Before I tackled the very large moving eyes, which felt like quite an intimidating task, I first decided I wanted to add some movement to Iris' base design to make her look a bit more alive. So I animated her slowly blinking and her hair flowing about slightly to match the future movements of the large eyes. I also was able to create this animation on a loop so it could play endlessly hopefully without any unnatural movements. At least that was the goal starting out.
In the recording above I show my process of creating the eye movement. I had the iris and pupil of the eye on separate layers grouped together, then after each movement, I would duplicate them onto the next frame so the size and shape of the eye stayed consistent helping the animation be a lot smoother. With the moving hair, I mostly would redraw that for every frame so there would be small differences and movements each time making it look more natural and as if it was moving along the probably slick surface of the eye.
While I kept the process of drawing the eyes mostly the same for each one, I slightly reorganised the process later on so I would animate just a circle for a base of the eye moving about, then I would go back and add the iris, then the hair. Previously when I was animating them all at once as I show in the video, the layers and organisation got slightly chaotic and confusing at times so I adapted to avoid any messy frames.
Near the end of the project, I decided I wanted to try and also add some movement to her arms to make her seem more natural and alive. However, since I didn't originally plan to do this, it led to parts of the eye that had previously been hidden behind her long sleeves being completely missing. I could have redrawn these parts without too many issues, however, I was starting to get very close to the deadline at the time and so I decided I didn't have time to fix this. While I still show the fact I attempted it in the above video, I didn't include the moving arms in the final product.
The final animation is included at the end of the video, and I believe creating the loop was very successful. I enjoy this character's redesign far more then her previous look and bringing her to life with this animation showcased how creepy she really is while having a very fun and dynamic design now.
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