… for Visual Effects

Tip #509: How to Create Line Boil Animation

Larry Jordan – LarryJordan.com

Line Boil used to be considered a mistake. Now, it’s a way to add life to animation.

The PremiumBeat folks posted a YouTube video illustrating how to create a line boil animation.

“Line boil” animation is where lines in an animated figure shiver, or “boil,”” as though every frame was drawn by hand. It gives life and energy to a line drawing by emphasizing rough edges.

Here are the steps:

• Using any drawing tool you prefer, create an original image. Line drawings of geometric shapes work best.
• Trace the original image by hand, or mouse, create 4 or 5 new images – either as layers or separate images, depending upon the software you are using.

NOTE: It is important that these different iterations not look the same. It’s the variations between them that adds life to the animation.

• Loop playback of these frames and watch your simple line drawing come to life.

EXTRA CREDIT

Watch the video linked above to see an illustration of this technique.