Cloudy With a Chance of Animation Principles

   The twelve principles are seen in every animation. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs is a prime example of the uses of the principles and how they can be exaggerated into the favor of the art style. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs uses principles such as squash and stretch, anticipation, slow in and slow out, and exaggerating. Every movement seems to use squash and stretch in this film. From the way the characters walk that gives a little bounce to their strut, to their facial expressions. It's used simply when the food falls from the sky and bounces off the ground or in the jello mansion when Flint and Sam jump around. Anticipation when Flint first turns on the machine to create a burger. He waits ready with a plate in his hands for the burger to be made while the machine prepares to make it. Of course the power surge caused the machine to stop which added to the anticipation. Another example would be when the crowd of people looking into the sky, gasping, before the view showed what they were seeing, causing anticipation for the viewers. Slow in and slow out was used while the food was falling from the sky. Secondary arcs were seen in most characters such as Sam giving her report and adding a wink at the end and the mayor continuing to eat while he's speaking. Both showing more about their characters besides what their primary action is. 

Boxtrolls and Stop Motion

Travis Knight, lead animator, president, and CEO of Laika, helps create a whole new stop motion film. From the creators of Coraline and ParaNorman, two Oscar winning films for their "creepy artistry", make a new movie called The Boxtrolls. The Boxtrolls is described as an absurdist coming-of-age comedy taking place in a Victorian town where monsters literally live bellow the wealthy citizens and a boy named Eggs who was raised by the boxtrolls learns to live with the humans above. 

   Everything learned from creating Coraline and ParaNorman are used together to make The Boxtrolls. Computer generated effects are merged with the stop motion to create effects they may not have been able to capture. They use tactics like colored 3-D printing to make all of the puppets' faces and built motion control devices for the biggest puppet made. To avoid going back and redoing a scene they carefully choose the right animators for the right scenes. Every moment of creating the stop motion film is precision. 

   This article has allowed me to see the processes used to create stop motion films. It seems painfully long to me to move each puppet slowly, frame by frame, for a feature length film. But the end result is beautiful and gives a feel other animation styles can't capture. Overall The Boxtrolls seems to have a great story and I look forward to seeing the results in theatre.  

Weekly Comments

   Week four is out the door and I'm ready to march further into animation. This week was the first week of animating and I feel like I'm a step closer to my dream. I'm not sure if I'm any good yet, on account of me being immpatient; 

which is making me avoid things that I could correct. But I'm prepared for improvement. 

   Learning movement was very interesting and I hope I can nail it one day. I often forget the amount of frames needed to change speed and that less frames give a faster effect, but it does make sense. Working on the different animation assignments has been fun overall. I didn't put that much creativity into it because I was focusing on figuring it out and I think I've got the basics down now.  I especially enjoyed the ball bouncing excersises. It was very soothing for me to draw the individual frames and create the squash and stretch movements. 

I've found this link compairing two different 3D styles of animation. And though we're not on that topic yet, I think it's still an interesting article. 

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=15&ved=0CDUQFjAO&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.awn.com%2Fvfxworld%2Fcreative-human-character-animation-incredibles-vs-polar-express&ei=4hUmVJeOBoKGyAS4jYLQCA&usg=AFQjCNHjYsM5XpdTcWpW8shI3DkIf1VkcQ&sig2=PEQXgjwla8UXxlSvnUiYig

I also found this video on creating comic pages that could be as interesting to others as it was to me. 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=j08XE6UcCN4

Michael Moore's Manifesto for Documentary Filmmaking

   Oscar winning Michael Moore tells a 13-point manifesto on how he makes successful documentaries. He gives many helpful tips for documentary making, but also tips that could be useful for any style film. Some of the important tips he gives that could be used for animation films are using laughter to benefit you and making films more personal. 

   "Laughter is a way to alleviate the pain of what you know to be true", as said by Michael Moore and put very well. No matter how sad the overall story is, comedy can lighten the situation and make things seem less serious. Of course, this method of lightening the mood should only be used when you want to brighten the audiences' spirits. If you want their mood to be grim or sad, a joke shouldn't be added. But you can see humour as a mask in many characters in films. A character may have a tragic backstory, but adding comedy to the character's personality will add depth. 

   Another useful tip from Moore is "make your films personal". It's hard to write stories about things you might not understand. Writing things you can relate to will typically show better results. Just as in his documentaries he wouldn't film something supporting an opinion he's against, you shouldn't write about something you dislike. Of course not all characters in a story should share the same opinions, and your characters shouldn't be exactly like you. But with the right touch you can use your past experiences to create a world in which the audience can relate to as well. 

