Body Language Research

Body language is very important to a 3D character. Facial animation alone will not be able to convey an emotion adequately. Body movement should be realistic for movement, but also support the intended emotion of the character.

In Disney Pixar's animated short 'Presto', the body langauge of the Magician is pompous at times and angry at others.


In this image, you can clearly see that the Magician is angry. However, when you stop looking at the face and just at the body. You can see the Magician is experiencing extreme pain which supports the look of shock and anger.


In this image I have drawn a basic representation of the skeleton of the Magician. You can see that the biped position would be quite easy to achieve. How the biped moves to that position is another story. When animating, the movement should be as smooth and appropriate to the situation as possible.