My book, How to Draw Animation, has found its way into many animation classrooms. So I was delighted when the people at Animation World, a Website I frequent, asked me if they could reproduce some of the art from the book. My aim in creating the book was to marry art instruction with appealing characters. Appealing characters lie at the heart of animation; and it always struck me that unless you create great characters, it's pointless to put so much energy into making them move. If you are interested in learning more about character design (both cartoony and semi-realistic types), as well as in creating fluid, convincing motion based on fundamentals and more advanced techniques, then give these pages a look. Although the examples given are of 2D animation, the same principles may carry over to 3D.

Last month we covered "Pushing an Expression," this month we continue with how to add the correct facial wrinkles to these exaggerated expressions.

Getting Facial Wrinkles Right
Wrinkles in the face are caused by the regular flexing of facial muscles. When people make expressions, they're flexing their facial muscles. Think of expressions as muscles thrusting in a direction, and think of the wrinkles as the reaction to those forces.

All drawings are © Christopher Hart; drawn by Christopher Hart.

When the mouth widens into a smile, it pushes the crease lines around the cheeks out, the same way this finger stretches this line. The points where the force of the mouth meets the cheek will show the most reaction.

The face has many muscles. A down-turned mouth is caused by the muscles below the lower lip and in the chin.