There are some basic things you need to know about animation and storytelling if you want to make a successful animation, so here are some obvious questions that need to be answered before you go any further with your creative aspirations.
1. What is animation?
Animation is the illusion of creating moving 2-D and 3-D artwork. This is done through playing a sequence of frames at a rapid rate (25fps etc.).
2. How has animation practice changed with the increase and improvement of technology available?
Whilst the principals of animation remain the same the practice and tools have dramatically changed resulting in a higher quality and more versatile animation. Ever since art was created, the desire for creating symbols representing movement was there; the early cave drawings depicted animals with multiple legs, over 5,000 year old pot had the frames of a goat walking. The common flip book was an early popular animation device invented during the 19th century which really effectively used the illusion of movement.
Whilst these tools were state of the art in their day, these were merely toys compared to the advent of cinematography.
Georges Méliès discovered a technique accidently in which he was able to stop the camera rolling, change something in the scene, and then continue rolling the film. This idea was later known as stop-motion animation.
During the 1910’s cell animation became an industry of its own, with “cartoon” shorts being produced to be shown in movie theatres. John Randolph Bray, who, along with animator Earl Hurd, patented the cell animation process which dominated the animation industry for the rest of the decade.
By the end of 20th century (1990’s) the traditional Cel animation process was becoming obsolete.
“Today, animators’ drawings and the backgrounds are either scanned into or drawn directly into a computer system. Various software programs are used to color the drawings and simulate camera movement and effects. The final animated piece is output to one of several delivery media, including traditional 35 mm film and newer media such as digital video. The “look” of traditional cel animation is still preserved, and the character animators‘ work has remained essentially the same over the past 70 years. Some animation producers have used the term “tradigital” to describe cel animation which makes extensive use of computer technology.”
Wikipedia (2011)
3. What elements of animation products and processes have not changed over time?
The process of using individual frames to produce the illusion of movement over time has been made easier with computer aided technology, although a lot has changed with the tools used to create animation the basic principles and storytelling is still very much the same.
4. Why is “story telling” so important to successful animation?
This site explains it magically =)
“The appeal of storytelling as a form of communication and entertainment comes precisely from this ability to excite then resolve tension and restore equilibrium in a neat and satisfying way. Stories are all pervasive in our culture: news stories, soaps, tabloid scandals, medical histories, workplace gossip and the endless stream of movies, videos, and dvd’s that frame our dreams of memory, adventure, and escape. We are storytelling creatures who seek to report experience, clarify tangled emotion, define and amuse ourselves through narrative: jokes, anecdotes, myth, romance, parable, folktale, history, fiction. Stories, it is argued, [1] inspire, heal, inform, and empower: forms of consciousness, ways of thinking that help us to deal with the unexpected, to imagine other possibilities. We identify with the protagonist, the one who struggles at the heart of the narrative to connect past, present and future in a coherent, causal way that bridges the empty spaces[2]: her struggle is our struggle to make our lives meaningful and different. We can change by rewriting our stories, and make our lives more interesting, interpersonal, and hopeful.[3]”
(P.O.V. 2011)
5. What are five things that make a story successful?
To make any story somewhat successful….You will need these 5 things
- · Plot: Also called a storyline. A plot is a plan, scheme, or main story of a literary or dramatic work, as a play, novel, or short story.
- · Characters: Are people/animals/things that have ethical qualities and have one/or a multiple personality. Without characters in an animation, the film would just be scenic drawing with sound.
- · Conflict: is needed for the story to have a successful plot. A conflict in a story is anything that needs to be resolved or a motive e.g. In Pixar’s Toy story 3 there are many conflicts: They believe Andy is throwing them away, they are unfairly treated at the child care centre, Woody needs to convince them that Andy wasn’t throwing them out….. and on and on.
- · Theme: is the subject that the plot follows. The need for awareness of climate change and its effects was the theme for the film ‘The Day After Tomorrow’.
- · Setting: Is the environment/ place/ time that the story is set in.
