Animation

The main bit of this lecture was about freedom in animation with the example of "Duck Amuck" showing how the animator and character interact without constraints. An animated film I really like is Peter and the Wolf (2006) directed by Suzie Templeton.

  

  It is a modernised version of the classic tale set in Russia with the music Sergei Prokofiev wrote for the story in 1936 made in stop motion. The sets in this film are amazing, they built a 70 ft forest with 1700 trees in it so the scale of the forest seems real.

Building the set

The finished forest

       In the seminar we talked about the Fleischer Brothers film "Snow White" and the singer Cab Calloway's part in it. The animators used rotoscoping to translate his movements while singing and dancing into a an animated character. Translating the movements this way mean that the cartoon, although different in image to the real Cab Calloway, is still easily recognisable as him. 

Above:In the cartoon

Below:The real Calloway

A great skill in character creation comes in being able to transfer something real being demonstrated e.g emotion, expression, movement, into whatever you are creating e.g. mask, model, sketch. If you can convey this then the audience will really believe and connect with the character.