Organizing BG layout elements

Rob Richards has made a great blog where he restores old animation BGs. This makes it very handy for me to study them and pass on some observations to you.

http://animationbackgrounds.blogspot.com/

ORGANIZING ALL THE ELEMENTS INTO A WHOLE VISUAL STATEMENT

Composition and Hierarchy of forms are 2 major fundamental tools of good artists. You can have a million different styles, but the best artists use the same fundamental skills of organizing the elements within their drawings to show them off.


Big picture first, then working their way down through the levels with each level relating to the larger form that it is part of.

USING NEGATIVE SHAPES AND FRAMING ELEMENTS TO DRAW YOUR EYE TO THE FOCAL POINT

HIERARCHY: FORMS WITHIN FORMS

This title card has a masterful use of hierarchical organization. From the overall framing of the trees around the title lettering, all the way down to the smallest level of individual leaves that radiate froM the branches and fill the washy clumps behind them. Each of those clumps flows naturally next to the other clumps and al fit together into an overall shape of foliage.

The perspective of the round bushes leads us deep into the distant horizon and keep the image from being too flat and graphic.


Each bush fits within an organized group of bushes and is also divided into sub forms and on down into the suggestion of leaves that flow around the forms.

The fungi group also has an overall form, while trees all have similar organizations and directions.

ORGANIZING CONTRASTS

The fence is wide, contrasting against the skinny poles.

The areas of sky are different widths.

The houses are low, to contrast against the high fence.

The textures of the trees are detailed, while the geometric shapes of the houses, fence, street are flatter.

Big heavy tree next to a skinny frail tree. Lots of space between them to make it easy for us to see the contrast.

The plank is basically a man made geometric shape. This contrasts against the wheat grass which is organized into its own overall flowing form with obedient subdivisions of grass and wheat, but is more organic than the board. The cans are also man made geometric shapes-but round stubby ones to contrast against the long flat rectangular board.

GROUPING DIFFERENT TYPES OF FORMS

Each group of forms has its own types of shapes and direction. No anarchy here. It's all arranged to give a group of waterfowl a direction to swim off into the distance.

ORGANIZING NATURE'S CLUTTER

Drawing a thick forest can easily add up to hard-to-read anarchy, but with organizational skills and hierarchies and patterns you can create quite pleasing and functional scenes that help support the characters with a rich environment and atmosphere.

A chaotic thick forest would distract from the characters, confuse the eye and defeat the purpose of being a background.

STYLIZED, YET ORGANIZED

This 50s WB style is what many studios misinterpret today as "wonkiness" - no rules. Some modern layout artists see a license for anarchy in these stylized images. I see very slightly distorted perspectives and stylistic interpretations of reality, but with still great planning and organization of all the graphic elements into a quickly readable statement that has a purpose in the scene and story.

Each element does not follow its own physics ; it is subservient to the overall composition. Every detail follows and helps define the larger object it is part of.

(unlike wonkiness where every element exists in its own universe, unrelated to anything else in the picture)

BTW, I was out of town for a few days, so have not yet had a chance to check all the comments and links about storyboarding for the George Liquor Show. I will in the next couple days. Thanks!