic battle inside Big Ben. Drawing all those gears and cogs would be a nightmare for the animators, so they experimented with using 3D animation.

But this was still the early 80’s. There was no digital ink and paint program, no way to merge the 2D animated characters with the 3D animated backgrounds digitally. So how did they get the 3D animated backgrounds out of the computer?

By drawing each frame on the plotter.

Every frame was printed out on the plotter, and then xeroxed onto animation cels, and then hand painted like traditional 2D animation cels are.

But why the plotter? If they were gonna have to export every frame anyway, why not use a printer? Well… because printers back then just weren’t very good. A plotter uses points and physically draws the line between them, much like how vector graphics work. It yielded a much smoother and higher fidelity line than if they just printed them out.

This was still a massive undertaking, but it was probably the best solution to getting the dynamic camera moves they wanted out on paper. 2D animation was drawn over top and then both layers of animation cels were filmed frame by frame.

And that’s how you got dynamic shots like this in the mid 80’s! 3D animated backgrounds, printed with a plotter, xeroxed onto animation cels, hand painted, and then re-photographed with the 2D animation on top!

This technique would be the standard way Disney got their 3D animation out of the computer for their 2D films… right up until The Rescuers Down Under which was the first fully digital animated feature. That movie used PIXAR’s proprietary CAPS System (hey that name sounds familiar 😉) to combine everything digitally. But that’ll have to be a story for another time!

[radwolf76]

"drawing all those gears and cogs would be a nightmare for the animators"

Yeah, about that. Seven years prior, this was all drawn by hand:

[capsyst]

I had a feeling someone was gonna bring this up, and I debated talking about it in the original post. But I decided against that because as much as I absolutely adore Castle of Cagliostro the actual animation behind it in comparison to what Disney wanted to do with Great Mouse Detective is so vastly different I felt it would detract from the point of the post. But since where here now let’s get into it 😃

The key differences between the two are camera movement and shifting perspective. In Cagliostro the backgrounds remain static 2D, meaning the animators aren’t trying to redraw every frame with a moving shifting perspective. They aren’t doing the sweeping dynamic camera moves Disney wanted for Great Mouse Detective. That reduces a lot of the work load on Cagliostro because they only need to animate the gears on 3-4 frame loops per scene.

Disney wanted more dynamic movement, where the camera could sweep in and around the scene. That places a HUGE amount of work on the animators to ensure that everything is being drawn in perspective while it’s moving. I can’t even begin to think about how much work and effort would’ve had to go into this sequence if it was done entirely by hand. It would’ve been a nightmare!

Please don’t get me wrong. I absolutely LOVE Castle of Cagliostro. It’s an amazing movie, especially knowing its history and the crunch they were under to get it made in such a short time. But it’s not exactly a 1:1 skill check comparison. Cagliostro used the fact the camera wasn’t moving much to reduce the work load and relied heavily on looping animation.

But if you’re looking for a 1:1 comparison skill check I’ve got you covered!

See, the purpose of this post was to talk about how the computer was making it easier on animators by not making them have to draw every frame in perfect perspective. If you wanted a comparable skill check then I would instead suggest comparing the clock tower sequence in Great Mouse Detective to the airplanes in Porco Rosso.

Every single shot of the planes in that film was done by hand. Miyazaki famously refused to use CGI for the longest time on any of his films. If Porco Rosso had been animated by anyone else, those planes would’ve been CGI planes. So every shot, every dogfight, every moment of these planes flying around and turning slowly in perspective was done meticulously by hand, and it looks absolutely AMAZING! That’s a technical marvel in and of itself!

Oh and if you want more examples of animators being absolutely INSANE and doing everything by hand, I strongly recommend the works of Richard Williams. Not only was he instrumental in making Who Framed Roger Rabbit look so convincing, he’s also the insane artist who animated things like this:

You wanna talk insane skills? How about animating every single card in a deck of cards as they fly about the screen? The guy was a technical perfectionist!

I get wanting to compare the clock tower sequence from The Castle of Cagliostro to the Big Ben sequence in the Great Mouse Detective. Story wise they are doing very similar things: having the hero fight the villain on giant moving gears. But the execution of how that was achieved is so VASTLY different it’s really not fair comparing them at all on a technical level. And I hope me pointing that out doesn’t make anyone think I’m being dismissive of Cagliostro either.

[twistedmiki]

Huggies with the buddies.

[desultory-suggestions]

The Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund (PCRF) is still and always in need of donations. Whether you can offer a dollar or a hundred, please do what you can to fund the powerful and direct support the PCRF is offering during this horrific genocide. Continue to share these resources, and do not let yourself become used to the violence and terror that Palestinians are living through. The money donated to the PCRF will not only offer immediate support to families, but will continue to be used to rebuild and recover in the long term.

PCRF

The Palestine Children's Relief Fund was established in 1992 by concerned humanitarians in the USA to bring injured and sick children for fr

“Our "Gaza Relief and Recovery" campaign aims to address urgent humanitarian needs and support long-term recovery efforts in Gaza. The funds raised will primarily focus on immediate relief, including providing essential medical supplies, food, medical treatment, clean water, and other necessities for families affected by the conflict. Additionally, our campaign will support rebuilding healthcare facilities and providing long-term support through impactful programs and projects to support the needs of children and the health sector in Gaza. It will also allocate resources towards trauma counseling, mental health support, and other initiatives for children affected by the conflict, aiming to foster healing and resilience within the community.” (PCRF, 2024).

[twistedmiki]

Warm up animation. Based on Temmie Chang's concept art of Kris' battle intro.

[twistedmiki]

Little animation loop I did for Haelian - the "Hades" guy.

[psipaka]

Scoot ma scoot kit celebrate Spy leaving for baguette

[kosmicznacebula]

it's always a good day to complain about English speakers

[fthgurdy]

Important addition: Maria Skłodowska-Curie was born during partitions, which means Poland didn’t exist, which means her insistence that she was Polish was a significant act of defiance against the occupation, which means that you should respect that instead of arguing that ‘well she had French citizenship’. She couldn’t have Polish citizenship despite being Polish, that’s kinda the point she was making by keeping her maiden name and naming a chemical element she discovered ‘Polonium’ .

[morepopcornplease]

HOW TO PRONOUNCE: Skłodowska

L with a dash through it (ł) makes a “W” sound. and W makes a “V” sound.

skwo-DOV-ska

[thesaltofcarthage]

thank you for the pronunciation guide!

[twistedmiki]

Mulan's sacrifice

[twistedmiki]

Wishing upon a star ⚝

[twistedmiki]

Singing in the moonlight.

[twistedmiki]

✧.☆ ART COMMISSIONS *.✧

I’m open for commissions again! Full TOS as well as other additional information is available on my website https://twistedmiki.carrd.co/

You can e-mail me at

[email protected]

[twistedmiki]

Revenge.

[razzyberii]

👻 Crypton ghosts

- Razel

[twistedmiki]

I had a very eventful week to say the least so unfortunatelly I was unable to finish this piece but at least I got the line art and flat colours done so progress, yay!