Topic: Animation Question For Teague

So through both a combination of both re-listening to the Up commentary and re-watching Emperors New Groove today, I noticed something off that I want to ask you about.

In Up you guys mentioned camera movement in animation specifically the shot in Madagascar where the camera does the extreme dolly into the characters on the beach. And how it pulls you out of the movie watching experience as it's something that couldn't possibly be done in real life.

And then watching New Groove I notice ALOT, and I do mean ALOT of actions/movements/stuff that couldn't possibly work in real life (Well duh it's a cartoon). yet you mention it as one of your favorite animated, if not one of your favorite films ever.

So what I'm wondering is, where do you draw the line for what a cartoon can get away with while still keeping you engaged and not pulling you out of the movie?

Because when it comes down to it New Groove and Madagascar are very similar in many respects. Animated, very stylized, semi based in reality. So the only REAL difference I can find is that of Classical Animation vs 3D.

Is there really such a divide between the two mediums, that something defying physics in one is considered normal yet feels awkward and out of place in another?

It's just something I've been thinking alot about lately, this whole concept of keeping a certain element of reality in animation (3D especially) while still having the freedom to go big with things and keep it stylized (cartoony) and ultimately where you can draw the line.

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Animation Question For Teague

This is only me hazarding a guess, but I would speculate that it's because Emperor's New Groove is slapsticky where Up is not. You can get away with a lot more when you go slapstick but you pay for that latitude by lessening the amount of emotional investment you audience will make in your story.

The greater the sense that what they're watching is "real," the greater the emotional investment the audience is willing to make. Slapstick, while potentially entertaining, takes away from that potential.

Re: Animation Question For Teague

Well yes Up I can understand, but Madasgcar (like a lot of dreamworks stuff) has a much more prominent element of slapstick, so I'm wondering why something like the camera move you guys mentioned would be so jarring. (I'm just using these movies as examples cause they're the ones you guys brought up and hey, they're good examples)

I think another part of it is a trend I've sort of noticed, where 3D inherently is treated as something much closer to film than it is to classically done animations. So it seems to me (and I'm just going from what I've witnessed, your mileage may vary) that 3D animations feel restricted and limited by this expectation of realism. I don't know if that's a simple product of the way the 3D pipeline works coupled with a sort of mob consensus of what 3D "should be" or if the slapsticky thing doesn't work the same when done in 3D (I'm just guessing on that one, because I haven't seen enough 3D animations done in that style to make a judgment call.)

As for the emotional investment. I feel the same amount of attachment (If not even more, because I just think it's a better movie) to Kuzco and Pacha as I do to Carl and Russell.

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Animation Question For Teague

"A lot" is two separate words.

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http://trek.fm

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Re: Animation Question For Teague

nvm

Last edited by TrowaGP02a (2010-05-20 06:03:18)

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Re: Animation Question For Teague

Thank you for your ever so thought providing and interesting addition to the conversation at hand there Greg. And I've spelt it both ways since childhood and no one has ever told me either was wrong (Except you) so I'll continue to use both, thank you very much.

And besides, ALOT, looks a whole lot prettier than, A LOT, you've just got an extra space in there gumming up the works and detracting from the full oomf of the all caps style.

Last edited by BigDamnArtist (2010-05-20 06:12:06)

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Animation Question For Teague

Brian wins.

Also, Madagascar is more an example of the type of camera move rather than a really frustrating use of it. For me, anyway.

Teague Chrystie

I have a tendency to fix your typos.

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Re: Animation Question For Teague

Hmm, alright. I guess it must've been...Trey, maybe? Who said that the Madagascar one took him out of it.

Anyways.

So I take you would pretty much just sum everything I said in the last 6 paragraphs of text as a an aesthetic choice to be made by the director? (Attempting to read between the lines of a rather short post to, what I thought, was a rather interesting question. But then I am quite often wrong on these types of things.)

