Choose one primary pull
Give the body a clear internal direction: toward a person, away from a sound, down into a secret, up to an idea. A rig becomes easier to pose when its centre has a reason to lean.
ACT 01 Maker-room field guide
Give a character a reason to move.
A practical set of notes for shaping animated puppets: readable poses, dependable controls, elastic timing and scenes that leave room for a performer’s choice.
OBSERVERIGTESTREVISE
Start with the puppet logic
HOLD THE LINELET THE JOINTS SPEAKKEEP A WAY BACKHOLD THE LINE
ACT 02 Before the joints
A puppet is a chain of decisions.
The first useful question is not “What can this control do?” It is “What does this character protect, pursue or postpone?”
Name the pressure point
Locate the area that resists change: a proud chest, a guarded shoulder, a planted heel, a fixed gaze. This pressure point lets a pose feel intentional rather than merely asymmetrical.
Plan the recovery
Every stretch, tilt and reach needs a credible route back. Leave a return pose in the scene, then allow the character to arrive there late, early or slightly wrong as the moment demands.
ACT 03 Pose lab
Three ways to make a silhouette answer.
Swap the same puppet through contrasting movement instructions. The tabs reveal different rig priorities rather than “correct” poses.
WEIGHT / DEFAULT
Let the floor make the opening statement.
Set the hips over the supporting foot first. The ribs can disagree later. A reliable weight pose tells us which limb is available, where friction lives and how much stillness the next action can carry.
- Plant one foot before shifting the chest.
- Show the load in the ankle and knee.
- Save the head adjustment for the end.
GLANCE / DELAY
Move the thought before the head.
A glance is often more useful when the eye line or face target changes before the neck commits. Keep the torso doing its previous job, then let the head arrive as a small confession of attention.
- Separate eye aim from head rotation.
- Keep the shoulders on their earlier task.
- Use a tiny settle rather than a full nod.
RECOIL / CONSEQUENCE
Let impact travel through the hierarchy.
A recoil does not have to be large. The key is a legible order: contact, resistance, transmission and a choice about recovery. Give the torso a fraction longer than the hand and the result gains an aftertaste.
- Place contact on a decisive frame.
- Offset hand, arm and chest reactions.
- Stop the recoil before it turns into a loop.
ACT 04 Rig room
Build handles for the questions that recur.
A rig is a negotiation surface. Make routine decisions easy, visible and reversible; reserve complexity for work that truly needs it.
Separate aim from shape
Eye direction, eyelid design and face volume often want different timing. Independent controls keep a watchful face from becoming a busy face.
Expose a clean silhouette pass
Keep primary limb and body controls readable at a distance. Secondary detail can live closer, but a quick posing pass should not require hunting through a forest of helpers.
Make reset a deliberate act
Neutral is not failure. Save a known, inspectable rest state and make it possible to return there without erasing the useful evidence of what happened.
01 / LABEL THE AXIS02 / TEST EXTREMES03 / CHECK MIRRORS04 / LEAVE BREATHING ROOM
ACT 05 Small principles, tall consequences
Look at the puppet from three distances.
NEAR
Joint stories
Does each bend explain where force meets resistance?
MID
Silhouette stories
Can the pose be recognised before its detail is read?
FAR
Scene stories
Does the character alter the room by entering it?ACT 06 Timing ledger
Timing is the shape of attention.
AnticipationInvite the viewer to notice a coming choice. It may be a breath, a pause or a hand that stops just short.
ActionUse the fewest frames that preserve the intended force. Fast action can still have a clear path.
SettleAllow one small correction after arrival. It makes the stop feel found rather than imposed.
HoldKeep a held pose alive by maintaining its pressure point, not by adding nervous motion everywhere.
ACT 07 Desk-side check
Run a local pass before you call it finished.
This list stays in this browser only. Tick the checks that help your current scene, watch the count, and clear it when you begin another pass.
0 of 6 checked
ACT 08 Observation pocket
Borrow from people; do not copy their surface.
When observing movement, note the sequence of commitments: a foot finds the floor, a shoulder decides whether to follow, eyes check the consequence. These relationships travel well into stylised characters because they describe attention and load, not a particular person’s appearance.
“Keep a note of what changes first, and what refuses to change.”
ACT 09 Handoff board
Make the next reader’s first five minutes useful.
State the scene question
One sentence about what the character is deciding gives a reviewer a way to read the choices.
Flag non-obvious controls
Name special spaces, switch points and expected ranges directly where they will be found.
Show the neutral
Include a still reference for the default pose, especially if the model has intentional asymmetry.
Describe known limits
Notes about stretching, collision or intended cheat angles let the next person use the rig with care.
ACT 10 Questions at the workbench
Useful answers, not rules carved in stone.
Open a question when it is the one you need; the accordion is powered locally by Bootstrap.
Decide it before you invest in fingers, face shapes or corrective detail, but treat it as a proposition rather than a prison. A line of action helps a character take up space with purpose. During a shot it may bend, break or be replaced as long as the revised line explains a new thought, load or resistance.
A helpful control answers a frequent creative question in a predictable way. It has a clear name, a sensible place, a stable range and a visible effect. It does not need to expose every possible mechanical operation. If a performer repeatedly reaches for a workaround, that is evidence for a better control or a clearer relationship between existing controls.
No. Follow-through is a useful consequence, not decoration that belongs on every limb. A tightly controlled character, a held breath or a deliberate stop may need very little of it. Add it when different parts of the body have distinct mass, flexibility or priorities, then make sure the delayed motion clarifies the beat instead of blurring it.
Change the viewing distance and ask a different question at each scale. From far away, read the silhouette and centre of gravity. At a medium view, inspect the sequence through the torso and limbs. Close up, inspect contact, joint compression and the face. Returning to the wide view after each detail decision keeps the small adjustment accountable to the larger action.
ACT 11 Leave a note
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