Motion and time

Member lesson

Timing and spacing

Lesson 2 of 10 in Motion and time.

Animation basics: The art of timing and spacing - TED-Ed · TED-Ed
Lesson

Two separate quantities get confused constantly. Timing is how long something takes. Spacing is where it is at each moment in between, and spacing is where nearly all of the perceived character lives. Two moves of exactly the same duration, one with evenly distributed positions and one with the positions crowded at each end, do not read as the same move at a different quality. They read as a machine and as a thing with mass.

even spacing · no weighteased · the object has masssame duration, same distance
The same distance covered with even spacing and with eased spacing.
Several overlapping copies of a child on a swing along one arc, close together at the high ends and far apart at the bottom, with a parent watching.
A child on a swing drawn at equal moments along its arc. The copies crowd together where it slows and spread apart where it speeds up, which is what animators call spacing.
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  1. Question 1, locked

    What is the difference between timing and spacing?

    • Timing is how long it takes, spacing is how the movement is distributed inside that time
    • Timing is for interfaces, spacing is for film
    • They are two names for the same thing
  2. Question 2, locked

    Which of these words means this? “How long a move takes. Measured in frames or milliseconds.”

    • Sound off
    • Timing
    • Diegetic sound
    • Sync point
  3. Question 3, locked

    Which of these words means this? “How the distance is distributed across that time. This is what the eye reads as weight.”

    • Spacing
    • Follow through
    • Staging
    • Anticipation

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