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Animation Question For Teague

Like everything else, it's a balance. You can have slapstick moments in an otherwise affecting story. It's just a matter of how much you put on each side of the scale. If it's nothing but slapstick all the time, then you won't genuinely affect your audience. And the more slapstick there is, the more your audience will be subconsciously clued, "This isn't real, it's just a show."

Re: Animation Question For Teague

Brian again speaks for me on this issue.

Also, "a lot."

EDIT: And while we're at it, "never mind." That's just one of virtually hundreds of two-word expressions and terms that people connect with a hyphen or a lack of a space that makes me shift uncomfortably in my chair.

Teague Chrystie

I have a tendency to fix your typos.

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Re: Animation Question For Teague

maul2 wrote:

And I've spelt it both ways since childhood and no one has ever told me either was wrong (Except you) so I'll continue to use both, thank you very much.

Really?

I mean, I was mostly kidding, but, really?

That's kinda gotta be the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

I mean no offense dude but.

Wow.

Posted from my iPad
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Re: Animation Question For Teague

BrianFinifter wrote:

And the more slapstick there is, the more your audience will be subconsciously clued, "This isn't real, it's just a show."

This is the part I don't quite fully buy into. I think that we as a culture of movie goers have become familiar enough with the concept of 3D movies (meaning any sixth grader could tell 5 different programs to make a 3D movie of his own, and has probably tried). So I think that we automatically "know" going into a 3D movie that what are are going to see will not real. This is of course assuming we're talking about Pixar/Dreamworks type stuff, not Avatar or stuff trying to be "Photoreal".

So we as an audience will always have that voice at the back of our mind (Even if it's not completely conscious) that is telling us that what we are seeing is fake.

So why are we constantly trying to make 3D movies more "real" when the audience already knows that it isn't and they aren't expecting it to be. And as I've already stated the "slapstickiness" has never really impeded my ability to connect with the characters in any good 2D film I've seen. So why would it impede in a 3D film?

Obviously I'm exaggerating my views for the purpose of this discussion (I have alot of respect for Pixars restraint), but I've just always been confused by this mentality of a lot of 3D films I've seen to keep it realistic and bound by "physics".

Basically I'm wondering, why isn't there a New Groove in 3D? (...you get what I mean.) Or at least, why isn't there more of it?

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Animation Question For Teague

Well, one speculative answer might be because you don't engage on a physics level with a cartoon and you do with most 3D animated movies.

Teague Chrystie

I have a tendency to fix your typos.

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Re: Animation Question For Teague

Gregory Harbin wrote:
maul2 wrote:

And I've spelt it both ways since childhood and no one has ever told me either was wrong (Except you) so I'll continue to use both, thank you very much.

Really?

I mean, I was mostly kidding, but, really?

That's kinda gotta be the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

I mean no offense dude but.

Wow.


I gotta say, this whole sarcasm thing really doesn't work on the internet.*

*Refer to the Alien 3 thread for further proof

Last edited by BigDamnArtist (2010-05-20 06:51:33)

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Animation Question For Teague

downinfront wrote:

Well, one speculative answer might be because you don't engage on a physics level with a cartoon and you do with most 3D animated movies.

I don't really understand what you mean.

Well I do, in so much as a 3D movie is built in "physical" space as it were and the images are rendered in a much closer to "realistic" way than most 2D films. But a 3D film is no more restricted by the laws of realism than a 2D film is (Unless you want to start talking about simulations and whatnot, but even those can be manipulated).

Last edited by BigDamnArtist (2010-05-20 06:57:17)

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Animation Question For Teague

Right, but a zoom in a 3D movie - in terms of rendering or presentation - feels like your perspective moving. In a cartoon, it seems like a transition.

Teague Chrystie

I have a tendency to fix your typos.

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Re: Animation Question For Teague

When I was referring to "real" earlier, I was speaking in the suspension of disbelief sense, not the visual sense, that you believe these are real people going through a real emotional experience. As opposed to funny characters standing on a stage to make you laugh. The more they act like funny characters on a stage, the less you will believe they could be real people going through a real experience and thus, the less you'll empathize with what they're going through.