6. Why is research so important to successful animation?
Why is research so important… well let’s put it this way. Why do you research for an assignment or learn about the topic for an up and coming exam; well it’s because you want to get your facts right and you want to make sure your formatting is correct so everything is the highest of quality. It’s the same with animation; the team creating the story want to make sure that every bit of information is presented believably, that way the flow of the animation isn’t interrupted by false evidence.
When creating music or any other art form (like animation), the artist have received influence from other artists through their time studying the subject (whether they wanted it or not), this too is a form or research. Without this influence the Animators may be creating pieces that have been done before, or producing an animation to the quality of a 6th grader stop animation.
7. Name 3 successful animations from after 2000 and list three reasons why each of these has been so appealing.
Rather than excluding some breathtaking animations from the three ‘successful animations’, I’ve taken the top three animation companies
Pixar: One of the reasons Pixar has been so successful over the past decade or so, is to do with their captivating plots, breathtaking animated graphics, perfect soundtracks and their Disney genius that immerses the viewer’s completely in the animation. Some of Pixars animations include Wall-e, Toy Story and Nemo.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBYtgfrT85g
DreamWorks: this animation studio won over the minds of the audience with their humorous characters and comical plot spoofing and twisting. Although the animation has never been to the same graphical quality as Pixar, the laughs win over their animations. DreamWorks have created light hearted animations such as Shrek, Eldorado and Space Chimps.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9PtpALF_3w
Aardman: is a British animation studio based in Bristol, United Kingdom. The studio is known for films made using clay stop-motion animation, particularly those featuring Plasticine characters Wallace and Gromit. However, it successfully entered the computer animation market with Flushed Away.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvetXvMwXjs
8. Research the animation practice of the first Disney classics such as Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck and explain the technological process involved in these pioneering animations?
One of Walt Disney’s most recognised early Animations was un-doubtedly Steamboat Willie. This iconic animation was produced in black and white in the 1930’s and was the first Micky mouse movie to be released theatrically and to include synchronised sound.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBgghnQF6E4 ( Steamboat Willie 
)
The first step in in animating Disney’s early animations was to write a storyline and then to story board it out. After the script and storyboards were created the dialogue was then recorded, this was done before the sketches so that the animators could use the dialogue to model there characters; no background is drawn at this stage.
Once the film is drawn out on paper (without colour) it is sent to the inking department where they copy the drawings on to a Cel (clear celluloid acetate, this is a clear material), then these Cel’s get sent to the painting department so colour can be added to the characters; the colour is done on the back of the Cel so the character has a crisp outline.
The background is then created on separate Cel’s/glass/paper usually with water colours or Tempera. The drawings are then filmed by photographing each frame, after this the dialogue and music is added.
Before they went to the effort of adding sound into Steamboat Willie (which is a long process), Walt Disney played the half-finished animation through a glass panel and had a live ‘band’ playing the music: ‘Wilfred Jackson played the music on a mouth organ, Ub Iwerks banged on pots and pans for the percussion segment, Johnny Cannon provided sound effects with various devices including slide whistles and spittoons for bells. Walt himself provided what little dialogue there was to the film, mostly grunts, laughs, and squawks.’ (Wikipedia 2011) The reason they did this was to test whether or not sound added emphasis to their animation; other early Micky films didn’t get released to the public, this was because it didn’t appeal to a wider audience due to the lack of sound.
Steamboat Willie really lead the way for animators in the years to come and was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry for being considered culturally and historically significant.
References:
P.O.V. 2011, Storytelling and Film
Fairy Tales, Myth and Happy Endings, Brian Dunnigan, viewed 12/08/2011
http://pov.imv.au.dk/Issue_18/section_1/artc1A.html
Just Disney, Walt Disney Studio animation, viewed on 11/08/2011
http://www.justdisney.com/animation/animation.html
Wikipedia 2011, Steamboat Willie, viewed 12/08/11
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steamboat_Willie