Keeping 2D Movies Alive With Hullabaloo

   3D animation seems to be dominating the world's media today. Causing 2D to die with it's success. Or at least that's what James Lopez, a veteran Disney animator, believes. James Lopez has worked on many classic 2D Disney animated films such as, Lion King, Pocahontas, and Paperman. But he has never done anything that was his own. And with 2D becoming less popular in cinema he thinks it's the best time to let his world blossom and bring back the classic hand drawn animation. 

   Hulaballoo is a story with steampunk and female protagonists. The main character spends the story searching for her missing father who invents many steam-powered machines that she uses on her adventures to find him. Lopez hopes it could develop into a television show or even a feature length movie. Him and a few other veteran animators, like Rick Farmiloe who worked on Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin, plan to get this project going and have raised the money to support it and then some. 

   To me, this story idea is very exciting and I hope I get to see the end result as either an animated short, t.v. show, or a movie. Though I don't fully believe that 2D animation is a dying art. It's not seen often in movies anymore, but is still a preference for cartoons. But hopefully Hullabaloo can bring back the 2D animation that is fading fast in theaters. Because there really is something in 2D films that 3D just can't capture. 

Weekly Comments

   It's only been three weeks now and I've already learned more than I could have hoped for in my high school year. It's been so exciting to learn more about animation and it just makes me hope to get into the field even more. This week we mainly covered color harmonies, the importance color gives to the mood of every scene, and principles of animation. I've known that color can give moods, but I never realized how often it's used in animation. After this I'll never look at movies the same. It's opened up my eyes to see the many different harmonies in every scene. The twelve basic principles of animation that we've learned really helped me understand animation broken down and I will always keep it in mind when I animate in the near future. 

   As for what I'd like to learn, I just hope I can learn how to use color harmonies to my advantage. It's easier to learn them on paper than it is to actually achieve a propper combination that sets the correct mood for the viewer. 

   What frustrated me this week has been blog posts for sure. I've gotten used to Animate Pro for the most part and ultimately the way the class is orginized, but I'm still not the best at blogging. It's a little difficult writing your own opinion when you've been writing about other's all of high school. But I definitely understand that this will prepare me and hopefully I'll get the hang of it. 

  I've found a video demonstrating the twelve basic principles in a series of short animations. It's basically what we've learned already but provides different and simplistic demonstrations. 

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=2&ved=0CBMQtwIwAQ&url=http%3A%2F%2Fm.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DbHfDEsNLg34%26autoplay%3D1&ei=PJwcVKDIHIadugSryoGABw&usg=AFQjCNH8etWkUNRwgbFJdcCd6xNZSpVGmg&sig2=X7s5Rgt6w0jzr1glUcZw-A

  

   

Weekly Comments

This week I've already learned a lot about animation. Learning about the history and modern animation have been very interesting and I'm looking forward to learning even more; especially how to animate. I'm having a little trouble reverting from my paint software to Animate Pro. Drawing on it is difficult to get used to, but it's worth the time and frustration.  

6 Tips From Recruiters

  This article provides first hand tips from animation recruiters. It gives you six to do and not to dos of demo reels. Such as, what to provide in your reel, how long it should take, how to be unique, knowing your audience, confirming everything works, and to be aware of trends. The article also gives many examples of quality demo reels from several animators. 

   I found this article to be very insightful and altogether useful for my future. This article could provide knowledge and help for many animators starting in the field. The use of examples and direct advice from recruiters makes the article very informative. 

Games Embracing Film Imperfections

   A new video game, The Order, may just be revolutionary for how we view video games today. Video games are becoming more like films along the years, making them more realistic and natural. This new game takes a much larger step in gaming experience.

   The game was designed to feel as it were being filmed with cameras. Games leave out the seemingly minimal imperfections of film, but now it could be embraced. Lens curvature, vignette, chronic curvature, lens dirt, etc... are all flaws that make films that much more real. This movie-like technique will also help bring moods to the gamers by using camera angles, mood related lighting, and various other methods often used in movies. "We wanted to show gamers what the next generation of gaming would be like", said the CEO and creative director at Ready at Dawn, hoping this will start a new way of viewing video games.

   I find that the use of filming styles in video games could be a large improvement for the industry. I've learned that different media fields can use similar techniques to advance. And that certain minor flaws can make things seem more realistic to the viewers. 

\m/