Drawing For animation - advice by Howard Beckerman

"Daily practise is necessary for handling the shifting forms and shapes that are province of animation. The following five important aspects of drawing that animators must understand: gesture, weight and balance, solidity, proportions, silhouetting.

gesture - the posture and movement of figures is determined by gesture. All things (...) exhibit a stance.     Develop a feel for the inherent movement in things and allow your hands to draw the lines as if you were in trance.
weight and balance - suggesting where the greatest concentration of weight occurs adds solidity to drawings and believability to animation. All figures and objects have centre of mass, and all figures, unless they are falling, are always in balance.

solidity - how bones and muscles affects the movement of people and animals.

proportions - the distortion of the shapes does not preclude balanced design or satisfying patterns.

silhouetting - establish obvious silhouettes of shapes for quick recognition on the screen.
perspective - to accurately represent the three-dimensional world, it is necessary to understand perspective and foreshortening"

- Howard Beckerman "Animation the whole story"