Interview: Kate Inabinet

Atomic's model girl shares the secrets of game animation.

BIO
Name: Kate Inabinet
Occupation: Animator
Website: www.bluetongue.com

 Kate Inabinet is currently an Animator for Blue Tongue Entertainment in Melbourne. She has been in the industry for 4 years, and prior to games development worked as an animator for advertising and film. Kate studied at the Academy of Interactive Entertainment (AIE) in Canberra where she is still involved as a mentor for the Women in Games Pathway, presenting regularly at conferences and universities on the topic.  

Q: How did you get started in the games industry? Was it always your plan to get involved? 

A: I kind of fell into the games industry. When I first studied animation, my goal was to work in advertising or film, and I did enjoy a number of years in those fields. When I went back to the Academy of Interactive Entertainment (AIE) to study advanced animation I was approached by Atari (then Infogrames) at one of the industry nights. I had no real interest in games but it was the lure of working on a title based on one of my favourite childhood cartoons that caused me to change my mind. Who could resist the chance to work on Transformers? Since then I have never looked back. I honestly believe I have one of the most rewarding jobs anyone could wish for, and I thoroughly encourage anyone interested in pursuing a career in games.

Q: How has animating changed over the years? Has the process for animating a character stayed the same or have technologies (like ragdoll) impacted heavily on how you work?

A: Animation itself will always follow the same fundamental principals – staging, timing, anticipation, exaggeration, etc - but the tools and the technology, including ragdoll effects, have become more advanced making it a lot easier and faster to do my job. Motion capture is becoming more prevalent in games as it becomes increasingly accessible and the results are a lot cleaner than they used to be, and there is always the fear of it replacing traditional animation entirely, although I wonder about the ease of finding actors to play aliens with 6 legs, 2 heads and a set of wings.

Q: How important do you believe animating is in a game? Do you think it could ever be replaced?

A: I don’t think animation in games will ever be replaced. Even games that rely almost entirely on AI still need someone to animate the sequence of motions for the AI to run through. I think that a lot of emotion and life would be lost without the human element behind the characters. That being said, I don’t think a car racing game would be severely disadvantaged without an animator on the team. 

Q: How long does it take to animate your average model, and what would you say are the absolute minimum types of animation a character needs (say walk, idle, run)?

A: Characters take a lot longer to animate than people realize. It can range from a couple of hours to an entire day to animate a single looping step for a walk cycle. The job requires a very patient personality. For a game, the bare minimum animation set would include a walk, run, jump and definitely an idle. The quickest way to make a character look dead is for it to be completely still while waiting for direction. Each character will also need its specific playing actions: punching, sword fighting, shooting, martial arts – whatever the game dictates. After that, a character needs to respond to its environment and other characters. It is going to need an animation to represent damage from every angle, and perhaps a death animation. After this, there a thousand incidental animations that would improve gameplay and add to the character, but these are the bare essentials. 

Q: What skills are required for animation? Say, a good mind for mathematics and motion? Does someone need to have an eye for it?

A: Patience as I've already mentioned is one of the most valuable skills an animator can possess. It is slow work, but it is very rewarding. The job requires an eye for detail, and consequently most animators tend to be perfectionists. A good understanding of body language is important, and a vivid imagination is essential. Making something walk is simple enough, making something walk with an attitude that is easily read by the viewer is substantially more difficult. 

Q: What's harder to animate -- a person or an object? Why is this? 

A: It is much harder to animate a person than it is to animate an object. With objects, the most important aspect of their motion is weight, mechanics and timing. A properly animated person not only needs weight, mechanics and timing, but also acting, emotion, personality and life. Character can be read on a person’s face, in their hand gestures and via their posture, and the simplest mistake in any of these areas ruin the illusion of life.  

Q: What tools do you use in animation? How many people does it take to animate your average model?

A: A character is animated via a rig of 'bones' that the mesh (skin) is adhered to. Essentially it is a skeleton that allows the animator to manipulate the character and snapshot it in a series of poses in order to create each animation. Each character usually has one animator, and one coder assigned to it. Sometimes there is a separate person who builds the rigs, but more often the animator will do this themselves.   

Q: What are your thoughts on the recent 'merging' of Pandemic and BioWare, as well as the acquisition of Irrational by Take 2 Games? Do you feel that developers in countries like Australia should just expect to be absorbed by big publishers if they're successful?

A: There are always pros and cons associated with being acquired by a larger company. Although there is an element of control over content that is lost, the added security being part of a larger company provides is definitely a bonus. The nature of the industry is to be fickle, and with a bigger company on board, the knowledge that there are other games in the pipeline is a relief. There are exceptions to every rule though, and the purchase of Ratbag by Midway (Midway recently closed down Ratbag) is an example of when it is perhaps not an advantage to be bought by a bigger company.

Q: What is the best way of getting into games development? Is it better to get certified or just to jump in and get your hands dirty?

A: It is only the exceptionally talented who get hired without any certification or previous experience. A course is a great way to get into the industry, and provides you with the foundations needed to pursue your career in games, but nothing beats hands on experience to teach you the true dynamics of a games environment. 

Q: Have you had any trouble fitting into the male-dominated industry of games development? Are they particular segments that are more female dominated than male? What are they and why do you think this is so?

A: I come from a family of 6 boys, so fitting into a male dominated environment was never really an issue for me. If there are problems, it is because someone else is not used to being around girls, but they soon get over it when they realise they don’t have to stop being 'boys' just because I am in the room.

Q: Are there other areas of games development that pique your interest?

A: I would love to get into the programming side of games. Mathematics was always my best and favourite subject at school, and it would be great to be able to apply those skills to my animation work.