Friday 3rd May

I’ve added the first full faces, to Dad for the first sequence of him talking. My solution for the eyes was to draw them like this:

That way I’ve got enough information from the line at the top and the pupil to create expressions, without having to worry as much about keeping the shape consistent, because I don’t have the bottom line to worry about as well.

I also decided to add eyebrows which was really helpful for the expressions as well. I animated these mostly straight ahead and through trial and error, just moving them up and down and at different angles until I felt like the expression was right. The only time I really changed the shape of the eyes was on the “worse” expression, where I’ve got him widening his eyes like this:

But I think I should do something similar for the earlier part where his eyebrows are the most raised, as the raised eyebrow goes quite quickly and could definitely be emphasised more.

I also added a couple of blinks, which you can’t really see when watching it, but as well as being realistic, it sort of provides a transition between different eye expressions. For example, he blinks right before the wide-eyed frame above, which emphasises that expression more. I imagine it would also be more obvious if they weren’t there, and his eyes were constantly open all the time.