Kanan Jarrus, The Last Padawan (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
uncertain_dume) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomhigh2016-05-24 07:53 am
uncertain_dume) wrote in fandomhigh2016-05-24 07:53 am
Entry tags:
Off The Grid: Laying Low for Beginners, Tuesday, Period Two
This week, they were back in the classroom, Kanan looking only slightly disappointed by that fact. Practical experience was all the better to learn by, in his opinion, but it only went so far if people didn't have a chance to actually do the exercise. So! Lecture class it was!
He crossed his arms over his chest as he stood at the front of the room.
"So," he said, looking at the students gathered, "this week we'll be talking about tells. Little things that give you away as you to whoever might be keeping an eye open. It could be a facial feature, could be a nervous habit you don't even realize you have. Scars, clothing, the timbre of your voice..."
He shrugged his shoulders.
"Some of those things, you'll be able to hide or change. Some of them, you obviously can't. You can't turn a Togruta into a Chiss without some pretty impressive holo-technology, or whatever illusion-creating equivalent there might be where you're from. If there's not an equivalent, then you need to get creative. Ahsoka used a cloak during last week's exercise to hide her identity completely in order to slip out of the cantina unnoticed. There's one good way of doing it, just so long as the cloak is something that people aren't going to pick out as odd."
Or the Jedi robes. Great for huddling under in the cold and the rain. Little bit of a dead giveaway.
"It's worth thinking on those tells that you can't change, and seeing if there is a way you can hide them if you need to. This week, though, we'll be focusing on those tells that you can. Those little things you might not realize are there. Habits, mostly, like a quick dart of the eyes toward an exit when you're worried you might be about to be found, or reaching for an item that you carry on you that you find to be a comfort. Hell, back in my smuggling days," had he mentioned he used to have smuggling days? Oh well, "a friend of mine pointed out that I had a habit of running my hands through my hair when I was nervous. I found a way to fix that."
By pulling his hair back into a ponytail. Simple fix, but it worked. It meant his hand kind of detoured to stroke at his beard now, but the beard obscured his face a bit, distracted from some of his more prominent features, so it had been a trade-off.
"Some of you are new enough that the people here might not have picked out your habitual tells yet," he continued. "But odds are they aren't the ones you're trying to avoid, either. Take a few moments to talk among yourselves if you're comfortable doing so about any tells that you might have noticed in one another, or, if you're comfortable sharing with the class and want some advice, feel free. Otherwise... just keep this lecture in mind. Spend the next week trying to pick out little habits you do when you're nervous, or angry, or relieved. Ask yourself why you're doing something when you find yourself reacting to your surroundings, and think about whether that's something you might want to figure out how to mask. It could save your life someday."
[OOC: Open!]
He crossed his arms over his chest as he stood at the front of the room.
"So," he said, looking at the students gathered, "this week we'll be talking about tells. Little things that give you away as you to whoever might be keeping an eye open. It could be a facial feature, could be a nervous habit you don't even realize you have. Scars, clothing, the timbre of your voice..."
He shrugged his shoulders.
"Some of those things, you'll be able to hide or change. Some of them, you obviously can't. You can't turn a Togruta into a Chiss without some pretty impressive holo-technology, or whatever illusion-creating equivalent there might be where you're from. If there's not an equivalent, then you need to get creative. Ahsoka used a cloak during last week's exercise to hide her identity completely in order to slip out of the cantina unnoticed. There's one good way of doing it, just so long as the cloak is something that people aren't going to pick out as odd."
Or the Jedi robes. Great for huddling under in the cold and the rain. Little bit of a dead giveaway.
"It's worth thinking on those tells that you can't change, and seeing if there is a way you can hide them if you need to. This week, though, we'll be focusing on those tells that you can. Those little things you might not realize are there. Habits, mostly, like a quick dart of the eyes toward an exit when you're worried you might be about to be found, or reaching for an item that you carry on you that you find to be a comfort. Hell, back in my smuggling days," had he mentioned he used to have smuggling days? Oh well, "a friend of mine pointed out that I had a habit of running my hands through my hair when I was nervous. I found a way to fix that."
By pulling his hair back into a ponytail. Simple fix, but it worked. It meant his hand kind of detoured to stroke at his beard now, but the beard obscured his face a bit, distracted from some of his more prominent features, so it had been a trade-off.
"Some of you are new enough that the people here might not have picked out your habitual tells yet," he continued. "But odds are they aren't the ones you're trying to avoid, either. Take a few moments to talk among yourselves if you're comfortable doing so about any tells that you might have noticed in one another, or, if you're comfortable sharing with the class and want some advice, feel free. Otherwise... just keep this lecture in mind. Spend the next week trying to pick out little habits you do when you're nervous, or angry, or relieved. Ask yourself why you're doing something when you find yourself reacting to your surroundings, and think about whether that's something you might want to figure out how to mask. It could save your life someday."
[OOC: Open!]
Re: OOC!
Re: OOC!
(Animator pedantics also have me wanting to point out that character design isn't the same thing as animation style, but I know what you meant, so I'll sit on my hands again. ;P )
Re: OOC!
I thought it was probably something like that. I guess some of it is my lack of experience at watching 3D animation on TV; I haven't watched TV animation since...um. Animaniacs?...Before you started getting me into shows. But Rebels does seem a lot smoother to me - Kanan may be a tube, but...okay, his hair doesn't move much, but Sabine and Ezra's do.
I know it's a silly thing to get hung up on, but I'm a hair fan, okay? LOL
Re: OOC!
But that's fair! Hair can sell a lot when a character moves, bringing a little bit of extra life into what might otherwise be a dull, flat motion. It's got its own sense of timing, is generally the last part of a character (besides possibly clothes) to stop moving, and can help push animation to make it seem just that much less stiff. Hera's lekku serve the same purpose on Rebels, and I find myself staring at them going "oooooooo" a lot, because they pull off that secondary animation beautifully.
(I went back and edited this three times to carve the production jargon out. I'm so far down the rabbit hole, there's no saving me now.)
Re: OOC!
But yeah, Clone Wars seems to have very little of that secondary animation - not in clothes or hair or anything - at first. I think it got a bit better with Luminara, same time the faces did, but there still isn't much. Weirdly, I think the character that shows it best is Jar Jar. At least he's good for something?
Re: OOC!