Drawing a New Narrative for Cartoon Music

2013 ◽  
pp. 228-244
Author(s):  
Daniel Goldmark
Keyword(s):  
Technological Changes ◽  
Historical Account ◽  
Hollywood Film ◽  
Animated Films ◽  
Studio Practices ◽  
Live Action

This chapter provides a historical account of animated films and their music. It describes the variety of early studio practices, the centrality of production for music, and the effects of technological changes after 1950. It compares Disney’s Steamboat Willie and The Fairly OddParents with the works of Pixar, which deliberately avoided making a musical in the Disney mold. This chapteralso suggests that while the score of Pixar’s animated films are rich, provoking, and complex as any live-action Hollywood film, they still dip into some good old-fashioned cartoonism.

Postscript

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
J.P. Telotte
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Film And Television ◽  
Space Race ◽  
Animated Films ◽  
Technological Developments ◽  
Instrumental Works ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Live Action

The postscript surveys a number of changes that can be found in the key SF memes and their treatment as animation moved into postwar film and television. It frames these alterations in terms of a question that is often asked about cartoons: whether they are simply harmless amusements or “instrumental” works that can motivate their audiences after the fashion that, many argue, the best SF literature does. The chapter chronicles a variety of postwar scientific and technological developments that would quickly appear in and become staples of both live-action and animated films, including rockets, robots, computers, and the space race. The popularity of these elements demonstrates the postwar persistence of the SF memes explored in the previous chapters and suggests how animation was working, much like SF literature, not only to familiarize audiences with the impact of science and technology, but also to make that impact less threatening and more acceptable to popular culture.

Digital Realism

2021 ◽  
pp. 100-122
Author(s):  
Katherine Thomson-Jones
Keyword(s):  
Digital Image ◽  
Digital Images ◽  
Theoretical Background ◽  
Animated Films ◽  
Photographic Realism ◽  
Live Action ◽  
The Way

In this chapter, I acknowledge that a study of the digital image would not be complete without a discussion of realism. The widespread concern about whether to trust digital images is tied up, for many art and media theorists, with particular accounts of realism (e.g., Rodowick 2007). The notion of realism is a complex one, and this chapter provides some important theoretical background on one central kind; namely, the kind had by traditional photographs. This prepares the way for a discussion of digital “photorealism” as it is derived from traditional “photographic realism.” Through an analysis of “live-action animated” films, I develop an account of photorealism and its effect on the viewer’s experience of the composite—i.e., part recorded, part computer-generated—shot.

Change and Continuity: The Making of Contemporary Hollywood Animation

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-40
Author(s):  
Noel Brown
Keyword(s):  
Computer Animation ◽  
Film Industry ◽  
Hollywood Film ◽  
Narrative Structures ◽  
Action Cinema ◽  
Live Action

In setting the scene, the opening chapter does four things. First, it surveys production trends in Hollywood feature animation from the 1930s to the present. Second, it presents an overview of the major changes in the Hollywood film industry since the 1970s, contextualising the resurgence of animation within developments in live-action cinema, family entertainment and multimedia conglomeration. Third, it examines the stylistic continuities and changes in post-1990s Hollywood animation, particularly with regards to the rise of computer animation. And fourth, it weighs the recurrent narrative structures and mythological influences on the form against more recent changes in storytelling conventions.

Creative Challenges in the Production of Documentary Animation

2018 ◽  
pp. 221-234
Author(s):  
Sheila M. Sofian
Keyword(s):  
Creative Process ◽  
Documentary Films ◽  
Nonfiction Film ◽  
Non Fiction ◽  
Animated Films ◽  
Animation Technique ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Live Action

