Effects layering for an offensive area-of-effect spell with a wind-up:
Character animation, no FX
Basic spike FX (to show that this is a damaging attack) and a runic circle (to feel magicky and indicate the effect's radius during wind-up). Communicates the idea but lacks oomph.
The oomph: a second layer of ethereal tendrils and a spirally burst for the circle.
Additional spell vibe from glows & added a reflection to better integrate the effect into the environment (character reflections are done in-engine)
Okay so I've figured out what the problem is with all the animation and animatic tutorials I've found.
None of them address workflow.
Not a single one tells me how I should be handling my files, saving them, applying them to my music, etc. They don't ever address the finishing work of clean-up or finalizing or saving it to a completed thing that can be posted. I haven't seen advice on file management nor how those files are later compiled. There's also nothing in animation tutorials about how to figure out how to pace your animation to music beats if that's something you want to do.
I don't want advice on 'how to make my animatic better' or how to conceptualize. I want the bare bones explanation of how to make this as not painstaking as possible, the best way to save storage space on my computer, and how to actually do this from a technical standpoint, not an artistic one.
ft. the worst possible way i couldve lipsynched this. i have no idea what im doing (all of the mouths are one object and i forgot i can parent things so i manually moved/rotated the whole thing when i needed a certain mouth........)
BTW i hate adobe animate and blender is waaaay to excessively complicated so im back to animating in photoshop which isn't the most cohesive platform for animation but i can zoom in and out of my canvas as i please and i can use all my brushes however i want to. heres a wip