Some consider this to be the most important principle of animation out of the 12. By manipulating the shape of an object or feature during movement or contact (literal or thematic), you make a movement look less static and more elastic and engaging.

The logic of this technique is that any real-life object will be squashed about and compressed as it interacts with an external object or force; for example, if you throw a bouncy ball against the floor and view its bounce in slow motion, you will see a visible example of this effect. Obviously, in real life, this effect is quite subtle, but it can be exaggerated for the purpose of expressive cartoons.

This effect doesn't just have to be applied to the obvious things, like an animated ball bouncing or a character falling down a set of stairs in an exaggerated fashion; it can be applied to anything and everything and is especially fun when applied to a character's expressions and movements. A character who's surprised can be stretched so that their face and eyes are long, and then they are squashed down to shake their head in disbelief. A character pulling away from a stinky plate of food can be stretched away during the fast movement for dramatic effect.

When applied to more realistic animation, however, it's always important to remember that while real-life objects do squash and stretch to a certain extent, they also maintain a constant volume. In more exaggerated, unrealistic cartoons, it's okay to break the laws of physics a little (though even in the most exaggerated animation, keeping a vaguely constant volume is important); however, in more realistic-looking animations, such as 3D animation, it's best to keep this principle as subtle as possible.

Anticipation is what we get before any given movement—someone bending their knees before jumping, someone rolling back their fist in preparation for a punch, etc. It can be exaggerated for cartoony animations or used subtly for more realistic animations; however, no matter the type, anticipation is absolutely key in any animation.

Anticipation is, like the squash and stretch principle, all about making movements look organic and realistic. This might seem strange since anticipation is often greatly exaggerated and made to look unrealistic, but really, if one were to animate a movement with no anticipation whatsoever, it would look incredibly strange and fake. Think about someone jumping without first bending their legs, or someone cutting down a tree without first swinging their axe back. In the real world, it's not physically possible most of the time since building momentum before a grand action can help to put more force into it, and so by adding in an exaggerated amount of anticipation to your animation, you make the movement not only look more realistic but more purposeful and thought-out, both by the character and by the animator.

This technique doesn't just stop at actual physical movements, though that's what we tend to think of when someone mentions anticipation in animation; something as simple as a character turning their focus towards an object before picking it up (looking at it, turning their body towards it, reaching for it, etc.) is also a type of anticipation in itself. Furthermore, a lack of anticipation can have an impact on an animation. For example, a character suddenly turning and running away with no visible anticipation is often used in cartoons to indicate urgency or perhaps a sense of mischief and spontaneity.

This principle can be seen in every kind of animation, and a lot of the time it extends to things like plot anticipation and even live-action media since the concept of "anticipation" isn't limited to just animation. For example, the scene before the climax of a film is anticipation. However, in regards to animation, this technique is extremely important in making sure a character's movements are organic and realistic and in indicating to the audience that the character, or animator, has intention and purpose.

Staging in animation can mean many different things. Johnson and Thomas described it as simply "the presentation of any idea so that it is completely and unmistakably clear". This seems like quite a vague statement, but at its core, staging is all about drawing your audience to the most important part of the story and animation. Whether that be a character, an emotion, a movement, or a theme,

Like in theatre, staging can mean the actual physical layout of the screen and characters so that the most important movements and expressions are clear and eye-catching. If your animation included six different characters moving all at once in a similar direction, it's hard to pick out the main character, for example, and focus on their pained expression or their plot-important endeavour. It would be better to have this character at the centre of the animation, walking against the crowd, and to possibly pan in to their face to make it extra obvious which character the audience should be concentrating on. All of these techniques are used by animators to make it as obvious as possible where the audience should be looking.

Staging can also refer to the level of detail an animator puts into the different areas of the animation. Basically, the more detailed an asset is, the more likely the audience is to get distracted by it. This can be used as yet another tool to draw your audience to an important asset of an animation, but it can also be distracting and unnecessary when too much detail is applied to an unimportant part of the animation. For example, it's pointless having an incredibly intricate and detailed TV screen right in the middle of the frame when the audience is meant to be focused on the rat crawling on the top of the TV.

These are two different methods of animating. Essentially, straight ahead action refers to something that is animated as you go—drawing one frame, then the next, then the next. Pose-to-pose animation, on the other hand, utilises what you call "keyframing", where one draws the beginning frame, the end frame, and then fills in the ones in the middle.

Straight-forward animation is considered more free, spontaneous, and organic. If you want fluid, smooth movements, straight-ahead animation is the superior method. While this technique can be fun and more effective for action-based animation, it's essentially animating with a blindfold on, and by design, you don't have a clear idea of where your animation is going. Assets are prone to moving around the screen or changing size when using this technique.

