These videos are pure gold. These tangent situations are similar to what you’d learn in graphic design and photography but I think they get overlooked sometimes in other industries. Great content!
Thanks Jeffry! Ya, I honestly hadn't heard of them until I started at Pixar, and after the concept was drilled into my head I do my best to avoid them in all my work, unless of course they're meant to be there :) Hopefully this will help others who haven't run into them either.
ArtOfSoulburn I’m sure they will be very helpful! And I feel that especially with 3d work people focus so much on software related tutorials and techniques it’s easy to forget about important topics like you’ve been posting (and have in the past on your site).
Thanks for reminding me of this. I completely forgot about it and your explanation is great. Edit: I have a question: At 6:50 Landos (?) is touching inc(?)'s body with his right arm. Would you consider that a tangent aswell? Cheers!
Thanks Panda! And yes, that is yet another tangent. That image was a tough one since there's no many legs and arms near each other, lots of tangent opportunities. But if I could take that image back and tweak it, that would be another excellent tangent to fix!
Are tangents related to triangles in composition? For example, Frank Frazetta made a pretty famous painting of Buck Rogers which makes him (Rogers) the very obvious target of an alien holding a gun. Almost everything in the painting points to Rogers' head, re-inforcing him has being the target (ie. lines alingning objects). Would this kind of composition be an on-purpose tangent?
Yes indeed. Tangents can be used for good instead of evil. If you're using a single tangent to create a focal point, that's usually just referred to as a tangent, but you can also use multiple tangents that form a shape. Most compositions have some sort of shape associated with them, like a circular composition, a triangular composition, etc. I have a lesson planned going over the different types of compositions, hope to get to it later this year. Anyways, thanks for bringing up this great example!
hey! i'm following all your comp tutorials and idk if you style answering to comments on these videos but i was wondering, isnt tangent a real life thing making a creation looking natural ?
Good question! So yes, tangents absolutely happen in real life, but there's a difference between something being natural and something looking natural. In pretty much any work of art, be it film, a painting, whatever, we're generally trying to get some sort of point across, and remove anything that distracts from that point. Even in a documentary film, the camera person will try and avoid tangents because they want you to focus on say what the person they're interviewing is saying, and not the fact their head keeps lining up with the top of a building in the background. It all depends on what you're trying to do, so you certainly don't need to remove tangents in all cases, but if your goal with whatever visual you're creating is to focus the viewer on something, tangents can help or hinder that goal, and so it's good to keep in mind.