In this chapter, Sheila M. Sofian examines animated documentary from a filmmaker’s perspective. This chapter explores the appropriateness of animation’s use within nonfiction film. This chapter also asks how and when animation’s use might enhance audience understanding of a given documentary topic, and how and when it might distract from the same. The chapter also examines whether animation’s use in documentary reveals the filmmaking process in a more overt fashion than witnessed within live action documentary, and what controversies arise as a result. This chapter discusses these and other issues through reflective accounts of the production and exhibition of Sofian’s own animated documentary films. In discussing these works, this chapter examines the creative process of animated documentary production and the unique challenges faced when producing non-fiction animated films. The relationship between sound and image, choice of animation technique, and the effectiveness of literal versus abstract imagery are all topics explored.

scholarly journals Make-Believing Animated Films Featuring Digital Humans: A Qualitative Inquiry Using Online Sources

Animation ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 156-173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Hetherington ◽  
Rachel McRae
Keyword(s):  
Social Interactions ◽  
Qualitative Inquiry ◽  
User Comments ◽  
Animated Films ◽  
Digital Humans ◽  
Atypical Feature ◽  
Human Actors ◽  
Live Action ◽  
Online Sources ◽  
Robert Zemeckis

A qualitative inquiry of reviews of films featuring digital humanlike characters was performed by sampling user comments from three online reviewer aggregator sites: the Internet Movie Database, Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic. The films chosen for analysis were: Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (dir. Hironobu Sakaguchi and Motonori Sakakibara, 2001), The Polar Express (dir. Robert Zemeckis, 2004), and Beowulf (dir. Robert Zemeckis, 2007), all produced using CGI animation, together with A Scanner Darkly (dir. Richard Linklater, 2006) whose visuals are depicted by rotoscoping using Bob Sabiston’s Rotoshop software. The authors’ analysis identified individual differences in the viewing experience, particularly in relation to the uncertain ontology of the humanlike characters created using CGI (CGI-Humans). They found examples of reviews indicating an inability to distinguish between real and CGI-Human actors, observations of characters transiently exhibiting realism before returning to their artifice, and of characters being viewed as eerie (analogous to the uncanny valley), thus illustrating a complex and dynamic response to this phenomenon. In some situations, character uncanniness was related to the presence of an atypical feature such as movement of the eyes. Whilst specifically for Beowulf, perceptions became more problematic when there was familiarity with the actor playing the CGI-Human character, with some reviewers describing difficulties in categorizing the character as either real or animated. CGI-Human performances were also characterized by a lack of, or inappropriate, social interaction. Online reviewers did not perceive characters depicted using Rotoshop (Rotoshop-Humans) as eerie; rotoscoping was found to preserve, and possibly enhance, the natural social interactions between actors recorded from the live-action film which was used as the source material for the animation. The authors’ inquiry also identified user motivations for viewing these films and the importance placed by reviewers on the form of display when viewing the CGI films. They situate their interpretation of these findings in relation to Walton’s make-believe theory ( Mimesis as Make-Believe: On the Foundations of the Representational Arts, 1990).

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty: The Components of Costume Design in Disney’s Early Hand-Drawn Animated Feature Films

Animation ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-19 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maarit Kalmakurki
Keyword(s):  
Design Process ◽  
Costume Design ◽  
Sleeping Beauty ◽  
Feature Films ◽  
Principal Character ◽  
Snow White ◽  
Animated Films ◽  
Character Design ◽  
History Of ◽  
Live Action

Costumes in feature films can be deliberately used for narrative purposes to reveal or conceal something related to the plot, functioning as a key element for cinematic storytelling. Costume design in animation is an integral part of character creation; however, relatively little is known about the design process. Previous research concentrates on either the history of hand-drawn animation, the principles of making animated films or character construction. This article presents several key components of the animators’ costume design process in Walt Disney’s animated feature films Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), Cinderella (1950) and Sleeping Beauty (1959). The author demonstrates that the costume design in these films was a multi-layered process. For example, for Snow White, the costume silhouette of the final animation is visible in the early conceptual designs whereas, for Cinderella or Princess Aurora, the principal character animators designed the final costume. Additionally, the slow production time influenced the style of the costumes: small details on costumes and complex constructions were not used as it would have taken too long for them to be drawn. The article also reveals that animators used live-action filming and rotoscoping as tools for designing costumes. Furthermore, costumes that were used in pre-production filming for rotoscope were different in their construction from everyday garments. The work of a costume designer existed in the character design process, although not as a separate profession. This article aims to highlight the importance of characters’ costumes in Disney’s early hand-drawn animated films and the different ways costumes have been designed for animated characters.

