Realistic Animation vs Natural Animation

This tutorial primarily applies to character animation....

So what do I mean by realistic animation vs natural animation?

A lot of novice animators come across a simple problem and turn it into a huge waste of time. The problem is that the novice animator is trying so hard to make his animation look real. They'll send countless hours trying to make their character move like a real person. The novice animator will look at other animation and try to figure out why those move so real.

The reality is that animation is not supposed to move real or realistically. But rather, the are supposed to move naturally. Naturally means that characters from every genre and medium are designed in different ways and styles. Each character has their own "anatomy". Therefore, their bodies will behave and move uniquely.

Example:

The Disney-Pixar movie CARS, everyone believed and accepted each character as an individual. They were able to act and carry a story. But, not one of the characters ever moved realistically. After all, real cars do not talk, crack jokes, or fall in love. Real cars have no personality, no emotions, they do not have faces! Cars a soulless machines meant to transport us from point A to point B. So the animators had to study and experiment with animation on ways to make the cars feel like they are naturally behaving as cars would if they could talk, crack jokes and fall in love.

If the character is an anthropomorphic bear who plays soccer. Then the bear should be animated to those specifications. In order to achieve the natural animation for this character, you need to do some research. Ask yourself question and research the answers. It should be something like this:

1) How do soccer players run and play?

2) What type of soccer player is he? Is he bad, good or great?

3) What position does he play?

4) How long has he played soccer?

5) Is he a team player or is he a ball hog?

6) How heavy is he?

7) What type of bear is he?

8) Where is his center of gravity?

9) How would his anatomy be?

10) Is he always on two feet or occasionally?

Another example:

Disney's Lady and the Tramp, a classic film. The following scene is the most famous in the film in any film really. Here we can clearly see how the animators asked themselves questions similar to those above. They researched how dogs move and behave. They experimented on how to incorporate human emotions onto dog faces. And as you can see, dogs move in and out from human characters to dog characters so smoothly it feel and is natural. Here is the clip:

So when you animate, do not try to make it animate the characters like a realistic person. But, animate them to move naturally to what their character design, anatomy, and personality allows them to move. If you want something realistic... film it! But don't use motion capture! That is evil!