Artefact 4 Evaluation - Creating believable characters through the key principles of animation : Timing

My fourth artefact concentrated on timing. The aim of timing is critical when establishing a characters mood, emotion and reaction to a situation. Timing also gives meaning to a movement, as the speed of an action defines how well it will read to an audience. For this particular principle I decided to focus on creating an animation to show timing through a reaction. To do this, I created a scenario where a character is slowly walking backwards, as though he is trying to escape from something or be unobserved. The character then slowly goes to turn around as though the coast is clear, and then hits his head on a 'Mind your head' sign, who then falls flat on the ground. I originally presented this artefact with no movement to this sign once the character had bumped into it, almost as though it was acting as part of a wall. After receiving feedback on this, it was suggested that I could try animating the sign as though it is free hanging. I then developed this artefact so that the sign swung slightly as the character hit his head on it. However, at certain angles the sign looks as though it swings quite rapidly at some point, therefore not looking completely realistic and believable. However, the main focus of this artefact is the principle of timing and the character. Other feedback commented on how this principle was conveyed quite well, and that on one of the angles you could almost hear a 'bump' as the character hits the sign. I am quite pleased with this as I feel this achieves the purpose of the artefact. And for this reason, I also feel that even though the addition of the swinging sign doesn't take any focus away from the main animation, it possibly works better with the sign remaining static.