How do you animate?

I just got a FB question from a young student that asked: "I was wondering if by any chance you could tell me how you animate and the mental process you go through when trying to make a character believable?"

Really, this is a hard question to answer.  It involves very individual "thought process" answers, not just what tools do you use.  I gave the answer a thought or two below.  I thought I'd share it with you all since I have gotten similar questions here on DA.  Let me know if this was helpful at all.  Lots of misspellings, bad sentences, I didn't edit it.  Sorry.



Here's my thoughts concerning my (animation) process:

First off, I have to think about the scene for awhile.  If I don't, I end up with animated spaghetti.  It moves, but it doesn't have any thought as to WHY its moving.  There comes a point in your progression in animation where you jump from just moving things around to making them seem alive.  I believe that jump happens when you mature as an artist and go beyond concentrating on how to draw a character and think more about the emotions/reasoning behind the character.  So, at that point, its important to think, THEN thumbnail.  I started seriously thumbnailing every scene on Lion King.  It was hard (I was impatient and wanted to jump into animating, making it move around), but after a few tries at it, and a few successes) I started really "getting" why it was important.  Animation isn't improve.  When I was first starting out, I thought it was.  It's not, it is carefully researched, thought out acting.  That doesn't sound fun at first, but it pays off in the end.  Famous Disney animator, Mark Henn, was my mentor when I was first starting out and he would ask me questions about my animation (you know, like, "Why is he doing that?  Is that a nervous smile or a sly smile?").  If I didn't know the answers to those questions, it was obvious to him that I really hadn't thought out what I was doing.  And if you don't, then what you just created is animated spaghetti!  My next book (that I'm working on now) will be going into a lot of this; the artist's thought process.  It's really the most important part of what we do.  And you know what?  There are no other steps to my process.  I know that doesn't make sense, but its true- because from that point on, how you animate, create an illustration, or draw a comic book is about drawing and your ability to do it or not do it.  So often, young artists ask "what pencil do you use" or "did you get that technique digitally or traditionally?"  Those questions only tell me one thing: that person isn't working hard enough.  You don't ask those questions, you find them out for yourself!  Practice, Practice, Practice.  There are no short cuts, its all hard work.  If you love it, though, the time will go by like it was nothing.  Good luck!  - Tom B.