The Mannerist Game

2018 ◽  
pp. 205-223
Author(s):  
Christopher Holliday
Keyword(s):  
Film Noir ◽  
Pop Music ◽  
Trompe L'oeil ◽  
New Hollywood ◽  
Digital Animation ◽  
Animated Films ◽  
Animated Film ◽  
Music Film ◽  
Action Cinema ◽  
Live Action

This chapter argues that mannerism and traditions of mannerist art give greater definition to how computer-animated films playfully dismantle their illusionist activity by making false claims about their relation to live-action cinema. To consider these specific forms of Mannerist humour in the computer-animated film, this chapter plots Mannerism’s cinematic lineage within certain styles and genres (film noir, pop music film, heritage drama, period film and cinéma du look), and notes that despite scholars having employed a vocabulary drawn from European art history to describe the (often digitally-assisted) bravura camerawork of New Hollywood cinema, Mannerism has yet to be employed as a descriptor for digital animation. This chapter therefore re-imagines computer-animated film comedy as strongly Mannerist in its invention, and draws particular attention to their strategies of allusive anti-illusionism. Computer-animated films frequently stage false, illusory discourses of revelation (feigned blooper reels, outtake material, behind-the-scenes ‘actor’ interviews) as a comic flourish that maintains the genre’s illusion. To interrogate the wit of the genre’s Mannerist play, I examine its many trompe-l’œil illusion effects and activities of self-deception.

Falling with Style? The Computer-Animated Film and Genre

2018 ◽  
pp. 24-40
Author(s):  
Christopher Holliday
Keyword(s):  
Genre Theory ◽  
Specific Context ◽  
Film Genre ◽  
Digital Animation ◽  
Software Packages ◽  
Internal Structures ◽  
Animated Films ◽  
Animated Film ◽  
Action Cinema ◽  
Live Action

Chapter One maintains the genre narrative established in the book’s introduction, interrogating in greater depth the shape of contemporary film genre theory, and its relationship to the study of digital animation to understand how computer-animated films might be conceptualised in generic terms. The interrelationship between animation and genre is identified as a complex series of engagements and negotiations, and drawing on animation scholarship and theories of film genre, this chapter engages with the problem of generic classification when placed within the specific context of animation. Informed by Paul Wells’ work on animation’s generic “deep structures”, this chapter argues that it is in the process of ‘doing’ recognisable genres (similar to notions of genre parody) that computer-animated films both create and announce their own internal structures and attributes, which will be pursued across the book as a whole. Chapter One also works through technological considerations (including current software packages) to identify the computer-animated film genre as a significant attribute of textual structures that are underpinned by technological concerns. Questions of genealogy and the computer-animated film’s potential influence (live-action cinema; videogames) are therefore brought together in a discussion of the ‘computer-animated film’ as a viable critical label.

scholarly journals Hiding Hiroshima

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam Fernandes
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cultural Studies ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
The United States ◽  
Action Films ◽  
Cultural Ideologies ◽  
Animated Films ◽  
Action Cinema ◽  
Live Action

<p>Explores the representation of nuclear weapons in Japanese anime and US live action cinema in the 1980's, using methods from cultural studies. Examines, specifically, the silences and contradictions of the selected films to reveal the cultural ideologies of Japan and the United States during the time in which the films were produced. Analyzes the Japanese animated films, Barefoot Gen, Barefoot Gen 2, and Grave of the Fireflies, and the American live action films, The Day After, Testament, and Miracle Mile.</p>

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