Symbolism in Animation

It has long been a complaint that we are relying on dialogue too much instead of good acting in modern animation. Since animation is a visual medium it makes sense to try and make everything understandable even if you strip the soundtrack off.

The use of symbolism is probably a carry-over from the days of silent cinema where everything had to be communicated visually but it does have the advantage of super-charging a scene by loading it with layers of information.

Certain types of film lend themselves better for the use of symbolic imagery such as the Musical and the Fairytale because they are already stylized and more fanciful in the storytelling right from the beginning.

Symbolism in animation began with animation itself and one of the best examples is Disney’s “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.” The queens casting of spells to make a disguise and poisoned apple use symbolism to load the imagery in a powerful way that go beyond dialogue with a universal visual language everyone can understand. As the queen makes her potion each phrase she speaks is illustrated to heighten the impact: To shroud my clothes, the black of night- A drop falls into the potion and spreads changing the liquid to black. To age my voice, an old hag's cackle.-A bubbling cackling fluid drops into the potion with each drop making a cackling laugh. To whiten my hair, a scream of fright-. A drop of something explodes with a jet of steam forming into a shrieking face! Later as the queen now in old peddler disguise makes the poison apple she dips it into a solution and as she pulls it out the mixture runs off the apple forming a skull that sinks into the apple turning it a beautiful red.



There are many fine moments of symbolism in the Disney canon of films. Although fairly naturalistic in it’s depiction of forest life Bambi takes a surprising visual change with the appearance of the love interest Faline. Bambi is love struck and literally starts floating on a cloud. The landscape transforms into a dreamy cotton candy cloudscape as Bambi leaps effortlessly in bliss. This is suddenly broken by the intrusion of a rival and a battle ensures casting the stags in silhouette as the backgrounds become almost solid colors. The change in mood and color bring an impact that works on a psychological level.



“The Little Mermaid” has some great uses of symbolism where Ursula commands Arial to sing while smoky tentacle hands steal her ‘voice’.



The writhing nude female figures made of fire held in the mighty devils hands from “Fanstasia” are a great depiction of souls lost to sexual sin and temptation. This was used again as fireplace flames form the alluring dancing figures that reflect the tortured thoughts of Frolo lusting for Esmeralda in “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”. In the same scene Frolos guilt caused shadows to grow into accusatory figures that tower in judgment of him pictorially showing us the inner conflict he is wrestling with.





Who can forget Dumbos drunken ‘pink elephant’ nightmare? It became a highlight of the movie and a delightful way of getting a baby elephant up a tree.

My hope is that more applications of this kind of visual storytelling can be found that feel organic to the story and would replace or complement dialogue. When done right they are the moments you remember for a lifetime.

Stop Motion Mission

http://justinrasch.blogspot.com/search?updated-min=2009-01-01T00%3A00%3A00-08%3A00&updated-max=2010-01-01T00%3A00%3A00-08%3A00&max-results=8

I've never met this couple but I've grown to love them and their family following the making and success of their award winning film "Gerald's Last Day".

Justin Rasch has a terrific blog called Stop Motion Mission, (follow link or click on title), that chronicles the making of his film with the help of his wife Shel and their entire family. The blog videos show a family who combine work and play with an infectious joy and passion not only for animation but life in general.

It's wonderful to see the rewards starting to come in and the well deserved recognition for Justin's super terrific animation skills.

Toon Boom Testing

I downloaded the Personal Training Edition of Toon Booms new Animate package. There's this watermark they stamp everything with but other than that it's a fully functional program. I was coming onto it cold with no previous experience and did this very simple crappy four drawing run cycle, tossed it onto a background and added a camera move. It's pretty easy and seems to have better drawing features, (not as good as TVPaint), than Flash and impressive multiplane background capabilities. You can also fill areas on a character with textures and do some nice drop shadows and things. I'm really liking it so far.

Paul & Faul

Yes the myth of Paul McCartney continues. I have a hard time believing any images today because of digital manipulation but check this one out. It supposedly shows Paul and his double variously referred to as Billy Shears, William Campbell, and Faul as in fake Paul together in one picture.

Stop-motion in the Digital Age

The stop-motion movie has been around almost as long as the creation of the motion picture. Trick films were the specialty of early filmmakers who employed superimposed images, traveling mattes, stage effects, substitution, and stop-motion as part of their arsenal to astound an audience who were already astonished by the singular idea of moving pictures projected on a theater screen.

