L.O. 2: Making Space for the action to take place in

SPACE is an extremely important tool in drawing and composition. Too many of us don't anticipate the need for room. Space helps us see objects. If everything is crammed together, it makes it hard to see what's going on. The smaller you draw (like storyboard artists sometimes have to), the more likely you will cram everything together. It's hard to get any detail into tiny characters.

A layout artist must make more room, not only for aesthetic reasons, but to give the animator room to move the characters around in the scene. If everyone is already so close that they are almost touching, there is no place left to move. Imagine your whole family stuffed in a closet trying to yell at each other. You couldn't wave your arms or throw pointy things like you'd need to.
Making space is partly creative and partly functional.


All through my storyboard Donald Bastard keeps changing sizes. Sometimes he is smaller than the boys, as he should be, being a fowl, and sometimes he is as big as them. So as a layout artist, I'm going to correct that the best I can.
SEE DONALD HOP THROUGH THE MAGIC OF CHEESY TECHNOLOGY

still more to come...