Re: Animation Question For Teague

I don't really understand the difference even in a classically done film there will still be a certain amount parralax when a dolly forward is done (ala the very first shot in New Groove in fact), if it's done correctly at least.

The only difference I can see between the dolly in in New Groove and the one in Madagascar (other than distance traveled) is that the 3D one will have more "realistic" (I hesitate to use that word, but it's the best one I can come with right now) interaction with the environment and characters?

So by that concept, it is the very nature of 3D films that prohibits them from this kind of a style.

Well this is the part where I admit I have no issue with the type of camera move used in Madagascar or any film like that (As long as it fits with the style of the rest of the movie as Brian has pointed out multiple times.) I think that it is a style that can work equally effectively in a 3D environment as it has in 2D for decades. But everything I've gotten from you guys so far has been trying to tell me that it can't, and I still don't get why.*

*of course this could very easily be due to the overwhelming ability to miss the obvious that seems to be a particular specialty of mine

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Animation Question For Teague

Again, don't recall the conversation, but I've used the Madagascar zoom as an example of a type of camera movement that can be used inappropriately, not as an inappropriate use.

Teague Chrystie

I have a tendency to fix your typos.

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Re: Animation Question For Teague

BrianFinifter wrote:

When I was referring to "real" earlier, I was speaking in the suspension of disbelief sense, not the visual sense, that you believe these are real people going through a real emotional experience. As opposed to funny characters standing on a stage to make you laugh. The more they act like funny characters on a stage, the less you will believe they could be real people going through a real experience and thus, the less you'll empathize with what they're going through.

This kinda goes back to what i was saying before, but if we were talking about live action, I would be completely on board with you 100 percent, but we aren't, we are talking about obviously not real, highly stylized cartoon characters. So automatically the audience is clued into the fact that what they are about to see is not real. I can understand trying to limit the "slapstickiness" in an attempt to create a style (ala Pixar), but I don't but it as a legitimate excuse to not do the more slapsticky "2D" style in a 3D medium.

But I do understand what you mean about trying to limit the slapstick, to try and heighten the emotional connection. But I don't buy that it needs to be like that in order for 3D to make an impact emotionally.

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Animation Question For Teague

Are we still talking about crash zooms and impossible camera moves? My problem is with something that is trying to seem physically plausible and realistic going in for one of those gimmicks, not cartoons.

Teague Chrystie

I have a tendency to fix your typos.

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Re: Animation Question For Teague

downinfront wrote:

Again, don't recall the conversation, but I've used the Madagascar zoom as an example of a type of camera movement that can be used inappropriately, not as an inappropriate use.

Well I guess I have lisented to the conversation more recently than you have, but I believe what you said was basically "It's starts a million miles out and zooms into thier feet. There is no way a shot like that could exsist in real life, it draws attention to itself as a fake thing, so it draws you out of the movie." That was the basic idea of what you were saying at least.

But anyways, I'm just sort of using the camera movement as a proxy for that style of film making I guess and the 2 camera movements were an easy comparison.

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Animation Question For Teague

Yeah, I'm not completely onboard with myself as paraphrased there. In cartoons it doesn't bug me so much.

Teague Chrystie

I have a tendency to fix your typos.

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Re: Animation Question For Teague

downinfront wrote:

Yeah, I'm not completely onboard with myself as paraphrased there. In cartoons it doesn't bug me so much.


Well I guess thats where this whole thing started, is where does it cross the line from becoming a "gimmick" to being part of the style of the movie/ using your medium to create unique/cool shots that help tell the story

Last edited by BigDamnArtist (2010-05-20 07:36:55)

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Animation Question For Teague

I think cartoons are safe, and conservatively directed movies are not. I guess the line is somewhere in computer animated movies, with a little bleed into very stylized photographed movies and classically directed cartoons.

Teague Chrystie

I have a tendency to fix your typos.

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