The fascination of tangible dimensional figures seemingly moving of their own accord became the main preoccupation for certain individuals whose life work became the pioneering of the stop-motion art. Whole stories were constructed around stop-motion just as traditional drawn animation proved able to sustain the interest of movie goers.

Then the advancement of computer graphics occurred so rapidly compared to stop-motion and drawn animation that both mediums were declared virtually dead.

It’s only through the championing of a few individuals as in the early days of cinema that we continue to see stop-motion as a viable platform for animation today.

In reality the viability to produce stop-motion pictures in today’s economy is partly due to the advancements of the digital image and computer programming. All motion picture production has been affected by computer imaging. C.G. graphics have replaced the glass-shots and optical printers no longer handle transitions or compositing. Even editing is done digitally.

The introduction of the “framer grabber”, the digital devise used by animators to judge incremental movements in puppets previously done with surface gauges, gave stop-motion a new life and improved the animated performance and the speed in which the animator could produce the performance. See earlier post: Claymation Techniques and Innovations for more details.

Digital rig removal allows animators to position rigs that hold puppets upright allowing them not to support their own weight and enabling them to be supported in midair. A clean pass of the scene without the characters or rigs is shot and digital samples of the background are pasted over areas where the rigs were. Motion controlled cameras store movements that can be repeated multiple times thanks to computer programing.

What once was done by hand in the fabrication of props and set pieces is now taken from drawing to virtual modeling in the computer and then exported as a hard copy. This method has extended to the fabrication of face replacements allowing more expressions for the stop-motion puppet. It also allows a way of pre-visualizing dialogue and acting using the virtual expressions before body animation begins.

There are devotees who prefer stop-motion over animation done with computer and we’ve seen a continued proliferation of feature films done in stop-motion. Even so certain conditions constrain the stop-motion film where the C.G. film is not restricted.

Because these are tangible objects occupying real space, a large shooting stage must be devoted to accommodate a stop-motion production. Even if the characters are shot on green screen and matted into elaborated digital backgrounds space still needs to be reserved.

To keep the production moving and prevent bottle-necks many figures of the main characters need to be created. As each figure is an intricate ball and socket armature with custom fitted paddles for loose bouncing attributes, foam injected skins and hand tailored clothing, this can be very expensive. Replications of certain key sets are made allowing more footage to be covered in reoccurring locations but the expense of replication must be considered.

Part of appeal of stop-motion is the performance done by the animator. Unlike drawn or computer animation which can be done in a layering of details starting with basic shapes that are moved for timing with the addition of looser attributes for overlapping actions and progressive detailing, stop-motion is a concentrated effort made in one take. All the acting including the pacing and delivery, the physicality of hair, clothing, gravity and other forces of nature must be considered by the animator for the entire length of the shot at one 24th of a frame per second. Animation will become more complex and time consuming with multiple characters in a shot.

As mentioned the frame grabber has proven to be an indispensable tool for stop-motion and not only allows for better animation but lets you do rehearsals before committing to an actual shot. The grabber is useful to monitor set lights also ensuring consistency in a shot.

A Computer animated film has the advantage of sharing assets be they characters, props, sets or lighting schematics freeing the need to build expensive replications. Since virtually everything is done ‘in the box’ there is not the need for large shooting stages and cameras, lights, tracks and all that’s entailed in stop-motion.

The performance of C.G. animation is similar to drawn in that it is finessed and polished with the ability to change and alter without discarding or re-shooting. Shots might be done with multiple animators working on separate characters bringing a consistency to acting and speeding the completion of complicated scenes with multiple characters.

As there are no physical restrictions in C.G. there is no need for rig removal and compositing elements such as smoke, fire, etc. There is also no restriction on the scale of environments and entire worlds can be created.

The average movie audience may not be able to distinguish what they are looking at because of the fine improvements in stop-motion. Is it C.G. or is it stop-motion? Perhaps they don’t care. Perhaps they just want a good movie.

Coraline

Seen it yet?

A Page From History

Norman Mattoon Thomas (November 20, 1884 – December 19, 1968) was a leading American socialist, pacifist, and six-time presidential candidate for the Socialist Party of America.
The Socialist Party candidate for President of the US , Norman Thomas, said this in a 1944 speech:

"The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism. But, under the name of "liberalism," they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program, until one day America will be a socialist nation, without knowing how it happened."

