Animation Appreciation
I remember one summer day, my family asked me to show them my school projects I’ve done for my 3D animation program. I’ve shown my mom my projects before, but my sister has never seen any or almost none of my works. The project I showed them was a ballet scene I made at the end of my third semester. It turned out very nicely, it was a total of around four to five seconds. When it ended, my sister asked: “Is that it?”. She’s not a person who watches animated movies or plays video games. So I understand that she doesn’t get the amount of work put into a short animation like that. It really opened my eyes to how some people don’t really comprehend or value this subject for what it is. However, after explaining it to her, I’m happy I could make her see that even the shortest projects can take lots of time and effort to complete.
Whenever you do anything at all, using reference is always a good idea. Whether you’re doing art, sport or math, using something that already exists can help you understand the subject. Same thing goes for animators, most of the time they don’t animate from the top of their head. They use reference, or they get up and act it out, or even film themselves. Similarly to a painter who does a sketch of the person he’s drawing before painting it, to comprehend the shapes. As a boxer who watches footage of his opponent to understand his movements, to get the timing of his hits right. The boxer would know when to use jabs against his opponent, since he has studied him, he would know what feels right or wrong in the fight. Same for animation, reference is important to get your timing right to make a nice natural art piece, because nobody wants to see a bad fight, a bad painting, or a bad animation. Not using reference can result in an unnatural scene, like a ballerina who decided to do a robot dance. A difficult part of animation is to actually comprehend what you’re doing. If you’re animating a ballet dancer, you need to learn how ballet dancer moves. A good animation is a researched one. You won’t get as good of a ballet shot from someone who’s animated clowns before, than from someone who has researched and learned about ballet. Detailed knowledge on a subject leads to a smooth emulation of movements that fits the attitude of the character. That’s why when you watch a well animated movie, it seems natural and flows nicely. Animation isn’t something concrete you learn, like maths or science, it’s an art. You can never know how to do something perfectly. Since human behaviour is so complicated, there is always a different way to animate a same scene. Take a walking scene for example. Every animator learns in school how to make a 3D walk. What they need to learn with experience is in what manner are they walking. Is the person walking angry? Is he excited? If so, what are the small details you need to add to demonstrate that emotion. That is what makes the subject so complex.
Even the best animators struggle sometimes. According to this source, Mike Hollingsworth, supervisor director for BoJack Horseman, said that his most difficult moment was when he needed to recreate a speedboat race. It was a very specific thing to animate, not something you learn in school. Naturally, he had to look for reference and apparently had to redo the same scene twelve times over. This happens to every single person in the industry, amateur or professional.
For example, according to this source, Lino DiSalvo, the head of animation for Frozen and supervisor for on tangled, and Bolt. He himself said that there was a very challenging scene in Tangled where Flynn is dying in Rapunzel’s arms. He said that he thought he was good at recreating subtle emotion, but that was on another level. Another example, David Stoddolny, animated a 3 second shot that took a month. It was an elaborate fighting shot with Po and the wolves from Kung Fu Panda.
All these examples really demonstrate how much work is put into some animations for even very short scenes. Some scenes that last a few seconds can take weeks or months to make. When even some of the most respected and talented animators like Lino DiSalvo find animation complicated, you know that it’s a skill that takes a lifetime to perfect and should be appreciated a little more.
Some people think animated movies are too childish, and don’t belong alongside live action movies, and not beautiful enough to be considered fine art. Its stuck in between, appreciated by few. It has started to change in recent years and get more noticed, but most people don’t see animation as something groundbreaking or true art. They are only able to appreciate the aesthetics of the film. People think that a movie for children is just that, but it has deeper meanings. Like the Iron Giant which contains emotional depth, or any other movie usually has some deeper meaning to it. Animation needs to not only be more appreciated, but not seen as only for children. Hundred of artists that work years on a feature length film go unrecognized. This is a good source to understanding an animators point of view, and how animation can be undermined.
Animated movies are for both kids and adults. Many of them win Oscars, for being brilliant movies. Almost every Pixar film has won Animated Feature Film. Many 3D animation movies have underlying messages to them. Zootopia is a message about two natural enemies teaming up to defeat the bigger evil. Another movie, like Wall-E can have a message about pollution. Shrek covers the journey of someone being able to accept himself. Inside out tackles how emotions affect a person psychologically. There are also some adult jokes slipped into kids movies most of the time. Animated movies are always fun to watch as an adult, and shouldn’t be considered as only kids movies. The source is people answering someone’s question about animated movies and if they’re bad, since he thinks they’re for kids.
