Post #8 Character poses

Learned some interesting things about character poses, the main thing being about the line of action. There can be several lines of action but the primary line of action runs from a characters head, through the spine and down the leg. Basically, having a curved line of action will prevent your characters from looking stiff. 

Source: https://warosu.org/data/ic/img/0015/74/1383132525978.jpg

Dynamic lines of action are most obvious in cartoons such as 'Tom and Jerry' where the characters have highly exaggerated poses. As you can see above, the line of action is a curve, which helps the characters to move with flow, rather than on sharp angles that make the animation a bit more clunky. 

Here are a couple of poses I have done for my Lionel Clegg character. Still need some work. I think the first pose with his arms outstretched has a bit of a curve to it. The running pose has a straight diagonal line of action so it does look a bit more stiff.