He went on to say: "I no longer need to run as a Presidential Candidate for the Socialist Party. The Democrat Party has adopted our platform."



"The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money."

~~Margaret Thatcher

Alice and Martin Provensen and Golden Gems

http://goldengems.blogspot.com/ This link, ( or clicking the title), will take you to a great site called Golden Gems by blogger Barbie Miller. There I found these beautiful scans from one of my favorite books, "The Golden Bible-The New Testament" by the amazing art team of Alice and Martin Provensen. The Provensen's did a lot of work for Disney and like other Disney artists they also did many illustrations for Little Golden Books.

See more of their work at Golden Gems. This site offers entire scans of Golden Books from cover to cover and is a great place for inspiration and graphic ideas.

NRBQ

I have a friend who hadn't heard of NRBQ,(New Rhythm and Blues Quartet). These guys can make me cringe sometime but more often they just astound me. I dig their version of "Wild Weekend" also.

Krazy Site

http://www.georgeherriman.com/toons.html

The above link,(or clicking on the title), will take you to the 'toon' section of Craig Yoe's site devoted to George Herriman, creator of Krazy Kat. Here you will find all the attempts to bring Krazy to the screen from silent films to the 1996 stop-motion test that was mentioned in an earlier post. Another area of the site is devoted to the original strip cartoon as penned by Herriman. You'll see why Krazy has been hard to present as an animated film while staying true to the idiosyncratic strip.

(Click image to enlarge)

Nerd on Wheels

With gas prices going up I got myself a scooter. It's an automatic so no shifting, gets 60+ to the gallon, and it's my size. I've never been cool so have no dignity to preserve and it's really really fun!

Squirrels

I guess this is called 'creature animation', although I always think of monsters when I hear that. It's some animation I did for a family movie called "Dog Gone". I picked these scenes because they were the first time we see these characters and I wanted to see how realistic I could make them.

It's a little confusing without the set-up but there is a chocolate bar on a string hanging from a tree as bait and the squirrels are trying to get it. Later in the film the squirrels become more anthropomorphic and behave more like humans which is why they were animated.

This file is silent so there is no chattery squirrel voices.

Jerry and the Earless Dog

We've been snowed in, (THIS IS OREGON!), over the holiday season so to pass the time I've read Eric Goldberg's book and played some more with the TVPaint 2D program.

This is some rough animation of Jerry Mouse I did to learn how to draw the character, and my version of Eric's Earless Dog, kind of, (lets just say I didn't draw any ears on the thing). I did these just for fun and to try out some different walks, learn the program, get back into 2D, and kill some time. Trying to animate Jerry makes me appreciate what Irv Spence and those guys did!

It's started snowing again...

Imagine Exploiting John Lennon

This is just horrible. The timber of the voice is right but the cadence and diction are nothing like John. It saddens me to think John is being used against his will. People,(Yoko), are now literally putting words in his mouth, something he fought so hard against. I wonder what he would have to say if he were alive today.

Interpreting Krazy Kat

The original 1918 strip used for the Spitting Image Test below, (CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE)














A fatter Krazy from the 40's in color.

The test from Spitting Image Productions

Over the holiday season Cartoon Brew posted a test done in 1996 by Spitting Image Productions for King Features Syndicate. The test was done to see if King Features could create new interest in one of their most eccentric and highly regarded properties: “Krazy Kat” by George Herriman.

Krazy was animated for the silent screen during its earliest appearances as a comic strip around 1914. But the treatment was the same as any silent animated characters at the time and never tried to capture the strips idiosyncrasies. Later in the 60’s, almost twenty years after the strip had stopped and fallen into oblivion, another attempt was made to revise interest with a new animated series with sound and color. The voice casting and limited animation satisfied no one, especially anyone with any familiarity with the strip.

Even as a comic strip cartoon Krazy was an acquired taste and would have been dropped had it not been championed by William Randolph Hearst who owned the paper. So great was Hearst’s admiration that he gave Herriman a guaranteed life time promise that Krazy would always have a home in his paper.

