This has been my favourite exercise by far. As soon as I had settled on my video I had a very complete image of what I wanted the animation to look like.
I started by plotting out my thumbnails and when action would happen against the timing of the audio. Based on how I worked on the other lip-sync I drew out and experimented with different mouth options, making a particular choice to only create shapes that were needed and not over complicate the lip-sync. I tried to keep aware of similar sounding/shaped syllables that could reuse existing mouth shapes and how I could make small adjustments that kept the lip-sync fluid and wouldn’t overcrowd it. I also trialed some different design options before settling on a classic cartoon ‘bean’ mouth.
The next step was to roughly timeout the thumbnails and create a lip sync test (below). I found this a much quicker process compared to my first lip-sync exercise and I think using restraint in terms of the mouth shape was a big contributor to this.
After this I worked on fleshing out the movement and adding the mouth shape to the design. I found this far easier that the first lip-sync, partially down to having it done it once already but also due to this being a simpler and more stylised design with less complex movement in the head and face.
My first pass of the full animation came out relatively well. The main feedback was that there was too much stillness in the body in the beginning and end compared to when she pulls down on her face.
Christina suggested initially, to readjust the timing of the audio in comparison to the movement so that the final line “I love halloween” would happen earlier, allowing for a more dynamic performance. I then reworked the body and facial expressions during “look it, look it” to make more extreme poses, added more performance into her hair and a final image that punctuated the ending.