Caricatures have direction as well

Hey, sorry about the late post.


I've found another example to explain this idealogy I had on this missing animation principle I call "Direction"

You see I read this book a while ago about caricatures by Alex Hughes called "Learn to Draw Caricatures" which I think is a decent start on caricatures.

I'm going to use a page I found as an example:


This is a good example of "Stretch" with no direction, as he explains in the book he's just stretching the face (Which explains that why just stretching the entire face isn't always the best soluation). Unfortunately a lot of cartoons nowadays have "Squash and Stretch" with no real purpose behind it (Without Direction), they're just relying the principles and formulas to animate.

These examples show that he isn't just stretching features, he's also holding some back as well. He's identifies which factors on the face need to do what, he's found the purpose his aiming for. Unfortunately he's final drawing is a little too focused on design gimmicks and things I guess he likes to add into his drawings out of habit (I'm a bit like that too).

Here's my pathetic attempt at it, originally I started just copying the form and general construction of the final drawing (Which is partly the reason why his head is leaning back).

I found that some of the features from the original were lost in the final (Maybe to force appeal into the drawing). I feel that drawings should never force focus appeal into them, I strongly believe that "Direction" or "Purpose" or "Clarity" or "Whatever you would like to call it" needs to be understood more then simply making the drawing look nice.

Appeal as a principle is some nasty joke of an idea of forcing something nature to work in a way that it shouldn't and that's why there is a lot of nice looking stuff out there nowadays but not a lot of it has a true driving force of what they are trying to accomplish or show.

Here is some of the factors I felt I did correctly with direction by understand what to push for. Please note I am not talking about exaggeration, exaggeration is the amount of direction you put into it.

Here's the factors I felt I missed in the drawing which I think makes it a successful example with both good points and bad points.