This long term agreement for the life span of Krazy began around 1913 and ended in 1944 with the death of Herriman. The 31 year run saw an evolution in style affecting not only the characters appearance but also the formatting and a transition to color. The early prose of K.K. had a running narrative that was lyrical and poetic. This was dropped during the later strips and became limited to the love triangle of Pup, Kat, and Mouse most associate with today.

So which Krazy is Krazy? The Kat from the 20’s is leaner and has a finer line quality than the Kat from the 40’s with its scratchier loose and thick strokes caused by Herriman’s increasing arthritics and bad health. Add to this the phantasmagorical backgrounds of Coconino County which morphed from panel to panel turning day into night and back again during the same action and conversation.

Although faithful to the original strip this test minimizes the transitional landscapes, wisely going with cuts, and prettifies the designs over what Herriman conceived. The premise comes from a 1918 strip but uses a 1940's Kat. Perhaps stop-motion wasn’t the best choice because it couldn’t carry the graphic nature so essential to the strip. Yet you can't argue the fine animation. The narrative is perhaps the weakest part of this presentation being far too modern and lacking the poetic flavor of the original. Unlike other comic characters like Popeye and Charlie Brown, Krazy Kat has proven to be too unique a vision to bring to the screen so far.

Baby Rose Marie

The cast of "The Dick Van Dyke Show": Mary Tyler Moore, Dick Van Dyke, Morey Amsterdam, and Rose Marie making devil horns.

I have always loved "The Dick Van Dyke Show" created by Carl Reiner. I still think the character Laura Petrie, (Mary Tyler Moore), is incredibly sexy and laugh at the same stuff I've seen hundreds of times before. But I've learned something about the actress who played tough aggressive Sally Rodgers that I didn't know. Sally was played by child star Baby Rose Marie. Yup, check out this amazing YouTube performance and see what a seasoned trooper this gal really was.



Watch "The Dick Van Dyke Show" here: http://www.hulu.com/watch/30462/the-dick-van-dyke-show-jilting-the-jilter#s-p1-so-i0

Merry Christmas!

I saw this on Cartoon Brew and couldn't resist. Of course that's Ward Kimball on the trombone and Frank Thomas on piano. Merry Christmas!

Twinning

Most books on animation including Disney animators Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston’s, “The Illusion of Life” warn against drawing mirrored poses or having the same timing on body gestures that echo each other. The term is called ‘Twinning' and the argument is that asymmetry is more natural. Perhaps this is true in a still image to prevent stiffness and to give interest, but I find it happening in live performances again and again. I also recall ‘twinning’ in Disney’s “The Wind in the Willows” segment where Mr. Toad goes car crazy. Now John Kricfalusi has posted some images from Disney’s “Song of the South” that sure look like ‘twinning’ to me. I guess when you make the rules you can break them too.

3D Craze Again...

There seems to be a renewed interest in stereoscopic movies these days. The first projected stereoscopic images were done by Charles d'Almeida in 1858 using the red and green lens anaglyphic method. Another form of stereo projection was the use of polarized lights created by John Anderton in 1891. These two methods became the standard formats for all stereoscopic films during the first 3D boom in the fifty's. Hollywood turned to 3D because of the increasing sales of television sets and the threat of audiences staying home. Will this new wave of stereoscopic movies pull crowds into theaters and away from renting films on DVD?

Here is a sample of Warner Bros. one and only attempt to capitalize on the 3D craze. "Lumber Jack-Rabbit" hit theaters in 1954 just as the craze was dying. Although we can't watch it in the 3D format, you can get a sense of what was intended by some of the exaggerated set pieces.

Joe Myers

Once upon a time in a small seeping pustule on the buttock of the universe there lived five little boys who wanted to make a lot of noise. They were bothers of brothers who had once formed a band called The Children. Now two of the brothers were very good and too good to stay in the small seeping pustule. They were smart enough to get out and do something worthwhile.

I say all this as a way of introducing my old band mate Joe Myers who sent me an email not too long ago. Joe who was and is a phenomenal guitarist has rightfully gained some recognition in Phoenix Arizona as a musician/singer/songwriter. he has several albums of original music with his equally talented brother, (my other band mate Matthew), drumming on some of the tracks. He has also written music for the film "Flowers of Madison"

Go here to listen to some of his tunes, ( I love "River To River" myself): http://www.myspace.com/joemyersaz

And go here to buy his music: http://www.joemyers.net/index.html

Happy Holidays Joe & Matte!