Cover letter
I think my second draft is pretty well done, if need be I can still add some more information from the research I have done, but I don’t think its completely necessary. I’m happy with all the analogies I did, I think they worked well in comparing animation to something people may be more accustomed to. I like this paragraph:
Whenever you do anything at all, using reference is always a good idea. Whether you’re doing art, sport or math, using something that already exists can help you understand the subject. Same thing goes for animators, most of the time they don’t animate from the top of their head. They use reference, or they get up and act it out, or even film themselves. Similarly to a painter who does a sketch of the person he’s drawing before painting it, to comprehend the shapes. As a boxer who watches footage of his opponent to understand his movements, to get the timing of his hits right. The boxer would know when to use jabs against his opponent, since he has studied him, he would know what feels right or wrong in the fight. Same for animation, reference is important to get your timing right to make a nice natural art piece, because nobody wants to see a bad fight, a bad painting, or a bad animation. Not using reference can result in an unnatural scene, like a ballerina who decided to do a robot dance. A difficult part of animation is to actually comprehend what you’re doing. If you’re animating a ballet dancer, you need to learn how ballet dancer moves. A good animation is a researched one. You won’t get as good of a ballet shot from someone who’s animated clowns before, than from someone who has researched and learned about ballet. Detailed knowledge on a subject leads to a smooth emulation of movements that fits the attitude of the character.
I like all the comparisons I made, I think it paints a nice picture of what I’m trying to explain. I like how I used several different analogies, like the boxer and the painter, and the ballerina. I just think the wording and the description in this paragraph is well done. I didn’t find anything I wrote particularly hard or easy. It was more me trying to find the right words to describe what I was talking about, The hardest part was probably trying to find imagery or analogies to compare animation to something else. I think using examples was also very helpful to show the reader many in real life scenarios that have happened. I use examples all the time to make my points clearer. For my final draft, I might go through my essay again and add some more research that I did. I might add some more imagery in some paragraphs, or some more examples. I will also add a conclusion paragraph to tie everything together in the end. I might add some images or videos as well to make the final draft more interactive with the viewer, I think it would make sense since I’m talking about animation. The process of writing the second draft wasn’t that hard for me, since I’ve used everything I’ve already done before and compile it together. I edited some of the text to make it better and less repetitive, but it wasn’t anything too time consuming. In my current situation, it is the end of the semester and I have many projects due in the next weeks, so I had to bring my focus on my main classes, and that is why I’m submitting this a few days later. I still think even though it’s late, my overall text makes it’s points nicely. As for my final draft, I might submit that one later too, because I will probably have several other projects to submit during that time. However, I’ll see what the teachers comments on my second draft are. If there isn’t much to add, I could be able to do it in time. If there is a lot to add, then I will take my time to try to deliver a good final draft.
Sources:
Alan Beesley, “Animation – A Study and Comparison of Concepts and Software Issues” Digital Commons, 2004, https://commons.emich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://scholar.google.ca/&httpsredir=1&article=1002&context=honors.
Alex Dudok De Wit, “Animators Share Their Thoughts On The Hardest Shots They’ve Ever Done”, Cartoon Brew, 2020, https://www.cartoonbrew.com/educational/animators-share-their-thoughts-on-the-hardest-shots-theyve-ever-done-186107.html.
Iphigenia, “Appreciation For Animation”, Odyssey, 2017, https://www.theodysseyonline.com/appreciation-for-animation.
Nathan Gilbert, “Are 3-D animation movies garbage because they are only aimed at children and are not for adults?”, Quora, 2017, https://www.quora.com/Are-3-D-animation-movies-garbage-because-they-are-only-aimed-at-children-and-are-not-for-adults.
Rebecca Alter, Brian Moylan, “The Hardest Thing I Ever Animated”, Vulture, 2019, https://www.vulture.com/2019/11/the-hardest-thing-i-ever-animated.html.
Sílvio César LizanaTerra, Ronald Anthony Metoyer, “A performance-based technique for timing keyframe animations” Science Direct, 2007, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1524070306000646?via%3Dihub.
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