Pose-to-pose animation, on the other hand, can be used more effectively for more regimented animations, in which you need to have a clear idea of where your assets are going to end up on screen. This is useful when you have multiple characters interacting with one another or when a character needs to interact with the setting. The drawback to using pose-to-pose animation is that movements can end up looking blocky or robotic, though this is sometimes considered the more technically correct method of animation.

A good animation will use an effective combination of both techniques; for example, many animators use straight ahead for blocking in the keyframes and then smooth the animation out with pose-to-pose. Also, different techniques work for different styles of animation, so mixing and matching depending on the context is never a bad idea.

These are two closely linked techniques that an animator uses to give the impression that their animation abides by the laws of physics. It gives the animation fluidity and makes all of the different parts look cohesive and real.

Follow-through is when an animator makes a free-moving asset that is attached to an object in motion, such as hair or loose skin, move a few frames after the main body of the animation has come to a standstill. For example, if a robot with an antenna moves its head down, the antenna will flop forward a little even after the head has stopped moving. When animating people, the centre of the animation is their torso and legs, with things likely to cause follow-through being hair, arms, or clothing. Overlapping action is when a free-moving asset, such as a tail or a dress, follows the main body at a slightly different rate, creating the illusion of drag. The secondary asset must be moving independently, though at the same time, as the primary asset in order for it to be considered "overlapping".

Like the majority of these techniques, follow-through and overlapping action can be used subtly to make an animation look more realistic or in excess to make it look exaggerated and cartoony. All animations have a certain amount of these techniques in order to look real, even for something as subtle as slight hair or clothing movement. But, for example, a character in a cartoon who is overweight and moving very fast might have an excess amount of follow-through in order to exaggerate their weight. Not only does this make the animation look more fun and dynamic, but if the character's weight is an important part of their character, then this could draw attention to it and make it more obvious.

This is yet another principle that is intended to make an animation look more real and organic. Slow in and slow out is the technique of drawing fewer frames in the middle of an action and more at the beginning and end, near the keyframes. Often, this technique is less about how many frames an animator draws and more about how these frames are distributed around the animation. Utilising slow in and slow out gives an otherwise robotic animation the illusion of speed, flow, and realisticness.

For example, if you had an animation of a dancer, you wouldn't want to draw one frame exactly for each unit of movement; number one, this would take a long time, and number two, it would look incredibly robotic and fake. If this were a real-life movement, it would actually take a huge amount of energy to move in this way, keeping a constant speed from the beginning of an action to the end, rather than using momentum and precision. What you would do instead is draw more frames as she picks her foot up from the ground, less as it's quickly moving through the air, and then more as it comes to a stop. This gives the animation fluidity and makes it look a lot more dynamic and precise. This also makes the viewer focus more on the extreme poses in an animation.

For more exaggerated cartoons, an animator might only draw one frame between keys in order to emulate extreme speed and urgency. For more realistic animations, or perhaps for 3D animations, this technique is still utilised, although much more subtly, and it's often not as noticeable due to these animations' higher framerates. Of course, this technique can and must be used for all moving assets in an animation, whether that be a person, an object, or even an element of the background or setting.

Nature does not follow straight lines; this is of course true of true movements as well. An object in fast motion, especially, does not follow a straight trajectory and instead follows implied natural "arcs". Animators must emulate this in order to make a fluid, organic-looking animation and to avoid any given movement appearing robotic.

If you were to throw a ball into the air, it would fall back to earth in an arc as Earth's gravity pulled it down slowly. Any object affected by gravity will also travel in predictable arcs. If an ice skater were going extremely fast and wanted to make a turn, they would need to make a larger sweeping arc in order to turn 90° than a skater that was going at, say, half their speed. As such, assets moving quickly tend to make larger and more obvious arcs than slow, more precise movements.

By utilising arcs, an animator ensures that their animation is not mechanical and linear and gives it a little more natural flow. Furthermore, the lack of arcs can emphasise a movement's erratic defiance of natural physics; sometimes, for more eccentric or unnatural characters, this can be exaggerated in order to make them seem more unnerving or "wrong". This is a subconscious distinction that many viewers will make without realising why or connecting it to the lack of arcs. Most people don't ever recognise that an animation utilises arcs until someone points it out, but if you know what to look for, you'll soon realise that they're present in almost every single movement in modern animation, no matter how small.

This principle is based on the little details in an animation and how they can enhance and tell a story very effectively. A secondary action is, as one might expect, an action that supports the "primary action", aka the main focus of an animation. If the primary action of animation is someone knocking on a door, the secondary actions might be the character's posture, other hand, or facial expression.

