“Chloe” |
The purpose of the expression sheets was to help the modelling department create blend shapes for the character rigs, showing a range of expressions and moods, which could then be captured in the animation. This was my third “talking animals” live action movie, following Racing Stripes and Underdog.
“Papi” |
Dog noses are very expressive too. Dogs have a keen sense of smell, and their noses are constantly at work, sniffing out their surroundings.
“Delta” |
At Cinesite we did over 600 talking dog shots. Our pipeline got very efficient (as you might imagine), with each animator getting very good at animal lipsync.
Lipsync & Dialogue Resources
Racoon Dialogue Short – Animated by Mark Masters |
We have many resources on animating dialogue and lipsync at Animation Apprentice. To find out more, follow the links below:
Lipsync – General Principles
- Why Animators Should Hold “M”s “B”s and “P”s for two frames
- Why Lipsync Should be “Two Frames Ahead”
- Why Lipsync Needs Wide and Narrow Mouth Shapes
- The Secret to Animating Dialogue and Lipsync
- Speed Lipsync – How to Animate Dialogue Fast
- Why Animators Should Open Wide on the Big Vowels
- Animating Lipsync – Why Animators Should Avoid Famous Lines of Dialogue
- How to Block Out and Animate a Dialogue Shot
- Why Animators (Usually) Leave Lipsync Until Last
- Lipsync Resource – The Sesame St Sound Archive
- Why Animators Need to “Hit The Accent”
- Why Animators Need “Head Muppeting”