Exaggeration - It happens.

As far as the Principles of Animation go, I hear a lot of students these days taking issue with Exaggeration.  I'm not sure if it's an issue of the students who attend the college where I instruct, or a growing trend in humans overall.  There are a lot of links I could toss in here, but let's keep this brief.

I am sure of one thing.  People rarely choose to notice the exaggeration that exists in the world around us, and we typically have a rigid view of human anatomy compared to even what is really going on.  Thanks, left brain.

Let's take a look at a simple example:

Did you catch that?

Whoa, is his leg breaking backwards?

Certainly, some of the curvature of the leg comes from the shape of the pants deforming around the leg, and drag.  But none of that really matters.  We see what we see.

If this happens in reality, we must at least present the viewer with the shapes and forms that exist.  And then we exaggerate for clarity.  To distill something down to its essence.

Further reading:

Pixar Animator Victor Navone on Exaggeration

A couple others, slightly off topic but related:
Keith Lango - Audience Preferences

Sam Nielson - Uncanny Valley