An animation's secondary action can give great insight into how the character feels or how the action is being performed. If an animation's primary action is a character picking up a phone, then the secondary actions can give the viewer an impression of how the character is feeling or what to expect from the story. If the character looks nonchalant, with hands by their sides, chances are they're just checking their notifications. If they're biting their nails, looking anxious, and tapping their foot, perhaps they're waiting for an important call, or maybe they're in trouble.

One very important thing to note about secondary actions is that they must never overshadow or distract from the primary action. If a character's anxiety is distracting from the fact that they've picked up their phone, which was supposed to be the focus of the scene, then perhaps it's best to tone down the secondary action or maybe further exaggerate the primary action. If a secondary action is a distraction or is likely to not be noticed at all, then a lot of the time it's not included at all. For example, in action-based scenes, secondary facial expressions are often not drawn in at all, or the expression is copied and pasted from one frame to another to save time. These secondary actions are not forgotten, however, but are simply made up for in the beginning and end frames of an animation.

This technique is purely grounded in reality and is less about making an animation look exaggerated and fun and more about simply making it look and move in a way that abides by the real-world laws of physics.

By using fewer frames in a shorter period of time, the animation appears faster; likewise, using more frames in the same period of time makes the animation look slower. Taking away from the fact that this is simple physics, effective use of timing can also give a motion more character and tell the viewer about how exactly a motion is being performed. Is it precise or erratic? Urgent or apathetic? This doesn't just have to be applied to big movements such as a person's walking speed or an object's weight; expressions, hand gestures, and other such secondary actions can all utilise this technique. If someone makes a shocked face very quickly, it's likely they are being shocked by a sudden event. If they were to go from a neutral facial expression to being very shocked, starting off very slowly before increasing in speed, then perhaps they are watching a shocking event unravel slowly before their eyes. Things like that can be heavily impacted by speed, pacing, and blocking. This principle can be combined with previously mentioned principles such as slow-in and slow-out, or anticipation, for maximum impact.

Timing in modern animation is often utilised for comedic purposes. This can be extremely effective, especially when combined with sound effects (since the ear is better at picking up subtle timing effects than the eye). You might see this a lot in older cartoons, which quickly became very good at comedic timing. A lot of the time, as many as three frames can make a joke land better, and exaggerating or defying the expected laws of physics can make an animation a whole lot funnier.

This is, for a lot of people, a staple of the older Disney or Loony Toons' style of animation. The famous Tom and Jerry scream, with eyes popping out and limbs extending to ridiculous lengths These techniques define the cartoon era of animation and were somewhat lost when 3D and realistic animation became more popular; however, this principle is now completely ignored in modern animation.

Contrary to what you might think, exaggeration is not always about defying the laws of reality but rather about amplifying important or comedic aspects of a character or movement in order to make them more obvious or funny. In real life, children and young animals have slightly bigger eyes and heads than adults, so in a cartoon, making a character's eyes unnaturally big and giving them a bobble head will make them look young and innocent (think of chibi caricatures or Betty Boop). If a character is old and decrepit, giving them an unrealistically exaggerated hunch makes this more obvious and draws the viewer's attention to this character trait. Traditionally, large bowties and shoes are funny and add that extra bit of character to a design. In more realistic animation, this could be something as simple as a character making an unnaturally expressive facial expression or using an unnaturally bright colour. Of course, exaggeration in animation itself is often used to emphasise that something ridiculous is happening.

Take the animated gif to the left, for example (made by IdeaRocket). The deer turns into a mini-tornado in order to amplify the idea that it is destructive. Of course, this in no way abides by the real-world laws of physics, as anyone will tell you that animals cannot turn into tornadoes without great difficulty. However, the use of exaggeration makes it funnier and gets the animator's point across much easier.

Storyboarding is, of course, a planning strategy used in all kinds of different media, from filmmaking to advertising to, of course, animation. Storyboarding is a simple way to plan out your animation before you even start sketching it. It is a way of visualising, structuring, and organising a scene or set of scenes to initialise it and add basic visuals to the writers' scripts. There are whole teams of people in any given animation department dedicated to this stage of production, and it takes an immense amount of creativity and flexibility in order to begin turning the director's and writer's vision into reality.

Some important things to keep in mind when storyboarding an animation are things such as playing with angles (using filmography techniques when considering close-up vs. wide shots), character expressions, character mindsets, and overall just having a general feel for the scene and characters. Remember, the storyboard is not a direct reference for the animators; they will not be following it shot for shot; they will be using it as a rough guide for how the facial expressions and movements flow together and would sync with the dialogue and audio. A really good example of this in action is Frozen 2's "Into the Unknown"; there is a video online comparing the original storyboard to the final cinematic version (as referenced in my bibliography). You can really see how the animators have taken the essence of the storyboards and used them as a guide for the composition and mindset of the character.