As a young animator, it is common to look at Animators that inspire me for movement reference. This is quite a fad amongst young and up and coming animators of the 21st century. However, this proves to be more of a handicap as we develop a ‘second-hand’ aesthetic (Cooper).
"Many young artists are looking for an easier way out and study styles of existing animators, as opposed developing their own. Doing something that involves the figure, you want to have it based on a little reality as opposed to a stylization or distortion of someone else’s truth. That’s like getting information secondhand. You need to do the same thing they did, which is to work from live models and find your style.” Dan Cooper
This is the reason why many prominent Animation companies offer free Life Drawing classes to their Animators.
According to Karl Gnass, a former storyboard artist who’s worked at Disney, DreamWorks, Sony Pictures and Nickelodeon, Life Drawing can be used to develop an intuition with proportion, structure and perspective:
"You can draw animation and gesture without life drawing, but life drawing skills give you proportion, structure, perspective, and a certain vitality through rhythmic gestures, you can’t achieve dynamics without bones and structure, and in order to have structure you need to study it. From there one can extend out in any direction towards any style.” Karl Gnass
According to Cooper, Life Drawing is more like a sport and helps keep him sharp for his work. I can relate to the feeling of stiff and compartmentalised drawing.
"Drawing from life keeps me loose, fresh, and accurate. I find that when I’m not doing it, I draw more stiffly and tend to compartmentalize,”
http://www.fastcocreate.com/3033246/learning-in-the-flesh-why-disney-sends-its-animators-to-life-drawing-classes
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