Why should every motion designer should try a plugin detox?

 

Now, don't get me wrong, I love plugins. Ease Copy, Flow & FX Console deserve a Nobel prize. But they're a certain type of plugin -- a tool that helps you do what you need to do, just faster. They're not animating for you. 

 

I used to use easing plugins all the time that would add an ease or bounce to my animation. And the result... well, you've probably already guessed it. All my animation ended up looking the same. The same pace, the same motion. It was flat because I let the plugin make the decisions for me.

 

Remember, one of the few things humans still have an advantage over computers is our creative choices.
 
I also had no idea what I was doing inside the graph editor when a specific motion needed to be made... That was when I decided to quit. Cold turkey.
 
I went 8 weeks without using a single plugin. And it was one of the best things I've done to improve my skills.
 
Yes, it was annoying to have to jump into the graph editor and tweak the curves when I could have just clicked 1 button & gotten the same result for a simple motion.
 
But I spent so much time in the graph editor, that by the end of the 8 weeks, I knew it like the back of my hand. I was finally making a motion that was custom to the scene and it made a huge difference. I stopped avoiding complex motion because I thought it would be too difficult. To make it sound like the cheesy climax to a cliche montage... I was free.