1. What is Animation?
'To animate' literally means to give life to. Animating is moving something that cannot move on it's own. Animation adds to graphics the dimensions of time, which tremendously increase the potential of transmitting the desired information. In order to animate something the animator has to be able to specify directly or indirectly how the 'thing' has to move through time and space.

2. The Heritage of Animation
The concept of animation has been a focus of study and research for a long time.
Winsor McCay is considered by many to have produced the first popular animation. He drew images each one slightly different from the other.

3. Traditional Methods:
Traditionally most of the animation was done by hand. All the frames in an animation had to be drawn by hand. Since each second of animation requires 24 frames (film), the amount of work required to create even the shortest of movies, can be tremendous.

4. Types of Traditional Methods:
Key frames
Cel animation
Rotascoping

5. Computer Animation
There are two main categories of computer animation: computer-assisted animation and computer generated animation.

6. Animation Production So we have the following hierarchy:
presentation->act->scene->shot->frame

7. Principles of Animation:
Squash and Stretch
Adding exaggeration to an object in motion gives it a greater sense of weight and volume. This principle is often demonstrated with a bouncing ball: the ball appears stretched when it is falling and  squashed when it hits the ground. By squashing and stretching the ball, an animator gives a more realistic feel.

8. Staging
Influenced by theatrical principles, staging helps establish mood, create focus and clarify what is happening in the scene.

9. Straight Ahead Action & Pose to Pose
Straight ahead action refers to the technique of drawing each pose, one right after another, which can yield a fluid animation style. Pose to pose refers to the animation technique in which key frames are planned ahead of each other and then connected to afterward. Pose to pose usually leads to a more proportional animation that is convincing to the eye.

10. Slow In and Slow Out
In the physical world, objects and humans need to pick up momentum before they can reach full speed. Similarly, it takes time to decrease speed before something can come to a complete stop.

11. Arc
When someone shoots an arrow, it rarely flies completely straight. Gravity causes objects in motion to arc between the start and end points. Even many of the natural movements in the human body move on arcs, such as the arm, hand, fingers, etc.

12. Secondary Action
In the physical world, we can observe primary movement in the motion of a person walking or a bird flying. Secondary actions, such as a person swinging their arms as they walk or a birds’ feathers rippling in the wind, help support primary movements. Even smaller actions, such as blinking, are also considered secondary actions. In any secondary animation, it is important that it doesn’t detract from or dominate the main animation movement.

13. Timing
In a true animation, timing is an essential aspect of the way frames are drawn. Timing also helps in establishing personality of characters and the emotions they express.

14. Solid drawing
Solid drawing takes an enhanced level of realism to the skill of drawing, adding good form and a three-dimensional feel to an animated work. No matter what tool (pencil or computer) is being used to create the drawing, it must work in three-dimensional space.

15. Appeal
A character with appeal isn’t always attractive. He or she can be an ugly or evil character with a certain level of charisma that is makes sense within the story. In motion design, appeal can be established before anything moves by choosing an interesting typeface, creating a visual translation,

16. Keyframing
Keyframe systems take their name from the traditional hierarchical production system first developed by Walt Disney
Skilled animators would design or choreograph a particular sequence by drawing frames that established the animation - the so-called keyframes
The production of the complete sequence was then passed on to less skilled artists who used the keyframes to produce ‘in-between’ frames

17. Keyframing
The emulation of this system by the computer, whereby interpolation replaces the inbetween artist, was one of the first computer animation tools to be developed.
This technique was quickly generalized to allow for the interpolation of any parameter affecting the motion
Care must be taken when parameterizing the system, since interpolating naive, semantically inappropriate parameters can yield inferior motion